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Indian Palaeography from about B.C. 350 to about A.D. 1300 c8.s1: § 27. — Definition and varieties

Indian Palaeography from about B.C. 350 to about A.D. 1300 c8.s1

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§ 27. — Definition and varieties

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[60] With BURNELL and FLEET, I understand by the term "southern alphabets" the scripts of plates VII. and VIII,¹ which, developed out of the characters of the Andhra period, have been generally used since about A. D. 350 in the territories south of the Vindhya, and most of which still survive in the modern alphabets of the Dravidian districts.

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¹ Preparation of Plates VII. and VIII: —

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Their most important common characteristics are: —

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(1) The retention of the ancient forms, open at the top, of *gha*, *pa*, *pha*, *ṣa* and *sa*, of the old *ma*, and of the tripartite *ya* which is looped only occasionally, especially in the Grantha.

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(2) The retention of the long stroke on the right of *la*, which however is mostly bent towards the left.

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(3) The *ḍa* with the round back.

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(4) The curves, originally open at the top, at the ends of the long verticals of *A*, *Ā*, *ka*, *ña* and *ra*, as well as of the subscript *ra* and of medial *u* and *ū*.

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(5) The medial *ṛ* with a curled curve on the left, with occasional exceptions occurring in *kṛ*.

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PLATE VII.

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Cuttings from facsimiles.

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Col. I; from FLEET, Gupta Inscriptions (CII. 3), No. 5, pl. 3 B; with *E* from No. 62, pl. 38, B. Cols. II, III; from F.GI (CII. 3), No. 18, pl. 11. Col. IV; from plate at IA. 7, 66. Col. V; from plate at IA. 5, 205; with *A*, *Ā*, *U*, *ghā*, *dhau*, *hā*, *kṣa*, *ttā*, from plate at IA. 6, 9, and *nta* from plate at IA. 7, 68. Col. VI; from F.GI (CII. 3), No. 38, pl. 24. Col. VII; from F.GI (CII. 3), No. 39, pl. 25. Col. VIII; from plate at EI. 2, 20, No. 1; with *I*, *ña*, *ba*, *ñca*, *brā*, *lya*, from No. 3, at p. 22. Col. IX; from plate at IA. 13, 78. Col. X; from F.GI (CII. 3), No. 55, pl. 34; with *U* and *AU* from No. 41, pl. 27, and *Ū* from Ajaṇṭā No. 3, B.ASRWI. 4, pl. 57. Col. XI; from F.GI (CII. 3), No. 56, pl. 35. Col. XII; from plate at IA. 7, 35. Col. XIII; from plate at IA. 7, 37; with *I*, *ṅśa*, *jye*, *ṇām*, *tsā*, from plate at IA. 6, 24. Col. XIV; from plate at IA. 10, 58; with *Ā*, *U*, and *ccha* from plates at IA. 7, 161, and *kḷ* from plate at IA. 6, 72, and *ḷa* from plate at IA. 8, 44. Col. XV; from plate at IA. 10, 104, FLEET's No. 94; with *Ī* (3, XV, *b*), *ṅge*, *śi*, and *ḷi* from FLEET's Nos. 99, 100, plate at IA. 10, 164, and *ḻa* from FLEET's No. 95, plate at IA. 10, 104. Col. XVI; from plates at IA. 8, 24 ff. Col. XVII; from plate at IA. 13, 137. Col. XVIII; from plates at IA. 8, 320. Col. XIX; from plate at IA. 13, 123. Col. XX; from plates at IA. 5, 50 ff. Col. XXI; from plates at IA. 5, 154 ff. Col. XXII; from HULTZSCH'S SII. 2, pl. 10. Col. XXIII; from HULTZSCH'S SII. 2, pl. 9. Col. XXIV; from HULTZSCH'S SII. 2, pl. 11.

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PLATE VIII.

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Cuttings from facsimiles.

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Col. I; from plates at IA. 12, 158 ff. Col. II; from plate at IA. 11, 126, FLEET's No. 123. Col. III; from plates at IA. 12, 11. Col. IV; from plates at IA. 13, 186 ff. Col. V; from plates at IA. 7, 16. Col. VI; from plates at IA. 14, 50 ff. Col. VII; from plate at IA. 6, 138; with *A*, *U*, *cā*, and *ṭṭa* from plate at IA. 9, 75. Col. VIII; from plates at IA. 11, 12 ff. Col. IX; from plate at EI. 3, 62. Col. X; from plate at IA. 13, 275. Col. XI; from plate at IA. 18, 144. Col. XII; from plate at EI. 3, 18. Col. XIII; from HULTZSCH'S SII. 2, pl. 13. Col. XIV; from plate at EI. 3, 76. Col. XV; from plate at EI. 3, 14. Col. XVI; from HULTZSCH'S SII. 2, pl. 12. Cols. XVII, XVIII; from HULTZSCH'S SII. 2,. pl. 4. Cols. XIX, XX; from plate at EI. 3, 72, the lower part. Cols. XXI, XXII; from plate at EI. 3, 72, the upper part.

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According to other peculiarities, the southern alphabets may be divided into the following varieties:¹—

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¹ Compare B, ESIP. 14.

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(1) The western variety, which, being strongly influenced by the northern alphabets, is the ruling script between about A. D. 400 and about A. D. 900 in Kāṭhiāvāḍ, Gujarāt, the western portion of the Marāṭhā districts, *i. e.* the Collectorates of Nāsik, Khāndesh and Sātārā, in the part of Haidarābād (Ajaṇṭā) contiguous to Khāndesh, and in the Koṅkaṇ, and which during the 5th century occasionally occurs also in Rājputāna and the Central Indian Agency, but altogether disappears in the 9th century in consequence of the inroads of the Nāgarī alphabet (see above, § 21).

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(2) The Central-Indian script, which in its simplest form closely agrees with the western variety, but in its more developed form, the so-called "box-headed alphabet," shows greater differences, and which from the end of the 4th century is common in northern Haidarābād, the Central Provinces and parts of the Central-Indian Agency (Bundelkhaṇḍ), but appears also occasionally further south in the Bombay Presidency and even in Maisūr.

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(3) The script of the Kanarese and Telugu districts of the Dekhan, — *i. e.* of the southern portion of the Bombay Presidency (the Southern Marāṭhā States, Sholāpur, Bījāpur, Beḷgaum, Dhārwār and Kārwār), of the southern territory of Haidarābād (roughly speaking south of Bīdar), of Maisūr, and of the north-east portion of the Madras Presidency (Vizagapatam, Godāvarī, Kistna, Karnūl, Bellary, Anantpur, Cuddapah, Nellore), — which appears first in the Kadamba inscriptions of the 5th and 6th centuries, and after a long development leads to the very similar and temporarily identical Kanarese and Telugu round-hand.

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(4) The later Kaliṅga alphabet of the north-eastern coast of the Madras Presidency between Cicacole and the frontier of Orissa (Gañjām), which is strongly mixed with northern letters and in later times also with Grantha and Kanarese-Telugu characters, and which occurs in inscriptions of the 7th—12th centuries.

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(5) The Grantha alphabet of the eastern coast of Madras, south of Pulikat (North and South Arcot, Salem, Trichinopoli, Madura and Tinnevelli), which first appears in the ancient Sanskrit inscriptions of the Pallava dynasties, and survives in the modern Grantha and its varieties, the Malayāḷam and the Tuḷu.

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The Tamil alphabet of the same districts and of the western coast of Madras (Malabar) probably is derived from a northern script, imported in the 4th or 5th century, but greatly modified by the influence of the Grantha. A cursive variety of the Tamil alphabet is found in the Vaṭṭeḷuttu (the "round-hand," Burnell) or Cera-Pāṇḍya (Hultzsch),² which is known through inscriptions from the western coast and the extreme south of the -Peninsula, and according to Burnell [**61**] has fallen into disuse only in recent times.³ Though these two alphabets come from a different source, they have been included in this chapter, because they occur in the same districts as the other five.

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² IA. 20, 286.

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³ B, ESIP. 48.

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