Indian Palaeography from about B.C. 350 to about A.D. 1300 c8.s6.t2.6

c8.s6.t2.6

From a paleographical point of view, the Vaṭṭeḷuttu may be described as a cursive script, which bears the same relation to the Tamil as the modern northern alphabets of the clerks and merchants to their originals, *e. g.*, the Moḍī of the Marāṭhās to the Bālbodh and the Ṭākarī of the Dogrās to the Śāradā.⁸ With the exception of the *Ī*, probably borrowed from the Grantha, all its letters are made with a single stroke from the left to the right, and are mostly inclined towards the left. Several among them, such as the *ña* (plate VIII, 15, XXI) with the curve and hook on the left, the *va* with the open top and the hook on the left (plate VIII, 38, XXI, XXII; compare cols. XVII—XX) and the round *ra* (plate VIII, 45, 46, XXI, XXII; compare 47, XVII—XX), show the characteristics of the second variety of the Tamil of the 11th and later centuries. And with the usage of the later Tamil inscriptions agrees the constant omission of the Virāma. Some other characters, such as the round *ṭa* (plate VIII, 20—23, XXI, XXII; compare col. XVI), the *ma* with the curve on the right (plate VIII, 34, XXI, XXII; compare col. XVI), and the *ya* with the loop on the left (plate VIII, 35, XXI, XXII; compare col. XVI), seem to go back to the forms of the earlier Tamil. And three, the rounded *U* (plate VIII, 5, XXI), the pointed *E* (plate VIII, 8, XXI) and the *ṇa* with a single notch (plate VIII, 26, XXI, XXII), possibly show characteristics dating from a still earlier period.