Elements of South-Indian Palæography, from the Fourth to the Seventeenth Century A.D. c4.57

c4.57

Paper was probably introduced by the Muhammadans; in all parts of India it appears to be called by some corrupt form of the Arabic name 'kāgat'. Its use in S. India is at all events very recent, and even now scarcely ever occurs except among the Mahrāṭī colonists. I have seen a Telugu MS. of a Sanskrit work written about the end of the 17th century, and Paulinus à St. Bartholomæo notices MSS. on paper of the Bhāgavata (in Travancore 18th century); but the bigoted Hindus of the South still consider this material to be unclean and therefore unfit for writing any book with the least pretence to a sacred character¹).