Elements of South-Indian Palæography, from the Fourth to the Seventeenth Century A.D. c5.s3.12

c5.s3.12

The ultimate origin of the Vaṭṭeḷuttu is again a difficult problem in Indian Palæography. In the eighth century it existed side by side and together with the Grantha[^2); it is, therefore, impossible to suppose that the Vaṭṭeḷuttu is derived from the S. Açoka character, even if the conclusive argument of the dissimilarity between the phonetic values of many of the corresponding letters be neglected[^3). Again the S. Açoka character would have furnished a more complete representation of the Tamil phonetic system than either the Vaṭṭeḷuttu or the modern (Grantha) Tamil alphabet does[^4); it must, therefore, follow that the alphabet was formed and settled before the Sanskrit grammarians came to Southern India, or we should find as accurate a representation as they effected for Telugu and Canarese. The Tamil grammarians, however, evidently found the language already written when they began their labours, and thus this part of their grammars is comparatively imperfect[^5). Again as the Vaṭṭeḷuttu is an imperfect alphabet, it cannot be the origin of the S. Açoka character; for, if it were, the evidence of the extension and adaptation must be far greater than it is. It is plain that many of the aspirated letters in the S. Açoka character are formed from the corresponding unaspirated letters, but if that alphabet were formed from the Vaṭṭeḷuttu, it would have shown traces of a similar formation in the letters **g**, **j**, **ḍ**, **d** and **h** for which there are no forms in the Vaṭṭeḷuttu. But these letters appear to be primitive in the S. Açoka character. The only possible conclusion, therefore, is that the S. Açoka and Vaṭṭeḷuttu alphabets are independent adaptations of some foreign character, the first to a Sanskritic, the last to a Dravidian language. There are, however, resemblances between the two that point to a common Semitic origin; and these extend perhaps to two-thirds of the