Early Tamil Epigraphy: From the Earliest Times to the Sixth Century A.D. c20.s6.t2: 1.6.2 Mannarkoil: the earliest reference to a kaṭikai (ghaṭikā)
Early Tamil Epigraphy: From the Earliest Times to the Sixth Century A.D. c20.s6.t2
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1.6.2 Mannarkoil: the earliest reference to a kaṭikai (ghaṭikā)
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This account of the discovery of the Tamil-Brāhmī cave inscriptions concludes with a brief note on the most recent and southernmost of these records discovered in the closing days of the 20th century at Mannarkoil, a village near Ambasamudram in Tirunelveli District. A pair of Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions,³ one on the ceiling inside a cave and the other on a stone bed at the summit of a bare rock outside, are located near the foothills of the famed Potikai mountain, the legendary abode of Akattiyar (Agastya), the Tamil sage. The inscriptions are dated to ca. 2nd century A.D. on palaeographic grounds. One of them⁴ contains the earliest epigraphic reference to a *kaṭikai* (*ghaṭikā*) 'assembly of learned persons, institution of higher learning or place of the assembly'. The place may plausibly be identified with the modern village of Kadayam near the site.
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³ Nos. *88* & *89*. See also Figs. 8.42 & 8.43 (tracings) and Pl. 42 (estampages). As the inscriptions were discovered after the manuscript of the present volume was got ready for the press, they had to be placed at the end of the section on Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions in the present Corpus, and not in the proper chronological order after Anaimalai (No. *60*) and before Pugalur (Nos. *61*-*72*).
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⁴ No. *88*.
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It is a measure of the progress made in understanding Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions that while the earliest discoveries made around the beginning of the century baffled the most experienced epigraphists of the day, the Mannarkoil inscriptions discovered at the end of the century were immediately deciphered by the TNSA, and the estampages were published with full and accurate translation of the texts in the local newspapers within days of the discovery.⁵ My personal voyage of discovery of the Tamil-Brāhmī cave inscriptions which began on 11th February 1962 at Marukaltalai ended 38 years later on 30th December 2000 at Mannarkoil, the two southernmost sites both in Tirunelveli District.⁶
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⁵ The inscriptions have been read by M. Senthil Selvakumaran and C. Chandravanan of the TNSA.
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⁶ I spent the next two days at Kanyakumari to watch the last sunset of the old millennium and the first sunrise of the new millennium.