Early Tamil Epigraphy: From the Earliest Times to the Sixth Century A.D. c20.s6.t2.1

c20.s6.t2.1

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.