Early Tamil Epigraphy: From the Earliest Times to the Sixth Century A.D. c21.s16.1

c21.s16.1

The chronology of Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions has not been free from controversy. The earlier investigators, Venkayya, Krishna Sastri and Subrahmanya Aiyer⁵ assigned the cave inscriptions discovered by them to about the 3rd or 2nd century B.C. on the ground that the characters resembled those of the Asokan edicts. This is a matter of direct and verifiable observation, and the criticism that the dating is based "on grounds which are largely theoretical" is hardly justified.⁶ Comparison with the Brāhmī inscriptions of Sri Lanka and the Bhattiprolu casket inscriptions confirms broadly the dating of the earliest Tamil cave inscriptions in the last centuries B.C. The chronology became controversial only when the earlier date was sought to be applied mechanically to inscriptions with late palaeographic features discovered subsequently as at Pugalur (*ARE* 1927-28) and Mamandur (*ARE* 1939-40).