Early Tamil Epigraphy: From the Earliest Times to the Sixth Century A.D. c22.s1.t4.1

c22.s1.t4.1

Recent advances in our knowledge of the language of the cave inscriptions summarised in Chapter 2 have rendered the earlier views based on unsatisfactory readings obsolete. The argument of the present study is that starting from accurately copied texts,⁴ and applying the orthographic rules which can be empirically formulated for reading the texts,⁵ it can be demonstrated that the language of the cave inscriptions, despite the presence of Prakrit loanwords, is Old Tamil, not materially different from the language of later Tamil inscriptions or even literary texts, in its basic phonological, morphological and syntactical features.⁶