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Early Tamil Epigraphy: From the Earliest Times to the Sixth Century A.D. c25.s10: 5.10 Vowels

Early Tamil Epigraphy: From the Earliest Times to the Sixth Century A.D. c25.s10

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5.10 Vowels

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**a / ā:** In Early Tamil-Brāhmī, the two arms of the letter are wide apart and often turn away from each other at right angles (Chart 4: *a: 1, 2*). This form is attested in the Asokan Edicts at Erragudi¹ and is also characteristic of the Early Sinhala-Brāhmī script.² The exceptional form (ibid. *63*) looking somewhat like X may be compared with those occurring in the pottery inscriptions at Arikamedu (Chart 7: AKW 6; AKB 7, 20), in which the lower arm of the letter is reversed and placed on the opposite side of the vertical. In Early Vaṭṭeḻuttu, the Late Tamil-Brāhmī forms are still retained at Pulankurichi (Chart 8), but later become cursive (Chart 4: *a: 108, ā: 116*).

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¹ C.S. Upasak 1960: Appendix No. 1 (9).

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² S. Paranavitana 1970: chart facing p. xvi.

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**i / ī:** The letter *i* consists of three dots (Chart 4: *i: 89, 76*) or three short, horizontal dashes (ibid. *17, 60*) both arranged in a triangular pattern. Even though the three-dot form occurs later than the three-dash form in the Corpus, the former is the original form as it is attested in Asokan Brāhmī.³ In Early Vaṭṭeḻuttu, the three dashes join together in the composite form seen at Pulankurichi (Chart 8). At the next stage, this form is simplified as a single, smooth curve (Chart 4: *i: 111*).

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³ C.S. Upasak 1960: Appendix No. 3.

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The letter *ī* does not occur in Asokan Brāhmī. The Northern Brāhmī form of four dots in a rectangular pattern (Chart 1), derived from the three-dot form of *i*, does not occur in Tamil-Brāhmī. In this script, there is a special form for *ī* consisting of a tall vertical line flanked by a pair of dots (Chart 2). The letter occurs from the earliest times in the Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions (Chart 4: *ī: 1*) and its form remains stable. It is possible that Tamil-Brāhmī was formed at a time when Brāhmī still did not have a character for *ī* and one had to be created locally.

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It appears that there was also a practical reason why Tamil-Brāhmī did not adopt the four-dot form of *ī*, and seldom employed even the three- dot form of *i* which is in most cases represented by the symbol for *ī* (to be read as *i* from the context).⁴ The dots would be virtually invisible on the rough, uneven and undressed rock surfaces on which the Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions are engraved.

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⁴ The use of *ī* to denote the sound *i* in the Early Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions is discussed in section 6.14.

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The Early Sinhala-Brāhmī cave inscriptions also adopted the more visible Tamil-Brāhmī letter for *ī* for apparently the same practical reason but to denote the sound *i*.⁵ The change in value caused no confusion in Sinhala-Brāhmī as the Sinhala-Prakrit of the early cave inscriptions had no long vowels.⁶ In Late Sinhala-Brāhmī, the Tamil-Brāhmī form was replaced by the contemporary Southern Brāhmī form for *i*.⁷ There is, however, no doubt that the original value of the letter is *ī* as in the Brāhmī inscriptions of India.⁸ Though there are no examples of *ī* in the Late Tamil-Brāhmī or Early Vaṭṭeḻuttu inscriptions included in the Corpus, the letter must have reverted fully to its original long value sometime after the Early Tamil-Brāhmī Period, as the Vaṭṭeḻuttu and Grantha forms ¹ and even the Sinhalese form² of *ī* are all clearly derived from it.

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⁵ S. Paranavitana 1970: p. xviii.

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⁶ Ibid.

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⁷ S. Karunaratne 1984: p. 16; Fig. 2.

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⁸ C. Sivaramamurti 1952: chart for *ī* (Fig. 23, p. 64).

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¹ C. Sivaramamurti 1952: chart for *ī* (Fig. 23, p. 64).

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² S. Karunaratne 1984: Fig. 2.

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***u* / *ū*:** The letter *ū* does not occur in Asokan Brāhmī presumably on account of its rarity in the language of the edicts. However, the letter is attested in its primitive form in Tamil-Brāhmī ³ from the earliest times (Chart 4: *ū*:*9*). The forms of *u* and *ū* remain stable in Tamil-Brāhmī and Early Vaṭṭeḻuttu. The employment of the letter *ū* for the sound *u* in the Early Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions is an orthographic feature which is discussed in Chapter 6.⁴

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³ The occurrence of *ū* in the Early Tamil cave inscriptions is not noticed in A.H. Dani 1963 (Indian edition 1986): Pl. VIIa or in C. Sivaramamurti 1952: p. 65.

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⁴ See section 6.15.

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***e* / *ē*:** The letter *e* in Tamil-Brāhmī is rather unusual for its multiple geometric forms which defy any chronological arrangement. The variants with oblong, triangular, circular, semicircular and other odd shapes are illustrated in Chart 4: *e* / *ē*. The Early Vaṭṭeḻuttu form is arch-shaped (ibid. ***121*** ), very similar to the later forms.⁵

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⁵ Cf. C. Sivaramamurti 1952: chart for *e* (Fig. 25, p. 68).

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***o* / *ō*:** The letter *o*, formed by the addition of a short horizontal stroke at the top left of the vowel *u* occurs in angular (Chart 4: *o* / *ō*: ***18***) and cursive forms (ibid. ***6***). An exceptional variant (ibid. ***12***) is formed by the addition of the double strokes of the medial vowel *-o* at the top of the vertical of the initial vowel *u*.

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**The short vowels *e* and *o*:** The length of the short vowels *e* and *o* is not indicated in the Early Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions and has to be inferred from the context.⁶ The initial short vowel *e* with the *puḷḷi* placed inside the letter occurs in a Late Tamil-Brāhmī inscription (Chart 4: *e*:***85***) and also in the Early Vaṭṭeḻuttu inscriptions (ibid. ***117*** and Chart 8). It is also attested in a Tamil-Brāhmī coin-legend.⁷ No actual example of the initial short vowel *o* with the *puḷḷi* has been found so far.

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⁶ This is what K.V. Subrahmanya Aiyer (1924: p. 283) meant when he stated that "in the case of combined consonants the occurrence of short *e* and short *o* deserves special attention, the two being the special characteristics of the Dravidian alphabets". He was not referring to the graphic forms as misunderstood by T. N. Subramanian (1938, reprint 1996: p. 22; 1957: p. 1507) and T.V. Mahalingam (1967: p. 134). For discussion on the contrast between *e*/*ē* and *o*/*ō* sounds in the Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions, see section 6.16.

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⁷ See No. 13, Table 1.6.

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The unusual manner in which the letters of the short vowels *e* and *o* are formed from the respective long vowels deserves special attention. In the Brāhmī script, the letters of the long vowels are derived from those of the respective short vowels as in the pairs *a* > *ā*, *i* > *ī* and *u* > *ū*. The process is reversed in Tamil-Brāhmī only for the pairs *ē* > *e* and *ō* > *o*. In these cases, the Brāhmī script has only the long vowels. These were taken over by Tamil-Brāhmī and were employed, to begin with, to denote both the long and short sounds which could be recognised only from the context. However, as Tamil has also the short vowels *e* and *o*, the need to distinguish the length of the vowels was felt and the *puḷḷi* was added as a diacritic mark to the short vowels *e* and *o* (both initial and medial) to distinguish them from the respective long vowels. This development proves conclusively the derivation of Tamil-Brāhmī from the Brāhmī script.

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***ai:*** The curious asymmetry in the occurrence of the vowel *ai* in Asokan Brāhmī¹ is also reflected in Tamil-Brāhmī. In both cases, the initial vowel is absent, but the medial vowel occurs from the earliest times.² The initial vowel *ai* is attested for the first time in the Early Vaṭṭeḻuttu inscription at Tirunatharkunru (Chart 4: *ai: 116*). The form of this letter looking like a 'trident' is quite different from the earliest form in Brāhmī.³ However, the trident-form of *ai* occurs in a Southern Brāhmī Prakrit inscription⁴ at an earlier date than in the Early Vaṭṭeḻuttu script.

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¹ C.S. Upasak 1960: pp. 114-115.

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² E.g., *tantai-y* 'father' (Corpus: No. 2). See also Palaeographic Chart 6: *-ai:* 2.

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³ In the Hathigumpha inscription of Kharavela (K. G. Krishnan ed. 1989: No. 67). See illustration in A.H. Dani 1963 (Indian edition 1986): Table VI a. 9.

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⁴ At Alluru (Krishna District., Andhra Pradesh) in *ARE* 331/1924. See illustration in T.N. Subramanian 1957: pp. 1518-1519; Pl. 2, Col. IV. 49.

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***au:*** The vowel *au* (initial or medial) does not occur in Tamil-Brāhmī or Early Vaṭṭeḻuttu although it is included in the list of vowels in *Tolkāppiyam* (*Eḻu.* 4).

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**The *āytam* (*ḵ*):** The unique Tamil sound *āytam* is not represented graphically in the Tamil-Brāhmī or Early Vaṭṭeḻuttu inscriptions.⁵ The phrase *muppāl puḷḷi* (*Tol. Eḻu.* 2) has been interpreted by some commentators (e.g., Nacciṉārkkiṉiyar) as 'dots on three sides' supposedly referring to the graphic shape of the *āytam*. However, as the character with three dots in a triangular pattern represents the initial vowel *i* in Tamil-Brāhmī, the same character could not have represented the *āytam*. The alternative interpretation of the *sūtra* as referring to 'three types of sounds marked by dots viz., the shortened *-i* and *-u* and the *āytam*' seems to be correct (e.g., Pērāciriyar). However, there is no inscriptional evidence that the dependent sounds, shortened *-i* and *-u*, were marked by the *puḷḷi*. It is likely that the present form of the *āytam* with three dots is itself a result of the later misinterpretation of this *sūtra* as referring to the graphic shape of the letter. There would have been no confusion as by this time in the early medieval period, the letter *i* was no longer being written as three dots (compare *i* in Charts 4 & 8).

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⁵ The earliest inscriptional occurrence of the *āytam* is in the expression *veḵkā* 'name of a river' in the Kasakkudi Plates of Nandivarman II (ca. 753 A.D.). Here the letter is depicted as an upward-looking curve flanked by a pair of dots placed above and below (*SII*. II: No. 73, Pl. IXb, Line 115). This form is likely to have been influenced by the *visarga* symbol of the Grantha script (M. Raghawaiyangar 1938, reprint 1984: pp. 127-131). The *āytam* occurs in the expression *aḵkam* 'payment in grain' in the Vaṭṭeḻuttu inscription of Varaguna II (ca. 874 A.D.) at Tiruchendur. In this record, the letter is represented by a horizontal line with dots marked above and below 'like the division sign' (*EI.* XXI: p. 102).

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