Early Tamil Epigraphy: From the Earliest Times to the Sixth Century A.D. c27.s44.1

c27.s44.1

The Tamil-Brāhmī and Early Vaṭṭeḻuttu inscriptions included in the Corpus are all very brief records. The two longest inscriptions (Nos. *61* & *62*) have only 15 words each. The average length of an inscription is 3 to 4 words only. Only a few inscriptions have two sentences each (Nos. *1*, *2*, *24*, *49*, *55*, *61*, *62*, *63*, *73*, *76* & *115*). At the other extreme, there are several inscriptions with only a single word (e.g., Nos. *109-111*) or a string of nouns and attributes without structural features (e.g., No. *56*). These inscriptions are excluded from the following discussion.