Early South Indian Palaeography c14.s3: 3. Kilavalavu

Early South Indian Palaeography c14.s3

Language: English

3. Kilavalavu

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On the low range of hills with huge boulders between Kīḻūr and Kīḻavaḷavu, nearly seven miles from Melur on the road to Tirupattur are found some caverns containing the usual beds and inscriptions. Near one of these caverns there are cut in the rock numerous Jaina figures with Vaṭṭeḷuttu inscriptions below them.¹ The Brāhmī inscription² discovered as early as 1903 (and it was the first to be discovered in the Tamil country) is about fifteen feet from the ground level of the cavern. Many letters are written upside down and are boldly cut. Evidently the engraver had better convenience to work from the upper part of the cave than from the front.

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¹ The place appears to have been a strong centre of Jaina influence like Āṉaimalai. The figures of the naked Jaina Tirthankaras etc. are interpreted by the local people as 'school children', and the whole spot is connected by them with a school that is supposed to have once existed here. Evidently the word *paḷḷi* which denotes a Jaina Temple also meaning a school is responsible for this belief of the people.

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² No. 135 of 1903.

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According to Parker, there is an old Brāhmī inscription written upside down on one of the Tēvāṇḍāṉ Puliyangulam hills in Ceylon. He refers to it as the first instance of what is known there as the *Paerali Basa*. In this system is required an interchange or transformation of letters in written or spoken words; and in interpretation, the letters have to be read from right to left.³ Krishna Sastri was doubtful if the Kīḻavaḷavu Brāhmī inscription was of this variety. Probably he felt it was not.

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³ *Ancient Ceylon*, pp. 429-30.

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His transcription of the record was as under

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*u pa [ c ] a a pō ta ṇe ṭu la vō*
*chō ko ṭu pa ḷi ī*

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Among the letters in the inscription, the sixth and the twelfth *te* and *ko* are in the normal correct position with reference to the reader from the ground, while the others are upside down.

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He also notes that the word *Ūpacaa* at the beginning seems to suggest the Prākṛt forms of *upādhyāya* and *vachō* are like-wise synonymous. The root *koṭu* has occurred elsewhere. He also compares the word *paḷi ī* with the word *paḷiya* occurring in the record *A* at Ariṭṭāpaṭṭi.

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Subrahmanya Ayyar thinks that the first word *upa-ca-a* may be regarded as the Tamil form of *upasaka* through Prākṛt, as found largely in Ceylon inscriptions. He reads the record as follows:

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*upa-ca-a pōta Neṭula Vōccō*
*koṭu paḷi ī.*

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According to him the second word *pōta* is no doubt the equivalent of *putra*. *Neṭula vōccō* is the name of a person, the second part of which is the Prākṛt form of *vatsa* as may be seen from the same form of *vaccō* standing for *vatsa* in the Bhaṭṭiprolu Casket inscriptions⁵. *I* at the end of the record is treated by him as the pronoun ‘this’. “If the use of the word at the end of a sentence is objectionable and unlikely, it may form part of *paḷi*. This inscription is the second one which uses the word *paḷi* in the sense of a ‘cave’.” Subrahmanya Ayyar translates the record as follows:

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⁵ *Ep. Ind.*, II. p. 329.

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“This is the cave cut by Neṭula Vōccan the son of a lay devotee”.

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Narayana Rao reads the record as follows:

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*upaca’a pōta naṭṭala vocco koṭu pāli’i*

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restores it as:

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*upadhyāya-putraḥ naṭya kar o padhyayaḥ*
*kuṭṭapita palika (kī o)*

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and translates it as

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“the monastery that the instructor of the dancers, the son of the teacher, got cut”.

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⁴ Parker: *The Ancient Inscriptions of Ceylon*, Nos. 13, 37 and 447.

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The reading of the inscription is as follows:

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*u pā cā a po ta ṇe ṭu ḷa vo co ko ṭu pa ḷi i*

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There seems to be some space between the second and third letters, i.e., *pā* and *cā*. It is also to be noted that these two have each two *ā* long symbols added to their right. As pointed out earlier the sixth letter *ta* and twelfth letter *ko* are in correct position with reference to the reader from the ground, though the other letters are upside down. It is also possible to take the twelfth letter as *ku* taking it also as written upside down like the rest, as the horizontal stroke to take left at the bottom is not quite clear. The ninth letter read here as *ḷa* has been read by Krishna Sastri as *lā*. It is also possible to read it *ḷi*.

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The *ā* symbol added to the ninth letter also looks like that of the medial vowel *i*. The eleventh letter has been read as *chho* by Krishna Sastri, and as *cco* by Subrahmanya Ayyar. The loops at the bottom which should be discernible both to the left and the right are not clear. On the other hand it appears more like a horizontal line, thus making it look like *na*.

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The reading of the inscription as restored in Drāviḍī will be:

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*Upāca apote ṇeṭuḷa voco koṭu paḷi i.*

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*Upāca* is derived from the Sanskrit word *Upasaka* and is possibly connected with the Tamil word *Uvaccan*. The last two words *koṭu paḷi* would mean the *paḷḷi* or bed given by (i.e. *koṭutta-paḷḷi* in modern form). The middle three words should form the name of a person. *Apote* may possibly be equated with *aputran* which name with the initial vowel lengthened as *āputtiran* was borne by one of the characters appearing in the Tamil epic the *Maṇimēkalai*.⁶

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⁶ cf. canto 24. *Āputtiran nāḍu aḍainta kātai*; canto. 25. *Aputtiranōḍu Maṇipallavam aḍainta kātai*. *Āputtira nāḍu*, the land of Āputra figures as one of the countries (an island) to which Maṇimēkalai the heroine of the poem is said to have flown by air from the Cōḷa capital kāvērippūmpaṭṭinam. Canto. 24. i 169 mentions that Nāgapura was the capital of that island.

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*Ṇeṭuḷa* should mean something like *Neṭuveḷ* (indicating god Muruga) or Neṭiyōn (indicating Lord Viṣṇu). Literally the word means a tall person or a person of great height (thus probably meaning the God having his temple on the top of a hill). *Voco* is the Prākṛt form of the word *Vatsa*. It is also to be noted that the word *ṇeṭuḷa* commences with the lingual *ṇa* which is not one of the initial letters in Tamil, i.e., the letters with which a Tamil word commences. But in Prākṛt the dental *na* becomes lingual and we have many words commencing with the lingual *ṇa*. This clearly shows the influence of Prākṛt in this record.

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The entire record may be translated as follows :

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"The bed given by (endowed or made by) the *upasaka* (lay disciple) Āputtiraṉ (Āputran) Neḍuvēḷ vatsa (i.e. son of Neḍuvēḷ)."

Linked texts (1)

Maṇimēkalai — Cīttalaic Cāttaṉār, Tamil