A History of South India from Prehistoric Times to the Fall of Vijayanagar c10.7

c10.7

The kingdoms of South India, together with Ceylon, are mentioned in the second and thirteenth rock-edicts of Aśoka. The list in the second edict is the more complete and includes the names of Chola, Pāndya, Satiyaputa, Keralaputa and Tambapanni (Ceylon). All these lands are distinctly stated to have lain outside the empire of Aśoka; but the great emperor was on such friendly terms with them that he undertook to arrange for the proper medical care of men and animals in all of them, and for the importation and planting of useful medicinal herbs and roots wherever they were needed. He also sent missionaries to preach the dhamma, the essentials of Buddhism, among the people of these countries, thus evincing a keen interest in their spiritual and moral well-being no less than in their physical fitness. The mere mention of such facts is enough to indicate a certain level of general culture and progress in the arts of civilization among the people of the South. The Tamils and the Sinhalese must have had a settled polity and lived in well-ordered states for some time before Aśoka could think of starting his friendly intercourse with them.