A History of South India from Prehistoric Times to the Fall of Vijayanagar c6.41

c6.41

Literary evidence is the next important source of knowledge. It is both indigenous and foreign. In all Indian literature there are few professedly historical works. There are indeed some temple chronicles like the *Maduraittala-varalāru*, and the *Śrīrangam-kōyil-oḷugu*. While furnishing valuable hints on comparatively recent times, say from 1200 onward, they are nothing more than a farrago of legends for the earlier times and contain too many inaccuracies and distortions to be used by themselves without the testimony of other more trustworthy sources. The semi-historical works that were produced at the beginning of the nineteenth century to the orders of Col. Colin Mackenzie do not concern us as they deal with recent events outside the scope of this book. The *Kongu-deśa-rājākkaḷ caritram* and the *Kēralōt-patti* in its various recensions have often been overrated and are in fact of very little value; so too are the numberless *sthala-purāṇas*, mostly recent redactions of popular legends. Ballads like the *Rāmappayyan-ammānai* are in a somewhat better class, but no early specimens of such popular quasi-historical material have survived.