The Early History of India, from 600 B.C. to the Muhammadan Conquest, including the Invasion of Alexander the Great c35.s2.4

c35.s2.4

As early as the time of Pliny, in the first century after Christ, the capital was Madura or Kūdal; but there is reason to believe that in still more ancient days Korkai was the chief place of the kingdom, and there is some evidence that a place called South Mañalūr on the east side of the Madura District had been the capital of Pāṇḍya chiefs in prehistoric times.² All native traditions indicate Korkai or Kolkai, the Greek Κόλχοι, as the cradle of South Indian civilization, and the home of the mythical three brothers who were supposed to have founded the Pāṇḍya, Chera, and Chola kingdoms. The city, now represented by an insignificant village on the bank of the Tāmraparni river¹ in Tinnevelly, was a great seaport in the days of its glory, and the head-quarters of the trade in pearls and conch-shells (*Turbinella rapa*), which constituted the special source of wealth enjoyed by the Pāṇḍya kings. Even when the royal court was established at Madura, the Crown Prince resided at Korkai in order to control the important revenue and commercial interests centred there. In the course of time the slow elevation of the coast² rendered Korkai inaccessible to ships, and the city gradually decayed, like the Cinque Ports in England.