The Beautiful Tree: Indigenous Indian Education in the Eighteenth Century c6.4

c6.4

A schoolmaster in Malabar receives every two months, from each of his pupils, for the instruction given them, two *Fanon* or *Panam*. Some do not pay in money, but give him a certain quantity of rice, so that this expense becomes very easy to the parents. There are some teachers who instruct children without any fee, and are paid by the overseers of the temple, or by the chief of the caste. When the pupils have made tolerable progress in writing, they are admitted into certain schools, called *Eutupalli*, where they begin to write on palm leaves (*Pana*), which, when several of them are stitched together, and fastened between two boards, form a *Grantha*, that is, an Indian book. If such a book be written upon with an iron style, it is called *Granthavari*, or *Lakya*, that is, writing, to distinguish it from *Alakya*, which is something not written.