Tamil Literature

319 Pages·1975·11.38 MB·English

by  K.V. Zvelebil

HANDBUCH DER ORIENTALISTIK
ZWEITE ABTEILUNG
2. BAND, 1. ABSCHNITT
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HANDBUCH DER ORIENTALISTIK
Herausgegeben von B. SPULER
unter Mitarbeit von
H. FRANKE, J. GONDA, H. HAMMITZSCH, W. HELCK, B. HROUDA,
H. KAHLER, J.E. VAN LoHUIZEN-DE LEEUW und F. Vos
ZWEITE ABTEILUNG
IN DIEN
HERAUSGEGEBEN VON J. GONDA
ZWEITER BAND
LITERATUR UND BURNE
ERSTER ABSCHNITT
TAMIL LITERATURE
LEIDEN/KbLN
J.
E. BRILL
1975
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TAMIL LITERATURE
BY
K. V. ZVELEBIL
LEIDEN/K<JLN
J.
E. BRILL
1975
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ISB~ 90 04 04190 7
Copyright 1975 by E. J. Brill, Leiden, Netherlands
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be repr~duced or
translated in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, microfiche
or any other means without written permission from the publisher
PRINTED IN THE NETHERLANDS
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This handbook of Tamil literature is dedicated to all
my Indian friends who readily and gladly assisted me
during my years of study of Tamil classical writing: to
M. V. Venugopala Pillai, R. Kannan, M. S. Venkatasami,
Jeevabandhu Sripaul, M. Varadarajan, X. S. Thani
Nayagam, A. Subbiah, to the South India Saiva Sid
dhanta Works Publishing Society, and all those whom I
may have forgotten to mention by name. May their
understanding and generosity be praised. N ci?J cettu elu
pirappu pirantalum, avarka! ceyta na?}mai marakka
mafte?J.
In a very special way I am indebted to my wife
whose patience and understanding helped me con
stantly when working on this book.
Wassenaar, r.7.1973 K. v. ZVELEBIL
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CONTENTS
Note on Transliteration and Pronunciation IX
List of Abbreviations XI
Introduction . . . . l
I. The Rediscovery of Tamil Classical Literature 5
II. Questions of Authenticity and Attribution. Integrity of
Texts, Interpolations, Additions, Revisions . 22
III. Periodisation of Tamil Literature . . . . . . 28
IV. Problems of Relative and Absolute Chronology . 34
V. Beginnings, Pre-History of Tamil Literature 47
VI. The Bardic Corpus . . . . . . . . . . 80
VII. Post-Classical Period (A.D. 250-600). . . no
VIII. The Literature of Bhakti (A.D. 600-900) . 130
IX. Early Medieval Period (A.D. 900-1200). . 166
X. Late Medieval Period (A.D. 1200-1750) Part I. 198
XI. Late Medieval Period (A.D. 1200-1750) Part II . 233
Appendix I. Biographical Data of the Most Prolific Classical Tamil
Poets . . . . . . . . . . . . 265
Appendix II. On Tamil Prosody 278
Index. . . . . . . . . . . . 282
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NOTE ON TRANSLITERATION AND PRONUNCIATION
The transliteration used for Tamil words in this book is a system
adopted by the Madras University Tamil Lexicon. A few current local
and personal names appear in their anglicized spelling. The following
Roman letters are used for the Tamil characters:
Vowels
Short Long
a a
i
u ii
e
e
0 6
ai au
Consonants
Ridge behind Hard Soft
Lips Teeth upper teeth palate palate
Stops p t t c k
Nasals m n u If fi Ii
Liquids r
r 1
Semivowels v y
The Tamil long vowels are simple vowels, unlike their Engl. diph
thongized counterparts. Final-"ai" is pronounced approximately
like-"ey".
Tamil has two series of consonants somewhat unfamiliar to Engl.
speakers: the dentals t, n and the retroflexes t, If, L 1. The dentals are
pronounced with the tongue at the teeth, the retroflexes are produced by
curling the tongue back towards the roof of the mouth.
In the middle of Tamil words, long consonants occur, indicated in the
transliteration by double letters (cf. Nakkirar, paftu). English has long
consonants between words, as in hot tea, pen(k)nife.
The Tamil r is flapped or trilled as in Spanish or Czech. The l is some
what like the American variety of r; r and rare not distinguished by most
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x NOTE ON TRANSLITERATION AND PRONUNCIATION
modern Tamil speakers, but long rr is pronounced like tr in English
trap or tt in hot tea; ur is pronounced ndr as in laundry.
p, t, t, c, k are pronounced differently according to their position:
initially, p, t, and k are voiceless stops, t does not occur, and c is initially
pronounced ass or sh. Between vowels, p, t, t are voiced into b, d, and
<;l and pronounced as lax voiced stops; k and c are pronounced as gh or
hands or sh. After nasals, all stops are voiced into b, d, <;l, j, g.
Instances: akam is usually pronounced aham, Tolktippiyam as tolha:
piyam, Kuruntokai as kurundohey, narriJ:iai as nattiney.
The transliteration of Sanskrit, Prakrit and Pali words follows the
rules adopted by Indology.
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