The Pandyan Townships- Historical Geographyn of the Pandyan Kindgdom in Set of 2 Volumes (An Old and Rare Set)

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The late Mr. R. Tirumalai, IAS, was a well-known scholar administrator of India. He was a student of the revered doyen of South Indian history, the late Prof. K.A. Nilakanta Sastri. Mr. Tirumalai's Earlier epigraphical works include: 1) 'Rajendra Vinnagar' (1980); 2) 'Studies in Ancient Townships of Pudukkottai' (1981); 3) 'Collected papers' (1994) - all published by the Department of Archaeology of the Government of Tamil Nadu, and

4) "Land grants and agrarian reactions in the Chola and Pandyan times" (1987) published by the University of Madras.

The present work titled "The Pandyan Townships' is the fourth and the last book written by Mr.Tirumalai shortly before his death in 1997. The book is published in two parts - Part I dealing with the ancient geography of the Pandyan and Part II dealing with life in these townships in all their multi-faceted aspects. This tremendous work of scholarship, which is the outcome of a lifetime of research on Pandyan inscriptions, will be a boon to scholars interested in the social and economic history of the Pandyan period.

The Pandyan Townships Part I and II are the outcome of my intense research based on the Pandyan Epigraphs, most of which remain unpublished as yet. This was greatly facilitated by the Jawaharlal Nehru Fellowship granted to me for two years 1983-85 by the Jawaharlal Nehru Trust. I am deeply sensible of the honour conferred on me which has enabled me to intensively research into the vast unpublished material, and bring out this pioneer work on the Pandyan Townships.

I thank the Jawaharlal Nehru Trust for this generous funding of the Project. The collection of materials alone has taken over two years I had also to tap other sources, the Tamil Nadu Department of Archaeology and the secondary sources. The total output as a result was too much to be compressed into one volume. I have, therefore, published the histories of some individual Pandyan Townships in my "Collected Papers". Part-I of this work contains the historical geography of the Pandyan Townships. The substantive content of life in the Pandyan Townships in all their multi-faceted aspects is dealt with in Part-II. The Introduction Chapter sets out the scope and content of Part-II. It is appropriate that the three works are being published by the State Department of Archaeology.

It is my privilege to acknowledge the great interest evinced by the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, Dr.M.Karunanidhi and the Minister for Tamil Development, Dr.M.Tamizhkudimagan in publishing this work. I have had the privilege of working with both of them and it is indeed an act of their personal kindness and attachment to me that they encourage me in publishing these two volumes of original work. It also evidences the interest they have in bringing out new aspects of Tamil Culture and original research in the history of Tamil Nadu.

This work incorporates the results of the original research on the Pandyan Townships which I have carried out over a period of 7 years. This work has been greatly facilitated by the grant in the form of Fellowship from the Jawaharlal Nehru Memorial Fund for a period of 2 years from 1983-85 The work mainly depends upon the Pandyan Inscriptions. The published inscriptions are but few, compared to the total volume available. Hence the 2 years were mainly taken up by the study, copying and analysis of a large volume of unpublished inscriptions available with the Epigraphy wing of the Central Department of Archaeology. My greatful appreciation is due to the then Director of Epigraphy Dr.K.V.Ramesh and the Chief Epigraphist to the Government of India Shri Katti for making available this large corpus of unpublished inscriptions in their custody.

While studying the unpublished inscriptions, it came to light that there were a number of inscriptions originally copied by the Department of Archaeology but the estampages for which have become worn out due to efflux of time. Some new inscriptions also have to be copied and some of the earlier ones denovo. The Director of Epigraphy kindly undertook to fill this lacunae and has since furnished me with the copies of most of these inscriptions required. My work would not have been complete but for this prompt and effective assistance of the Directorate and my personal gratitude to the Director of Epigraphy has become many fold.

The copper plates of the period form another good branch of the evidence and these have also been harnessed.

I have utilised the evidence that can be culled from literary sources, but in its very nature this is but comparative or corroborative in nature and meagre in quantum.

**Contents and Sample Pages**