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ix
and popularity of Jainism in Tamilnādu during the Sargam age, N. Subramaniam says “During the period lighted by the Sangam literature, we see as much of Jainism as of Buddhism but both are clearly subordinate to the indigenous practices of the Brahmanical Vedic religion. There were in important cities like Puhār a concentration of Jains known as the Samaņar and their places of stay were called Samanappaļļi or Amaņappaļļi. Cāvakar, (a common designation of a Jaina layman), a sect among Jainas, are mentioned in the Maduraikkāñci; they were householders observing religious observances; the lay Jains were called Ulaga-Nõņbigaļ. At Uraiyūr there was an Aruhan temple called 'Sri Kandappalli', also called ‘Nikkandappaļļi’(nikkanda = nirgrantha, a Jaina) or Nikkandakkottam' and the deity in the Uraiyūr Jaina temple was called 'Uraiyūr Sri Kõil Nāyaṇār'. Nikkanda-kkõttam was usually abbreviated as Kandakköțțam and it was easy to confuse this, at a later period, with a Murugan temple; the expression Kõţtam' usually associated with Jaina Paļļis will give away its origin, anyway.... The Amaņappaļļis were retiring or resting places of the Jaina anchorites and these places were surrounded by gardens full of flowering plants”.
We learn from the Maņimēkalai that the Jaina philosophical system was one of the subjects of study at Kāñcī, one of the most important centres of education in early South India'.
1. Samgam Polity (1966), p. 367. 2. The contents within the brackets are mine (-K.V.R.]
3. K.A. Nilakanta Sastri : A History of South India (III edn., 1966), p. 423.
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