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336
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
(DECEMBER, 1895.
to literature and the lexicons, and as far as I am aware, they are obsolete also in the current revenue system of the land. Neither kaliyakkam nor oflira carries any meaning to my mind. U ovi, according to Winslow, may mean head ;' but what sort of tax was called by this rare word for 'head' is now impossible to conjecture. Bamboo grain' is still of some use to bill-men, and probably it stood, in those days of little or no forest conservancy, as the type of hill products, which in Travancore now includes besides timber, ivory, bees' wax, eto. Aļageruds is a term already met with in these inscriptions and despaired of. Literally, it may moan a 'fair bull. To the known tax on hand-looms, we find here attached a tax on the palmyra, and it looks probable that what is meant ia a tax for tapping, and not otherwise nsing, that palm. Besides fines, the government of those days, it would appear, appropriated certain payments under the name of kó-muraippadu, literally 'royal-justice-income,' which we might take to represent the court fees and judicial revenue' of modern times. Karaipparru means 'adhering to or renching land,' and it might be taken to include trensure trove, mines, jetsam and flotsam, and all such royalties known to law. It would be interesting indeed to know how, at what rates, and through what agencies, these several taxes were levied, and what cxactly was the bearing of the change with respect to both people and government, when the revenue was assigned away, as in the present instance, for the maintenance of a particular temple. One would think from the minute political divisions and subdivisions : noticed in this document that the administration of the revenue was far from crude or primitive. We have seen above that Vêşîd was primarily divided into eighteen provinces or nádus, and probably Tennadu, or, Southern Province, was one of these primary divisions. That the part of the country about Padmanabhapuram should be called the southern province, while the one still farther to the south is named Nânchil-nadu, may be signifioant of the extent of the Vêpad principality at one stage of its history. The loose and redundant style of the document speaks badly of the literary capacity of the hereditary clerk of the crown, Kaitavay Iraman Kêra!nn, whose family name, Kaitavậy, occurs so frequently in the royal grants in my collection, - unless, indeed, it is taken to indicate the hurried occasion of the grant itself, such as the flush of a signal triumph, or sudden recovery from a serious malady. The absence of the usual expression Hail! Prosperity !' at the commenoement, and that of the
sign manual' at the end are omissions equally worthy of attention. What they signify, if any. thing at all, we have no data to determine. That only two of the four ministers or chieftains that arrange for the grant sign their names, may to some extent be taken as an indication of the state of education at the time.
Results. The next record I have in point of date would take me beyond the fifth Malabar century, and therefore beyond the scope of the present paper. Of the many themes of historical interest calling for investigation in Travancore, I selected the royal house as that most naturally and rightfully claiming my first and foremost attention. Limiting myself to a particular period in the history of that house, viz., the 4th and 5th Malabar centuries, of which no account of any description has been hitherto forthcoming, and availing myself of but one of the means of historical research, the safest and the best in fact, viz., pablic stone inscriptions, I have endeavoured to dispel the darkness in which the epoch has up to date been enveloped. Putting aside all side lights and inferences as to the general condition of the country, its society, its economy, its internal government, I have now the following solid facts to offer :
I. 'Sri-Vira-Kernlnvarman rnled Venad in 301 and 319 M. E. 11. Sri-Vira-Ravivarman in 336 and 342 M. E. III. Sri-Vira-Udaiyamartândavarman I. in 348 M. E. IV. Sri-Aditya-Ramavarman in 365 M.E. V. Sri-Vira-Ramavarman in 371 M. E.
