Indian Antiquary Vol 47

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Devadatta Ramkrishna Bhandarkar
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 53

FEBRUARY, 1918
ASOKA YOTES. YO. XII.
Mahabharata and in the Raghuraiia. It is considered extremely sacred throughout its whole course, and especially at the falls in the hills. The Greeks called ic Solen, which seems to be a variant form of Ceylon. It is remarkable that they, like the Indians. should apply the one name to the river and the island The Potigai mountain appears as Bettigo' in Greek.
The port of Korkai, which used to be situated near the mouth of the Tâmraparại, but now is five miles from the sea, seems to have been the first settlement of civilized man in those parts. The ruin of Korkai and the other ancient ports in the neighbourhood uncloubtedly is due to a gradual elevation of the land, and not to mere silting up by deposits of sand brought down by the rivers. The proof is given concisely hy Caldwell in the following passage :
I should not expect to find relics of the oldest period anywhere near the sea, as I consider it certain that the land has been slowly but steadily rising above the ancient sea level for ages, probably even before man made his appearance in the district. The rise of the land all through the historical period is, I think, capable of proof. Near Kulasekharapattanam, a town and port of some antiquity, pieces of broken pottery are occasionally found imbedded in the grit stone, a marine formation abounding In sea shells of existing species, found all along the coast. I have a specimen in my possession found about #mile from the sea-shore ; but I regard this as proving, not the immense antiquity of the pottery, which does not appear to differ in the least from the pottery now in lise, but rather the comparatively recent origin of some portions of the grit-stone.' 2
The long-expected edition of the edicts of Asoka by Professor Hultzsch was in the press when the war broke out in 1914. The work is not sufficiently advanced to be completed by any body exoept the author. I have been permitted by the Clarendon Press to consult the small portion printed off which comprises the whole of the Rock Edicts in the Girnår recension and most of the Kalsî recension, but not the 13th edict or the close of the 12th. Dr. Haltzsch correctly renders the words a Tambapanni in Edict II, Girnar, by as far as the Tamraparnt', and appends the note:
Here and in edict XIII Tâmraparoi is usually taken to refer to Ceylon; but it is more natural to understand by it the river of this name in the Tinnevelly district, which was known to the author of the Ramayana (Bombay edition, iv, 41, 17). Cf. Mr. V. A. Smith's note, ZDMG., 63, 211.'
Edict XIII in the Girnar recension is missing
In edict II of the Kálgi recension we have the enumeration of foreign countries Chorld Paida ya Satiyaputo Kelalaputo Talibapa ini, which Dr. Hultzsch renders :the Chodás, the Pandyas, the Såtiyaputa, the Kelalaputa, the Tâmraparņi.'
His edition of the 13th edict in that recension is not at my disposal.
It is clear that in both edicts Tambapanni means the Tinnevelly rive, not the Island of Ceylon.
History of Tinnevelly, Madras, 1881, 5, 9-11, 19, 38. Within India proper there have been local changes in the relative level of land and sea within recent geological times... On the east side of Bombay Island trees have been found imbedded in mud about 12. feet below low-water mark, while a similarly submerged forest has been described on the Tinnevelly coast. On the other hand, there is evidence to show that a part of the coast of Tinnevelly has risen and driven back the sea in the neighbourhood of Kayal.' (Imp. Gaz, 1907, 1, 99, Geology' by T. H. Holland.)