Indian Antiquary Vol 53

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Stephen Meredyth Edwardes, Krishnaswami Aiyangar
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 19

JANUARY, 1924)
A SKETCH OF SOUTH INDIAN CULTURE
A SKETCH OF SOUTH INDIAN CULTURE. (From the Lectures of Prof. Rao Sahib Krishnaswami Aiyangar.)
BY SIR RICHARD C. TEMPLE, Br. PROFESSOR KRISHNASWAMI AIYANGAR'S lectures to the Caloutta University in 1920 have now been published in one volume, as Some Contributions of South India to Indian Culture. They are so full of valuable suggestions that it is worthwhile to consider here the results of the studies of a ripe scholar in matters South Indian. They are divided into a Preface and nineteen Chapters, carrying the studies from the most ancient days to the time of the Vijayanagar Empire in an historical sequence, and thence in a sense to the days of the British Empire. To myself the book is a fascinating one, and it cannot but be of the greatest value to the students for whom the lectures were intended.
In his Preface Prof. Krishnaswami draws special attention to the peculiar position that the Brahman has occupied in South India, and his views are of extraordinary interest as those of one who is himself a South Indian. He gives the position as being identical with that when the Bråhman emigrated from the North. “That position," says the Professor, “involved the double responsibility of performing elaborate ritualistio sacrifices for the benefit of society, and the conservation and cultivation of the learning that is involved as & necessary corollary." And then he makes arresting reinarks which are worth reproduction: "the Brahman has striven to discharge these responsibilities to the best of his ability and opportunities, setting up such & high example in actual lifo as invariably to exert influence in the direction of uplift, which has been felt throughout .. . It was a characteristic feature of the Brahmanical organisation that the least developed communities in the vast and varied population of India had a recognised place in Society moving upwards slowly.... His achievements in the sphere of the propagation of learning.... both in Sanskrit and the Sanskritic and other vernaculars of the country were magnificent. One has only to examine the names of eminent contributors to the literature of Tamil to confirm this statement."
The Professor then goes on to deal with Bhakti, devotion to a personal God by faith, and says of it : "the transformation of this ritualistic Brahmanism into the much more widely acoeptable Hinduism of modern times is due to the increasing infusion of theistic belief into the religious system of the day. In this new development South India [Tamilland) played an important part ; ” not however in its origin, be it remembered, but in its development. And then he says that along side of it "has run another stream which is best described as Tantrisın, worship by means of mystic signs and formulæ of various character; ” in which, too, South India played an important part, though by that term the Professor implies here the land of the Telugus rather than that of the Tamils.
He next points out how much South India had to do with "the spread of Hindu culture to the islands of the East and the Indo-Chinese Peninsula " as far as China, and with the commercial carriage to the West of Indian articles of trade. In matters of administration, especially of local administration, he claims that the indigenous system was developed and "carried to the fullest fruition under the Great Cholas A.D. 850-1350," and "continued undisturbed down to the end of the period of the Vijayanagar Empire," so that "the revenue and fiscal organisation of a considerable part of the Madras Presidency under the East India Company is derived from the system that obtained at the commencement of the ninteenth century, as a lineal descendant of the ancient Chola administration."
Such is the Professor's brief summary of his lucubrations, and he truly remarks that " the whole of the investigation rests upon the Chronology of Tamil litorature and history."
This is why his book is so valuable; it brings the ancient literature of the country into the argument and shows how history can be delved out of it,-a line of research, to which. to my mind, it is satisfactory to see a native Indian dovoting sincere attention,