Indian Antiquary Vol 53

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

Page 29

FEBRUARY, 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, BT.
(Continued from p. 16.) There is an inferenco liere that by the Sangam period South Indian Brahmanism had become anti-Buddhistic. Indeed, that the Tamil-land in the early days was pro-Brahmanist and anti-Buddhist is shown throughout the literature. Asöka's propaganda did not reach it and was kept out by forco : witness the numerous statements as to the credit taken by all tho rulers,-Pandya, Chola or Chera--for achievements against the Aryas. The opposition was * set up" not in mere hostility to the peaceful pursuit of Buddhism or Jainism, but seemed to bo easontially intended for securing freedom for the unfettered pursuit ol Brahmanism in the Tamil country. "The result was that the continuity of Hindu Culturo has been a special feature in the History of Southern India." "Brahmanism, having found a welcome home in this region, when Buddhism was in the ascendancy in North India, pursued its path unmolested .... This freedom made the Tamil country at this period, as it proved to be in other lator perioda, a special refuge to Aryan culture, whenever it was hard pressed in the North."
Tho literature of tho early times exhibits "& certain ainount of development in tho dgamic worship of the Vaishnava Pancharatrins, though this does not exclude the advent of the Saiva dgumas (cloctrinos) at the same period;" whilo the rise of the School of Bhakti in the North, as a development of the Upanishadic culture, "received welcome support from the position of this particular school of Brahmanism in the South."
"This special development could not have been on this sido of the Christian era," and there was obviously an intimate connection then betweon the North and the South. Thus, in the days of the Sungas of the North, Pushyamitra organised "a revivification of Brahmanism in face of a foreign enemy, like the Greeks of Bactria ... who were in the political senso a foreign enemy' and in the sacerdotal conception heretics in religion." The Tamil literature, as confirmed by the Hathigumpha Inscription of Khára vêla of Kaliiga, shows that this created a religious ferment"referable to the period of revival under the Sungas and the Kanvas."
Tho Professor hero turns aside for a while to consider the connection of South India with Ceylon in tho ancient days, which, as he says, was generally one of hostility. Here it is interesting to note that Tamil literature has several references earlier than the Buddhist tradition to the story of the Ramayana, so far as it relates to Ceylon. These references are of such a nature as to show that it was familiar in South India at that very early time "in minute detail."
Turning to the Mahavainsa, the Professor discusses the story of the occupation of the Island by the Vaiga (Bengal) Buddhist prince Vijaya and his followers vid Lata, landing en route at Suppâraka, and he sets to work to show that Lata is not Gujarat, and that Suppåraka is not "Sopara on the West Coast of India . .. In the course of this narrative Ceylon receives both the names of Lanka and Tambapanni," and it may be added, also that of Sihala.
Despite its coating of myth, the story contains the germs of the history of the establishment of civilisation in Ceylon from Bengal, or "to be more precise, from Gangetic Kalinga." It is with this in view that the Professor argues that Lata is not Gujarât, but Radha (Ladha, Lala), i.e., Bardwån and Kalinga, being confirmed in this opinion by ancient Tamil literary accounts of the legend. Assuming then the journey to have been vid the Bay of Bengal,