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164
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY
SAPTOMER, 1928
"which included the white Syrians109, and they were subjected to the penalty of a fine or such punishment as the Arbitrator thought fit to inflict, but if it happened that the Syrian Christians were maltreated by any of the five tribunals, the case must appear before the Arbitrators; so that the tribunal, which had taken cognizance where a Syrian Christian was concerned, underwent the severest penalty of the law, that is if the case was not amicably adjusted by an adequate apology made by that tribunal. These privileges granted by the Rajah were said to have continued until the 920th aundoo or era of Colum, corresponding to A.D. 1745."
"Another Manuscript states that the name of the first bishop from Antioch was Joseph, and that he landed in the year 345 A.D. with four hundred and seventy-two Syrian families, This Bishop110 built a town near Cranganore on some land granted by the Rajah, and called it Mahadevarpatnam. The (P. 195) honorary distinctions granted to the Syrians were engraved on copper-plates, which are now in existencelli, as our readers are probably aware : but we suspect the date of these occurrences was many centuries later than that assigned. There certainly appears in this account of the colonization from Antioch and their reception by a heathen king very little of the spirit of the early ages of Christianity. It is also stated that an inscription on a slab of granite of the privileges granted by Charaman Permaul was placed on the north side of the Church112 of Cranganore. Mar Joseph, it is said, ordained ministers, and appointed archdeacons (Malpans ?) throughout the country. This state of things remained for 480 years, until 825; how the ministers were ordained does not appear, or whe. ther there was any bishop in Travancore. But, as before observed, we doubt not that Mar Joseph was much more distantly removed from the days of the apostle. From the year 825 A.D. a series of bishops came from Antioch. The following is a list of them taken from a Syrian manuscript in the Conancode113 Church near Quilon."
List of Bishops. «Christian Malayala Bishops. Metropolitans Patriarchs. Remarks.
Era. Era. 8251 825 1 Marsabore
Landed at Cranga. Ambroat 114
nore116 in company with Towrio116 mer. chant.
109 White Syrians seems to be a mistranslation of mámódisd samayakkár, i.e., new converts from the low castes. See footnote 108, No. 13.
In connection with the arbitrators referred to in the text, the following passage may be road with advantage: "If a pagan of any of these " (eighteen) "tribes should receive an insult, he has immediately recourse to the Christians," (their authorized protectors) "who procure A suitable satisfaction. The Christians depend directly on the prince or his minister, and not on the provincial governors. If anything is demanded from them contrary to their privilegea, the whole unito immediately for general defence. If A DAGAN trikes one of the Christians, ho is put to death on the spot, or forced himself to bear to the church of the place an offering of a gold or silver hand, according to the quality of the person affronted".--La Croze Aummarised by Capt. Swanston in JRAS., vol. I, 1834, p. 181. (See footnotes 107 and 108).
The grievances of the eighteen castes called vitayakkar (subject folk) used to be heard and disposed of by the Syrian Christians in an assombly called together for the purpose. The holding of these gamblies continued, according to some authorities, till A.D. 1745. How this date was arrived at it is difficult to say.
110 The bishop whom Thomas Cana brought is not usually said to have built a town.
111 No. The two plates of Thomas Cana (A.D. 345) have been missing ever since A.D. 1544, when Bishon Mar Jacob handed them over to the Portuguese in Cochin. What now exist are five of the seven plates of the Quilon church (c. 880 A.D.), and the plate of Iravi Korttan (A.D. 1320).
112 Not the north side of the Church, but of the temple of Cranganore. One cadjan MS. says that the stone slab lies "north of the Cranganore temple, and at the royal door of the temple of
113 This is Kannankote in Central Travancore. 114 These two ore Mar Sabor and Mar Prodh, who is said to have come to Quilon in Travancore in 825
in Sabriso's ship. These bishops were condemned Ag Nestorinns at the Council of Diamper, 1599. and the Churches in their name ordered to be renamed under the invocation of All Saints.
116 They are believed to have landed in Quilon, not in Cranganore.
116 Towrio is the merchant prince Sabriso, the founder (in A.D. 1825) of Quilon as an emporium rivalling Muziris (Cranganore).
