Jaina Inscriptions in Tamilnadu

Author(s): A Ekambarnathan, C K Sivprakasham
Publisher: Research Foundation for Jainology Chennai

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The present work has a collection of 530 Jaina inscriptions in Tamilnadu from the earliest times down to the modern period,
llected from various sources such as Annual Reports on Epigraphy, South Indian Inscriptions, South Indian Temple Inscriptions, Epigraphia Indica, Travancore Archaeological Series, Corpus of the Tamil-Brahmi Inscriptions, Inscriptions of ihe Pudukkottai State and the Kanyākumari, Madras, Dharmapuri Districts' Inscriptions published by the Department of Archaeology, Government of Tamilnadu. Besides, A Topographical list of Inscriptions in the Madras Presidency (1919) by V. Rangacharya, List of Inscriptions in Southern India (1932) by R. Sewell, A Topographical list of Inscriptions in Tamilnadu and Kerala (Vol. I, North Arcot, 1985) by T. V. Mahalingam, and various journals reporting the discovery of Jaina inscriptions were consulted to present an exhaustive list of the records available in this region.
In this work, the records have been classified chronologically and villages have been arranged alphabetically under each district. Additional information is given wherever necessary at the end of the inscriptions. The old names of the districts, as found in the Epigraphical reports, are retained for those districts which have not been bifurcated so far. The names of the newly formed districts have also been included here to make the list upto date. [Madurai bifurcated into Anņā and Madurai districts. Coimbatore divided into Periyar and Coimbatore districts. Tirunelveli bifurcated into Chidambaranār and Tirunelveli-Kattabor man districts. Rāmanāthapuram trifurcated into Kamarajar, Pasumpon Muthurāmalingam and Ramanathapuram districts.)
We owe a sense of gratitude to the authorities of the Epigraphy Department, Mysore-5 and the Southern Circle of the Archaeological Survey of India, Madras-9, for permitting us to consult the published epigraphical reports available in their libraries. Our thanks are also due to Prof. S. Thanyakumar for kindly placing the publications of the Jain Youth Forum, Madras-600 17, at our disposal. We are under deep obligation to the authorities of the Research Foundation for Jainology, Madras-600 079, for not providing a contingent grant of Rs. 5000/-to complete the project work, but also for undertaking its publication.