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Studies in Jainology, Prakrit
could not be the language of the common people of the day, and he, in ecletic attitude, must have preferred to write in the natural language of the day. In any case one cannot place the Tirukkural much later than 300 A.D., for it preserves certain aspects of the older language inspite of its acceptance of new developments in the language (iii) But Prof.S.Vaiyapuri Pillai proposes 600 A.D. us the date of the Kural, placing it after the great Tamil grammatic work Tolkāppiyam and advancing the following reasons : Kural is later than Tolkāppiyam. Linguistic considerations too strengthen this conclusion. There is a higher percentage of Sanskrit words in the Kural than in carly Sangam Works and in the "Tolkāppiyam. New forms of functional words appear in the Kural for the first time in the history of Tamil language.
The author of the Kural is known as Tiruvalluvar (tiru being an honourisic prefix). But very little is known about this great and noble poet-philosopher. For want of cxact information about him, several anecdotes, folk-tales and traditions have come up about him and around some aspects of his life. He is associated with Madurai region by some and with Maylapore near Madras by others. In some places a valluvar is known as a product of a Brahmin by a Harijan (low-caste) woman. The term valluvar also refers (as found in the Manimekhalai, another Tamil classic) to a low class community and is applied to the King's officers or men, announcing the royal proclamations to the public all round the capital city, sitting on the elephant and heating drums. Whatever could be the indicative meaning of the term valluvar, Tiruvalluvar was a great personage of saintly and catholic dignity, with deep insight into human psychology and behaviour, sincerely nourishing humanitarian values, cver breathing goodness ad goodwill and zealously catering them to the people at large.
Thus very little is exactly known about Tiruvalluvar and his life; and besides there prevails some uncertainity about his date. As a result, there has also been, for the last several decades, a
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