68-511: Thirukkovil Temple (officially Thirukkovil Citra Velayudha Swami Kovil , Tamil : திருக்கோவில் சித்திரவேலாயுத சுவாமி ஆலயம் ) is the most significant Hindu temple in Thirukkovil , Ampara District of Eastern Province, Sri Lanka . It is dedicated to Chitravelayudhar ( Cittiravēlāyutar , literally "One with elegant spear") who was once the guardian deity of Mattakkalappu Desam ( Batti - Ampara districts nowadays) and this temple enjoyed
136-468: A lexical root to which one or more affixes are attached. Most Tamil affixes are suffixes . Tamil suffixes can be derivational suffixes, which either change the part of speech of the word or its meaning, or inflectional suffixes, which mark categories such as person , number , mood , tense , etc. There is no absolute limit on the length and extent of agglutination , which can lead to long words with many suffixes, which would require several words or
204-484: A , as with other Indic scripts . This inherent vowel is removed by adding a tittle called a puḷḷi , to the consonantal sign. For example, ன is ṉa (with the inherent a ) and ன் is ṉ (without a vowel). Many Indic scripts have a similar sign, generically called virama , but the Tamil script is somewhat different in that it nearly always uses a visible puḷḷi to indicate a 'dead consonant' (a consonant without
272-759: A 2001 survey, there were 1,863 newspapers published in Tamil, of which 353 were dailies. Tamil is the primary language of the majority of the people residing in Tamil Nadu , Puducherry , (in India) and in the Northern and Eastern provinces of Sri Lanka . The language is spoken among small minority groups in other states of India which include Karnataka , Telangana , Andhra Pradesh , Kerala , Maharashtra , Gujarat , Delhi , Andaman and Nicobar Islands in India and in certain regions of Sri Lanka such as Colombo and
340-519: A family of around 26 languages native to the Indian subcontinent . It is also classified as being part of a Tamil language family that, alongside Tamil proper, includes the languages of about 35 ethno-linguistic groups such as the Irula and Yerukula languages (see SIL Ethnologue ). The closest major relative of Tamil is Malayalam ; the two began diverging around the 9th century CE. Although many of
408-607: A number of apparent Tamil loanwords in Biblical Hebrew dating to before 500 BCE, the oldest attestation of the language. Old Tamil is the period of the Tamil language spanning the 3rd century BCE to the 8th century CE. The earliest records in Old Tamil are short inscriptions from 300 BCE to 700 CE. These inscriptions are written in a variant of the Brahmi script called Tamil-Brahmi . The earliest long text in Old Tamil
476-671: A number of skeletons were found buried in earthenware urns dating from at least 696 BCE in Adichanallur . Some of these urns contained writing in Tamil Brahmi script, and some contained skeletons of Tamil origin. Between 2017 and 2018, 5,820 artifacts have been found in Keezhadi . These were sent to Beta Analytic in Miami , Florida , for Accelerator Mass Spectrometry (AMS) dating. One sample containing Tamil-Brahmi inscriptions
544-518: A number of sound changes, in particular, a tendency to lower high vowels in initial and medial positions, and the disappearance of vowels between plosives and between a plosive and rhotic. Contact with European languages affected written and spoken Tamil. Changes in written Tamil include the use of European-style punctuation and the use of consonant clusters that were not permitted in Middle Tamil. The syntax of written Tamil has also changed, with
612-535: A reward for this marvelous construction. Gajabahu and his queen Thambathi Nallaal established a new kingdom known as 'Unnaasagiri' there. After a few years, their son Megavarnan, whose royal title was Manuneya Gajabahu reconstructed the temple in stone. There were many ladies and Devadasis providing their services in Thirukkovil. Thangammai was one among them and she was the aalaathipendu (lady doing aarti ) of Thirukkovil. During her later life, She couldn't be at
680-647: A small number speak the language. In Reunion where the Tamil language was forbidden to be learnt and used in public space by France it is now being relearnt by students and adults. Tamil is also spoken by migrants from Sri Lanka and India in Canada , the United States , the United Arab Emirates , the United Kingdom , South Africa , and Australia . Tamil is the official language of
748-610: A subject of study in schools in the French overseas department of Réunion . In addition, with the creation in October 2004 of a legal status for classical languages by the Government of India and following a political campaign supported by several Tamil associations, Tamil became the first legally recognised Classical language of India. The recognition was announced by the contemporaneous President of India , Abdul Kalam , who
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#1732779892180816-463: A variety of dialects that are all collectively known as Brahmin Tamil . These dialects tend to have softer consonants (with consonant deletion also common). These dialects also tend to have many Sanskrit loanwords. Tamil in Sri Lanka incorporates loan words from Portuguese , Dutch , and English. In addition to its dialects, Tamil exhibits different forms: a classical literary style modelled on
884-438: A vowel). In other Indic scripts, it is generally preferred to use a ligature or a half form to write a syllable or a cluster containing a dead consonant, although writing it with a visible virama is also possible. The Tamil script does not differentiate voiced and unvoiced plosives . Instead, plosives are articulated with voice depending on their position in a word, in accordance with the rules of Tamil phonology . In addition to
952-635: Is a Dravidian language natively spoken by the Tamil people of South Asia . It is one of the two longest-surviving classical languages in India , along with Sanskrit , attested since c. 300 BCE. The language belongs to the southern branch of the Dravidian language family and shares close ties with Malayalam and Kannada . Despite external influences, Tamil has retained a sense of linguistic purism, especially in formal and literary contexts. Tamil
1020-457: Is based on the dialect of Jaffna . After Tamil Brahmi fell out of use, Tamil was written using a script called vaṭṭeḻuttu amongst others such as Grantha and Pallava . The current Tamil script consists of 12 vowels , 18 consonants and one special character, the āytam . The vowels and consonants combine to form 216 compound characters, giving a total of 247 characters (12 + 18 + 1 + (12 × 18)). All consonants have an inherent vowel
1088-401: Is deemed unlikely by Southworth due to the contemporary use of the compound 'centamiḻ', which means refined speech in the earliest literature. The Tamil Lexicon of University of Madras defines the word "Tamil" as "sweetness". S. V. Subramanian suggests the meaning "sweet sound", from tam – "sweet" and il – "sound". Tamil belongs to the southern branch of the Dravidian languages ,
1156-563: Is extensively described in the oldest known grammar book for Tamil, the Tolkāppiyam . Modern Tamil writing is largely based on the 13th-century grammar Naṉṉūl which restated and clarified the rules of the Tolkāppiyam , with some modifications. Traditional Tamil grammar consists of five parts, namely eḻuttu , col , poruḷ , yāppu , aṇi . Of these, the last two are mostly applied in poetry. Tamil words consist of
1224-511: Is found in Tholkappiyam , which is dated as early as late 2nd century BCE. The Hathigumpha inscription , inscribed around a similar time period (150 BCE), by Kharavela , the Jain king of Kalinga , also refers to a Tamira Samghatta ( Tamil confederacy ) The Samavayanga Sutra dated to the 3rd century BCE contains a reference to a Tamil script named 'Damili'. Southworth suggests that
1292-405: Is generally taken to have been completed by the 8th century, was characterised by a number of phonological and grammatical changes. In phonological terms, the most important shifts were the virtual disappearance of the aytam (ஃ), an old phoneme, the coalescence of the alveolar and dental nasals, and the transformation of the alveolar plosive into a rhotic . In grammar, the most important change
1360-409: Is generally used in formal writing and speech. For instance, it is the language of textbooks, of much of Tamil literature and of public speaking and debate. In recent times, however, koṭuntamiḻ has been making inroads into areas that have traditionally been considered the province of centamiḻ . Most contemporary cinema, theatre and popular entertainment on television and radio, for example,
1428-410: Is in koṭuntamiḻ , and many politicians use it to bring themselves closer to their audience. The increasing use of koṭuntamiḻ in modern times has led to the emergence of unofficial 'standard' spoken dialects. In India, the 'standard' koṭuntamiḻ , rather than on any one dialect, but has been significantly influenced by the dialects of Thanjavur and Madurai . In Sri Lanka, the standard
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#17327798921801496-510: Is interpreted as it was one of the ancient settlements of Naga tribe of ancient Sri Lanka. Another name indicating Thirukkovil, Kaṇṭapāṇantuṟai , is also mentioned in Purva Charithiram manuscript. Kalinga King Bhuvaneka Gajabahu and his wife Cholan princess Thambathi Nallaal visited Batticaloa region during their way to Katirkamam . Prasannajith, the kinglet of Batticaloa welcomed the royal couple and requested them to repair
1564-771: Is not always consistently applied. ISO 15919 is an international standard for the transliteration of Tamil and other Indic scripts into Latin characters. It uses diacritics to map the much larger set of Brahmic consonants and vowels to Latin script , and thus the alphabets of various languages, including English. Apart from the usual numerals, Tamil has numerals for 10, 100 and 1000. Symbols for day, month, year, debit, credit, as above, rupee, and numeral are present as well. Tamil also uses several historical fractional signs. /f/ , /z/ , /ʂ/ and /ɕ/ are only found in loanwords and may be considered marginal phonemes, though they are traditionally not seen as fully phonemic. Tamil has two diphthongs : /aɪ̯/ ஐ and /aʊ̯/ ஔ ,
1632-592: Is predominantly spoken in Tamil Nadu , India, and the Northern and Eastern provinces of Sri Lanka . It has significant speaking populations in Malaysia , Singapore , and among diaspora communities . Tamil has been recognized as a classical language by the Indian government and holds official status in Tamil Nadu, Puducherry and Singapore. The earliest extant Tamil literary works and their commentaries celebrate
1700-409: Is the Tolkāppiyam , an early work on Tamil grammar and poetics, whose oldest layers could be as old as the late 2nd century BCE. Many literary works in Old Tamil have also survived. These include a corpus of 2,381 poems collectively known as Sangam literature . These poems are usually dated to between the 1st century BCE and 5th century CE. The evolution of Old Tamil into Middle Tamil , which
1768-621: Is the term referred to seven popular temples in Batticaloa region - Kokkadichcholai , Sithandy, Thirukkovil, Mandur, Kovil Porativu , Verugal and Ukanthai . They are believed to be revered by the Chieftains ruled the country. Some historians consider the term "paṭai" in Thiruppataik kovil refers to weapon of Murugan - Vel, and ignores Kokkadichcholai from Thiruppataik Kovil list as it is a Sivan temple. Old Batticaloa District
1836-428: Is unusual to apply the sacred term "Thirukkovil" to not only a specific temple but to its whereabout too. "Mattakkalappu Purva charithiram" , the 18th century CE Tamil chronicle of Eastern Sri Lanka, narrates that Nagarmunai Subramanya Kovil was the first temple initially constructed in agamic tradition at Batticaloa region and it was subsequently known as "Thirukkovil" (prominent temple). The old name Nagarmunai
1904-793: Is used as one of the languages of education in Malaysia , along with English, Malay and Mandarin. A large community of Pakistani Tamils speakers exists in Karachi , Pakistan , which includes Tamil-speaking Hindus as well as Christians and Muslims – including some Tamil-speaking Muslim refugees from Sri Lanka. There are about 100 Tamil Hindu families in Madrasi Para colony in Karachi. They speak impeccable Tamil along with Urdu, Punjabi and Sindhi. Many in Réunion , Guyana , Fiji , Suriname , and Trinidad and Tobago have Tamil origins, but only
1972-562: The Kandyan Kings . The stone inscriptions such as Thambiluvil Inscription confirm that once this deity was revered by the kings such as Vijayabahu VII of Kotte and Rajasinha II of Kandy . This temple has been substantially mentioned as Thirukkovil Pagoda in the Dutch maps of Ceylon starting from 16th century CE . The temple was looted and destructed by Portuguese in 1620s and it could only resurrect after two centuries. However,
2040-465: The Pandiyan Kings for the organization of long-termed Tamil Sangams , which researched, developed and made amendments in Tamil language. Even though the name of the language which was developed by these Tamil Sangams is mentioned as Tamil, the period when the name "Tamil" came to be applied to the language is unclear, as is the precise etymology of the name. The earliest attested use of the name
2108-599: The University of Madras , was one of the earliest dictionaries published in Indian languages. A strong strain of linguistic purism emerged in the early 20th century, culminating in the Pure Tamil Movement which called for removal of all Sanskritic elements from Tamil. It received some support from Dravidian parties . This led to the replacement of a significant number of Sanskrit loanwords by Tamil equivalents, though many others remain. According to
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2176-491: The 11th century, retain many features of the Vaishnava paribasai , a special form of Tamil developed in the 9th and 10th centuries that reflect Vaishnavite religious and spiritual values. Several castes have their own sociolects which most members of that caste traditionally used regardless of where they come from. It is often possible to identify a person's caste by their speech. For example, Tamil Brahmins tend to speak
2244-462: The Batticaloan equivalent post for head of trustee), belongs to Vellalar caste of Thambiluvil village played a main role in the administration while "வன்னியனார்" (Vaṉṉiyaṉār - former kinglet of Batticaloa region ) of Karavakupattu, belongs to Paṇikkaṉā matriclan of Mukkuvar caste supervised the rituals and other main activities of temple. Vaṇṇakkar is expected to be from Kantan kuty, one of
2312-481: The Indian state of Haryana , purportedly as a rebuff to Punjab , though there was no attested Tamil-speaking population in the state, and was later replaced by Punjabi , in 2010. In Malaysia, 543 primary education government schools are available fully in Tamil as the medium of instruction . The establishment of Tamil-medium schools has been in process in Myanmar to provide education completely in Tamil language by
2380-474: The Indian state of Tamil Nadu and one of the 22 languages under schedule 8 of the constitution of India . It is one of the official languages of the union territories of Puducherry and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands . Tamil is also one of the official languages of Singapore . Tamil is one of the official and national languages of Sri Lanka, along with Sinhala . It was once given nominal official status in
2448-590: The Tamil language, Kannada still preserves a lot from its roots. As part of the southern family of Indian languages and situated relatively close to the northern parts of India, Kannada also shares some Sanskrit words, similar to Malayalam. Many of the formerly used words in Tamil have been preserved with little change in Kannada. This shows a relative parallel to Tamil, even as Tamil has undergone some changes in modern ways of speaking. According to Hindu legend, Tamil or in personification form Tamil Thāi (Mother Tamil)
2516-696: The Tamils who settled there 200 years ago. Tamil language is available as a course in some local school boards and major universities in Canada and the month of January has been declared "Tamil Heritage Month" by the Parliament of Canada . Tamil enjoys a special status of protection under Article 6(b), Chapter 1 of the Constitution of South Africa and is taught as a subject in schools in KwaZulu-Natal province. Recently, it has been rolled out as
2584-442: The ancient language ( sankattamiḻ ), a modern literary and formal style ( centamiḻ ), and a modern colloquial form ( koṭuntamiḻ ). These styles shade into each other, forming a stylistic continuum. For example, it is possible to write centamiḻ with a vocabulary drawn from caṅkattamiḻ , or to use forms associated with one of the other variants while speaking koṭuntamiḻ . In modern times, centamiḻ
2652-418: The chief temple of his country, Nagarmunai Subrahmanya Swami Kovil. Bhuvaneka Gajabahu sought the assistance of his father in law Thirucholan and constructed Nagarmunai Kovil with the chola immigrants sent by the same. He consecrated the temple and renamed Thiukkovil since it was the first temple erected in agamic tradition in Batticaloa region. Prasannajith gifted his southern territory to Bhuvaneka Gajabahu as
2720-689: The culture associated with the Neolithic complexes of South India, but it has also been related to the Harappan civilization . Scholars categorise the attested history of the language into three periods: Old Tamil (300 BCE–700 CE), Middle Tamil (700–1600) and Modern Tamil (1600–present). About of the approximately 100,000 inscriptions found by the Archaeological Survey of India in India are in Tamil Nadu. Of them, most are in Tamil, with only about 5 percent in other languages. In 2004,
2788-952: The dialect of Madurai , and iṅkaṭe in some northern dialects. Even now, in the Coimbatore area, it is common to hear " akkaṭṭa " meaning "that place". Although Tamil dialects do not differ significantly in their vocabulary, there are a few exceptions. The dialects spoken in Sri Lanka retain many words and grammatical forms that are not in everyday use in India, and use many other words slightly differently. Tamil dialects include Central Tamil dialect , Kongu Tamil , Madras Bashai , Madurai Tamil , Nellai Tamil , Kumari Tamil in India ; Batticaloa Tamil dialect , Jaffna Tamil dialect , Negombo Tamil dialect in Sri Lanka; and Malaysian Tamil in Malaysia. Sankethi dialect in Karnataka has been heavily influenced by Kannada . The dialect of
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2856-399: The differences between Tamil and Malayalam demonstrate a pre-historic divergence of the western dialect, the process of separation into a distinct language, Malayalam, was not completed until sometime in the 13th or 14th century. Additionally Kannada is also relatively close to the Tamil language and shares the format of the formal ancient Tamil language. While there are some variations from
2924-647: The district of Palakkad in Kerala has many Malayalam loanwords, has been influenced by Malayalam's syntax, and has a distinctive Malayalam accent. Similarly, Tamil spoken in Kanyakumari District has more unique words and phonetic style than Tamil spoken at other parts of Tamil Nadu. The words and phonetics are so different that a person from Kanyakumari district is easily identifiable by their spoken Tamil. Hebbar and Mandyam dialects, spoken by groups of Tamil Vaishnavites who migrated to Karnataka in
2992-699: The hill country . Tamil or dialects of it were used widely in the state of Kerala as the major language of administration, literature and common usage until the 12th century CE. Tamil was also used widely in inscriptions found in southern Andhra Pradesh districts of Chittoor and Nellore until the 12th century CE. Tamil was used for inscriptions from the 10th through 14th centuries in southern Karnataka districts such as Kolar , Mysore , Mandya and Bengaluru . There are currently sizeable Tamil-speaking populations descended from colonial-era migrants in Malaysia , Singapore , Philippines , Mauritius , South Africa , Indonesia, Thailand, Burma , and Vietnam . Tamil
3060-413: The homage of the Tamil inhabitants of Southern Batticaloa - known as Ampara District today. They still praise the guardian deity at Thirukkovil and celebrate his Mega fiesta "tīrttam" Festival annually with full of devotion and harmony. Tamil language Sri Lanka Singapore Malaysia Canada and United States Tamil ( தமிழ் , Tamiḻ , pronounced [t̪amiɻ] )
3128-601: The honor of Desathukkovil (Tēcattukkōvil, royal temple) of the Batticaloa region . Archaeological and historical evidences suggest that Cholan , Kotte and Kandyan kings maintained strong relations with this temple in the past. Kovil is the Tamil equivalent of shrine or temple. All Hindu temples in Tamil Speaking region are generally known as Thirukkovils adding the prefix 'Thiru' which means great or sacred. The inhabitants of Eastern Sri Lanka praise that it
3196-432: The introduction of new aspectual auxiliaries and more complex sentence structures, and with the emergence of a more rigid word order that resembles the syntactic argument structure of English. In 1578, Portuguese Christian missionaries published a Tamil prayer book in old Tamil script named Thambiran Vanakkam , thus making Tamil the first Indian language to be printed and published. The Tamil Lexicon , published by
3264-461: The latter of which is restricted to a few lexical items. Tamil employs agglutinative grammar, where suffixes are used to mark noun class , number , and case , verb tense and other grammatical categories. Tamil's standard metalinguistic terminology and scholarly vocabulary is itself Tamil, as opposed to the Sanskrit that is standard for most Indo-Aryan languages . Much of Tamil grammar
3332-423: The name comes from tam-miḻ > tam-iḻ "self-speak", or "our own speech". Kamil Zvelebil suggests an etymology of tam-iḻ , with tam meaning "self" or "one's self", and " -iḻ " having the connotation of "unfolding sound". Alternatively, he suggests a derivation of tamiḻ < tam-iḻ < * tav-iḻ < * tak-iḻ , meaning in origin "the proper process (of speaking)". However, this
3400-537: The old aspect and time markers. The Nannūl remains the standard normative grammar for modern literary Tamil, which therefore continues to be based on Middle Tamil of the 13th century rather than on Modern Tamil. Colloquial spoken Tamil, in contrast, shows a number of changes. The negative conjugation of verbs, for example, has fallen out of use in Modern Tamil – instead, negation is expressed either morphologically or syntactically. Modern spoken Tamil also shows
3468-429: The prominent matriclans of Thambiluvil village. Karavaku Vanniyanar is identified in the name of "Kovil Vanniyanar" during his temple activities. A post named "வட்டாரப் பிரதிநிதி" (Vaṭṭārap piratiniti, Regional representatives) was given to each villages and "Pattus" of Batticaloa, from Panama to Kallady. Nur Yalman , a Turkish anthropologist observed "Kudukkai Kuruthal", a ritual based on Caste and Clan system, which
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#17327798921803536-435: The purpose of another inscription is unclear which is also donated by same King. Annual Festival of Thirukkovil is called as "Aadi Amavasai theertham" ("ஆடி அமாவாசைத் தீர்த்தம்""Āṭi amāvācait tīrttam" simply "tīrttam") which is a mega festival of South-East Sri Lanka. It is celebrated for 18 days and finished on Aadi Amavasya, the new moon day comes on Aadi month (July–August) of Tamil Hindu Calendar. Necrolatry carried out in
3604-552: The results of these facts, Vaṭṭārap piratinitis north to Kalmunai ignore their responsibilities on temple. At last, Thirukkovil lost its primitive state significance permanently. However, the Vannakkar-based Paṇṭu paravaṇi system still continues compromised along with the modern administration system of President, Secretary and Treasurer in which Kovil Vanniyanar post was integrated into President post. Hence, Thirukkovil Temple could maintain its position as "Tecathuk Kovil" with
3672-424: The right to rule their own temple. And the old Mattakkalappu Desam divided de facto two new districts in 1961 - one remained in the same name while latter got the name "Amparai". As the capital of newly formed Batticaloa District , Mamangam, another ancient temple situated near Puliyantivu , which also celebrated its annual festival on Adi Amavasai, subsequently began to replace Thirukkovil in northern Batticaloa. As
3740-517: The rituals and its state importance through Batticaloa region were continued in its grievous period also. Thomas Christie, an Inspector of Hospitals of British Ceylon describes the antiquity of Sanctum, the sculptures and chariot belonged to Thirukkovil during his journey to Tangalle from Trincomalee in 1802. Thirukkovil is usually referred as thesaththukkovil as well as thiruppadaikkovil . Thiruppadai Kovil (திருப்படைக் கோவில் Tiruppaṭaik kōvil Literally "Holy Temple of Soldiers' Camp or weapons")
3808-594: The shore of Thirukkovil sea on an Adi Amavasai is considered to give peace to the spirits of ancestors. A Dutch merchant Johann Herman Von Bree states about the Annual Festival of Thirukkovil where the assembly of "Dessave" (Chieftain) and the thousand of people of Batticaloa happened in July month of 1603 CE. Even after the colonial period, Temple was administrated by a conservative method based on clan system - பண்டு பரவணி ("Paṇṭu paravaṇi"). The வண்ணக்கர் (Vaṇṇakkar,
3876-470: The standard characters, six characters taken from the Grantha script , which was used in the Tamil region to write Sanskrit, are sometimes used to represent sounds not native to Tamil, that is, words adopted from Sanskrit, Prakrit , and other languages. The traditional system prescribed by classical grammars for writing loan-words, which involves respelling them in accordance with Tamil phonology, remains, but
3944-434: The temple on time for the service and temple administrators terminated her service as she was 80 years old then. She couldn't bear that pain of leaving lord Citravelyudhan and cried and yelled all the night in the temple. Next day morning no one could find Thangammai in the temple premises but miraculously there was an eight-year-old girl getting ready for aarti. Devotees and administrators surprised when she revealed herself she
4012-526: The word for "here"— iṅku in Centamil (the classic variety)—has evolved into iṅkū in the Kongu dialect of Coimbatore , inga in the dialects of Thanjavur and Palakkad , and iṅkai in some dialects of Sri Lanka . Old Tamil's iṅkaṇ (where kaṇ means place) is the source of iṅkane in the dialect of Tirunelveli , Old Tamil iṅkiṭṭu is the source of iṅkuṭṭu in
4080-534: Was a Tamilian himself, in a joint sitting of both houses of the Indian Parliament on 6 June 2004. The socio-linguistic situation of Tamil is characterised by diglossia : there are two separate registers varying by socioeconomic status , a high register and a low one. Tamil dialects are primarily differentiated from each other by the fact that they have undergone different phonological changes and sound shifts in evolving from Old Tamil. For example,
4148-600: Was claimed to be dated to around 580 BCE. John Guy states that Tamil was the lingua franca for early maritime traders from India. Tamil language inscriptions written in Brahmi script have been discovered in Sri Lanka and on trade goods in Thailand and Egypt. In November 2007, an excavation at Quseir-al-Qadim revealed Egyptian pottery dating back to first century BCE with ancient Tamil Brahmi inscriptions. There are
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#17327798921804216-578: Was continued till 1950s. The structure of Sanctum is identified with Pandyan architecture . Inscriptions and Segments of broken sandstone pillars can be observed in the courtyard around the temple. Two main inscriptions are preserved in a small room south to temple entrance. One of them - Thambiluvil Inscription found in Thambiluvil Sri Kannaki amman temple tells about the donation of "Vovil" (probably an irrigation water source) by King Vijayabahu VII of Kotte kingdom (1507-1521) while
4284-540: Was created by Lord Shiva . Murugan , revered as the Tamil God, along with sage Agastya , brought it to the people. Tamil, like other Dravidian languages, ultimately descends from the Proto-Dravidian language , which was most likely spoken around the third millennium BCE, possibly in the region around the lower Godavari river basin. The material evidence suggests that the speakers of Proto-Dravidian were of
4352-571: Was divided into 8 "pattu"s (Administrative divisions) - Akkaraipattu , Karaivakupattu , Eruvilpattu , Manmunaippattu , Sammanthuraipattu , Porativupattu , Eravurpattu , Kiriwittipattu along with three other adjacent pattus - Koralaipattu , Panamaipattu and Nadukadupattu . Ritual rights in Thirukkovil Annual Festivals were shared with whole inhabitants of 7 main pattus and Panamaipattu of Batticaloa region. According to Temple records, it can be confirmed that this custom
4420-504: Was none other than Thangammai. Though the origin of the Thirukkovil temple is uncertain, it is assumed that the temple was initially a small thatched hut worshipped by Vedda and Naga tribes of this region. It was later expanded and built according to agamic tradition during the Chola rule in Sri Lanka (993-1070 CE). The deity here was venerated as the guardian deity of the Batticaloa region , ruled by Vannimai chieftains, feudatory under
4488-446: Was observed in another Thiruppadaikkovil Kokkadichcholai . After the independence of the country, the reliability of Paṇṭu paravaṇi was questioned in the mid 20th Century and had to face many court cases. Since the old settlement around the temple was started to be distinguished as two villages separately - Thirukkovil and Thambiluvil, where the latter had the post of Vannakkar , the inhabitants of Thirukkovil raised their voice for
4556-504: Was the lingua franca for early maritime traders, with inscriptions found in places like Sri Lanka , Thailand , and Egypt . The language has a well-documented history with literary works like Sangam literature , consisting of over 2,000 poems. Tamil script evolved from Tamil Brahmi, and later, the vatteluttu script was used until the current script was standardized. The language has a distinct grammatical structure, with agglutinative morphology that allows for complex word formations. Tamil
4624-451: Was the emergence of the present tense. The present tense evolved out of the verb kil ( கில் ), meaning "to be possible" or "to befall". In Old Tamil, this verb was used as an aspect marker to indicate that an action was micro-durative, non-sustained or non-lasting, usually in combination with a time marker such as ṉ ( ன் ). In Middle Tamil, this usage evolved into a present tense marker – kiṉṟa ( கின்ற ) – which combined
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