and even 'ships' (small 'decked' coasting vessels-toṇī, oṭam, vallam; kappaḷ, paṭavu), no acquaintance with any people beyond the sea, except in Ceylon, which was then, perhaps, accessible on foot at low water; and no word expressive of the geographical idea of 'island, or 'continent'. They were well acquainted with 'agriculture' (er='plough,' velan-mai=‘agriculture'), and delighted in 'war'. They were armed with 'bows' (vil) and 'arrows' (ampu), with 'spears' (veḷ) and 'swords' (vāḷ). All the ordinary or necessary arts of life, including 'spinning' (nūl), 'weaving' (ney), and 'dyeing' (niram) existed among them. They excelled in 'pottery,' as their places of sepulchre show." The late Professor P. T. Srinivasa Aiyangar (lyengar) compiled a remarkable work,² in which, on the basis of native Dravidian words in Old Tamil, he has given us a most detailed survey of the type of culture in all its ramifications which obtained among the Primitive Tamil or Dravidian people before they began to come under the influence of the Aryan speech and culture.

Hindu tradition is vaguely conscious of Hindu religious ideas and philosophy, practices and ritual falling under two great categories- āgama and nigama. Nigama stands for the Vedic, i.e. the pure Aryan world of ideas, centring round what has been called the Vedic karma-kāṇḍa, the practical religion of Vedic inspiration in which the homa or fire-sacrifice to the gods of the Vedic world forms the most noteworthy thing. Āgama indicates what may be described as the Tantric and Puranic domain of religion and ritual, and it includes Yoga as a special form of mystico-religious ideology and practice. Pure Nigama religion is what we see in the great Vedic sacrifices which are still performed from time to time. Āgamic religion and ritual is largely influenced by the Nigamic or Vedic, but it forms a world apart.

In ordinary Hindu usage, there is a good deal of compromise between the two. Take, for example, the distinctive Hindu ritual of the pūjā, by which we mean the worship of an image or a symbol of the divinity by treating the latter, after it has been consecrated, as a living personality, and bringing before it, as before a living being, cooked food, vestments, ornaments, and other offerings which are usable by a man, and showing grateful worship by offering to it flowers, the produce of the earth, and incense, and by waving lights in front of it and playing and singing before it. This is something which is quite different from the Vedic rite of the homa, in which a wood fire is lighted on an altar and certain offerings of food in the shape of meat and fat, butter and milk, cakes of barley, and soma or spirituous drink, are offered to the gods, who are not at all

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²Pre-Aryan Tamil Culture, Madras, 1930