originally undertaken in 1833, by Rev. J. Knight of the American Mission of Jaffna. The first title read “Tamil Dictionary” and was one among the three dictionaries he began to work on. Later due to Knight’s death, it was changed to read “Manual Dictionary of the Tamil Language” and was prepared by Pandit Chandrashekaraṉ, a native scholar of Ceylon. An appendix was added by Vedagiri Mudaliar of Kaḷathūr (Madras). In 1842, Rev. Levi Spaulding published it. Later it came to be popularly called as the “Jaffna Dictionary” or Maṇippāy-Akarāti. Though moulded on the framework of Beschi’s Caturakarāti, it was an improvement both qualitatively and quantitatively. In the introduction, the compiler claims that it is nearly four times the size of the entire Caturakarāti. One notable feature of this is that many Sanskrit words have been added from Sanskrit Lexicons (like Wilson’s Sanskrit Dictionary) without considering whether they were in use either in literature or common speech. This inclusion of many Sanskrit words increased the vocabulary. Very few words that were in common use in the Tamil country were included. The arrangement was in the alphabetical order. Despite a few defects, this book was a popular dictionary. The popularity it enjoyed showed the ever increasing need for a good Tamil dictionary. Several editions followed and each successive edition was an enlargement on the earlier one. These enlarged editions were named Pērakarāti or Virivakarāti. Errors increased as editions increased. One edition by Mr. N. Katrivēl Piḷḷai is to a certain extent devoid of numerous errors and may be considered an improvement on the others.

The Caṅkam Dictionary otherwise called Maturaittamilppēr akarāti had its first volume printed in 1910. Sri C. W. Katirvēl Piḷḷai of Jaffna commenced to compile material for this work. Due to his demise before completion, the Madura Tamil Caṅkam undertook its printing. Many scholars have contributed their share towards it. Both words of high and common Tamil are included in it. Both words of high and common Tamil are included in it. It gives in the Appendix words recently loaned from such languages as Portuguese, English and Hindi. It is modelled after Beschi’s Caturakarāti and has four divisions and the invocatory verses of all except the first part are borrowed verbatim from