territory in course of time. Many place names like Madurai, and names of countries like Sumatra (Sumadurai), Borneo (Porunai), Malaya (Malayam)etc., still bear testimony to the ancient Tamilians having had acquaintances with peoples across the seas. Oceanic navigation was undertaken for the first time only by Tamilian seamen. All kinds of naval craft including ocean going merchantmen were built originally in Tamilian ship-yards, and hence the Latin names navis (T.nƒvƒy) and barca (T.padagu).

     Despite the damaging nature of his statement, Dr. Caldwell is not to be blamed, as he had no knowledge of the ancient classics at all. It is only the anti-Tamil historians of Tamil Nadu, who take it for an authority, that are to blame.

     Having not even heard of the submerged original Pandiyan territory, Dr.Caldwell considered Korkai as the place of origin of the Tamilian civilization.

     He writes, “It would appear from the unanimous voice of ancient legends that the earliest Dravidian civilization was that of the Tamilians of the Pƒ–dya kingdom, and that the first place where they erected a city and established a state was Kolkai, on the Tƒmrapar–i river (see p.99), near the southern extremity of the peninsula.”¹

     He thought that the indigenous civilization of the Tamilians was only elementary in nature, and was later developed by the Brahmins.

     Another, humiliating statement is the planets ‘Mercury’ and ‘Saturn’ were not known to the early Tamilians.

     It must be definitely known that the discovery of the seven planets, viz., Sun, Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, and Saturn, and the institution of the seven-day week; were acts of the ancient Tamilians, who were the first to attain proficiency in Astronomy. As a result of Sanskritisation of all Tamil nomenclature started by the Brahmins during the mediaeval period, the Tamil names of the two week days ‘AŠivan’ and ‘Kƒri’ were replaced by the Sanskrit

1.D.C.G.Introducton,p.2
2.Ibid,1.4