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TAMIL STUDIES

Sendan) Chulamani a Jaina Tamil classic was composed by Tolamoli Devar in memory of the king's father Maravarman Avani Chulamani. Maravarman Arikesari (No. 4) who boasts of having won the battle of Nelveli (நெல்வேலியில் வென்மாறன்) must be identified with Sundara or Kun Pandya. Had the impaling of 8000 Jains by Trignana Sambanda—an event so much exaggerated and described with pride in the Saivapuranas—been an accomplished fact it must have been referred to in the plates. Arikesari Parankusan had the title of Ter Seliyan—a name which occurs in the above commentary as Ven-Ter Selivan and as the founder of the second Sangam. Tatila Varman Parantakan, known to the Tamils as Komaran Sadaiyan, was a famous king and the donor of the Velvikudi grant. He had the title of Srivara and granted the village of Srivara-Mangalam in the Nanguneri taluk, Tinnevelly district, to a Magada Brahman named Sujjata Bhatta. He was a devout worshipper of Vishnu. His minister Marankari built a temple and an agrahara in A. D. 770 to God Narasimha at the foot of the Elephant hill or Yanaimalai near Madura. Varaguna I might have been the builder of the Vishnu temple at Varaguna-Mangalam. His grandson was a staunch Saivite, converted probably to that faith by his minister and Saiva saint Manikka Vachakar, while his great-grandson Rajasimha III or Srivallabha Deva was a Vaishnava owing to the influence of the Vishnuvite Selva Nambi, his purohit and religious preceptor. In the reign of this last Pandya lived the Vishnuvite saints Periyalvar and Andal.

Some of these facts will be found stated in early