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Х

THE TEN TENS

'Padirruppattu' or the 'Ten tens' is the fourth of the eight poetical anthologies, the collection and arrangement of which are attributed to the third academy. As implied by the name it had originally ten books, of which the first and the last are now lost. The remaining eight books were composed by eight different authors in commemoration of the military exploits, the liberality and other noble qualities of eight Chera kings of ancient times. It is said that the authors of these books were given enormous presents by these kings. Parts of this work night have been written, so early as the end of the second or the beginning of the third century ; and Chera was one of the Kodun-Tamil countries according to the early Tamil grammarians. The work under review is, therefore, a museum of obsolete words and expressions, archaic grammatical forms and terminations, and obscure customs and manners of the early western Tamil people who were the ancestors of the modern Malayalis.