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APPENDIX II
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dya, who is known in Tamil religious literature as Nedumara Nayanar of Nelveli, he might be identified with No. 4, Maravarman Arikesari (A. D. 680) given in our genealogical table. Thus, we find the pauranic accounts of these historic facts are grossly anachronous and at variance with those which one might glean from early Tamil literature and the epigraphical reports.


APPENDIX II

NOTE ON AGASTYA'S GRAMMAR

Quite recently there has appeared a small book, entitled Per-Agattiya-Tirattu, which profeses to be a collection of aphorisms from 'the great grammar of Agastya.' It contains, besides, a set of rules which Pandits believe were composed by Kazharamban at the bidding of his revered teacher Agastya. Both these collections of excerpts seem to be for the following reasons forgeries foisted, like so many other works, upon that great mythical sage.

1. The style is simple and very modern ; it contains too many Sanskrit words; and the difference between the language of this work and that of Tolkapyar, his direct disciple, is patent in every one of its Sutras.

2. In the days of Agastya the number of Sanskrit words in Tamil must have been very small, and the necessity for framing rules for the loan of Aryan words could not have been felt, as it was in the days of Buddhamitra and Pavanandi. It was on this account that Tolkapyar did not give any definite rule under that head, except in a vague manner thus:—

சிதைந்தன வரினுமியைந் தனவரையார்.