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TAMIL STUDIES

the Dravidian languages may be affiliated morphologically to the Uralo-Altaic or the Finno-Tartaric family of tongues which comprise the Samoyedic, the Finnic, the Turkic, the Mongolian and the Tungusian groups. To the same family belonged Accadian - a fully developed language spoken by a highly civilised Turanian race that had lived in Assyria, Chaldea, Susiana and Media. The learned bishop after indicating the points of resemblance in grammar and vocabulary between Accadian and the Dravidian languages, comes to the conclusion ‘that the Dravidian race though resident in India from a period long prior to the commencement of the Christian era, originated in the Central tracts of Asia—the seed plot of nations-and that from thence after parting company with the Aryans and the Ugro-Turanians, and leaving a colony in Baluchistan, they entered India by way of the Indus.'

In the language of the Behistun tablets (Accadian) we find largely used the consonants of the cerebral class, t, d, n; the genetive termination a அ as in na, nina, or inna, and dative ikka or ikki (Tam. கு, ku); ordinals ending in im (Tam. ஆம் am); and the second person pronoun ni, nin (Tam. நீ, நின்). There are other points of linguistic affinity between Tamil and the Altaic languages and the reader is referred to Dr. Caldwell's invaluable Comparative Grammar which ought to be in the hands of every student of the Dravidian languages. The connection of the Tamils with Asia Minor is further