race whose ancestors had occupied the regions watered by the Jamna. This may be inferred boih from the name of the king and that of his capital which was called Madura after the celebrated city which adorned of old, as it does still the banks of that great tributary of the Ganges.' The kingdom is mentioned by Pliny (A. D. 77), by the author of the Periplus of the Erythran Sea and by Ptolemy.
In his commentary on the prefatory sutra to the Tolkapyam, Nacchinarkiniyar describes a tradition relating to the migration of the Dravidian race, which is as follows:- The sage Agastya repaired to Dwarka (Tam. Tuvarapati) and, taking with him eighteen kings of the line of Sri Krishna, eighteen families of Vels or Velirs and others, moved to the South with the Aruvalar[1] tribes, There, he had all the forests cleared and built up kingdoms settling therein all the people he had brought with him. One of the principalities thus founded by him was Dwarasamudram in the Mysore State, Kapilar, a Brahman poet probably of the second century A. D., addresses the reigning
- ↑ The Aruvalars seem to have been the ancestors of the Kurumbas. They were not liked by the Velirs or Vellalas as will be evident from the bad meanings which these Tamil words acquired in later times and from the following quotation.
வடுக ரருவாளர் வான்கரு நாடர்
சுடுகாடு பேயெருமை யென்றிவையாறும்
குறுகா ரறிவு டையார்.(The wise will not approach the Vadugas, Aruvalas, Karnatas the burning ground, the devil and the buffalo.)
