பக்கம்:தொல்காப்பியம் எழுத்ததிகாரம்.pdf/35

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இப்பக்கம் மெய்ப்பு பார்க்கப்படவில்லை

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The worship of God Siva is as old as the Tamil world. Is the 6th stanza of Purananuru composed in honor of Murukudumi Peruvazhuthi (முதுகுடுமிப் பெருவழுதி) who was a descendant of the Pandian king Nedion of Pahruli fame, it is stated that the Royal umbrella of the prince (USSR) would go down only when he was worshipping the great three Eyed-God; hence the antiquity of the worship of Siva in the Tamil Country. A close study of the Tojkappiam and its age impresses on us the fact that even before the days of St. Tolkappiar, the Tamil Country was the seat of a bigh civilisation fostered by an advanced race who had developed the manifold branches of arts and sciences under the able rule and patronage of the three ancient princes of the Chera, Chola and Pandian kingdoms and who had a monolbeistic religion based on the soundest principles of Philosophy. Space does not permit here a detailed account of it. At any rate the date of Tolkappiam must be fixed prior to that of Valmiki's work which is dated earlier than the Seventh Century B.C. Tolkapplam is divide into three parts:-() Orthography (*) Etymology and Syntax combined, and (iii) the Science of literature and prosody. It is this last part which gives us a scientific survey of the Empire of ideas, of which the ancient Tamils were born citizens. It is as well a clear index of the mighty growth of the Tamil genius at a time when all the rest of the world was groping in the twilight of knowledge. In it we discern the germs which in later times developed into the stupendous systems of social custom and supreme Philosophy It is highly interesting to note at this distance of time that in the age of Tolkappiam the Tamilians had a grasp of the fundamental principles of Universal Phonetics. The Tamil world of to-day is deeply indebted to the genius of Mr. P. V. Manickam Naicker, R.E., M.C.L., M.L.E., Executive Engineer, for his evolution of the science from an investigation of the rules of Grammar laid down in the initial chapters of எழுத்த திகாரம். In brief he has made hen all the mighty Browth citizens. Teideas, of which gives