The origin of the three dynastic names, Pandiya, Chola and Chera

All the western philologists, including Dr. Caldwell, had an indelible wrong notion in their minds, that the Tamilians were immigrants from the Mediterranean region and that they were indebted to the Aryans for all the higher arts of life. This strong prejudice effectively stood in their way of understanding the true meaning and origin of all the important words connected with the civilization and culture of the ancient Tamilians.


It is true that Arjuna, one of the five Pandava brothers, married a daughter of the contemporary Pandiyan king in the course of his many wanderings. But this alliance does not warrant the derivation of the name Pandiyan from Pƒ-du, the name of the father of the Pandavas, as all the three Tamilian dynasties with their typical names had existed for a very long time before the Maha Bharata war, in which all the three Tamil kings took part in some way or other. The Pandiyan and Chola kings fought in the side of the Pandavas as their allies, while the Chera king, Peruj† Š Šu Udiyan Ch„ralƒdan took up a neutral position, and fed both the belligerent armies sumptuously throughout the period of the war. In recognition of this unparalleled hospitality, the Chera king was honoured with the epithet Peruj† Š Šu, of the gargantuan feed, and highly praised in a poem (PuŠam 2) by Murajiy‡r Mudinƒgarƒyar. That part of the eulogium relating to the feed is translated by K.G. Sesha Aiyar as follows:


"Majestic monarch! when the ten times ten Kauravas, crowned with golden tumbai wreaths Wrathful in battle ‘gainst the heroes five Lords of the fiery steeds with tossing mane Their patrimony lusting after fought Thou didst unstinted savoury food supply To either host, till all the Kurus fell."


The Chera king's free supply of food to the rival hosts at Kuruk™tra is celebrated in Silappadikaram (29:24) also, in unequivocal terms.


The name Pƒ-diyan is derived from pƒ-di ‘a bull’. As the wild or uncastrated male bovine animal was taken by the ancient Tamilians as an ideal of valour and obstinacy, a hero was metonymically called kƒ˜ai, the most common word for bull. This usage is now restricted to the literary dialect. Tauromachy which is still practised in Tamil Nadu, Spain, and Mexico attests to the ancient popular opinion. St. Valluvar has compared an industrious and indefatigable ruler to a bullock. He says in the 624th Kura˜, that troubles will vanish before the man, who struggles against difficulties as a bullock drawing a cart succesfully through deep mire. So, it is easy and reasonable to derive the word Pan-diyan from Pƒ-di, by the simple addition of the masculine singular suffix ‘an’.


It was customary in olden days for kings to claim descent from a heavenly body or a deity. Accordingly, the three dynasts of ancient Tamil Nadu claimed descent from the three luminaries, which were worshipped as deities in the primitive times. The Pandiyan king claimed descent from the Moon, the Chola from the Sun, and the Chera from Fire.


The Pandiyan king fixed his choice upon the Moon, because he enjoyed the coolness of the lunar rays best, his territory having been traversed by the equator and scorched by the tropical sun, though the other two Tamilian kings also had their royal umbrella made of white silk, and thus gave it a moon-like appearance.


The Chola king adopted the Sun as the progenitor of his line, because the Moon was already appropriated by the Pan-diyan king and the northern part of his territory which seems to have extended upto the Vindhyas or Himalayas in the early days, needed warmth during the chilly part of the year so much as to appreciate the Sun, which has also the dignity of being the principal heavenly body, without whose light and energy no life is possible on earth.


The Chera king regarded Fire as the original ancestor of his line, because that as the only luminary left to him, and the wild fire which broke out and spread very often during summer in his mountain forests, and evoked awe and reverence.


The solar and lunar lines of kings of North India were but off-shoots of the Chola and Pandiyan lines of the South respectively, and this accounts for the remote ancestors having been common to the main and branch lines.


The first Pandiyan capital was called Madurai after the imaginary progenitor of that royal line. Madurai, lit. ‘the lunar city’, is derived from madi, ‘the moon’. Cf. kudirai, ‘horse’ from kudi, ‘to jump’. ‘Madirai’ later changed into ‘Madura’. Cf. edirkai-edukai, ‘rhyme’.


The whole of pre-Aryan India was originally divided into three kingdoms, viz., Pandiya, Chola and Chera, and peopled mainly by the Tamilicans, the Tamils inhabiting the South and the Dravidians the North.


The descendants of those Tamilians who escaped the first inroad of the sea, and migrated to the north, seem to have built up the North Indian Madurai and named it after the 1st capital of the Pandiyas in remembrance of their ancestral abode. This can be compared to the similar acts of the Americans and the Australians. The name Madurai has subsequently changed into ‘Muttra’ in accordance with the phonetic habits of the North Indians. The Lemurian Madurai and the North Indian Madurai were called, Then Madurai and Vada Madurai respectively, in relation to each other. Dr. Caldwell is wrong in identifying Then Madurai with the modern Madurai of Tamil Nadu, as he had no idea of the submerged land.


The existence of corrupt Dravidian dialects or languages in the mountain fastnesses of Bengal and Baluchistan, the Dravidian substratum of the North Indian languages like Hindi and Bengali which are characterized as Modern Aryan Vernaculars of North India. Kƒ˜i worship in Calcutta, place names like Patalipura and Nagapur, and caste names like Bania and š„—, are vestiges of Dravidian occupation of North India in pre-historic times.


The name Chola properly š†˜a, seems to have been derived from šol, ‘paddy’. The Ch†˜a country has been famous for paddy cultivation from the very beginning. Even now Tanjore District which formed the nuclear of the Ch†˜a country during the post-Christian period is called ‘the granary of Tamil Nadu’ for the same reason. The poetess Auvai II in a quartrain specifying the special products of the four regions into which Tamil Nadu was divided in her time says “Ch†˜a Va˜anƒdu š†Šudaittu.” which means ‘the fertile Ch†˜a country abounds in rice food’. The words š†Šu and šo‹Ši, both of which denote cooked rice, are derived from šol, ‘paddy’. It is even surmised that the ancient Tamilians might have discovered by chance, the paddy plant in its natural state in the area of the Tanjore District, as it is known for certain that every plant cultivated or every animal domesticated, excepting the newstrains developed or evolved by man, was originally growing or living wild.


The change of l into ˜ or ‰ is very common in derivation. e. g. kal (black) - ka˜ (black) - kƒ˜-kƒ˜am (blackness)- kƒ˜agam (blackness). mal - mƒl (blackness, black cloud) - ma˜ai (black cloud, raiŒ: kil (to dig) -k…‰ (to dig, to tear)-ki˜ (to dig, to undermine). pol (to bore) - po‰ (to bore) - p†‰ (to bore, to cleave).


The name Chera properly šra, is derviced from the word šƒral, ‘mountain-slope’. The lord of a hilly country is often called šƒral nƒdan in classical poetry. The whole of the original Ch„ra territory, whose area still remains undiminished for the most part, though broken up politically into several parts, lying north and south and traversed by the Western Ghats almost throughout the whole length is a long slope on either side of the mountain range.


Hence, the Chera King seems to have been originally called šaralan, ‘the lord of the sloping country’, which name subsequently changed by a single vowel change into šralƒn, and then by syncope became šran and ultimately by a further mutation šral. All these alterations are quite in accordance with the recognized laws of phonetic or verbal change.

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