Sangam age

Topic: Sangam Age and Early South India · NCERT: Class 7, Ch 6 "The Age of Reorganisation"

Meaning

The Sangam age is the early period of history in the Tamil south, roughly c. 300 BCE – 300 CE. It takes its name from the sangams: assemblies of Tamil poets that, according to tradition, met at Madurai. It matters because the Sangam poems are the main written source on the chiefs, society and economy of early Tamilakam. The period also shows that south India had its own kingdoms, outside Mauryan rule.

Explanation

Background: from megaliths to chiefdoms

• Before the kingdoms came the megaliths. Megaliths are large stone structures built for burying the dead.
• They appear across central and south India from the first millennium BCE.

• The burials hold many iron tools and weapons. This means people were working iron on a large scale before any kingdom appears in writing.

• How power grew (the standard argument):

• Iron tools helped farmers clear and farm the river valleys.
• Farming produced a surplus (more food than people needed to live).

• Chiefs rose who could collect this wealth and give it away to followers and poets.

• At Adichchanallur, gold diadems (crowns or headbands), bronzes and burials in different phases suggest that some people were already richer than others [3].

The land and its rulers

• Tamilakam means the ancient Tamil country. It covered Tamil Nadu plus parts of present-day Andhra Pradesh and Kerala.
• It was not one state. Many chiefdoms and kingdoms existed side by side.
• The three big ruling houses were [2]:
• Chera: the Malabar Coast and the land behind it [2].
• Chola: modern Thanjavur and the Kaveri (Cauvery) valley [2].

• Pandya: based at Madurai. They are praised in the earliest Tamil poetry [2].

• The south stayed outside the Mauryan empire. Ashoka's inscriptions name the southern peoples as living beyond his empire.

Sangam literature: what it is

• Sangam comes from the Sanskrit word sangha, which means "association" or "coming together". Here it means an assembly of poets [2].
• Tradition says the poems came from three literary academies (sangams) at Madurai [2].
• The poems are collected in anthologies (books of poems by many poets). They follow two themes:
• Akam (the "inner" theme): love. Love poems fill the first five collections [2].

• Puram (the "outer" theme): war and public life, including praise of kings. Heroism fills the next two collections [2].

• Ettuttokai means "the eight anthologies" of poetry [2].

• Key works:
• Tolkappiyam: a book of grammar and rhetoric (the art of speaking and writing well) [2].
• Tirukkural: by Tiruvalluvar, about ethics and right conduct.

• Silappadikaram and Manimekalai: the Tamil epics (long story-poems).

• The poems also tell us about political organisation, social structures and economic activities.

Results: trade and wider links

• Tamilakam was part of Indian Ocean and Roman trade:
• Pearls came from the Pandya coast.
• Pepper came from the west coast. It was a main reason Roman traders came [5].

• Ports such as Muziris, Korkai, Poduca and Sopatma handled this trade [5].

• This trade explains two things: how the chiefs became wealthy, and why Greek and Roman writers knew about the region.

Time, place and evidence

• Period: c. 300 BCE – 300 CE (NCERT dates). Britannica dates the surviving poems more narrowly, to the 1st to 4th century CE. Use the NCERT dates in the exam [2].
• Region: Tamilakam. Main centres were the Malabar Coast (Chera), the Kaveri valley (Chola) and Madurai (Pandya) [2].
• Ashoka's inscriptions name four peoples outside his empire:
• Cholas: lower Kaveri valley.
• Pandyas: Tamraparni and Vaigai valleys.
• Keralaputras: identified with the Cheras.

• Satiyaputras: northern Tamil Nadu.

• Kharavela of Kalinga says in his inscription that he defeated an alliance of southern kings and took hundreds of pearls from the Pandya kingdom. But there is no sign that he actually invaded the south. It was a boast, not proof of conquest.

• Foreign accounts:
• Megasthenes: a Greek writer at the Mauryan court.

• The Periplus of the Erythraean Sea: an anonymous Greek merchant's handbook of the 1st century CE, written c. 40–70 CE. It gives sailing directions from the Red Sea ports of Roman Egypt to India [4][5]. It names Muziris (Cranganore), Colchi (Korkai), Poduca and Sopatma [5].

• Archaeology:

• Adichchanallur (Thoothukudi district, Tamil Nadu) is an Iron Age urn burial site (bodies buried in large clay pots) on the Tambraparani (Porunai) river [3].
  • Dr Jagor of the Berlin Museum first noticed it in 1876 [3].
  • A. Rea dug it in the 1910s and found gold diadems, bronze objects and iron objects [3].
  • In 2003-04 and 2004-05, more than 160 urns were opened [3].
• Kodumanal: an excavated site used to check what the poems say.
• Keezhadi (Keeladi), in the Vaigai river basin:
  • ASI dug it in 2014-15, 2015-16 and 2016-17 [6].
  • Since 2018, the Tamil Nadu State Department of Archaeology has run the excavation [6].
  • ASI has published a report on the 2014-15 and 2015-16 seasons. It says the site helps us understand early urban settlement (early town life) in the region [6][7].

Don't confuse with

• Tamilakam: this is a place (the ancient Tamil country). The Sangam age is a period of time in that place.
• Akam vs Puram: Akam = love (the inner theme). Puram = war and public life (the outer theme).
• Tolkappiyam vs Tirukkural: Tolkappiyam is a grammar book. Tirukkural is a book on ethics, written by Tiruvalluvar.
• Adichchanallur vs Keezhadi: Adichchanallur is an Iron Age urn burial site on the Tambraparani. Keezhadi is in the Vaigai basin and is linked to early urban settlement.

Prelims Hooks

• Sangam comes from the Sanskrit word sangha ("association"). Here it means an assembly of poets, traditionally at Madurai [2].
• Ettuttokai = the eight anthologies. Akam = love; puram = war and public life [2].
• Silappadikaram and Manimekalai are the Tamil epics. Tirukkural was written by Tiruvalluvar.
• In Ashoka's edicts, Keralaputra = Chera, and Satiyaputra = northern Tamil Nadu. Both lay outside the Mauryan empire.
• Trap: Kharavela claims pearls from the Pandyas, but probably never invaded the south.
• The Periplus (c. 40–70 CE) names Muziris, Korkai (Colchi), Poduca, Sopatma [4][5].

Mains Points

• The south had its own political life. Ashoka's own edicts name the Cholas, Pandyas, Keralaputras and Satiyaputras as neighbours outside his empire. So calling the Mauryan empire "pan-Indian" goes too far. South India already had recognised kingdoms by the 3rd century BCE.
• Using poetry as history, carefully.
• The Sangam poems are the main source on chiefs, society and economy.
• But they are praise-poems written for patrons, so they may exaggerate.

• A good answer checks them against Ashokan edicts, Megasthenes, the Periplus and excavations at Kodumanal, Adichchanallur and Keezhadi [3][5][6].

• Iron, surplus and trade built Tamil power.

• Iron-rich megalithic burials came before the Sangam chiefs.
• Iron tools led to farming surplus in the river valleys. This let chiefs gather wealth.
• Pearls, pepper and ports like Muziris and Korkai linked Tamilakam to Roman and Indian Ocean trade. This made the region central to that trade, not marginal [2][5].

Related concepts

• Tamilakam
• Sangam literature
• Tamil Sangams
• Akam and puram
• Tinai
• Ettuthokai
• Akananuru
• Purananuru
• Pattuppattu
• Kapilar

Read more

• Tamilakam and its sources