[Full title: Tolkāppiyam Poruḷatikāram and Iṟaiyaṉār Akapporuḷ: Their Relative Chronology]

1. Introduction

The Tolkāppiyam (Tol.) has traditionally been recognized as the oldest extant grammar. There are, however, some who maintain that it consists of several layers and its third part on poetics, namely, Tol. Poruḷatikāram (TP), belongs to a later stratum. There are still a few who insist that the TP is chronologically later than the Iṟaiyaṉār Akapporuḷ (IA). It is almost impossible at the present stage of our knowledge to establish the absolute chronology of the TP and the IA, since we have very little evidence, both external and internal, for the dates of their composition. On the other hand, the TP is a treatise most parts of which are concerned with love (akam) poetics, while the IA is a text exclusively dealing with akam poetics, and so by scrutinizing both texts we should be able to come up with a relative chronology for them. This paper aims at establishing such a relative chronology, and my arguments focus on the akam terminology used in both texts.

2. Previous Discussions on the Subject

So far there have two critics who have declared that the IA is anterior to the TP. They are T.G. Aravamuthan1 and K.V. Zvelebil,2 and the latter in particular has been influential. As far as I know, it was Aravamuthan who for the first time put forward this view. In his excellent article, he says, "If we study the bare texts of the treatises of Iṟaiyaṉār and Tol-Kāppiyar, ignoring all the commentaries, we find that Iṟaiyaṉār´s special treatise on Love descends less into details and particulars than Tol-Kāppiyar´s general treatise on "grammar" in the corresponding chapters and that it presents a more general view of the subject. This would be a remarkable circumstance if we postulated the anteriority of the special to the general treatise, for it is very unlikely that a special treatise on a subject would give a more general treatment of the subject than an anterior work which goes fully into details "3 (italics mine).

 

Here I will provide a brief sketch of the TP and the IA for readers´ convenience in following his points. The Tol., in its present-day form, consists of three parts (atikāram < Skt. adhikāra).4 Each part has nine chapters (iyal), and the whole has approximately 1600 stanzas5 (the total number varying according to the commentators) of varying length (from 1 to the 59 lines of TP 144) divided into 27 chapters. The first part is called Eḻuttatikāram, "The Part on Letters," and deals with phonetics, phonology, graphemics, etc., comprising 466 stanzas of 980 lines in all.6 The second part, Collatikāram ("The Part about Words"), is dedicated to etymology, morphology, semantics and syntax, with 456 stanzas in 1049 lines. The third part, Poruḷatikāram ("The Part Dealing with Subject Matter"), consists of the following nine chapters, comprising 654 stanzas of 1960 lines in all.

 

(1) Akattiṇai-iyal	"Chapter on love themes (in general)"	(58 stanzas in 157 lines)
(2) Puṟattiṇai-iyal	"Chapter on non-love (heroic, war) themes"	(30 stanzas in 228 lines)
(3) Kaḷavu-iyal	"Chapter on secret, or premarital, love"	(51 stanzas in 243 lines)
(4) Kaṟpu-iyal	"Chapter on post-marital love"	(53 stanzas in 268 lines)
(5) Poruḷ-iyal	"Chapter on supplementary aspects of love"	(52 stanzas in 143 lines)
(6) Meyppāṭṭu-iyal	"Chapter on the manifestation of moods"	(27 stanzas in 88 lines)
(7) Uvamai-iyal	"Chapter on simile"	(38 stanzas in 79 lines)
(8) Ceyyuḷ-iyal	"Chapter on composition"	(235 stanzas in 503 lines)
(9) Marapu-iyal	"Chapter on traditional usage [of words]"	(112 stanzas in 251 lines)

Thus, the Tol. is, as is referred to by Aravamuthan, a general, detailed treatise on grammar. First, as a general treatise, it deals with all five branches of "grammar" (although the fivefold classification was established in the medieval period)— i.e. eḻuttu (sounds and letters), col (words), poruḷ (subject matter of poetry) in chapters 1–5 of the TP, yāppu (prosody) in chapter 8 of the TP, and aṇi (rhetoric) in chapters 6, 7 and 9 of the TP. Secondly, the detailed nature of the Tol. can be readily understood from its total number of stanzas and lines (about 1600 stanzas comprising 3990 lines).

 

The IA, on the other hand, is a small and specific treatise on love (akam) poetics. Its smallness or brevity is really striking, since the present text, without the commentary, comprises 60 stanzas of only 149 lines. This extreme brevity is quite noticeable when compared with the TP, which has several stanzas with more than 40 lines. Next, the treatise in its present-day form consists of two sections, kaḷavu "secret, premarital love" (stanzas 1–33) and kaṟpu "post-marital love" (stanzas 34–60). However, it should be noted that this division, which may have been made later, does not seem to represent the original scheme of the text, since it is actually composed of three parts: kaḷavu (1–33), kaṟpu (34–54), and the part devoted to the "constituents of poetry" which are common to kaḷavu and kaṟpu (55–60).7 Therefore, the better and more plausible headings of each part would be kaḷavu (1–33), kaṟpu (34–55), and oḻivu or potu (56–60), as I have previously suggested,8 and so the IA should be called a small but standard treatise on akam poetics, including the subject matter of love poems and, at the same time, the necessary treatment of poetics. In this connection, it is quite unsatisfactory that Aravamuthan and Zvelebil, having merely taken note of the headings of the present text, refer to it as if it deals only with the subject matter of premarital love (kaḷavu) and wedded love (kaṟpu).9

 

Let us now return to Aravamuthan´s argument regarding the relative chronology of the TP and the IA. Apart from the passage cited above, he does not refer to it anywhere else in his lengthy paper. Judging from this passage, the only criterion for his chronology is that simple, brief, and specific treatises should historically become lengthy, detailed, and general treatises, and not vice versa. This criterion seems to be shared by a number of scholars, but it is quite often clearly untrue. The Tol., a general treatise on grammar, is followed by specific treatises, such as the Naṉṉūl of the 13 th century dealing with only eḻuttu and col, the Akapporuḷ Viḷakkam (a specific treatise on akam poetics of the 13 th– 14 th centuries), the Puṟapporuḷveṇpāmālai (a specific work dealing exclusively with puṟam poetics of the 10 th century [?]), the Yāpparuṅkalam (a specific work on yāppu of about the 11 th century), and the Taṇṭiyalaṅkāram on aṇi of probably the 12 th century. The Naṉṉūl and the Akapporuḷ Viḷakkam are more compact in respect of the number of stanzas and lines, and more lucid and refined than the relevant parts of the Tol. Thus, we can say that Aravamuthan´s argument does not have any strong basis. Contrary to Aravamuthan´s opinion, I have the impression that lucidness and refinement in the description of topics and the orderly arrangement of topics are signs of the later date of a work. If so, the TP would be anterior to the IA, since the TP (especially chapters 1, 3, 4, and 5 dealing with akam poetics) is far from lucid if compared with the lucidness of the IA.

 

Let us take another argument, this time by K.V. Zvelebil, who also maintains the anteriority of the IA to the TP. Unlike Aravamuthan´s argument based on the texts themselves, Zvelebil´s analysis is based on the commentary on the IA. He says, "In more than one place, the commentary insists that the treatise is the first (that is, historically first, as well as first in merit) Tamil treatise on poruḷ or subject-matter (of love conduct and hence, of love-poetry)," and "The date of the composition of the treatise […] is unfortunately fully uncertain. […] Taking into account tradition again, we may probably consider the treatise to be indeed the "first" grammar on love-conduct and the conventions of erotic poetry, and in this sense, to have no "lineage". It would thus appear to be earlier than the third part of the Tolkāppiyam, the Poruḷatikāram, which contains similar subject-matter. "10 What Zvelebil bases his analysis on is the term mutaṉūl (mutal-nūl) used in the commentary. Mutal means, according to the Tamil Lexicon, "beginning; first, as in rank, place, etc.; best, that which is superior; root; base, foot, bottom or lowest part of anything," and nūl is "systematic treatise," and so mutal-nūl could be translated as the "first treatise." However, this translation is incorrect if we take into account the context of the commentary.

 

The first stanza of the IA is immediately followed not by a comment on it, but by the "preface", as it is aptly called by T.G. Aravamuthan. The "preface" starts with the classification of prefaces into general and specific ones. The commentary says a general preface is divided into four parts and a specific one has eight parts: the eight parts are the author´s name, lineage, boundary, book´s title, prosody, content, audience, and purpose. Furthermore, each of the eight parts is explained one by one. The commentator elaborates: "The lineage (vaḻi) means that this work is in such and such a [scholastic] line. This [, however, ] is not to be called a derivative treatise (vaḻinūl) because it is created by the Lord with the wisdom which removes karma, but is to be called an original treatise (mutaṉūl). "11 Then, in connection with the seventh part, "audience", the commentator narrates the very famous "history of the three Caṅkams", the "history of the IA", "determining the commentary on the IA", "the transmission of the commentary", and so forth. And again he refers to three types of treatises, stating: "In discussing what constitutes a treatise, note that treatises are of three types: original (mutaṉūl), derivative (vaḻinūl), and offshoot (cārpunūl). […] Of those, original treatises are those produced by one whose knowledge has no bound. […] Next, a work that discourses in a vein similar to one of those, providing variations on an original author´s views, is a derivative treatise. […] And a new arrangement of ideas covered previously in specific ways in those two types of treatises, but with a particular benefit in mind, is an offshoot treatise "12 (original terms in parentheses added). Judging from this context, mutaṉūl is the opposite of vaḻinūl, or a treatise derived from another, and should be translated as a treatise having no lineage or, at best, the first treatise in a lineage. Thus, an interpretation such as that of Zvelebil´s, regarding it as a historically first treatise, is obviously far-fetched and incorrect.

 

Moreover, the commentary mentions that the Tol., along with the Akattiyam and other works, was the nūl, the treatise or reference work for poets even in the middle Caṅkam, to say nothing of the last Caṅkam. It was, on the other hand, in the last Caṅkam that the IA was composed by Lord Śiva. Here again, the anteriority of the TP to the IA seems obvious. It is true that the commentary appears to suggest that there was no Poruḷatikāram, that is, that there existed only the Tol. without the third part, Poruḷatikāram, as follows:

"In those days famine visited the Pāṇṭiyaṉ land for twelve years, and as hunger grew the king summoned all his court scholars. "Come," he said, "My country is suffering horribly, and I can no longer support you: go wherever you can find a place. When this land becomes a real country again, think of me and return." Thus they left the king, and twelve years passed with no reckoning of the time. But in time the rains fell, and the land prospered: the king sent men in all directions saying, "As this land has now become a real country once again, bring back all those people well versed in literature." So they found and brought back all the scholars in the fields of letters (eḻuttu-atikāram), words (col-atikāram), and structures (yāppu-atikāram); but they had to report, "Nowhere could we find a scholar in the field of meaning (poruḷ-atikāram)." The king was stricken, and he worried. "What is the point in researching into letters, words, and structures, if not for the field of meaning? Without the field of meaning, gaining the other fields is no gain at all!" he exclaimed, and gave himself to meditation upon the fire-colored God at the Madurai temple. "13 (italics and original terms in parentheses added)

However, the context indicates that there had existed grammars, including Poruḷatikāram, and those who were well-versed in Poruḷatikāram before the famine, i.e. during the period of all three Caṅkams, otherwise grammatical works would have been meaningless, as is mentioned by the king: "What is the point in researching into letters, words, and structures, if not for the field of meaning? Without the field of meaning, gaining the other fields is no gain at all!" Thus, from this passage, we may safely conclude that the Tol. in the middle and last Caṅkams contained the Poruḷatikāram.

 

The overall context of the commentary on the IA demonstrates the anteriority of the Tol. (including Poruḷatikāram!) to the IA and also shows that the connotation of the word mutaṉūl is a treatise with no lineage. Nevertheless, some adhere to the supposition that the IA is anterior to the TP. The reason seems to me to be the same preoccupation as Aravamuthan has: simple, brief treatises should come first, followed by lengthy, detailed ones, and not vice versa.

3. Terminology of Love Poetics Used in the TP and the IA

As seen in the previous section, arguments regarding the relative chronology of the TP and the IA by T.G. Aravamuthan and K.V. Zvelebil are far from convincing. What, then, affords a clue to resolving the issue? Excluding the second chapter dealing with puṟam poetics, all eight chapters of the TP are more or less connected with akam poetics; in particular, chapters 1, 3, 4, and 5 deal exclusively with the subject matter of akam poetics. The IA is also a treatise about akam poetics, and so by scrutinizing both texts we should be able to come up with a relative chronology for them.

 

Many specific expressions are used to denote love events/phases/situations in the TP, the IA, and "colophons" (tuṟais) attached to akam poems, and some of these expressions later became fixed in usage and became technical terms of akam poetics. I have gleaned around 250 such expressions from the colophons of akam anthologies such as the Kuṟ., the Naṟ., the Ak., and the Aiṅ. These expressions/terms may be categorized into five groups.

1. Terms found only in colophons, but neither in the TP nor in the IA;
   e.g. iyaṟpaḻittal, iyaṟpaṭamoḻital, maṉai maruṭci, paruvam kaṇṭu aḻital/āṟṟāmai, vaṉpuṟai etiraḻital, viṉai muṟṟutal.

2. Terms found in colophons, the TP, and the IA;
   e.g. alar, allakkuṟi (-paṭutal), aṟattoṭu niṟṟal, ciṟaippuṟam, irantu kuṟaiyuṟutal (iṟantu piṉṉiṟṟal in colophons), iravukkuṟi.

3. Terms found in colophons and the TP, but not in the IA;
   e.g. ampal, celavu-aḻuṅkal, ceṟippu, iṭaiccuram, kaḻaṟutal, maṭalēṟutal, tūtu, uṭaṉpōkku, varaivu maruttal, veṟi (veṟiyāṭṭu).

4. Terms found in colophons and the IA, but not in the TP; cēṭpaṭuttal (cēṭpaṭai), kāmam mikka kaḻipaṭar kiḷavi, oruvaḻit taṉattal, paṭṭa piṉṟai varaiyāmai.

5. A love event referred to in colophons, the TP, and the IA, but with different expressions being used;
   āṟu pārttuṟṟa accak kiḷavi, iyaṟkaippuṇarcci, iṭantalaippaṭal (iṭantalaippāṭu), notumalar varaivu.

It goes without saying that terms of the first two categories do not contribute to resolving the point at issue. As for the third category, it is natural that some terms occur only in the TP but not in the IA, since, as seen in "The Nine Chapters of the TP" listed earlier, the parts of the TP relevant to the subject matter of love (i.e. chapters 1, 3, 4, and 5) comprise 811 lines, while the IA consists of 149 lines. With regard to the fourth category, on the other hand, is quite peculiar for the same reason if a term appears only in the IA. Therefore, I will examine terms belonging to the fourth and fifth categories.14

Category 4: Terms found in colophons and the IA, but not in the TP

cēṭpaṭuttal: Its traditional meaning is "to put off a lover by telling him of the insurmountable difficulties in the way of his clandestine meetings and urging him to expedite the marriage" (TL),15 and this is also technically known as cēṭpaṭai. It occurs in IA 12: 2 (ciṟaiyuṟak kiḷantu cēṫpaṫa niṟuttalum, "saying the heroine is shut up, [her friend] sends [him] away") and IA 52: 3 in its literal meaning. We also have occurrences in Naṟ. 45 t, 75 t, 80 t, 185 t (2), 301 t, 377 t, and Ak. 58 t, and in later works such as Tirukkōvaiyār 98, AV 143, and 144. TP 112: 7–9 could be pertinent to this theme, but the expression is entirely different: kuṟaiyuṟaṟku etiriya kiḻavaṉai maṟaiyuṟap/ perumaiyiṉ peyarppiṉum ulaku uraittu oḻippiṉum/ arumaiyiṉ akaṟciyum, "the maid tries to turn the man back on the pretext of his honor, the customs of the world, the difficulty of getting the heroine. "16

kāmam mikka kaḻipaṭar kiḷavi: This means "he words [of the heroine] suffering from excessive love-passion." IA 30 enumerates six sub-themes of the main theme, "he heroine´s friend urging the hero to marry the heroine" (varaital vēṭkai),17 and this is one of them along with āṟu pārttuṟṟa accak kiḷavi below. This phrase occurs verbatim in eight colophons18 and in later works such as Tirukkōvaiyār 174, AV 164, and 168.

oruvaḻit taṇattal: This traditionally means "he lover´s temporary absence from the place of his lady-love to avoid all tittle-tattle about him" (TL). We can find occurrences of it in IA 25: 3 and in 16 colophons,19 and also in later works such as Tirukkōvaiyār 181, AV 39, 40, 49, 167, and 168.

paṭṭa piṉṟai varaiyāmai: IA 25 comprising four lines starts with this phrase; IA 25: 1–2 reads paṭṭa piṉṟai varaiyāk kiḻavaṉ/ neṭṭiṭai kiḻantu poruḷvayiṉ piriyum ("the hero who does not marry after [something] happened, leaving for wealth for a long interval"). But its literal meaning is "ot marrying after [something] happened, "and so its meaning is obviously unclear by itself. However, the previous stanza of the IA (i.e. IA 24) mentions that there are two types of marriage, which are "arriage before the secret love is revealed" (kaḷavu veḷippaṭā muṉṉuṟa varaital) and "arriage after the secret love is revealed" (kaḷavu veḷippaṭṭa piṉṟai varaital). Therefore, it is clear that paṭṭa piṉṟai in IA 25 is an abridged expression for kaḷavu veḷippaṭṭa piṉṟai in IA 24. There are occurrences in colophons (Kuṟ. 233 t, Naṟ. 7 t, 277 t, 358 t(1), and 369 t), and they all start with this phrase (paṭṭa piṉṟai varaiyātu, "ithout marrying after [the secret love is] revealed"). This obviously signifies that the expression was fixed in the colophons. Although a parallel idea to IA 24 is found in TP 138,20 the expression paṭṭa piṉṟai varaiyāmai never occurs in the TP.

Category 5: A love event referred to in colophons, the TP, and the IA, but with different expressions being used

āṟu pārttuṟṟa accak kiḷavi: As was mentioned above, this along with kāmam mikka kaḻipaṭar kiḷavi is enumerated as one of six sub-themes of the theme varaital vēṭkai in IA 30, and means "he speech [of the heroine/her friend] out of fear, having seen the [dangerous] path [through which the hero comes]." This expression is repeated verbatim in later grammars (Tirukkōvaiyār 176, and AV 164 and 166). In the colophons of Naṟ. 104, 114, and 158 the theme occurs as "what the heroine (or her friend) spoke owing to fear of the path (āṟu pārttu uṟṟa accattāl)," and in the colophons of Naṟ. 255, 336, and 383 it occurs as āṟu pārttu uṟutal. The colophon of Naṟ. 255 in particular simply reads āṟu pārttu uṟṟatu, which obviously shows that āṟu pārttu uṟutal was a fixed term. In the TP, on the other hand, this motif is referred to as āṟṟatu tīmai ("badness of the path") in TP 112: 29, āṟṟiṉatu arumai ("difficulty of the path") in TP 134: 1, and simply āṟu in TP 207: 1. Among these three instances, only āṟṟiṉatu arumai of TP 134: 1 has a parallel in the colophon of Naṟ. 353, which runs tōḻi āṟṟatu arumai añci, tāṉ āṟṟāḷāyc colliyatu ("what the heroine´s friend said, unable to endure it, after fearing difficulty of the path [through which the hero comes]").

iyaṟkaippuṇarcci: This is one of the most famous terms of akam poetics and is generally known as "the first meeting of lovers," although its literal meaning is "natural union." The theme of "the first meeting of lovers" is variously called kāmakkūṭṭam ("union of love "; TP 89: 1 and 117: 1), kāmappuṇarcci ("union of love "; TP 487, IA 2), iyaṟkaippuṇarcci (IAC 2, Tirukkōvaiyār 1, AV 27, 33–7, 123, 125, and 12 colophons21), teyvappuṇarcci ("divine union "; IAC 2, Tirukkōvaiyār 7, AV 125), and muṉṉuṟupuṇarcci (IAC 2).22 According to the commentary to IA 2, although critics of various schools referred to this theme by different terms such as iyaṟkaippuṇarcci, teyvappuṇarcci, and muṉṉuṟupuṇarcci, the author of the IA called it kāmappuṇarcci because all these three occur through love.23 There might be, as is mentioned in the commentary on the IA, several schools of grammar, but one may notice here a vital difference in the terminology adopted by various works: the earlier grammars such as the TP and the IA adopt the term kāmappuṇarcci (or kāmakkūṭṭam), while later works such as the IAC, the Tirukkōvaiyār, and the AV use the term iyaṟkaippuṇarcci. Moreover, we can find a difference in terminology in the earlier works. The TP consists of several layers, as is pointed out in my book, and chapters 1, 3, 4, and 5 belong to an older layer while chapter 8 belongs to a more recent layer.24 Taking this into account, we can find an interesting coincidence in the usage of terms: the IA uses the same term as is used in the more recent part of the TP, since the term kāmakkūṭṭam occurs in TP 89 and 117, that is, in the third chapter of the TP (Kaḷaviyal), while kāmappuṇarcci occurs in TP 487, i.e. the 178 th stanza of the eighth chapter of the TP (Ceyyuḷiyal), and IA 2.

iṭantalaippaṭal (iṭantalaippāṭu): The TL, citing the commentary to TPP 498 (i.e. TP 487),25 defines iṭantalaippāṭu as "the union of lovers a second time at the same place where they first met each other," which is obviously the same theme as iraṇṭām kūṭṭam ("the second union") occurring in the colophons of Naṟ. 39 and 155. TP 487 and IA 3 refer to the theme as iṭantalaippaṭal, while later works (IAC 3,26 AV 27, 123, 134–5) and the colophons of Kuṟ. 62 and Aiṅ. 197 refer to it as iṭantalaippāṭu. It should be noted here again that the term iṭantalaippaṭal in IA 3, as was the case with kāmappuṇarcci, is only found in the more recent layer of the TP (eighth chapter, Ceyyuḷiyal).

notumalar varaivu: Its traditional meaning is" man other than the hero coming to the heroine´s relatives to propose marriage to her "(< literally, "tranger´s marriage". This phrase occurs in IA 29: 2 and in 13 colophons,27 while in the TP this famous theme is referred to as vēṟṟu varaivu (literally "nother marriage" in TP 109: 15 and as piṟaṉ varaivu (lit. "ranger´s marriage" "in TP 112: 40.

4. Interpretation of the Differences in Terminology

How should we interpret such differences in terminology as seen above? The highly refined, conventionalized nature of classical literature implies that there had been a considerable lapse of time (at least two or three centuries) before it reached this stage of development. During the time it took for it to develop and even after the classical or so-called Caṅkam period, erudite scholiasts may have tried to describe and codify the literary traditions and conventions, which is suggested by the tradition that there were 12 disciples of Akattiyaṉ. Eventually, as is mentioned in the commentary on the IA, several schools maintaining their own traditions may have been established. It seems that their poetic traditions formed the literary milieu of the classical and post-classical period and were shared among the cultured élite (cāṉṟōr), such as court poets, scholiasts, kings and chieftains. Many of the poetic situations and themes may have become increasingly conventionalized and begun being referred to by specific terms.

 

Terms of the second category (terms which occur in the TP, the IA, and colophons) appear to suggest that they were derived from the same source or that they followed the same tradition. It is the same with the terms of category 3 (terms found in the TP and colophons, but not in the IA), since, as was mentioned before, it is natural that there should be terms which occur only in such a voluminous and detailed treatise as the TP but not in a very compact treatise like the IA. However, this suggestion could be easily rejected in light of the terms in category 4 or 5. If it was appropriate, then why was the term oruvaḻit taṇattal of category 4 not mentioned in the TP while being mentioned in the IA, and why was the theme iyaṟkaippuṇarcci of category 5 variously referred to in different texts? The terms of category 4 or 5 indicate either the existence of different lineages, or differences in the dates of the texts, or both. Terms of category 1 along with the term iyaṟkaippuṇarcci of category 5, for example, may point to their later date since they are found only in later works, such as Nakkīrar´s commentary on the IA, the Tirukkōvaiyār, the AV, and the commentaries on the TP.

 

As for the expressions of category 4, they are not found in the TP, but are found in the IA, colophons, and later works such as the IAC, the Tirukkōvaiyār, and the AV. If it is maintained that the TP belongs to a lineage different from the other works, this is certainly wrong, because there are many terms shared by all the works including the TP, that is, the terms of category 2. If we consider the IA to be anterior to the TP, the author (s) of the TP may have missed referring to those terms mentioned in a very compact treatise (i.e. the IA) or may have failed to do so for some reason. But this would seem improbable since, if the themes designated in the IA were really in existence at the time of the TP, it would have referred to them by different ways of expression, as seen in the case of notumalar varaivu of category 5. If, on the other hand, we consider the matter the other way round, that is, if we regard the TP as being anterior to the IA, then all issues concerning terminology resolve themselves.

 

This supposition may be confirmed by the case of the theme āṟu pārttuṟṟa accak kiḷavi of category 5. Which is more primitive or premature, or which is more refined or sophisticated, among the expressions āṟṟatu tīmai and āṟṟiṉatu arumai used in the TP and āṟu pārttuṟṟa accak kiḷavi adopted by the IA and later works? The former is obviously more primitive and less sophisticated than the latter. The fact that the TP refers to the theme in several ways itself indicates that there was no fixed expression to denote it at the time of the TP. The same is true in the case of the theme notumalar varaivu, because the TP refers to the theme as piṟaṉ varaivu and vēṟṟu varaivu.

 

Thus, analyses concerning the terminology adopted by the TP and IA point to the anteriority of the TP to the IA. This then leads to another conclusion which it is no mere coincidence, namely, that two terms used in the IA, i.e. kāmappuṇarcci (see iyaṟkaippuṇarcci of category 5) and iṭantalaippaṭal of category 5, are found only in the more recent layer of the TP.

5. Concluding

As seen in the above, many terms are shared by the TP and the IA, while some are not and some others are newly adopted by the IA. Nevertheless, the commentator insists that the IA is mutaṉūl, "a treatise having no linage." Why did he insist on this? It should be noted here that if the IA was indeed the historically first and eventually the original treatise, as is maintained by K.V. Zvelebil, it would have been unnecessary for the commentator to insist on it.