Note 49 — V (continued 2)

In ‘The Tamils eighteen hundred years ago,’ Mr. V. Kanakasabhai writes that “among the pure Tamils, the class most honoured was the Arivar or Sages. Next in rank to the Arivar were the Ulavar or farmers. The Arivars were ascetics, but, of the men living in society, the farmers occupied the highest position. They formed the nobility, or the landed aristocracy, of the country. They were also called Vellālar, ‘lords of the flood,’ or ‘Karalar,’ ‘lords of the clouds,’ titles expressive of their skill in controlling floods, and in storing water for agricultural purposes. The Chera, Chola and Pandyan Kings, and most of the petty chiefs of Tamilakam, belonged to the tribe of Vellālas. The poor families of Vellālas who owned small estates were generally spoken of as the Veelkudi-Uluvar or ‘the fallen Vellālas,’ implying thereby that the rest of the Vellālas were wealthy land-holders. When Karikāl the Great defeated the Aruvālar, and annexed their territory to his kingdom, he distributed the conquered lands among Vellāla chiefs.49 The descendants of some of these chiefs are to this day in possession of their lands, which they hold as petty zamindars under the British Government.50 The Vellāla families who conquered Vadukam, or the modern Telugu country, were called Velamas, and the great zamindars there still belong to the Velama caste. In the Canarese country, the Vellālas founded the Bellāl dynasty, which ruled that country for several centuries. The Vellālas were also called the Gangakula or Gangavamsa, because they derived their descent from the great and powerful tribe named Gāngvida, which inhabited the valley of the Ganges, as mentioned by Pliny and Ptolemy. A portion of Mysore which was peopled mostly by Vellālas was called Gangavādi in the tenth and eleventh centuries of the Christian era. Another dynasty of kings of this tribe, who ruled Orissa in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, was known as the Gangavamsa.... In the earliest Tamil grammar extant, which was composed by a Brāhman named Tholkāppiyan, in the first or second century B.C., frequent allusions are made to the Arivar or Sages. But, in the chapter in which he describes the classes of society, the author omits all mention of the Arivar, and places the Brahmins who wear the sacred thread as the first caste. The kings, he says, very guardedly, and not warriors, form the second caste, as if the three kings Chera, Chola and Pāndy could form a caste; all who live by trade belong to the third caste. He does not say that either the kings or the merchants wear the sacred thread. Then he singles out the Vellālas, and states that they have no other calling than the cultivation of the soil. Here he does not say that the Vellālas are Sudras, but indirectly implies that the ordinary Vellālas should be reckoned as Sudras, and that those Vellālas who were kings should be honoured as Kshatriyas. This is the first attempt made by the Brahmins to bring the Tamils under their caste system. But, in the absence of the Kshatriya, Vaisya, and Sudra castes in Tamilakam, they could not possibly succeed; and to this day the Vellāla does not take meals at the hands of a Padaiyadchi, who calls himself a Kshatriya, or a merchant who passes for a Vaisya.” In speculating on the origin of the Vellālas, Mr. J. H. Nelson51 states that “tradition uniformly declares them to be the descendants of foreign immigrants, who were introduced by the Pāndyas: and it appears to be extremely probable that they are, and that an extensive Vellāla immigration took place at a rather remote period, perhaps a little before or after the colonization of the Tonda-mandala by Adondai Chakravarti. The Vellālas speak a pure dialect of Tamil, and no other language. I have not heard of anything extraordinary in the customs prevailing among them, or of any peculiarities pointing to a non-Tamil origin.... With regard to the assertion so commonly made that the Pāndyas belonged to the Vellāla caste, it is observable that tradition is at issue with it, and declares that the Pāndyas proper were Kshatriyas: but they were accustomed to marry wives of inferior castes as well as and in addition to wives of their own caste; and some of their descendants born of the inferior and irregularly married wives were Vellālans, and, after the death of Kūn or Sundara Pāndya, formed a new dynasty, known as that of the pseudo-Pāndyas. Tradition also says that Arya Nāyaga Muthali, the great general of the sixteenth century, was dissuaded by his family priest from making himself a king on the ground that he was a Vellālan, and no Vellālan ought to be a king. And, looking at all the facts of the case, it is somewhat difficult to avoid coming to the conclusion that the reason assigned for his not assuming the crown was the true one. This, however, is a question, the settlement of which requires great antiquarian learning: and it must be settled hereafter.”