Mvn.ind at 09:44, 18 July 2025

2025-07-18T09:44:24Z

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{{Short description|Earliest book on Tamil grammar}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=August 2019}}
{{Sangam literature}}
{{italic title}}
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'''''Agattiyam''''' ({{langx|ta|அகத்தியம் {{pronunciation|LL-Q5885 (tam)-Sriveenkat-அகத்தியம்.wav|}}}}), also spelled as '''''Akattiyam''''',<ref name=shulman/> according to Tamil tradition, was the earliest book on [[Tamil grammar]]. It is a non-extant text, traditionally believed to have been compiled and taught in the [[First Sangam]], (circa 300 BCE) by [[Agastya|Agattiyar (Agastya)]] to twelve students.<ref name="Weiss">{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ges6XgLkffEC&pg=PA81|title=Recipes for Immortality: Healing, Religion, and Community in South India|last=Weiss|first=Richard S.|date=2009-02-19|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=9780199715008|language=en}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=K A Nilakanta Sastri|title=A History of South India: From Prehistoric Times to the Fall of Vijayanagar|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HCQLAQAAIAAJ|year=1966|publisher=Oxford University Press|pages=76–77}}</ref><ref name=kz1/> Agastya is one of the seven revered ''[[rishi]]'' of Vedic literature, mentioned in the ''[[Rigveda]]''.<ref name="shulman" /> A few surviving verses of Akattiyam are said to be quoted in medieval commentaries.<ref name="Kamil V. Zvelebil 1992 p246">Kamil V. Zvelebil, Companion Studies to the History of Tamil Literature [New York: E. J. Brill, 1992), p246</ref>

Agastya, in medieval commentaries of Tamil [[Hinduism|Hindu]] scholars, is variously credited with either creating the [[Tamil language]] or learning it from the god [[Shiva]].<ref name=kz1>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Kx4uqyts2t4C&pg=PA62 |title=Tamil Literature, Handbook of Oriental Studies|last=Zvelebil|first=Kamil|year=1975| publisher=BRILL| isbn=9004041907| pages=61–63 with footnotes}}</ref> In contrast, according to medieval era Tamil [[Buddhism|Buddhist]] scholars, the sage learned Tamil from [[Avalokiteśvara|Avalokita]]. These legends are mentioned in Akitti Jataka and in Tamil Buddhist epics.<ref name=kz1/> There is no direct mention of the sage's name, or ''Agattiyam'' text, in ''[[Tolkappiyam]]'' or the bardic poetry of the [[Sangam literature]].<ref name=kz1/>

Tolkappiyar (epithet), the author of [[Tolkappiyam]], which is the oldest extant Tamil grammar, is believed by various traditions to be one of the twelve disciples of Agattiyar. Tolkappiyar is believed to have lived during the [[Second Sangam]] and to be the author of the ''Tolkappiyam'' that has survived.<ref name=kz1/><ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=w9pmo51lRnYC&pg=PA200 |title=Encyclopaedia of the Hindu World|last=Garg|first=Gaṅgā Rām|year=1992|publisher=Concept Publishing Company|isbn=9788170223740|language=en}}</ref>

== Legend ==
The context of the ''Agattiyam'' is in Sangam legend. ''Sangam'' literally means "gathering, meeting, fraternity, academy". According to [[David Dean Shulman]] – a scholar of Tamil language and literature, the Tamil tradition believes that the Sangam literature arose in distant antiquity over three periods, each stretching over many millennia.<ref name="shulman" /> The first has roots in the Hindu deity Shiva, his son [[Murugan]], [[Kubera]] as well as 545 sages including the famed Rigvedic poet Agastya. The first academy, states the legend, extended over 4 millennia and was located far to the south of modern city of [[Madurai]], a location later "swallowed up by the sea", states Shulman.<ref name="shulman" /><ref name=":0">{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xlwoDwAAQBAJ |title=A Brief History of India|last=Daniélou|first=Alain|date=2003-02-11|publisher=Simon and Schuster|isbn=9781594777943|language=en}}</ref> The second academy, also chaired by a very long-lived Agastya, was near the eastern seaside Kapāṭapuram and lasted three millennia. This was swallowed by floods. From the second Sangam, states the legend, the ''Akattiyam'' and the ''Tolkāppiyam'' survived and guided the third Sangam scholars.<ref name="Weiss" /><ref name=":0" /><ref>{{cite book|author=David Shulman|title=Tamil|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fG8NDQAAQBAJ |year=2016|publisher=Harvard University Press|isbn=978-0-674-97465-4|pages=27–28 }}</ref> Agastya convened this session and wrote the Agattiyam.

== Surviving verses ==
A few verses from ''Agattiyam'' have been quoted in medieval commentaries of the [[Tolkappiyam]], Yapparunkalam virutti, and [[Nannūl]].<ref name=shulman>{{cite book |author=David Shulman |title=Tamil |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_KkzDQAAQBAJ&pg=PA25 |year=2016 |publisher=Harvard University Press |isbn=978-0-674-05992-4 |pages=25–28 }}</ref> The Agattiyam is quoted 18 times in a 13th-century commentary on [[Nannūl]] by Mayilainātar.<ref>Jean Luc Chevillard, "The Pantheon of Tamil Grammarians: A Short History of the Myth of Agastya's Twelve Disciples", in Écrire et transmettre en Inde classique, ed. Gérard Colas et Gerdi Gerschheimer, Études thématiques, 23 [Paris: École française d'Extrême-Orient, 2009], p264</ref> However, the authenticity of these verses is uncertain.<ref>{{cite book |editor=N. Subrahmanian |title=Tamil social history|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PXXsAAAAIAAJ |year=1997| publisher=Institute of Asian Studies }}</ref>

[[Kamil Zvelebil]] states: "In Mayilainātar's commentary on Nannūl, and in Cankaranamaccivāyar's gloss on the same grammar, we find sixteen short sūtras of unequal length (all in all 48 lines) which are possibly genuine fragments of an old grammar, perhaps the Akattiyam."<ref name="Kamil V. Zvelebil 1992 p246"/>

==See also==
* [[Tolkappiyam]]
* [[Sangam literature]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}

{{Tamil language}}

[[Category:Tamil-language literature]]
[[Category:Tamil Hindu literature]]

Agattiyam - Revision history

Mvn.ind at 09:44, 18 July 2025