Written by London Swaminathan
Post No. 16,016
Date uploaded in London – 25 July 2026
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Item 651
Music in pastoral region!
Tamils are great music lovers. They hear music in waterfalls, wind blowing through the holes in bamboo trees, birds’ chirps, roaring sea waves etc.
Roaring seas= war drums beating = Narr.395;15;74;
Here is a poem where the frogs are singing; Akam 154,
The frogs in the pool croak like some of the musical instruments, the poet says.
Another poet says about real music coming out of the flutes of the cowherds returning home in the evening- Akam 54.
Flute music is heard not only in the south but also in the north. We know the most famous flute music expert Lord Krishna. He attracted all animals and human beings.
Tamil Periya Puranam sings the glory of Aanaaya Nayanar who reached heaven by playing flute.
***
Item 652
Sapphire and Coral
Tamils are great gemmologists. They use gemstones to compare even insects.
Akananuru is divided into three sections and the second section is called coral in between two sapphires. In tamil it is
Manimidai pavalam ; mani= sapphire; pavalam=coral.
But this simile comes in Akam. 14, long before section two. Section two comprises poems 121-300.
The red ground looks like vermillion; the faded kaya flowers on the ground with the cochineal insects moving quickly amidst them look like sapphire artistically combined with coral.
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Item 653
Mirage in Tamil literature
Kalidasa and other poets also described the mirage in Sanskrit.
Tamil poets called the mirage as
White car= ven ter= Akam.179;
Running car = out ter= Akam.89;
Demon /ghost car = pey ter = Narr.84
The car that never runs = valankaat ter- Kali. 7
Looks like vast sheet of water = Akam.327;
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Item 654
It is no wonder that the Tamil poets sing the glory of Kaveri, Vaigai and Tambrabarani. But they even mentioned the holy rivers of north India; this shows the Sangam poets considered the whole of India as one nation.
Yamuna is called Thozunai in Akam.59;
Holy River Ganga is mentioned 17 times by Sangam poets.
Here the poet says,
The Ganges descending from the Himalayas is always overflowing its banks, in Puram. 161.
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Item 655
Shakespeare in rivers.
There are descriptions of rivers gliding with gentle murmur reminding one of Shakespeare’s rivers in the
Two Gentlemen of Verona – II-VII-25-32
JULIA
The more thou damm’st it up, the more it burns.
The current that with gentle murmur glides,
Thou know’st, being stopped, impatiently doth rage,
But when his fair course is not hinderèd,
He makes sweet music with th’ enameled stones,
Giving a gentle kiss to every sedge
He overtaketh in his pilgrimage;
And so by many winding nooks he strays
With willing sport to the wild ocean.
***
Item 656
Huge ships
Tamils of Sangam age were great sea farers like their northern counterparts. We see botas in Indus seals, ships in Satakarni coins. Also big Hindu ships in Indonesian sculptures. But we had such huge ships in Sangam age too.
Marutan Ilanakanar’s verse in Akananuru 255 describing the course of a vessel on the sea compares its movement to the whole world in motion by reason of its hugeness and notes its blowing wind bellowing on the surface with the sailor at the helm directing its movement with an eye on the light house on the distant shore.
Akanānūru 255, Mathurai Maruthan Ilanākanār, Pālai Thinai – What the heroine said to her friend
If someone would be kind enough
to go and tell him that the stacked
bangles on my arms have slipped
down, my perfect jewels have become
loose and I have lost my great beauty,
he’ll come back, my friend,
to remove the sorrow that ruins me,
after leaving to earn wealth on a
fear-causing ship that moves as though
the earth rises, splitting the stinking
waves, sailing days and nights, moved
by fast wind, as the ship’s captain looks
at the bright flames on the lighthouse on
the tall sandy shores and figures distances.
***
Item 657
Sea = army
The whole sea is compared to the military expedition of a king,
The boats sailing = elephants in the army,
The sound of the waves= beating war drums,
White cranes sitting on the sand heaps= soldiers in white uniform.
This is in Kalittokai 149.
***
Item 658
Rig Veda and Paranar
Vedic people were great sea farers. After watching the sea for thousands of years one Vedic poet said the sea neither shrinks because the cloud drink its waters, nor swells because the rivers flow in to it.
This is in poem Pathitrupattu 45 as well.
To make such a statement, Hindus must have known thousands of rivers flowing into the sea every minute.
Unless they and their forefathers recorded it no one poet could say it.
To be continued………………….
Tags- Sea, huge ships, Ganges, Mirage, sapphire and coral, item 658, Purananuru wonders-43, Tamil Encyclopedia-83, One Thousand Interesting Facts -Part 83
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Tamil and Vedas 