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XV. The Brahmins of Malabar1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 March 2011

K. Ramavarma Raja
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Extract

THE lofty chain of the Western Ghats bears much the same relation to the land of Bhārgava-kṣetra, a Sanskrit name of the coastal country of Kerala or Malabar, as the gigantic Himālayan range bears to the land of Bhārata-varṣa, or the Indian continent as a whole. This huge and impervious mountain-barrier, shutting off the low-lying seaboard region from the high table-land of the Deccan behind, has made it a separate world in every respect. The face of Nature, with its luxuriant growth of palms nurtured by the abundant tropical monsoons, differs from that of any other part of the Indian Peninsula. The language, Malayālam, though a branch of Dravidian speech, is confined to this region.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society , Volume 42 , Issue 3 , July 1910 , pp. 625 - 639
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 1910

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References

page 625 note 2 In allusion to the legend that this country was created or reclaimed from the sea by Bhārgava Rāma for the purpose of free distribution among the Brahmins whom he is said to have brought and settled here, in sixty-four villages, in order to expiate the sin of having exterminated the Kṣatriya dynasties thrice seven times.

page 627 note 1 According to another view the two subdivisions of the C class are: (1) those entitled to the full right of Vedic study; (2) those entitled to the performance of temple service as Pujāris and to the bare right of Vedic study.

page 361 note 1 On Bādhūla as the name of a family see Hall's, Index to the Bibliography of the Indian Philosophical Systems (Calcutta, 1859), p. 112Google Scholar, and Burnell's, Catalogue of the Sanskrit MSS. at Tanjore, pp. 97, 122Google Scholar. [A. A. M.]

page 631 note 2 See Weber's, History of Sanskrit Literature, second edition, London, 1882, p. 100Google Scholar.

page 631 note 3 The Rājā of Cochin informed me that at least 3500 Brahmins in his State can recite the whole of a single Veda. [A. A. M.]

page 634 note 1 In fact, he is more probably Śaṅkara Bhaṭṭa, son of Nārāyaṇa, author of the Sarva-dharma-prakāśa, a work of which there is a MS. in the India Office Library. [A. A. M.]

page 635 note 1 Cf. MrPillai's, Sthanu article on Āryabhaṭa in the Indian Review, 07, 1905Google Scholar.

page 636 note 1 Aufrecht in his Catalogus Catalogornm enumerates more than fifty Stotras attributed to Śaṅkarācārya. He there gives a list of nearly 300 works attributed to the same scholar, who is reputed to have died at the age of 32! [A. A. M.]

page 636 note 2 He is perhaps identical with the Kulaśekharavarma Bhūpa mentioned below.

page 637 note 1 Vol. i, p. 453, No. 5701, as existing in the private library of Aṇṇāsvāmī, at Śrīvalliputtūr, in the Tinnevelly District. [A. A. M.]

page 637 note 1 The only drama with this title in Aufrecht's Catalogus Catalogorum is there stated to be by Gururāma Kavi. [A. A. M.]

page 637 note 3 Identified by tradition with the Cheraman Perumal or one of the Perumal rulers of ancient and undivided Kerala.

page 639 note 1 Further information on the subject of the paper will be found in the following publications: (1) Mr. Fawcett's monograph on the Nambūdris, Madras Museum Bulletin, vol. iii; (2) the old District Manual of British Malabar and the recently published District Gazetteer, Malabar and Aujengo; (3) the Travancore State Manual, 3 vols., Trivandrum, 1906; (4) The Census Reports of Cochin, Travancore, and British Malabar, 1901, more especially that of Cochin, chapter viii, on Caste, Tribe, or Race.