Tourism started in medieval times: Scholar Chandni Bi (AMU)
*Tiruchirapalli, Feb 13 *: The movement of people from one place to another over considerable distance is evident even from medieval history and can be understood from the Chola and Vijayanagar Dynasties, a scholar has said. Speaking at a National Seminar on CulturalTtourism in Tamil Nadu with special reference to Tiruchirapalli at a private college here yesterday,S. Chandni Bi Associate Professor, CAS, Department of History, Aligarh University said the such movement, termed as tour, was with or without purpose.
'In this context, we are to look in the medieval South India for tourists and tourism,' she said. The term 'medieval' can conveniently be understood to cover the time period during which the Cholas and Vijayanagar dynasties ruled almost the whole of South India. For history students with even some knowledge of stone age and the consequent periods, it is not difficult to recollect how people moved from one continent to the other. She cited the examples of Alexander who pursued conquests and Emperor Ashoka whose empire extended up to Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh in the South. Samudra Gupta's march up to Kanchipuram, Rajendra Chola I and Kulottunga I not only touched Bengal in India but waged sea wars to South East Asian Islands of Combuja, Java etc. These are some of the examples that one could pictorise in a fraction of a second to understand that really people moved for various reasons.
Ramayana and Mahabharata, Silapadigaram, Devaram etc also give us a vivid picture of common people and saints moving to different parts of our country for many reasons. Thus it was conspicuous for anyone to understand that tour and tourism were not something that was not known in Ancient and Medieval times, she claimed. Religion was the strong underlying factor for tour in the medieval period.
Ms Chandini Bi said in medieval India, business and religion served as a combined factor for the promotion of tourism. 'Hence, I have chosen to prefer the epigraphical sources that are available in the temples. It is needless to claim that the inscriptions are more authentic sources. In the first step, one can see if people moved from one place to another from epigraphs. There are many inscriptions in Tamil language itself denoting the presence of Kashmir people.
They are seen as donors, making endowments to Sri Rangam, Tiruvotriyur, Kanchipuram, and Chidambaram to mention a few. There are at least eight Tamil epigraphs that mention about Kashmir donors between 11th and 13th centuries, she added. Inferences make clear that the people from North India were settled in Tamil land and played significant role in the fields of politics and religion, she added. Apart from this, one could see the Arya Bhattas engaged in temple affairs from the many inscriptions in Sri Rangam. The Aryabhattas lived in groups and owned houses in the main streets of Sri Rangam could be traced well. A less known pilgrim centre--Tribhuvani in Pondicherry Taluk-- has a Siva temple named Bilavanateeswarar with early 80 inscriptions,a majority belonging to the Chola regime and less to Vijayanagar period, she said.
She further said donors who came from outside Tribhuvani were from different places like Tirutthuraipoondi, Cuddalore, Papanasam and Manavil. and many generations of his family alone could be seen as coming from Guntur as donors and making large hearted donations in gold.' 'Thimmarasar, son of Dhandu Obla Arasar, gave 200 pon (gold) in charity came from Red Hills in Chennai while Virriyundan Seman, a chief probably from Salem, donated 1,000 kasu for a special festival. Thus, it is evident that people within different states of South India and also from many parts of North India toured exhaustively for their political, economic, philanthropic reasons in medieval south India.
Ms Chandini Bi further said similarly, people from south India also went to North India for same reasons. Instances of Kings making endowments and grants to places outside their own dominions through their officers or feudatories or getting some religious rites performed in such places are many. For example, Eastern Ganga King and Queen were seen at Kanchi, Gahadavala King at Suryanar Koyil and several of the Hoysala and Vijayanagar Kings at Kasi. There are many examples in Indian history that speak about rulers outside India, showing interest to construct religious buildings and mutts for the convenience of pilgrims from their country to stay in the holy places. There is clear evidences to prove the existence of the concept of tourism in medieval South India among all classes of people. Most of the time the tourists' natural mode of transport was by road.
'There are many references that we have come across right from the time of Ashoka the Great, that kings constructed roads with shade giving trees on both the sides, inns and resting places at particular distances. Locating the ancient and medieval roads is a bigger issue that we have not touched in our research so far extensively. But it goes without saying that our volumes of inscriptions have many references denoting big and small roads and the ways connecting near and far places. Royal roads and temple roads had special prefix as Tiru and called as Tiruvidi.
It is really astonishing to understand that one such peruvidi ( big street) of 11th century at Tiruvalankadu is a part of the Prime Minister Golden Quadrilateral initiated by our former Prime Minister Vajpayee, she said.. Horses, bullock carts and donkeys were largely used by all sections of the people as modes of tranport. A larger section of the population trusted their own legs. The inland waterways were also not spared and boats specially built were utilised thoroughly. The temple premises and mutts were used as resting places, she added.
She said choultries called "chattiram" were very common perhaps on all junctions of main roads connecting different townships. Chattirams were managed by watchmen and the care for the traveller, his luggage and the animal, if accompanied, were available, ofcourse for a price. 'Even food and fodder were also available. The term Ira Chattiram(night choultry) perhaps indicate that it was meant for night stays. 'After transport and stay the next priority is food. In the days when packed food was not available all tourists generally satisfied themselves with the accessible local made food.
'It appears that eateries were available on road sides, which has been looked as a specific livelihood of destitute women. Some literature and hearsay stories confirm this practice,' she said.. When donations were extensively made in medieval times the donors did mention especially from Vijaynagar days that a particular portion of the food offerings should be meant for public distribution. The temple functionaries definitely had a share in it, she added.
There were also night choultries that were functioning and received this sort of food. The donations to serve food on festive days were enormous. In SriRanagam temple town alone one could come across a number of mutts and charity halls where these food offerings were diverted. Such was the system,the tourist would not have to spend on his or her food for days together at pilgrim centers. Tolerance prevailed in general mind set of all classes of people. The kings had sent their family members and ministers or chiefs as their representatives to the pilgrim centers in the rival land cutting across the political boundaries.
Ms Chandini Bi further said there was a provision perhaps for exchange of currency of different kingdoms and rulers that facilitated the tourists. There is one inscription that records a donation from the Chera country that also gives the rate of exchange between the Chera currency 'Achchu' and the Chola currency 'Kasu.' Their relation was one is to nine. The belief that supplying water to the needy people added merit to one's life encouraged people to create water pandals and supply free drinking water to humans and animals in the country. Such practices could be seen on all days, round the year at important places especially in the temple arenas. 'We find two water pandal people receiving a share of food from the SriRangaanathar Temple, Srirangam,' she added. There was a hospital functioning in fourth prakhara of SriRnagam Temple.
A particular family has been maintaining it for more than two centuries and the hospital maintainer also appears as a donor. The hospital is referred as 'Arogyasalai' There were many such instances where hospital existed and it was meant for both human and animals. Even Kundavai, the elder sister of the Chola king Raja raja I have donated to one such hospital in Kumbakonam. The college at Thirumukkudal had a hospital also. There was a special medical school at Tiruvavaduthurai, which would have catered to the needs of Vaidyans (physicians) to look after various hospitals in the Chola regime, she said.
Thus, for the convenience and comfort of tourists or pilgrims various facilities like roads, food and hospitals existed. With the infrastructure, the currency exchange system also prevailed. Moreover, almost all the houses had single or double raised platforms in front of the houses at the entry point called 'thinnai' which helped strangers and travellers to avail for rest and night stay. Generally the common public were also kind and large hearted to take care and spare food and water to the travellers from far and near. This is how the whole system of tourism functioned in Medieval South India, she added.