I feel, this is an interesting twist to our earlier discussions.
Can we compare RRC to the britishers, on equal footing?
Did RRC commit so much damage to the lankan empires?
Is there any type of Jallianwala bagh happened in lanka during RRC's war on it?
How was those wars characterised of?
Are the women raped during those wars of RRC?
IS the buddhist stupas and monasteries destoryed?
Is so, what is the reason for it, and can it be compared to the destruction of Hindu temples by the muslims?
I was really confused at this..
I just wanted to know, how was the wars of RRC times characterised of. As far as my knowledge is concerned, there were only political prisoners and NOT any who were abused or exploitated.
> > I just wanted to know, how was the wars of RRC times characterised of. > As far as my knowledge is concerned, there were only political prisoners > and NOT any who were abused or exploitated. > > Regards, > Senthil Raja
Hi Raja,
War is war - what else can it be - you come across instances of the ruthlessness of war in every day of the kurukshetra war.
the problem is that we have been sold an image of RRC by kalki which is very hard to shake. Beleive me, get your hands on a copy of the mahavamsa ( the lankan chronicle).....slaves were taken even prior to rrc times. without going into detail there are accounts of lankans in large numbers ( in thousands) brought as slaves - again all this is speculation - karikalan is said to hv brought 12000 to build the kallanai. gaja bahu is said to hv come and liberated these and taken an equal number of tamils back....again contradicting accounts of this event come up.
RJC not only recovered the pandya diadem but also the crown of lankan king, and not stopping at that - brought the king mahinda V and his queen and kept them under house arrest in madurai. the king died after 12 years in captivity in madurai.Anuradhapura, the 1400- year-old capital of Sinhala kings was destroyed - The destruction was so extensive the city was abandoned. Cholas made the city of Polonnaruwa as their capital...
According to the Hottur inscriptions of Satyasraya, dated 1007 1008 C.E., the Chola king with a force numbering nine hundred thousand had `pillaged the whole country, had slaughtered the women, the children and the Brahmans, and, taking the girls to wife, had destroyed their caste' - this was a campaign personally led by RJC as a general under RRC.
If you look further into RJC kedaram campagin and his war against sri vijaya - war trophies abound...so too are the number of war trophies that you see in GKC....the big temple itself is claimed to hv built with slave labour ( caputred armies)...Aditya claim to fame pandyan thalai konda - he is supposed to beheaded veerapandya and mounted the head on a bamboo pole and left it rotting outside tanjore for weeks....
> > War is war - what else can it be - you come across instances of the > ruthlessness of war in every day of the kurukshetra war.
continuing....RJC is said to laid waste malaysia in his naval campagin - the city destroyed was called kota kellangi and laid it waste...this led to the ultimate fall of the srivijaya empire.
I had earlier mentioned about the hottur inscriptions on RJC. But one must wonder...why did the hosala kingdoms support the cholas till Rajaraja III reign ? Kinda sounds odd though, may be a bit more reading into that part of detail may help.
If it were true, that could possibly be one of the reasons why many people do not talk or sing the praises of RJC and are proud of RRC. May be a reason why Kalki chose RRC too :-)
War is war - no question. But chola's administration was different, check out their structures of taxing vs british.
And please...Kurukshetra is a total different story, I am sure we can discuss for months on that..as such people are feeling left out on the independance threads.. lets stick to PS :-)
> > If it were true, that could possibly be one of the reasons why many people do not talk or sing the praises of RJC and are proud of RRC. May be a reason why Kalki chose RRC too :-) > > War is war - no question. But chola's administration was different, check out their structures of taxing vs british. >
the cholas and pandyas feud runs for centuries. both of them alternate in claiming the praise of severing the head of the other. Would be nice to list out number of such kings.
i am reading an interesting book - Dr. Kudavoil Balasubramanian's - Gopura kalai marapu. An excellant repository of well researched information neatly illustrated and indexed - a must read. Why i mention it is, he cites the blood feud between the two as one of reasons ( apart from our famed malik kafur) for lack of significant palace / podium / victory arches etc in tamil land. two references can be singled out- Kulottunga III on invading madurai - destroys the pandya palace, the throne and grounds it to dust, not stopping with that he ploughs it with a donkey and sows varagu!!!
not to be outdone, sundara pandian repays the cholas in the same coin - while invading uraiyur and tanjore.....large building complexes are set ablaze and he too destroys the chola palace,throne - grounds it to dust, and ploughs it using a donkey and sows varagu....
they also melted each others minted coins ( dont blame them - it would have been humiliating to see the seated tiger looking at the upright bow and the hanging fishes ( dead))
remember - the cholas pursued the pandya haram for two centuries and occupied the better part of lanka just for it - the srilankan king on his part refused to part with it despite all hardships..
on the chola/chera front - the very first sagasam of RRC is kandalur salai where he takes the name of keralanthagan....he is said to set ablaze the militiary academy at kandalur salai.
at that time, they must have spoken the same language,worshipped the same gods, studied the same scriptures, wore similar clothes, their people were of same color, creed.....yet the blood - drove them into this feud. a case in point is RJC did try and merge the two clans - but didnt succeed...
sundara pandian repays the cholas in the same > coin - while invading uraiyur and tanjore.....large building > complexes are set ablaze and he too destroys the chola > palace,throne - grounds it to dust, and ploughs it using a donkey > and sows varagu....
can you quote the exact edict. the general perception is mule( koveru kazuthai) and visha kaduku. not that it makes diference but gives some trivia of the socio economics
It is interesting to read this event. It is the same kulothinga III that built the sarabeshwarar temple (a simply superb temple, a very serene atmosphere after 6 pm) and restored thribuvanam temple along with many multitude of temples (also the kosai nagar (koyambedu) lava kusa temple). KIII time was when Kamban composed the epic. I have always been impressed by KIII's methods and works ...i guess except this one :-) I am beginning to believe that these same dudes get totally different when the go for battle... revenge and vengence seem to have blotted their minds.
One thing though, I dont read either the pandyas or cholas burning down temples built by either. If any other instance please do share.
Sometimes reading the meykeertis in english makes it difficult to read. Is it possible to post such instances alone in tamil(unicode/tscii) while the rest of the mail remains in english!
War is Ruthless.. Its no doubt. Infact, from what i understood from my little knowledge of our tamil literature, which i studied during my school days is, that, the ruthlessness is attributed to bravery.. A brave man is aggressive..
But, i feel, there is large difference between the wars waged by us, and the wars waged by the invaders.
I would like to know more on the following points..
1. Is the Wars were waged only between the kshatriyas, leaving the common mass undisturbed?
2. How was the political prisoners treated? Getting imprisoned is different from getting looted, exploited, tortured and abused by the enemy.
3. How was the relation b/w men & women on those days... what i understood is that, for the kshatriyas, the women captured in the war belongs to only kshatriya caste, and not from common people..
4. The mughal invasion is characterised by full of hatred, and by the policy of dar-ul-islam.. ie muslims and kafirs.. the kafirs are either to be converted or to be destroyed.. so, their wars were mostly of barbaric.. where, the entire civilisation is being destroyed.. But, i feel, our wars cannot be classified on par with them.. Firstly, they may be ruthless... the palaces were destroyed.. the defeated people were imprisoned. But, there is a basic level of decency, and a raja dharma, where the prisoners were treated properly, although they were used for most of the labour works.
5. Did the molesting & raping of women, done by all our kings or only by RRC? Does women from common masses are also affected?
6. In Goa Inquisition, the dutch christians, unleashed all barbarism on us.. for eg, the husband is tied to a pole, and his wife is raped in front of him.. then the genitals of the husband is cut-down before his wife. Then, his legs are tied to two bamboo poles, and then released apart, where his body will teared in to two..
I feel, such level of barbarism could not have happened by our kings.. Beheading, killing by striking the chest are all held as virtues of brave men, while stabbing from the back, running away from the war field were considered as shameful acts..
We could not compare the political prisoners with slaves.. slaves were treated cheaper than animals, while prisoners were treated with some humanity..
so, my final conclusion is that "Ruthlessness is a characteristics of war..But, barbarism is different from ruthlesness"
> Vijay, > > The second one looks like a sacrifice, rather than a massacre? Any other thoughts? > > Nanda
hi nanda
Exactly my point - we need to look at things in perspective - thats why we need experts who can read these and explain to us - sadly nobody wants to encourage them, buy their books, engage them to come and give lectures, present papers...they continue to do so out of their own interest - but how long will they last.
a case in point, just take a look at this panel - the beauty of this composition was explained by Dr Balu sir to me - the artistic expression has reached its zenith in just this one small sculpture, but how many know to appreciate
without going too much into the specs, a devot family, in abject poverty, still find something to offer to others, shiva decides to test them, in a thunder filled rainy night lands up outside their hut and seeks alms/food, there is absolutely nothing to offer in the house, the desperate man doesnt know what to do, his wife asks him to go to the field where they have sown paddy in the morning ( vidai nel) - the man goes with a basket and sieves the grain back, which the devot wife, mills and makes food. serves the guest, who takes one bite and is so filled with emotion that he burts into a jyothi - returns as shiva parvathi on nandi and gives darshan to the couple. the sculpture has to show this story in a panel that is the length of two pilot pens and 1 1/2 high.
take a look at this panel where a pen is shown to give you an idea of the size of panel
the man depicted with the basket on his head, the wife receiving it in her hand / next portion
- the wife is serving food to the ascetic - see the attn to detail in the presention of the food - the guest is seated on a four legged manai and food is served on a mukkali - the wife has a annavetti in her hand ( serving spoon). look carefully at the head of ascetic - you can see a small spark, a little above to the right a big flame and then a bigger flame. /next portion
shiva parvati on nandhi giving darshan....
the artistic excellance and the fact that he had to know the story in depth and come up with a concept to depict shows the depth of knowledge/ pinnacle of expression
We should join hands to encourage such people, buy their works and boost their morale to dwell more into the recess of our past to dig out these gems...
read this in context ...first he destroys their capital, sea port - strategically to assert and cement his position - then starts a systematic process of creating land divisions named after him/his country, renames road, places etc....builds temples, positions lots of his people there...even used the revenues to fund the big temple. this was no loot - this was an invasion/occupation - a well planned naval assault aimed at annexing the land.
I guess Satish hit the bulls eye on the note. It looks like some sort of symbolization on a venduthal or parikaram. The story of parasurama chopping his mothers head could look brutal but thats only a part of the bigger scheme. There are stories of Ettukudi and Enkann Muruga temples of what happened to the sculpturor, usually there is a pre and post case prior to these events. Unless the entire story is known, its not easy to classify these as barbaric, though on the top it looks so. In all essence, these could be mythological.
Reading on... the behavior is similar to current political trend, of down grading the opponent rule. I am beginning to believe that nothing is changed.
Hi how can war not affect everybody in a invaded land. you should read kalki's sivakamiyin sabatham to know the rules concerning loot. in the penultimate chapters where the pallava riducules the aged chola king for collecting more than what he should. loot was a major impetus for men to join the war. why else should they risk their lives for their king to expand his territory. but the common population was more affected when they let the lands fallow and the lakses unsilted . famine and general misery usually folowed a invasion.
kalki writes rather honestly about looting by the pallava king but somehow varnishes the truth with RRc's invasion. this has clouded the judgement on the cholas. mahavamsa details the destruction by the cholas.infact kalki creates a big issue of even rations not being taken from the enslaved land.
Somewhere in the long timeline, the morals must have been lost. The purpose is to find where the chains were broken and restore them' I have not read on any of the epic wars were abduction and molesting of women take place. The only instances of such code of conduct being crossed was with Vaalee and Ravana. I am talking of earthly avtars or existances... not of gandharva or deva - their code of conduct is under different set of rules.
Hi there are no rules governing war. if either you live or die in the end of the day you dont follow rules. dont get carried away by the mahabarat or ramayan serials. people fought with all their cunning and tactics in wars. ban on night fighting and other morals is not logical when your enemy has a sword in hand.
I dont think there was a specific caste called kshatriyas in the later periods. ofcourse the warrior castes like vanniyars and devars must have been the back bone of thwe army. as early as 8th century i think paranjothi who headed the pallava armies was a vellalar. even appars brother inlaw a vellaalar was a commander. i think except bramhins everybody fought the wars. there were cases of the lowermost varnas capturing power like the kakatiyas. one of the most powerful empires from warrangal they were about to turn their eyes on tamil land before malik destroyed them.
the kings fought for land, the armies fought for loot and the common man suffered in every way.
venketesh - In ponniyinselvan@yahoogroups.com, Tamil Arul Pandiyan mPandiyan
what slokas are you talking about? artha sastra? I think artha sastra lost its relevance soon after it was written. it even gives suggestions on what the king should do in the morning, the noon and the evening.I am not sure how many kings followed it. however it did insist on a position of a raja rishi who had to guide the king. during the period we are interested in 90% of battles were about short day long skirmishes.not much time for rules. and i dont think kings from all parts of the country were instructed in artha sastra.
> I think that is why we lost to the British, we did not involve as much sanskrit knowing people in the infantry as possible against the British. > those who fought predominantly in 1857 seem to be bramhins rani of jhansi, the peshwas, nana saheb( adopted) were bramhins. mangal pandey too could have been one . some accounts claims that Mangal Pandey was born in a Bhumihar Brahmin family to Divakar Pandey of Surhupur village so what do you derive from this. we used too many bramhins? I dont think you can interpret like this. venketesh
Initially, Sanskrit was available to everyone. knowledge of vedas was however restricted to the brahmanas (brahamana of vedic ages is different from today's brahmin).But again, over time, what you say could have happened, the base probably got clouded. Lord Krsna explains the 4 castes in the Gita, technically a family can have all people for all castes. The best example of how this degenerated may be explained with the saint ramanuja story of preaching the mantra from temple top. Technically it was quite complex to mix both languages, thats a fascinating aspect of thirupugazh, a classic blend of multiple languages in the praise of the lord.
Hi > The argument is like this - > If you remove/disparge all Sangam/Tamil Kings contribution then there will be no concept of family, language(grammar) or writing(script) to talk of. Tamils would have been living like animals. > when we are talking about history assembled by british sources why do you jump back to a hypothetical question.
the history of the pudukottai state which has been the scope for many international books still depends on " a manual of pudukottai state" by venkatrama iyer printed in the 30's. sponsored by the british and seshayya sastri. the district gazeteers assembled by the british for every part of tamilnadu is still a primary source of history for many writers.minute details about every part.
> The British/British bureaucrats sources are propaganda material given a semblance of normalcy/reality. It is plain vain self- glorification for the British and their Indian bureaucrats.
reading and ecording the edicts started with them. we kept thinking that the big temple was built by karikalan till they told us differently. do you want to doubt that because the british said that.
venketesh
p.s This conversation like the previous one is leading nowhere. I am opting out.
Let keep the discussions as far as possible closer to PS. I had the good fortune of attending a talk organised by the singapore library last evening - the topic was
The Imperial Cholas: An 11th Century Example of Regional Power Play in Southeast Asia
the paper was presented by a Lee Kong Chian Research Fellow, Mr Prasanna Weerawardane. ( will circulate once i get a copy).
While the paper was interesting, there were a few grey areas, thanks to the little knowledge i gained by being a part of this group and reading the archives i took this up and it was well appareciated. listing below:
The paper projected the cholas as a warring clan - eager to invade, raid countries for furthering their interests:
- examples were cited from the chornicle ( culavamsa) - of RRc taking back untold treasures, pillage the anuradhapura vihara etc. - unlike other campaigns - the cholas wanted to annexe lanka for its resources. - the cholas ill treated the royal women and took away king mahinda IV and his wife to madura where he died.
- the first attack on srivijaya by rjc was because they went on a specific disinformation on the chola power - leading to the first envoy from chola land being treated as an insignificant kingdom by the sung dynasty. - the profits from these raids were used to shower gifts on the big temple - the second raid on srivijaya by kullottunga was caused by the srilankan king seeking his aid to fight the cholas - the help was by providing products from the peninsula to aid the srilankan army/pay for their expenses. the attack was against this aid. - the buddhist viharam in nagapatinam was set up bascially to attact trade.
while it was heartening to note the amount of interest the cholas still hold among the intellectual faternity here, my arguments were as below:
1. The lankan angle has been going on since pallava period and the incursions were not unilateral. the lankan crown did interfere in the affairs of the chola state due to their close relations with the pandya crown.
2. the pillage might have been in search of the pandya diadems - which the chola wanted back to ensure peace reigned in his state. so the cholas were acting in self defense to ensure stability by closing out the pandya for good.
3. mahinda IV and his queen were taken back to madurai to stay in a palace and he lived a further 12 years there before eventually dying. what was the reason for this? the chola/pandya style of disposing an enemy is evident from their titles - chop the head off - yet they let the lankan king live for 12 years
4. right from pallava period buddha is shown as a sub incar of krishna and worshipped. even though south indian kings were frequently at war, they never touched the temples. so there was a sanctity associated with temples. the viharam was supported through generous grants by RRC,and these grants were further re instated by kulottunga. hence it could be a one sided account of the mahavamsa to say that the viharams of lanka were destroyed.
5. complete annhiliation of sri vijaya doesnt quite justify the chola style of functioning. just the system of misinforming the usng dynasty by the sri vijaya could not have been a reason for such a massive strike. at the same time the cambodian king was paying tributes - he gifted his famous chariot to the chola king.
I feel, you are degrading our own kings too much. The soldiers did not participate in war, not just for loots. There could be more than that..
Those who participated in war belongs to all castes.. In the epic of our community Called the Annanmar stories, it was mentioned that the vellala king "Kundrudaiyan" was alloted an area to govern by the chola king. (Ponnar Sankar kavyam was written by kalaignar itself)
His sons Ponnar & sankar, were assisted by Sambavan who belongs to a caste presently classified as SC.
This story is supposed to have taken place by 12th century.
So, we need to research on how the kingdom is structured, and how they collected armies to fight for.
To my knowledge, a kingdom is nothing but the consolidation of small rulers. Some times, when a king takes over another, all their sub rulers, might have accepted the victor's rule. Or for the fact that, the common people, are NOT disturbed, while those who settled at the capital of the kingdom might have been arrested.
Some times, when a victorious king, might appoint another men to an area, if the previous one is not good enough.
So, the same local chief, might have taken part on both chola and panyan kings, depending on various factors, like moral reasoning, or one of the kings might have mis-ruled, or the local chief might be under the dominance of a king.
But to the local chief, who ever rules, there is no difference. He is going to pay the tax.
so, the war is mostly an events among the kshatriya classes, among kingdoms, where ordinary people were not that much affected. Because, unlike in western nations, where the king had absolute power over all his subjects, in our political system, the power structure was highly distributed.
> I remember reading a post in agathiar on marco polo account of pandya time. If I recollect correct is says that our armies went to war almost naked with just a spear n the people were not too brave ( cowards)....will try to source n put it soon. > > Rgds > Vj > this is the post from agathiar>
The inhabitants of the kingdom worship idols and many of them worship oxen. Under no circumstances will they eat beef, nor will they kill an ox.All the houses are smeared with cowdung.There are some people called GAVI who eat beaf but only when the cow is dead by natural causes.
In this kingdom everyone including the king sits on the ground, when questiond why they do not sit a more dignified manner, they reply that it is extremely dignified to sit on the ground as we ourselves are made up of the earth and destined to return to the earth, so the earth so be respected and not to be held in contempt. There is rice but no corn in the kingdom.
The men go to war with lances but completely naked.They are not in the least brave but are miserable and cowardly people.They do not kill animals but if they want to eat them they ask saracens or people of other religion to kill it for them. The men and women wash their body in water twice a day.They do not dare to eat either in the morning or in the evening without having washed first.They drink only out of their personal cup and never put to their lips but hold above their heads, pouring the wine down their throats.
Now I will quit these particulars, and tell you of the most precious article that exists in the world. You must know that rubies are found in this Island and in no other country in the world but this. They find there also sapphires and topazes and amethysts, and many other stones of price. And the King of this Island possesses a ruby which is the finest and biggest in the world; I will tell you what it is like. It is about a palm in length, and as thick as a man's arm; to look at, it is the most resplendent object upon earth; it is quite free from flaw and as red as fire. Its value is so great that a price for it in money could hardly be named at all. You must know that the Great Kaan sent an embassy and begged the King as a favour greatly desired by him to sell him this ruby, offering to give for it the ransom of a city, or in fact what the King would. But the King replied that on no account whatever would he sell it, for it had come to him from his ancestors.[NOTE 5]
The people of Seilan are no soldiers, but poor cowardly creatures. And when they have need of soldiers they get Saracen troops from foreign parts.
Folks... pleasse pleasee remove unwanted parts of the original email.... its a pain to scroll through 2 meters of emails threads to read just one line.... like this.....