— Sores ©. Poems of Love and War> > ‘Although cultural influences spread throughout the indian subconti- ent, south India remained politically independent of the north until the British conquest. South Indians spoke languages of an entirely different family, Dravidian, than north india. The oldest of these lan- guages, Tamil, was regularized about 250 BCE and Is less influenced by Sanskrit than any other Indian language. It produced a classical literature during the period from 150 BCE to 250 CE, of which several anthologies of poems survive. There are about 150 million speakers of Dravidian languages today. Indian civilization took a different form in the Dravidian kingdoms. The Indus Valley civilization may have spoken a Dravidian language and thus may have influenced Vedic society as well as south India. The Indus Valley script has never been deciphered, however, and the extent fo which Dravidian culture originated in the Indus Valley is uncertain, In any case, agriculture did not appear in south India until centuries after the end of the Indus Valley civilization, and records of the Tamils date from hundreds of years later stil There are no reliable historical records from the period in which the poems were composed, but the surviving texts tell us much about the society. The poems are primarily secular and deal with love, war, governance, trade, and mourning, South india was divided into three kingdoms, the Pandyas, the Colas, and the Cheras. The region had lo major extemal threats. Classical Tamil poetry is called “Sangam” Poetry because it was later anthologized by a literary academy that called itself sangam (trom the name for a Buddhist community of 4“POEMS OF LOVE AND WAR 45 monks, or sangha). The academy claimed that two ancient sangams that preceded it had produced the poems. There is no historical evi- dence for the existence of these earlier academies, and the poems themselves clearly were composed by many different authors at cit- ferent times and places. The fact that the poems were compiled at a later date suggests that more literature may not have found its way into the compilations and is lost. Tamil poetics are described in the treatise Tolkappiyam, written in ‘about the year 300. Early Tamil poetry is predominantly secular and is divided into two categories, akam (interior, or subjective, pronounced “cham'’) and puram (exterior, or objective). Love poems fall nto the first category, war into the second. The primary elements of Tamil poetics are location (landscapes) and time (both the seasons of the year and the six parts of the day). The five landscapes of akam poetry are hills, forests, farmland, seashore, and wasteland. Akam poems are also shaped by "native elements," of relations between humans and nature, ‘nd "human elements,” usually the stages of a love affair. Puram poetry has seven landscapes, corresponding fo the phases of combat: catile raiding, invasion, siege, pitched battle, victory, death, and praise of kings. (The latter two were not considered suitable for poetry.) Within this framework the Sangam poets created a moving literature. In the first poem, for example, the kurifici and the mountain scene clearly mark this as a poem about lovers meeting, Their union is not described but only alluded to by the scene of the bees making honey from the flowers of the kurifci plant (which comes to flower only atter twelve years). The poem zooms from cosmic abstractions about the speaker's love to the mountain slopes, the bees, and the flower itself, suggesting her progression from idealized feeling to physical intimacy. All this is accomplished in a few lines. The remainder of the akam Poems ate also about lovers meeting, except for the last, which is from the genre palai (wasteland), which describes the lovers’ journey through wilderness. The puram poems here describe warfare and its consequences. The last of the puram poems, “king Killiin Combat,” is based on a histori- cal incident that would have been well known fo those who heard the poem. The Cola king Killi wagered his kingdom on a wrestiing match with a rival. The first part of the poem describes the frantic moves of a cobbler who must finish a cot for his wife, who by custom must deliver their baby on it.The situations are parallel: the movements of both are45 POEMS OF LOVE AND WAR skiliful.f the cobbler succeeds, the child will be born on the cot and they will rejoice; if King Kill succeeds, the kingcom will be reborn and. the people will rejoice. The labumam is not a symbol of a mood as it would be in an akam poem, but simply the emblem of a clan. The final poem is exceptional, since most of the poems have few religious references. It a late classical poem of praise to Tirumal, a god of the forests who was later identified with Vishnu. In this poem the classical form is adapted to the new devotional (bhakti) Hinduism. The translator of these poems, A.K. Ramanujan (1929-1993), was one of India’s greatest modern poets as well as a noted scholar of Dravidian languages. These pieces are not only accurate translations of the letter and spitit of the originals, but works of elegant poetry in their own right. In these and other collections, Ramanujan brought to lite one of the world's great literatures. The absence of early historical records for south India has led to much fanciful speculation about the prehistory of Tamil speakers. The site htip://archaeologyindia.com, incomplete at the time of his writing, attempts to illustrate as much of the early evidence as possible Questions 1. What to you are the most striking similarities and differences between the okam and puram poems? 2. Dothe very stylized references to location, season, and time of day detract from the message of an akam poem or enhance i? Ate there similarities in other love poems you have read? 3. The images of warfare in the puram poems are radically different from those in the Bhagavad Gita. Are there ur themes in the two genres? Po eos Poems of Love and War A.K. Ramanujan, sel. and trans., Poems of Love and War from the Eight Anthologies and the Ten Long Poems of Classical Tamil (New York: Columbia University Press, 1985), pp.5, 16, 17, 22-23, 63, 115-117, 120, 123, 179, 218POEMS OF LOVE AND WAR 47 Akam Poems What She Said Bigger than earth, certainly, higher than the sky, ‘more unfathomable than the waters is this love for this man of the mountain slopes where bees make rich honey from the flowers of the kurifici that has such black stalks. Tevakulattar Kuruntokai 3 What He Said Asa little white snake with lovely stripes on its young body troubles the jungle elephant this slip of a girl her teeth like sprouts of new rice her wrists stacked with bangles troubles me. Catti Natanar Kuruntokai 119 What She Said Only the thief was there, no one else. And if he should fie, what can [ do? There was only a thin-legged heron standing on legs yellow as millet stems and looking for lampreys in the running water when he took me Kapilar Kuruntokai 2548 POEMS OF LOVE AND WAR What Her Girl Friend Said to her ‘Their throats glittering like blue sapph tail feathers splendid, the peacocks gather with sweet calls, dancers skilled in slow-beat rhythms. But you don't play anymore like those peacocks with your girl friends in the long deep streams, ‘wearing wreaths of blue lily with petals like eyes, tresses flaring as they dance. Your heart is anxious, you're lonely, stricken ‘with pallor. Now, what shall I say to Mother if she should notice changes and ask for reasons? Tknow, our man from the mountain top where long silver waterfalls shiver in the wind like white banners borne high on elephants with trappings on their brow, T know he has brought you these pangs. But what shall [ say to Mother iff she asks Maturai Marutanilandicanar Akandniiru 358 What He Said The heart, knowing no fear,POEMS OF LOVE AND WAR 49 has left me to go and hold my love but my arms, left behind, cannot take hold. So what's the use? In the space between us, murderous tigers roar like dark ocean waves, circling in O how many woods between us and our arms’ embrace Allir Nanmullait Kuruntokai 237 Puram Poems Harvest of War Great king, you shield your men from ruin. so your victories, your greatnes are byword Loose chariot wheels lie about the battleground with the long white tusks of bull-elephants, Flocks of male ¢ cat carrion with their mates Headless bodies dance about before they fall to the ground. Blood glows, like the sky before nightfall, in the red center of the battlefield. Demons dance there. ‘And your kingdom30. POEMS OF LOVE AND WAR is an unfailing harvest of victorious wars. Kappiyarrukkappiyanar on Kalatikaykkanni Narmutice@ral Patirruppatiu 35, A King’s Last Words, in jail, before he takes his life Ifa child of my clan should die, ifitis bon dead, a mere gob of flesh not yet human, they will put it to the sword, to give the thing a warrior’s death, Will such kii bring a son into this world to be kept now like a dog at the end of a chain, who must beg. because of a fire in the belly, for a drop of water, and lap up a beggar’s drink brought by jailers, friends who are not friends? (Céraman Kanaikkal Irumporai Purananairu 74 The Horse Did Not Come Back ‘The horse did not come back, his horse did not come back. All the other horses have come back. ‘The horse of our good man, who was father in our house to alittle son with a tuft of hair like a plume on a steed, it did not come back.POEMS OF LOVE AND WAR St Has it fallen now, his horse that bore him through battle, has it fallen like the great tree standing at the meeting place of two rivers? Purananiiru 273, King Killi in Combat With the festival hour close at hand, his woman in labor, sun setting behind pouring rains, the needle in the cobbler’s hand is ina frenzy stitching thongs for a cot swilter, far swifter, were the tackles of our lord ‘wearing garlands of laburnum, as he wrestled with the enemy come all the way to take the land. Caittantaiyar: on PorvaikkOpperunar Kili Purandniiru 82 Religious Poem Tirumat In fire, you are the heat. In flowers, you are the scent. Among stones, you are the diamond. In words, you are truth. ‘Among virtues, you are love. In a warrior’s wrath, you are the strength. In the Vedas, you are the secret. Of the elements, you are the frst, In the scorching sun, you are the light.