Indian History Quiz: Sangam Age and the Early Tamil Kingdoms

The correct answer is A, Nedunjeliyan II, the Pandya king of Madurai who is remembered in Sangam poetry as the victor of the battle of Talaiyalanganam, in which he is said to have defeated a confederacy of the Chera and Chola kings and five lesser chieftains. Option B, Karikala, is wrong because he belonged to the Chola line; he won the battle of Venni, founded Puhar at the mouth of the Kaveri and is credited with the embankment across that river. Option C, Ashoka, is wrong because he was the Mauryan emperor of Magadha, although his Rock Edicts II and XIII do name the Pandyas among the peoples beyond his frontier. Option D, Nizam Shah, is wrong because the Nizam Shahi line ruled at Ahmadnagar in the Deccan in the medieval period, more than a thousand years after the Sangam Age.

The correct answer is C, Tamil. The Sangam corpus is the oldest body of Tamil literature and includes the grammar Tolkappiyam, the Eight Anthologies, the Ten Idylls and the Eighteen Minor Works, all in Tamil. Option A, Sanskrit, is wrong because Sanskrit was the language of the Vedic and classical literature of the north and of later inscriptions in the south, not of the Sangam poems, though Sanskrit words do appear in them. Option B, Prakrit, is wrong because Prakrit was used in Ashokan edicts and in Jaina canonical works of western India. Option D, Pali, is wrong because Pali was the language of the Buddhist Tipitaka of Sri Lanka and of the Theravada tradition. Tamil-Brahmi inscriptions of the same period, such as those at Pugalur, confirm the use of Tamil in the region.

The correct answer is B, Chola – Uraiyur. The early Cholas ruled from Uraiyur on the Kaveri and later made Puhar, also called Kaveripattinam, their capital and chief port; their emblem was the tiger. Option A is wrong because Madurai was the Pandya capital, not the Chera one, and the Pandya emblem was the fish. Option C is wrong because Vanji, identified with Karur, was the Chera capital, and the Chera emblem was the bow and arrow. Option D is wrong for the same reason: Puhar belonged to the Cholas, while the Chera ports were Muziris and Tondi on the western coast. The safest way to carry these pairs into the examination hall is to remember the chain Chera–Vanji–bow, Chola–Uraiyur–tiger and Pandya–Madurai–fish. The Chola capital later shifted to the coast because Puhar, standing where the Kaveri meets the sea, carried the kingdom's trade with Rome and with South-East Asia.

The correct answer is B, Tolkappiyam, written by Tolkappiyar. It is a work on Tamil grammar and poetics in three books, and because its sections on poetic conventions describe the land, the people and their occupations, historians use it as a source for Sangam society, including the five-fold division of land into kurinji, mullai, marutham, neithal and palai. Option A, the Tirukkural of Thiruvalluvar, is wrong because it is a later ethical work of 1,330 couplets grouped under the Eighteen Minor Works. Option C, Silappadikaram of Ilango Adigal, is wrong because it is one of the twin epics and was composed after the Sangam Age proper. Option D, Purananuru, is wrong because it is one of the Eight Anthologies, a collection of heroic poems rather than a grammar.

The correct answer is B, 1,330 couplets, arranged in 133 chapters of ten couplets each and divided into three parts dealing with virtue, wealth and love. The work belongs to the Pathinenkilkanakku, the Eighteen Minor Works, and is the most widely quoted book of Tamil literature. Option A, 1,008, is wrong; it is a round figure associated with devotional lists, not with the Kural. Option C, 2,000, is wrong because no section of the Kural reaches that number. Option D, 133, is wrong because that is the number of chapters, not couplets, and examiners deliberately offer it as a distractor next to the correct figure. Remembering the pair 133 chapters and 1,330 couplets together removes the confusion. The Kural's appeal across communities is one reason it was among the first Indian works to be translated into European languages.

The correct answer is B, Karikala, the best-known Chola of the Sangam Age. The poems credit him with the victory at Venni, which broke the power of a Chera and Pandya alliance, with developing Puhar at the mouth of the Kaveri, and with the embankment raised across that river. Option A, Senguttuvan, is wrong because he was the greatest of the Chera kings, called the Red Chera, and is remembered for his expedition towards the north and for the cult of the heroine of the Silappadikaram. Option C, Mudukudumi, is wrong because Mudukudumi Peruvaludhi was a Pandya king known for his sacrifices. Option D, Elara, is wrong because Elara was a Chola prince who ruled in Sri Lanka and belongs to that island's chronicles rather than to the Sangam poems of Tamilakam.

The correct answer is A, Kurinji, the hilly and forested tract whose people lived by hunting and gathering. Option B, Mullai, is wrong because it is the pastoral tract of forest and scrub where cattle were reared. Option C, Marutham, is wrong because it is the wet, cultivated plain of the river valleys, the home of settled agriculture and of the largest settlements. Option D, Neithal, is wrong because it is the coastal tract of fishermen and salt makers. The fifth tinai, Palai, is the dry waste land associated with raiding and cattle lifting. The names are also the names of poetic settings, since each tinai carried its own flower, deity and mood in Tamil poetics, which is why the classification appears in a grammar in the first place.

The correct answer is C, Arikamedu, on the Ariyankuppam river near modern Puducherry, where excavation uncovered Roman pottery including Arretine ware, amphora sherds that once held wine and oil, and the remains of warehouses, marking it as a trading station of the first centuries of the Christian era. Option A, Muziris, is wrong although it was indeed a great pepper port of the Chera coast; it is known chiefly from Greek and Roman writings and from the Pattinappalai, not from Roman pottery of this kind. Option B, Korkai, is wrong because it was the Pandya port famous for its pearl fishery. Option D, Tondi, is wrong because it was another port on the Chera coast. Hoards of Roman coins across the Tamil country support the picture these finds give.

The correct answer is B, only 1 and 3. Statement 1 is correct, because Rock Edicts II and XIII of Ashoka name the Cholas, Pandyas, Satiyaputras and Keralaputras as peoples on the southern frontier of the Mauryan empire, and this is the firmest early date available for the chapter. Statement 2 is wrong, because tradition speaks of three Sangams, at Then Madurai, Kapatapuram and Madurai, but only the works of the third have come down to us. Statement 3 is correct, because the Kalabhras overran the Tamil country after the age closed, and the later Pallava and Pandya records recall that interval as a dark age. Options A, C and D are therefore wrong because each of them includes statement 2. Both epics are also valuable as social history, since Silappadikaram describes the merchant quarters of Puhar and Madurai while Manimekalai sets out Buddhist doctrine in Tamil.

The correct answer is A, Ilango Adigal and Sattanar. Silappadikaram, the story of the anklet, is attributed to Ilango Adigal, who tradition calls the brother of the Chera king Senguttuvan, and Manimekalai, which continues the story in a Buddhist setting, is attributed to Sattanar, also known as Chithalai Chathanar. Option B is wrong because Thiruvalluvar wrote the Tirukkural and Tolkappiyar the Tolkappiyam. Option C is wrong because it reverses the two authors, which is the commonest mistake in this question. Option D is wrong because Avvaiyar and Kapilar were celebrated poets of the anthologies, not epic writers; Avvaiyar is the best-known of the women poets of the age. Both epics are usually dated a little after the Sangam Age proper. Avvaiyar, Nachchellai and Kakkaipadiniyar are the women poets most often named, and their presence in the anthologies is itself an examination fact worth remembering.