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Home > Tamil Language & Literature > European Missionarires and the Study of Dravidian Languages - Albertine Gaur
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TAMIL LANGUAGE & LITERATURE European Missionarires and the Study
of Dravidian Languages Albertine Gaur 'Vizha Malar', Second
International Conference Seminar of Tamil Studies,
1968 The Department of Oriental Printed Books and Manuscripts has altogether one hundred and fifty Dravidian Manuscriopts in its possession; some of them are written on palm-leaves in the traditional manner of the South, others on paper bound in book form. Little is known about history of the collection apart from the fact that the earliest manuscripts belonged to Sir Hans Sloane (1660 - 1753). the founder of the museum. They are but twenty seven in number. Oriental languages did not rank high among Sloane's many interests and none of them can be dated earlier than the beginning of the 18th centuary. Quite a large number of manuscripts are extracts from Mahabharathaand the Ramayana or works on sectarian Hinduism. There are two letters of Haider Ali written in Kannada and a Telugu bond from the year 1755 which relates gravely that the second son of Kasuvana Kolambakkam has borrowed 'six pagodas of the Chennipatnam Coinage' from the wife of Mr.Gramson. Two telugu Manuscripts on local history- a history of Kondavidu and a more general outline of Indian History giving genealogy of some ruling famalies - might interest the historian whereas the student of Malayalam literature might like to look through an abridged version of ' Pamanujan Eluthachan's Bharatham. With eighty seven manuscripts. Tamil is not only the best represented language: it has also some of the most interesting manuscripts of the whole collection. There are, to name but a few, grammatical works like nannul and tolkappiyam, a metrical vocabulary and works by the famous Auvaiyar and the even more renowned Kamban. It is possible that the few palm-leaf scripts belonging to tha orignal Sloane 's collections - a work on bodily organs, some Tamil - Portuguesen sentences and the tiny fraction of Tamil alphabet - were written before the 18 th centuary bit they are so fragmentary that it is immpossible to date, or even place, them with any accuracy. The two most valuable manuscripts however are two others written by Father Beschi and Batholomaus Ziegenbalg. The first Europeans who studied the Tamil language were Jesuit missionaries working in Portuguese-owned parts of the sub continent. Like the Spaniards the Portuguese had alsways claimed that their overseas conquests were not merely a result of gleed of exotic riches but the direct outcome of a guinine desire to spread Christianity among the inhabitants of the globe. To justify this argument they saw to it that their hands of reckless marauding adventurers were accompanied by pious Friars and when Vasco da Gama landed in India at the close of the 15 th centuary he faithfully followed the same traditon. Some of these ealiest Portuguese priests acquired, without doubt a knowledge of the vernacular but we know of none who had specially distinguished himself in this field. St. Francis Xaviour on the other hand, far from interesting himself in a realistic study of native languages, considered the translation of the Catechism into Tamil to be a task one could accomplish with the help of some intelligent bilingual natives in a matter of several days'. He saw only one aim, a quick conversion of as many as possible, and while still in India, his eyes were already fixed on China and Japan. Fortunately some of his succeesors were less single minded. Roberto de Nobili, a Jesuit like the restless visionary Xavior, not only acqired a thorough knowledgr of Tamil, Telugu and Sanskrit, but also made the first tentative attempts in the realm of prose. The most gifted among the early poineers, however, was father Beschi. A linguist and a creative poet of equal distinction, he made a definite contribution towords the developement of the languages by reinterducing the pulli and the distinction between long and short 'o' and 'e'. The Department possesses his Tamil-Latin dictionary written in Beschi's neat hand, it bears the date 1744 on the title page. The 18th century saw a general increase in the study of vernacular languages. In 1706, four years before Beschi joined he Jesuit Mission in India, the German Lutheran Burtholomaus Ziegenbalg and his colleague Heinrich Plutschau landed in Tranquebar. They came under the patronage of the Danish King Frederic IV who had suddenly decided to take an active interest in the spiritual life of his Indian subjects. Whether this desire was genuine or whether Frederic saw himself as an 18th century Joao III is difficult to tell; in any case, soon wanned and the newly founded Tranquebar mission had to look elsewhere for moral and financial support. Received with what amounted to an almost open hostility by the majority of Europeans living in Tarnquebar, Ziegenbalg was immediately thrown into close contact with the natives of the town. Within eight months he had mastered the Tamil language and was busy exploring the literature of the people he had come to convert to a new faith. There is a manuscript numbering 23 folios in the Departmental collection bears the title Verzeichnis der Malabarischen Bucher. Written in German, in a thin ornate hand, it is a catalogue of some hundred and twelve Tamil works. It had been composed by Ziegenbalg and sent to Denmark in the year 1708. Though Ziegenbalg's name is not mentioned in the manuscript, those acquainted with his other works and the numerous letters he wrote during his stay in India cannot fail to recognise him as the author. The little manuscript. a description of Ziegenbalg's vernacular library in Tranquebar - is valuable for two reasons; first it gives an account of a number of Tamil works which have since been lost, and secondly, due to Ziegenbalg's special way of writing, it allows interesting glimpses of popular Hinduism and local social life as they must have appeared to a foreign missionary some two hundred and fifty years ago. The Museum has a good number of Ziegenbalg's early printed works. Most of them are letters giving detailed descriptions of his life in Tranquebar, his studies, all the impressions and discoveries a man in his position and with his particularbent of mind was apt to make every day in a confusinglly strange and utterly different country. There three issues of the Propagarion of the Gospel in the East; a first edition printed in London in 1709 and two third editions published in 1718. The two third editions contain an appendix entitled An accout of the Malabarians in the form of questions and answers. Another set of letters appear in Merkwurdige Nachrichten aus Ost-Indien of which the Museum has the third edition published in Leipzig in 1709. Ziegenbalg's interest in Tamil literature and his studyof the Hindu religion, though, as he himself was always quick to point out, only pursuaded for the purpose of converting the 'heatherns' more easily to Christianity, did not always find approval among his more orthodox associates in Europe. The Museum has an amusing little pamphlet published anonymously in 1710 and modestly entitled Aufrichtiger Beytrag zum Kirchen-and Schul-Bau in Ost-Indien which is, in fact, a rather spiteful condemnation of Ziegenbalg's work and method, talking hypocritically about the 'two dear young and unexperienced people' (i.e, Ziegenbalg and Plutschau) who themselves badly misguided, 'deceive the poor heathens' nd turn them in to children of hell twice over. As a Lurtheran, Ziegenbalg saw his main task in a propagation which, in his circumstances, meant translation of the Bible. The Museum has a few early works by Ziegenbalg, Grundler and Schultze like, for example, the Novum Jesu Christi Testamentum exoriginali textu in Linguam Damulicam versum opera & studia printed in 1722 the 'Biblica Damilica' published 1714-1728 and a book of psalms Liber Psalnosrum Davidis Regis-er Prophetae, ex originali textu in Linguam Damulicam by Benjamin Schulze bearing the date 1724. There is also a palm-leaf manuscript in the Departmental collection which the List of Oriental Manuscripts, vol. i, describes as Novum Testamensum, Lingua et characteribus Malabaricis, codex in foliis palmarum 106 exaratus atque e Tranquebar transmissus. Apparentlly the manuscript had been purchased at the same time as the already mentioned Verzeichnis der Malabarischen Buchner. It was written at the beginning of the 18 th century and is undoubtedly the work of a missionary from Tranquebar but before identifying it as one of Ziegenbalg's own manuscripts careful study would be needed. The history of printing Dravidian, mainly Tamil, characters falls into two parts: the history of printing vernacular languages in India and the history of printing those languages in Europe. In 1556 the Jesuits had brought the printing press to Goa. At first this press was mainly used for printing Portuguese tracts meant to be distributed amongst resident members of the Society but soon a set of "Malabar' characters was cut and in 1578 the first Tamil book, a translation of Francis Xavier's Dautrina Christe by Henrique Henriques, appeared in print. The fact that the Portuguese used the term 'Lingua Malabar' for denoting the Tamil language caused a considerable amout of speculation as to whether the language of this work was Tamil or Malayalam but Geogscurhammer, in a recently published study, decided the question distincitly in favour of Tamil. Though the Jesuits began to set up printing presses in several parts of Portuguese held India, trying their hands, with varying degrees of success, on the Kannada and Devanagari scripts, they did not succeed in establishing the idea of printing firmly on the subcontinent and toward the middle of 17th century all their efforts came to an end. Fifty years later in 1711, Bartholomaus Zieganbalg persuaded the society for promoting Christian knowledge in London to send a further Portuguese printing press to India and soon afterwards he was able to obtain a set of ' Malabari ' letters from Germany. From then on printing seems to have progressed steadily in India. The position of Protestant missionaries was, of course, very different from that of Jesuits. Having no institutional powers like the Inquisition at their disposal, they were forced to reply to a much larger degree on the persuasive power of the written word. Moreover, not being directly connected with any political authority, their labours could not be brought to a sudden halt by purely political considerations like the degree of 1684, which had ordered that the vernacular languages of Goa sholud be replced by Portuguese. None of the early prints produced by the Jesuits is in the possession of the Museum. What has survived seems to have found its way more easily into archives in Portugal or in the Vatican. But, as we have seen above, the Ziegenbalg circle is rather well represented.. The Museum has altogether five lengthy tamil works prited in Tranquebar between the year 1714 and 1730 and a good number of those which appeared later. Most of those early works have two title pages, one written in Tamil, and one in Latin. In Europe no Dravidian Language appeared in print before the middle of 17 th century. The first work to display Tamil Characters was Philippus Baldacus Naatiwkeurige beschryvinge van Malabar en Choromadel, der zelver aurigrenzende, ryken, en helmochtig eyland Ceylon. The Museum has two editions of it, one in the orignal Dutch, one in German: both published in Amsterdam in 1672. The book, a large Volume beautifully illustrated, gives but three pages of what is called 'Malabarische Letter - Konst ' : :i.e. a set of Tamil characters with very peculiar transliteration. ' » ' for example translitterated by ' nha ' , ' L ' by ' ra ', ' ½ ' by ' hna ', and ' ¸ ' is supposed to stand for 'ca', 'K', ' ka ', ' qua '. A character written as ' 9 ' and transliterated by ' rra ' obviously stands for the presenrt ' È ' . To this is added a Tamil version of the Pater Noster and the Declaration of Faith with orginal taxt in Latin written under each line. A late and a scanty begining. Moreover Baldaeus's example was not taken up. No further Tamil character appered in print until the year 1716 when Ziegenbalg's Grammatica Damulica was published in Halle. The museum pocessess four examples of this work. The characters are large and square quite different from one used in Tranquebar. They resemble Tamil inscriptions of 15 th 16 th centuary but, on the whole, they are rather pleasing in design. There is of course no pulli; Ziegenbalg and Beschi though working simultaneously in India were not on sufficiently in good terms to exchange their discoveries for each others benifit. The relative lateness of Tamil printing in Europe is not really surprising. When, in the middle of the 16 th century, the Jesuits started their printing press in Goa they did it to provide themselves with an additional aid to proselytism. To suggest that these pagan languages should be studied for their own sake by pious Christians in Europe would have been heresy enough to attract the attention of the Inquisition. It took a Lutheran priest from Germany in the pay of a Danish king, a mercenary in the realm of faith not bound by rigidity of monastic traditions, to upset the old equilibrium. Even then many voices were raised in protest and the advance of modern linguistics had to wait for another century. The museum has two copies of the first Tamil Book printed in English. Rober Anderson's Rudiments of Tamil grammer : combining with the Rules of Kodun Tamil or the orignal dialect, an introduction to Shen Tamil or the elegant dialect of the language which appeared in 1821. A year later Benjamin Guy Babington who, like Anderson, had worked in Madras Civil Service braught out the text and a translation os Beschi's Paramarata - guruvin katai. Both works were published and printed by the same two firms, both make use of the pulli but Babington warns his readers in the intorduction that 'one exception ......occurs in the letter ' na ' ' ¿ ' which is never marked as quiescent, and the reason is that the fount of letters which I purchased did not contain a requisite character. It would have been easy to have had a new martix cut, but of this circumstance I was not aware until a considerable portion of the work was printed; and then for the sake of consistancy it appear to better to make no alterations ' . Having made his confesison he has to add that 'the larger type used for heading of Chapters, does not contain any dotted letters' either. The Tamil characters are square and quite attractive in appearance bearing certain resemblence to the types used in Halle. The Malayalam-speaking part of southern India now known as the state of Kerala, had, at quite an early stage, came into relatively close contact with European missionaries and traders. On his first journey to East, Vasco de gama Landed in Calicut and soon afterwords with the help of the Rajah of Cochin, the Portuguese began extending their influence along the coast. St. Fracis Xavier too visited Kerala and a number of charming legends tell of his miraculous success. The Jesuit missionaries did not always see eye to eye communities of native Syrian Christians which had been in existance since the 8 th centuary, but on the whole their efforts brought more responce in Kerala than in other parts of the subcontinent. As far as the study of Malayalam is concerned it seems that, from 1700 onwards, a no of series attempts were made by some of the missionaries. The department of Printed Oriental books and Manuscripts has in its collection an interseting palm-leaf manuscript containing eight Malayalam Poem on Gospel History. Christian doctrine and hagiology. The manuscript is supposed to have been written by Johann Ernst Hanxleden, a jesuit who, it seems was also known as Johannis Ernasidosr- among the native inhabitans of Travancore as - Arnos Patri. The date of his death is 1732. An accomplished Malayalam scholar he composed a large number of religious works in this Language and a Malayalam - Sanskrit-Portuguese dictionary. 'In estimating his writing' writes C.M.Agur in his Church history of Travancore, 'we have only to add that what Fr. Beschi was to Tamil Literature in South India, Fr J Ernasidos was to Malayalam in Malabar'. The manuscript is written in a script typical of 18th centuary. It consists of 104 folios and the poems are entitled Maranam kond'utla patt, Vidhi-Vidha; Narakam, Moksha Lokam, Devasukayaka- carita- gana, Mar Tresiya-punya - striyude caritram Umma-duhkham and puttan-ponu. Unlike Tamil, Malayalam character were not commited to print before the end of 18 th century. The Bombay University Library is in pocession of a Grammer which was printed in Bombay in 1799. The first Malayalam book printed in Europe seems to have been Giovanni Cristofano Amaduzzi's Alphabetum Grandoniza - Malabaricum sive Samscrudonicum, an essay on the Grantha-Malayalam alphabets with table and examples from materials supplied by Clemens de Jesu. The book appeared in Rome in 1722 and there is a copy of it in the Museum's collection. Clemens who died in 1782, spent several yaers in Kerala where he devoted himself to Mission work and a careful study of Malayalam Language. During a visit to Rome he cut and engraved a set of Malayalam types for the press of the Society of Jesus. Apart from the material directly connected with the study of Languages the Museum has a good collection of letters from Jesuit missionaries in India, some of them written and printed as early as 1550. Reading through them, one cannot fail to be impressed by the remarkable insight of these men who came to India more than four hundred yeras ago . Trained in intellectual discipline which did not allow them to come as sympathatic observers and unlike modern scholars, having no works of reference at their disposal they yet penetrated deeply into the complex structure of popular Hinduism, seeing the absolute behind the symbol, central idea in a maze of contridictory manifestations. Anybody attempting to understand South India culture beneth the surface of mere linguistics will find these documents an invaluable source of information. Foot notes:
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