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The Dravidian peoples, Dravidian-speakers or Dravidians, are a collection of ethnolinguistic groups native to South Asia who speak Dravidian languages. There are around 250 million native speakers of Dravidian languages. (2025). 9781315722580, Routledge. ISBN 9781315722580 The two largest Dravidian groups are the Telugus (c. 90M) and Tamilians (c. 90M). The next three largest are the Kannadigas (c. 44M), Malayalis (c. 40M), and Gondi people (c. 13M). India's 22 scheduled languages include these four Dravidian languages: Telugu language, Tamil language, Kannada, and Malayalam (the remaining 18 are Indo-European). Dravidian speakers form the majority of the population of South India and are native to India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, the Giraavaru people, Nepal, Bhutan and Sri Lanka. Dravidian peoples are also present in Singapore, Mauritius, Malaysia, France, South Africa, Myanmar, East Africa, the Caribbean, and the United Arab Emirates through migration.
Proto-Dravidian may have been spoken in the Indus civilization, suggesting a "tentative date of Proto-Dravidian around the early part of the third millennium BCE", after which it branched into various Dravidian languages. History and Archaeology, Volume 1, Issues 1–2 p.234, Department of Ancient History, Culture, and Archaeology, University of Allahabad South Dravidian I (including pre-Tamil language) and South Dravidian II (including pre-Telugu language) split around the eleventh century BCE, with the other major branches splitting off at around the same time.
The origins of the Dravidians are a "very complex subject of research and debate". They are regarded as indigenous to the Indian subcontinent, but may have deeper pre-Neolithic roots from Western Asia, specifically from the Iranian plateau. Their origins are often viewed as being connected with the Indus Valley Civilisation, hence people and language spread east and southwards after the demise of the Indus Valley Civilisation in the early second millennium BCE, some propose not long before the arrival of Indo-Aryan speakers,Razab Khan, The Dravidianization of India with whom they intensively interacted. Some scholars have argued that the Dravidian languages may have been brought to India by migrations from the Iranian plateau in the fourth or third millennium BCE or even earlier. However, reconstructed proto-Dravidian vocabulary suggests that the family is indigenous to India.
Genetically, the ancient Indus Valley people were composed of a primarily Iranian hunter-gatherers (or farmers) ancestry, with varying degrees of ancestry from local hunter-gatherer groups. The modern-day Dravidian-speakers are primarily composed of Ancient South Indian hunter-gatherer ancestry and varying levels of Indus Valley Civilisation ancestry, but also carry a small portion of Western Steppe Herder ancestry and may also have additional contributions from local hunter-gatherer groups.
The third century BCE onwards saw the development of many great empires in South India like Pandya, Chola, Chera, Pallava, Satavahana, Chalukya, Kakatiya and Rashtrakuta. Medieval South Indian guilds and trading organisations like the "Ayyavole of Karnataka and Manigramam" played an important role in the Southeast Asia trade,Angela Schottenhammer, The Emporium of the World: Maritime Quanzhou, 1000–1400, p.293 and the Greater India of the region.
Dravidian visual art is dominated by stylised temple architecture in major centres, and the production of images on stone and bronze sculptures. The sculpture dating from the Chola art has become notable as a symbol of Hinduism. The Sri Ranganathaswamy Temple located in Indian state of Tamil Nadu is often considered as the largest functioning Hindu temple in the world. The temple is built in Dravidian style and occupies an area of 156 acres (631,000 m2).
While the English word Dravidian was first employed by Robert Caldwell in his book of comparative Dravidian grammar based on the usage of the Sanskrit word in the work Tantravārttika by , the word in Sanskrit has been historically used to denote geographical regions of southern India as whole. Some theories concern the direction of derivation between and ; such linguists as Zvelebil assert that the direction is from to .
| Badagas | South Dravidian | 133,500 (2011 census) | Badagas are found in Tamil Nadu. |
| Brahui people | North Dravidian | 700,000 (1996) | Brahuis are mostly found in the Balochistan region of Pakistan, with smaller numbers in southwestern Afghanistan. |
| Chenchu people | South-Central Dravidian | 65,000 | Chenchus are found in Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, and Odisha. |
| Irula people | South Dravidian | 203,382 (2011 census) | Irula are found in Tamil Nadu, Kerala |
| Giraavaru people | South Dravidian (linguistically Indo-Aryan) | 0 < 100 (extinct) | Giraavaru people were found in Maldives. |
| Gondi people | Central Dravidian | 13 million (approx.) | Gondi belong to the central Dravidian subgroup. They are spread over the states of Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh, Uttar Pradesh, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar and Odisha. A state named Gondwana was proposed to represent them in India. |
| Khonds | South-Central Dravidian | 1,627,486 (2011 census) | Khonds are found in Odisha. |
| Kannadigas | South Dravidian | 43.7 million | Kannadigas are native to Karnataka in India but a considerable population is also found in Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Kerala. |
| Kodava people | South Dravidian | 160,000 (approx.) | Kodavas are native to the Kodagu. |
| Koyas | Central Dravidian | found in Andhra Pradesh and Odisha | |
| Kurukh people | North Dravidian | 3.6 million (approx.) | Kurukh are spread over parts of the states of Chhatishgarh, Jharkhand and Odisha. |
| Kurumbar | South Dravidian | N/A | Kurumbar are found in Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. |
| Malayalis | South Dravidian | 45 million | Malayalis are native to Kerala and Lakshadweep, but are also found in Puducherry and parts of Tamil Nadu. They are also found in large numbers in Middle East countries, the Americas and Australia. |
| Paniya people | South Dravidian | N/A | Paniya are found in Kerala and Tamil Nadu. |
| Tamils | South Dravidian | 78 million | Tamils are native to Tamil Nadu, Puducherry and northern and eastern Sri Lanka, but are also found in parts of Kerala, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, although they have a large Tamil diaspora and are also widespread throughout many countries including South Africa, Singapore, the United States of America, Canada, Fiji, Indonesia, Vietnam, Cambodia, Philippines, Mauritius, countries, Guyana, Suriname, French Guiana and Malaysia, as are the other three major Dravidian languages. |
| Telugus | Central Dravidian | 85.1 million | Telugus are native to Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Yanam (Puducherry), but are also found in parts of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Orissa and Maharashtra. Further, they have a large Telugu diaspora and are also widespread throughout many countries including the United States of America, Canada, Australia and countries. Telugu is the fastest growing language in the United States. |
| Toda people | South Dravidian | 2,002 (2011 census) | Todas are found in Tamil Nadu. |
| Tuluvas | South Dravidian | 2 million (approx.) | Tuluvas are found in coastal Karnataka and Northern Kerala (Kasaragodu district) in India. A state named Tulu Nadu was proposed to represent them in India. |
The most commonly spoken Dravidian languages are Telugu language (తెలుగు), Tamil language (தமிழ்), Kannada language (ಕನ್ನಡ), Malayalam (മലയാളം), Brahui language (براہوئی), Tulu Language (തുളു), Gondi language and Kodava language. There are three subgroups within the Dravidian language family: North Dravidian, Central Dravidian, and South Dravidian, matching for the most part the corresponding regions in the Indian subcontinent.
Dravidian grammatical impact on the structure and syntax of Indo-Aryan languages is considered far greater than the Indo-Aryan grammatical impact on Dravidian. Some linguists explain this anomaly by arguing that Middle Indo-Aryan and New Indo-Aryan were built on a Dravidian substratum. There are also hundreds of Dravidian loanwords in Indo-Aryan languages, and vice versa.
According to David McAlpin and his Elamo-Dravidian hypothesis, the Dravidian languages were brought to India by immigration into India from Elam, located in present-day southwestern Iran.David McAlpin, "Toward Proto-Elamo-Dravidian", Language vol. 50 no. 1 (1974); David McAlpin: "Elamite and Dravidian, Further Evidence of Relationships", Current Anthropology vol. 16 no. 1 (1975); David McAlpin: "Linguistic prehistory: the Dravidian situation", in Madhav M. Deshpande and Peter Edwin Hook: Aryan and Non-Aryan in India, Center for South and Southeast Asian Studies, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor (1979); David McAlpin, "Proto-Elamo-Dravidian: The Evidence and its Implications", Transactions of the American Philosophical Society vol. 71 pt. 3, (1981) In the 1990s, Renfrew and Cavalli-Sforza have also argued that Proto-Dravidian was brought to India by farmers from the Iranian part of the Fertile Crescent, but more recently Heggerty and Renfrew noted that "McAlpin's analysis of the language data, and thus his claims, remain far from orthodoxy", adding that Fuller finds no relation of Dravidian language with other languages, and thus assumes it to be native to India. Renfrew and Bahn conclude that several scenarios are compatible with the data, and that "the linguistic jury is still very much out."
As a proto-language, the Proto-Dravidian language is not itself attested in the historical record. Its modern conception is based solely on reconstruction. It is suggested that the language was spoken in the 4th millennium BCE, and started disintegrating into various branches around 3rd millennium BCE. According to Krishnamurti, Proto-Dravidian may have been spoken in the Indus civilisation, suggesting a "tentative date of Proto-Dravidian around the early part of the third millennium." Krishnamurti further states that South Dravidian I (including pre-Tamil) and South Dravidian II (including pre-Telugu) split around the eleventh century BCE, with the other major branches splitting off at around the same time.
Genetically, the ancient Indus Valley people were composed of a primarily Iranian hunter-gatherers (or farmers) ancestry, with varying degrees of ancestry from local hunter-gatherer groups. The modern-day Dravidian-speakers display a similar genetic makeup, but also carry a small portion of Western Steppe Herder ancestry and may also have additional contributions from local hunter-gatherer groups.
Although in modern times speakers of various Dravidian languages have mainly occupied the southern portion of India, Dravidian speakers must have been widespread throughout the Indian subcontinent before the Indo-Aryan migration into the subcontinent. According to Horen Tudu, "many academic researchers have attempted to connect the Dravidians with the remnants of the great Indus Valley civilisation, located in Northwestern India... but it is mere speculation that the Dravidians are the ensuing post–Indus Valley settlement of refugees into South and Central India." The most noteworthy scholar making such claims is Asko Parpola, who did extensive research on the IVC-scripts. The Brahui people population of Balochistan in Pakistan has been taken by some as the linguistic equivalent of a relict population, perhaps indicating that Dravidian languages were formerly much more widespread and were supplanted by the incoming Indo-Aryan languages.: "There are still remnant northern Dravidian languages including Brahui ... The most obvious explanation of this situation is that the Dravidian languages once occupied nearly all of the Indian subcontinent and it is the intrusion of Indo-Aryans that engulfed them in northern India leaving but a few isolated enclaves. This is further supported by the fact that Dravidian loan words begin to appear in Sanskrit literature from its very beginning."
Asko Parpola, who regards the Harappans to have been Dravidian, notes that Mehrgarh (7000–2500 BCE), to the west of the Indus River valley, is a precursor of the Indus Valley Civilisation, whose inhabitants migrated into the Indus Valley and became the Indus Valley Civilisation. It is one of the earliest sites with evidence of farming and herding in South Asia.UNESCO World Heritage. 2004. "Archaeological Site of Mehrgarh". UNESCO.Hirst, K. Kris. 2005. "Mehrgarh" . Guide to Archaeology According to Lukacs and Hemphill, while there is a strong continuity between the Neolithic and Chalcolithic (Copper Age) cultures of Mehrgarh, dental evidence shows that the Chalcolithic population did not descend from the Neolithic population of Mehrgarh, which "suggests moderate levels of gene flow". They further noted that "the direct lineal descendants of the Neolithic inhabitants of Mehrgarh are to be found to the south and the east of Mehrgarh, in northwestern India and the western edge of the Deccan plateau", with Neolithic Mehrgarh showing greater affinity with chalocolithic Inamgaon, south of Mehrgarh, than with Chalcolithic Mehrgarh.
Yuri Knorozov surmised that the symbols represent a logosyllabic script and suggested, based on computer analysis, an agglutinative Dravidian language as the most likely candidate for the underlying language. Knorozov's suggestion was preceded by the work of Henry Heras, who suggested several readings of signs based on a proto-Dravidian assumption.
Linguist Asko Parpola writes that the Indus script and Harappan language are "most likely to have belonged to the Dravidian family". Parpola led a Finnish team in investigating the inscriptions using computer analysis. Based on a proto-Dravidian assumption, they proposed readings of many signs, some agreeing with the suggested readings of Heras and Knorozov (such as equating the "fish" sign with the Dravidian word for fish, "min") but disagreeing on several other readings. A comprehensive description of Parpola's work until 1994 is given in his book Deciphering the Indus Script.
The process of post-Harappan/Dravidian influences on southern India has tentatively been called "Dravidianization",Razab Khan, The Dravidianization of India and is reflected in the post-Harappan mixture of IVC and Ancient Ancestral South Indian people. Yet, according to Krishnamurti, Dravidian languages may have reached south India before Indo-Aryan migrations.
According to Mallory there are an estimated thirty to forty Dravidian loanwords in Rig Veda. Some of those for which Dravidian etymologies are certain include ಕುಲಾಯ kulāya "nest", ಕುಲ್ಫ kulpha "ankle", ದಂಡ "stick", ಕುಲ kūla "slope", ಬಿಲ bila "hollow", ಖಲ khala "threshing floor". While J. Bloch and Michael Witzel believe that the Indo-Aryans moved into an already Dravidian-speaking area after the oldest parts of the Rig Veda were already composed.
According to Thomason and Kaufman, there is strong evidence that Dravidian influenced Indic through "shift", that is, native Dravidian speakers learning and adopting Indic languages. According to Erdosy, the most plausible explanation for the presence of Dravidian structural features in Old Indo-Aryan is that the majority of early Old Indo-Aryan speakers had a Dravidian mother tongue which they gradually abandoned. Even though the innovative traits in Indic could be explained by multiple internal explanations, early Dravidian influence is the only explanation that can account for all of the innovations at once. Early Dravidian influence accounts for several of the innovative traits in Indic better than any internal explanation that has been proposed. According to Zvelebil, "several scholars have demonstrated that pre-Indo-Aryan and pre-Dravidian bilingualism in India provided conditions for the far-reaching influence of Dravidian on the Indo-Aryan tongues in the spheres of phonology, syntax and vocabulary." Dravidian languages – Britannica Online Encyclopedia
Around this time, Dravidians encountered Muslim traders, and the first and Sri Lankan Moors appeared.
Ancient Tamil grammatical works Tolkappiyam, the ten anthologies Pattuppāṭṭu, and the eight anthologies Eṭṭuttokai shed light on early ancient Dravidian religion. Murugan (also known as Seyyon) was glorified as the red god seated on the blue peacock, who is ever young and resplendent, as the favoured god of the Tamils. Shiva was also seen as the supreme God. Early iconography of Murugan and Shiva and their association with native flora and fauna goes back to the Indus Valley Civilisation. The Sangam landscape was classified into five categories, thinais, based on the mood, the season and the land. Tolkappiyam mentions that each of these thinai had an associated deity such as Seyyon in Kurinji (hills), Vishnu in Mullai (forests), and Durga in Marutham (plains), and Indra in the Neithal (coasts and seas). Other gods mentioned were Krishna and Balaram, now identified with Krishna and Balarama, who are all major deities in Hinduism today. This represents an early religious and cultural fusion or synthesis between ancient Dravidians and Indo-Aryans, which became more evident over time with sacred iconography, traditions, philosophy, flora and fauna that went on to influence and shape Indian civilisation.
Throughout Tamilakam, a king was considered to be divine by nature and possessed religious significance. The king was 'the representative of God on earth' and lived in a "koyil", which means the "residence of a god". The Modern Tamil word for temple is koil (). Ritual worship was also given to kings. Modern words for god like "kō" ( "king"), "iṟai" (இறை "emperor") and "āṇḍavar" (ஆண்டவன் "conqueror") now primarily refer to gods. These elements were incorporated later into Hinduism like the legendary marriage of Shiva to Queen Mīnātchi who ruled Madurai or Wanji-ko, a god who later merged into Indra. Tolkappiyar refers to the Three Crowned Kings as the "Three Glorified by Heaven", (). In Dravidian-speaking South India, the concept of divine kingship led to the assumption of major roles by state and temple.
The cult of the mother goddess is treated as an indication of a society which venerated femininity. This mother goddess was conceived as a virgin, one who has given birth to all and one, and were typically associated with Shaktism. The temples of the Sangam days, mainly of Madurai, seem to have had priestesses to the deity, which also appears predominantly as a goddess. In the Sangam literature, there is an elaborate description of the rites performed by the Kurava priestess in the shrine Palamutircholai.
Among the early Dravidians, the practice of erecting memorial stones, hero stone, had appeared, and it continued for quite a long time after the Sangam age, down to about the 16th century. It was customary for people who sought victory in war to worship these to bless them with victory .
Chola-style temples consist almost invariably of the three following parts, arranged in differing manners, but differing in themselves only according to the age in which they were executed:
Besides these, a south Indian temple usually has a tank called the Kalyani or Pushkarni – to be used for sacred purposes or the convenience of the priests – dwellings for all the grades of the priesthood are attached to it, and other buildings for state or convenience.
Carnatic music originated in the Dravidian region. With the growing influence of Persian and Sufi music on Indian music, a clear distinction in style appeared from the 12th century onwards. Many literary works were composed in Carnatic style and it soon spread wide in the Dravidian regions. The most notable Carnatic musician is Purandara Dasa who lived in the court of Krishnadevaraya of the Vijayanagara empire. He formulated the basic structure of Carnatic music and is regarded as the Pitamaha ( lit, "father" or the "grandfather") of Carnatic Music. Kanakadasa is another notable Carnatic musician who was Purandaradasa's contemporary.
Each of the major Dravidian languages has its own film industry like Kollywood (Tamil), Tollywood (Telugu), Kannada cinema (Kannada), Malayalam cinema (Malayalam). Kollywood and Tollywood produce most films in India.
Traditional dress of Dravidian women is typical of most Indian women, that of the sari. This sari consists of a cloth wrapped around the waist and draped over the shoulder. Originally saris were worn bare, but during the Victorian era, women began wearing blouse (called a ravike) along with sari. In fact, until the late 19th century most Kerala women did not wear any upper garments, or were forced to by law, and in many villages, especially in tribal communities, the sari is worn without the blouse. Unlike Indo-Aryan speakers, most Dravidian women do not cover their head with the pallu except in areas of North Karnataka. Due to the complexity of draping the sari, younger girls start with a skirt called a pavada. When they get older, around the age when puberty begins, they transition to a langa voni or half-sari, which is composed of a skirt tied at the waist along with a cloth draped over a blouse. After adulthood girls begin using the sari. There are many different styles of sari draping varying across regions and communities. Examples are the Madisar, specific to Tamil Brahmin Community, and the Mundum Neriyathum.
In ancient times there were , public duels to the death, to solve disputes between opposing rulers. Among some communities, young girls received preliminary training up until the onset of puberty. In vadakkan pattukal ballads, at least a few women warriors continued to practice and achieved a high degree of expertise.
Sports like kambala, jallikattu, kabaddi, vallam kali, lambs and tigers, and maramadi remain strong among Dravidian ethnic groups.
History
Origins
The origins of the Dravidians are a "very complex subject of research and debate". They are regarded as indigenous to the Indian subcontinent, but may have deeper pre-Neolithic roots from Western Asia, specifically from the Iranian plateau. Their origins are often viewed as being connected with the Indus Valley Civilisation, hence people and language spread east and southwards after the demise of the Indus Valley Civilisation in the early second millennium BCE, some propose not long before the arrival of Indo-Aryan speakers,Razab Khan, The Dravidianization of India with whom they intensively interacted. Though some scholars have argued that the Dravidian languages may have been brought to India by migrations from the Iranian plateau in the fourth or third millennium BCE or even earlier, reconstructed proto-Dravidian vocabulary suggests that the family is indigenous to India.
Indus Valley Civilization
Dravidian identification
The Indus Valley Civilisation (2,600–1,900 BCE) located in the northwest of the Indian subcontinent is sometimes identified as having been Dravidian. Already in 1924, when announcing the discovery of the IVC, John Marshall stated that (one of) the language(s) may have been Dravidic. Cultural and linguistic similarities have been cited by researchers Henry Heras, Kamil Zvelebil, Asko Parpola and Iravatham Mahadevan as being strong evidence for a proto-Dravidian origin of the ancient Indus Valley civilisation. The discovery in Tamil Nadu of a late Neolithic (early 2nd millennium BCE, i.e. post-dating Harappan decline) stone celt allegedly marked with Indus signs has been considered by some to be significant for the Dravidian identification.Subramanium 2006; see also "A Note on the Muruku Sign of the Indus Script in light of the Mayiladuthurai Stone Axe Discovery" by I. Mahadevan (2006)
Decline, migration and Dravidianization
Paleoclimatology believe the fall of the Indus Valley Civilisation and eastward migration during the late Harappan period was due to climate change in the region, with a 200-year long drought being the major factor. The Indus Valley Civilisation seemed to slowly lose their urban cohesion, and their cities were gradually abandoned during the late Harappan period, followed by eastward migrations before the Indo-Aryan migration into the Indian subcontinent.
Dravidian and Indo-Aryan interactions
Dravidian substrate
The Dravidian language influenced the Indo-Aryan languages. Dravidian languages show extensive lexical (vocabulary) borrowing, but only a few traits of structural (either phonology or grammatical) borrowing from Indo-Aryan, whereas Indo-Aryan shows more structural than lexical borrowings from the Dravidian languages. Many of these features are already present in the oldest known Indo-Aryan language, the language of the Rigveda (c. 1500 BCE), which also includes over a dozen words borrowed from Dravidian. The linguistic evidence for Dravidian impact grows stronger as we move from the Samhitas down through the later Vedic works and into the classical post-Vedic literature. This represents an early religious and cultural fusion or synthesis between ancient Dravidians and Indo-Aryans.
Sanskritization
With the rise of the Kuru Kingdom a process of Sanskritization started which influenced all of India, with the populations of the north of the Indian subcontinent predominantly speaking the Indo-Aryan languages.
Dravidian kingdoms and empires
The third century BCE onwards saw the development of large Dravidian empires like Chola Empire, Pandyan dynasty, Rashtrakuta, Vijayanagara, Chalukya dynasty Western Chalukya, and kingdoms like Chera dynasty, Chutu dynasty, Ay kingdom, Alupa dynasty, Pallava dynasty, Hoysala Empire, Western Ganga, Eastern Ganga, Kadamba dynasty, Kalabhra dynasty, Andhra Ikshvaku, Vishnukundina, Eastern Chalukya, Sena dynasty, Kakatiya dynasty, Reddy dynasty, Mysore kingdom, Jaffna kingdom, Mysore, Travancore, Venad, Cochin, Kolathunadu, Calicut and the Nayak dynasty.
Medieval trade and influence
Medieval Tamil guilds and trading organisations like the Ayyavole and Manigramam played an important role in the southeast Asia trade. Traders and religious leaders travelled to southeast Asia and played an important role in the Greater India of the region. Locally developed scripts such as Grantha script and Pallava script induced the development of many native scripts such as Khmer script, Javanese script Kawi script, Baybayin, and Thai script.
European contact (1500 onward)
Portuguese explorers like Vasco de Gama were motivated to expand mainly for the spice markets of Calicut (today called Kozhikode) in modern-day Kerala. This led to the establishment of a series of Portuguese colonies along the western coasts of Karnataka and Kerala, including Mangalore. During this time Portuguese Jesuit priests also arrived and converted a small number of people in modern Kerala, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu to Catholicism, most notably the Paravars.
Dravidian culture
Religious belief
Ancient Dravidian religion constituted of an Animism and non-Vedic form of religion which may have influenced the Āgamas, Vedic and non-Vedic textsMudumby Narasimhachary (Ed) (1976). Āgamaprāmāṇya of Yāmunācārya, Issue 160 of Gaekwad's Oriental Series. Oriental Institute, Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda. which post-date the Vedic texts. The Agamas are Tamil language and Sanskrit religious text chiefly constituting the methods of temple construction and creation of murti, worship means of deities, philosophical doctrines, meditative practices, attainment of sixfold desires and four kinds of yoga. The worship of village deities, as well as sacred flora and fauna in Hinduism is recognised as a survival of the pre-Vedic Dravidian religion. Hinduism can be regarded as a religious and cultural fusion or synthesis between ancient Dravidians and Indo-Aryans, and other local elements.
Architecture and visual art
Mayamata and Manasara shilpa texts estimated to be in circulation by the 5th to 7th century AD, are guidebooks on the Dravidian style of Vastu Shastra design, construction, sculpture and joinery technique.Stella Kramrisch (1976), The Hindu Temple Volume 1 & 2, Tillotson, G. H. R. (1997). Svastika Mansion: A Silpa-Sastra in the 1930s. South Asian Studies, 13(1), pp 87–97 Isanasivagurudeva paddhati is another text from the 9th century describing the art of building in India in south and central India. In north India, Brihat-samhita by Varāhamihira is the widely cited ancient Sanskrit manual from the 6th century describing the design and construction of Nagara-style Hindu temples. Traditional Dravidian architecture and symbolism are also based on Agamas. The Agamas are non-Vedic in origin and have been dated either as post-Vedic texts or as pre-Vedic compositions.Nagalingam, Pathmarajah (2009). The Religion of the Agamas. Siddhanta Publications. [9] The Agamas are a collection of Tamil and Sanskrit religious text chiefly constituting the methods of temple construction and creation of murti, worship means of deities, philosophical doctrines, meditative practices, attainment of sixfold desires and four kinds of yoga.
Theatre, dance and music
Literary evidence of traditional form of theatre, dance and music dates back to the 3rd century BCE. at pp. 4–5 Ancient literary works, such as the Cilappatikaram, describe a system of music. The theatrical culture flourished during the early Sangam age. Theatre-dance traditions have a long and varied history whose origins can be traced back almost two millennia to dance-theatre forms like Kotukotti, Kaapaalam and Pandarangam, which are mentioned in an ancient anthology of poems entitled the Kaliththokai. Dance forms such as Bharatanatyam are based on older temple dance forms known as Catir Kacceri, as practised by courtesans and a class of women known as Devadasis.Leslie, Julia. Roles and rituals for Hindu women, pp.149–152
Clothing
Dravidian speakers in southern India wear varied traditional costumes depending on their region, largely influenced by local customs and traditions. The most traditional dress for Dravidian men is the lungi, or the more formal dhoti, called veshti in Tamil, panche in Kannada and Telugu, and mundu in Malayalam. The lungi consists of a colourful checked cotton cloth. Many times these lungis are tube-shaped and tied around the waist, and can be easily tied above the knees for more strenuous activities. The lungi is usually everyday dress, used for doing labour while dhoti is used for more formal occasions. Many villagers have only a lungi as their article of clothing. The dhoti is generally white in colour, and occasionally has a border of red, green or gold. Dhotis are usually made out of cotton for more everyday use, but the more expensive silk dhotis are used for special functions like festivals and weddings.
Martial arts and sports
In Mahabharata, Bhishma claimed that southerners are skilled with sword-fighting in general and Sahadeva was chosen for the conquest of the southern kingdoms due to his swordsmanship. In South India various types of martial arts are practised like Kalaripayattu and Silambam.
See also
Notes
Sources
Kamil Zvelebil (1990). 9788185452012, Pondicherry Institute of Linguistics and Culture. ISBN 9788185452012
(1988). 9780520057890, University of California Press. ISBN 9780520057890
External links
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