I have mentioned in various articles that the Dravididas,Tamils were mentioned in the Vedas,Puranas,Ramayana and Mahabharata.
These remarks were made in the passing,assuming that further explanation was not necessary.
This was remiss of me.
I assumed that Indians,educated included are aware of these references.
Thanks to western education and doctored History of India,where everything worthwhile in India was/is being dated only after the birth of Christ,despite overwhelming archeological evidence and foreign literary works.
I have also written that Poompuhar,excavated sometime back,is dated around 30,000 years ago and the Period literature Silappadikaram mentions Vedas.
And there is a million year old archeological site in Chennai ,India that had an advanced Tamil civilisation.
The earliest Tamil grammatical work of Tamil mentions Vedas and its author Tholkaapiyar declares himself to be a Brahmin well versed in the Vedas.
And I have written many articles on this subject of the intimate relationship between Sanatana Dharma and Tamil/s.
However there have been quite a few mails asking me to produce evidence of Tamil being mentioned in Early Sanskrit Texts.
The term Tamil is used to mention the language spoken by the people in South India in ancient India and is being spoken even today.
The term Tamils is used to refer to people speaking the language.
This is a linguistic identity.
One must remember that identifying people of India by language was an European invention,most of these attempts were aimed at dividing India.
And the landmass of present India was vastly different from the present India in ancient times.
The reference to various people belonging to different regions ,by early Indians was by the name of tribes.
And also by referring to the directions where they lived in relation to Vedic,Sanatana Dharma,which was prevalent in the,Gangetic plains and Saraswathi valley.
In terms of identifying people by directions,the Vedic people referred to the people in the south of Vindhyas,it was
Dakshinapada,the southern part.
It may be noted the term Deccan is derived from the word Dakshinapada.
This area in the south was also referred to as Dravida,meaning South.
The people of this area were called Dasyus,indicating those who did not worship the Vedic Deity,Agni.
Because of this,people, south of Vindhya Mountains were called Dasyus,heretics to Vedic form of worship.
It is a different matter that the Dravidas followed Sanatana Dharma and I have explained this many of my articles on Tamils,Sanatana Dharma,Ramayana and Mahabharatha.
The earliest reference to Tamil/s is foundin the Rig Veda.
‘Saratpada na dakshina paravarn na ta nu me prasnayo jagrbhre,
-Rig Veda x.61.8-Vedic Index by McDonnell and Keith ,Volume I,page 337.
The word Dakshinapada means,
‘To the place,the southward foot,where the Exiles( paravri) goes,on being expelled.
Shall write on how it came to people being expelled to south ,by whom and why.
Shall also provide evidence from the Vedas,Ramayana and Mahabharatha to Dravidas,Tamils in a series of articles.