Short notes on the Social Life of Pandyan Dynasty

We would know pretty little about the social life of the people of the Pandyan country during the 13th century but for the lucky accident that two great chroniclers have left valuable and interesting reports about the social condition of the Pandyan country.

The first was Marco Polo, the Venetian traveller, who came to South India from China during the reign period of Kulasekhara Pandya whose rule began in 1268. The other was Wassaf, a Muslim historian, many of whose statements confirm the details given by Marco Polo. Put together the accounts left by these two shrewd and fairly objective observers make interesting reading and confirm the experience of the modern Tamil.

The foreigners knew the southern part of the peninsula as MaTjar. In fact, MaT^ar extended from Kollam to Nellore. Kayal was an important Pandyan port. Marco Polo says that a number of brothers jointly ruled the Pandyan country and that the one to whom Kayal belonged administered his kingdom with great equity.

The horse trade of Kayal is mentioned by Polo who has harsh words for the Tamilian ignorance about anything connected with horses. He says that the country’s wealth was wasted on horses largely because the climate was unsuited to Arab horses. Polo’s mention of the substantial quantities of pearls traded in is borne out by Wassaf also.

The king was extremely rich. ‘Round his neck he had a nacklace entirely of precious stones, rubies, sapphires, emeralds and the like in so much that this collar is of great value’. He wore also hanging in front of his chest from the neck downwards a fine silk thread strung with 104 large pearls and rubies. ‘So let me tell you, ‘ says Polo, ‘what this king wears between gold and gems and pearls is worth more than a city’s ransom’.

Polo and Wassaf agree in saying that the Pandyan king had 1200 crores of gold dinars in his treasury. Polo says, ‘this king has some 500 wives and has many children’. The foreign observers have not failed to mention the personal attendants who protected the king and died with him when he died. They were the bodyguards known to epigraphy as Apattudavigal.

The life of the common people was very strange to Polo. He said roundly that there were no tailors at all in the country, nor was there any need for them ‘seeing that everybody goes naked’. He also mentions the custom if sati as a common practice. The following observations of Polo deserve quotation: ‘Let me tell you the people of this country have a custom of rubbing their houses all over with cowdung.

Moreover, all of them great and small, king and baron included do sit upon the ground only…. the people of the country go to battle all naked with only a lance and a shield; and they are most wretched soldiers…. it is their practice that every male and female do wash the whole body twice everyday…. in eating they use the right hand only and would on no account touch their food with the left hand…. so also they drink only from drinking vessel and every man has his own; nor will any one drink from another’s vessel.

And when they drink they do not put the vessel to the lips but hold it aloft and let the drink spout into the mouth…. they are very strict in executing justice upon criminals…. as soon as a child is born they write down his nativity i.e., the day and hour, the month and the moon’s age.

They observe this custom becuase every single thing they do is done with reference to astrology.’ Polo refers to Devadasis also and the use of betel leaves. This account of the social life of the people of the Pandyan kingdom of the 13th century serves to show how little life has changed in that part of the country since Polo wrote.

While to literature and to religion, the Pandyan country made no special contribution (apart from the rest of the Tamil country or even South India), the particular contribution made by the Pandyan in the field of religious architecture needs mention. One might say that in the five stages of Dravidian (Tamil) architecture, viz., (1) the cave and monolithic
rock-cut, (2) the structural, (3) the Chola, (4) the Pandyan and (5) Vijayanagar.

The fourth belonged to the Pandyas. The speciality about their contribution consists in having shifted the emphasis from the vimana over the sanctum to the multiplicity (generally four) of gateway towers. The difference is best seen by comparing the Brihadeesvaram in Tanjore with the Sri Meenakshi temple in Madurai.

These gateway towers became veritable bases for extensive sculpturing. The pillars which adorn the corridors also changed and took in more ornamentation. In fine the Pandyan religious architectural style may be considered to be in the stage of transition from the simpler Chola to the very complicated Vijayanagara style.