6.3 The Tamil Kingdoms

. The Tamil Kingdoms Southern India remained immune to the political changes taking place in the northern part of the country. Around the first century CE, the Satavahana kingdom was established in the Deccan area, comprising the modern states of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. This, however, was not like the centralised empire of the Mauryas, and the provincial governors of the Satavahanas had a considerable degree of autonomy. The political landscape of the Tamil region was fragmented into small kingdoms, in contrast to the north where extensive empires flourished. The Tamil region was ruled by muvendar , the three kings – the Pandyas from their capital Madurai, the Cholas from their capital Uraiyur (now a suburb of the city of Tiruchi), and the Cheras from Vanji (modern- day Karur). We know that these kings were known to the Mauryas even in the 3rd century BCE and Ashoka’s second rock edict mentions them as kingdoms bordering his empire. However, there were many war lords and chiefs (often referred to as velir ) who were ruling over smaller principalities in the region. We have extensive information about the Tamil region coming from the corpus of Tamil poetry collectively known as the Sangam literature, dating from the third century BCE to the third century CE. To these we can add the epics Silappadikaram and Manimekalai , which were written somewhat later. The very large volume of trade with the Tamil region evoked a great deal of interest among the Roman and Greek historians and geographers, and their Image of Satavahana King Gautami Putra Satakarni This was partly due to royal patronage and partly due to other factors, like the growing ascendancy of Mahayana Buddhism, which allowed the representation of the person of Buddha in human form. The Greek influence led to an Indo-Greek style of sculpture and art commonly referred to as Gandhara art. Statues of Buddha, sculpted particularly in Taxila and the north- western regions, show him in graceful garments, surrounded by cherubs and leaves inspired by the Greek tradition. But mention must also be made of the red sandstone sculpture with