what is referred to as sangam age. why is the age significant
Answers
• The Tamil heroic poems, popularly called the Sangam literature, constitute the-major evidence for the old Tamil literary tradition.
• In South India, Tamil had become a literary language, i.e., a full-blown language with its own system of writing, at least by third century BC.
• The Neolithic – Chaleolithic amalgam, which began around 2000 B.C., continued upto the middle of the first millennium B.C. It was then overlapped by the Magalithic culture inhabited by the Megaliths builders.
• The Megalithic culture which dates to C. 500 B.C. and A.D. 100 brings us to the historical period in South India.
• The Megalithic culture is known not from its actual settlements, which are rare, but from its graves. These graves are called Megaliths because they were encircled by big pieces of stone. They contain not only skeletons of peolple (fractional burials) who were buried but also iron objects like swords, spears, arrowheads, axes and pottery (black-and-red pottery).
• Agricultural tools like hoes and sickles found in the graves indicate and advanced type of agriculture.
• The Cholas, Pandyas, Cheras and Satyaputras mentioned in Ashoka’s inscriptions were probably in the Megalithic phase of material culture.
• About the beginning of the Christian era, the Megalithic culture was overlapped by what has been called Andhra Culture, on account of occurrence of Andhra coins.
• The distinctive pottery of the period was a white painted reddish brown ware known as the Russet-coated Painted Ware.
• This is also the time when South India had a large volume of trade with the Roman world, as shown by the occurrence, at numerous sites of Roman coins, glass work and pottery, the most noteworthy in the last item being the arrentine and the amphora.
• The cultural and economic contacts between the north and the deep south paved the way for the introduction of material culture brought from the north to the deep south by traders, conquerors, Jainas, Buddhists and some Brahmana missionaries.
• From the second century B.C., there was formation of state system, rise of social classes, use of writing, beginning of written literature, etc.
• The land south of the Krishna River was divided into three kingdoms – Cholas, Pandyas and Cheras or Keralas.
• The Pandyas are first mentioned by Megasthenes who speaks of the Pandya kingdom being ruled by a woman and that even seven year old mothers were found in the Pandya country; this may suggest some matriarchal influence in the Pandya society.
• According to Megasthenes Pandyan kingdom was celebrated for pearls.
• The three kingdoms – Cholas, Pandyas and Cheras, together with Satiyaputras (Satyaputra) are referred to as independent states by Ashoka in his inscriptions with which he maintained friendly relations.
• The name Satiyaputras is otherwise is an unknown name and has not yet been satisfactorily identified.
• The word ‘Sangam’ is associated with South Indian history where a college or assembly of Tamil scholars and poets flourished under the royal patronage of the Pandya kings at Madurai.
• Hence the age is known as ‘Sangam Age’, which extends roughly between 300 B.C. and 300 A.D.
Sangam age refers to the period when bulk of tamil literature was composed by a body of Tamil scholars and poets in three successive literary gatherings called sangam.
It is believed that the first sangam was attended by Gods and legendary sages.The second sangam attended by several poets produced a large mass of literature.The third sangam also attended by poets produced a large mass of literature.It is this fraction which constitutes the extant body of Sangam literature.