1838.] 



Report on the Mackenzie Manuscripts. 



67 



As in this town Comalavali was born, the place was called Coma/a, 

 which the Tamil people ignorantly term Covala. 



*~ *■ * * * 



This is a place of no known origin (andthi-SChalam). In ancient 

 times it was a town of a kadam (or 10 miles). It may have contained 

 five or six fanes, but the three called Comalam, Tiruvadam, and Malla- 

 puram (the seven pagodas) are known to have belonged to it, as proba- 

 bly one tow^n. But, going to ruin, it became a wilderness ; and so it 

 continues to be still. 



Note. — Calava is a derivation from Cala, or time. The marrying the 

 daughter is the recommencing another year. Vishnu, in a mystic sense, 

 is (like Zeus) the firmament. Fishnu, as Varaha, may point to the 

 Varaha-Calpa, or great period of time so called. In this way the 

 JSrahmans have constructed their Egyptian hieroglyphics, or Chaldean 

 fables; and, by means of them, mystified the people, and led them into 

 the crude personifications, and vulgarities, of a low, and disgusting 

 idolatry. 



The tradition of a lai-ge town having existed in the neighbourhood, 

 is worth keeping in memory. 



Mahomedan Account. 



Anciently this place was a Shahar, or great town, with many su- 

 burban adjuncts. In those times there were Hindu roja^, to whom 

 some few Mahomedans rendered obedience. This was in Hejira 1218, 

 or Fusly 1214. (In these dates there must be some error). 



In the times when the Mahomedans served the Hindus, some per- 

 sons committed the dead body of a disciple, enclosed in an ark w ith a 

 writing, to the sea (at what place not specified). The writing directed 

 the Mahomedans of the place, wherever the ark should be cast on 

 shore, to inter the body with great respect, build a tomb and render 

 homage there; the ark came ashore at Covelong, and was taken up by 

 the Mahomedans, by whom the prescribed duties were carefully ren- 

 dered. In process of time it attracted great veneration, and in the 

 days of the Nabob Sadatulla Khan, the simple tomb was turned into a 

 mosque, and a fort also was built * * * *. Another mosque built by a 

 devotee which had gone to decay was rebuilt and endowed by Sada- 

 tulla Khan. A fort, which afterwards belonged to the French, was 

 taken by Mr. Close (afterwards Sir Barry Close) and dismantled. 

 This was forty years since. Much salt is produced in this neighbour- 

 hood. There was a mint here in the time of SadatuUa-Khan ; discon- 

 tinued for thirty years. 



