158 An Essay on the Relationship of Languages and Nations. [Jan. 



II, ponnod ; 12, ponnat ; 13, ponmudshu ; 14, pank ; 15, poyj ; 16, par; 

 17, por ; 18, pottsb (in Tamul characters, ©LjrrZ-Lz_Lfi$) . ^ p6nboth ; 

 20, ovvoth; 21, ovvoduddhu ; 30, muppotfc ; 40, narboth ; 50, etboth ; 

 60, arroth ; 70, drvoth ; 80, ottvoth ; 90, onboth j 100, onnuvu ; 

 101, onnur odd, &c* 



The little I could as yet ascertain of their traditions is the following — 

 How the earth came into existence, they confess themselves ignorant 

 of. The first God, named oonu, came out of the earth like mist. His 

 wife is called, Pinnar'wursh. His son, Tekershi, is the governing 

 god, before whom marriages and all other solemnities are performed ; 

 he is the same, they say, who is called, karta, by the burghers, and 

 in the Konkani language. (The similarity of the words oon and 

 aitvv I think to be accidental, as I have found no other similarity 

 between the dialects, or nations, of the Todavers and of the Greeks). 

 One of the five kinds of Neelgherry-bees is called peten (ten means in 

 their dialect both the honey and the bee) ; it once stung God, and 

 therefore he decreed, that that kind of bees should never have much 

 honey. Others relate that " god asked once the bee to show him, how 

 it made honey ; the bee refused compliance ; and god tied it with a 

 thread, and kept it prisoner for six days ; the bee was obstinate, and god 

 let it go again." When I could not suppress a smile at the narration, 

 the Todaven who related it to me, added : " this is certain ; I shall bring 

 you a bee ; you will see how narrow it is in the middle ; that comes 

 from the thread." I have not yet been able to understand sufficiently, 

 what they relate about their own history ; thus much I ascertained — 

 They believe the first couple who resided on these hills was a man of 

 the Iruler tribe and a Todaver woman ; then came another couple, a 

 Todaven and a Iruler woman, from the mountain Cuppara (which, 

 they say, can be seen from Coimbatoor towards the western sea) ; 

 but returned again to Cuppara ; and when the first couple sent them 

 an invitation to return, they refused to come." — The Royal Asiatic 

 Society of Great Britain and Ireland, in a series of questions circulated 

 many years ago, state that a kingdom of Jews in the south of Arabia 

 was destroyed by Mahomed, and that many fled to the Malabar coast ; 

 and the question is added — whether any trace of the remnants of 

 that people could be found in the adjacent countries? The striking 

 similarity of the features of the countenance of the Todavers with 

 those of the Arabians or Jews, as well as their own tradition of their 

 having come from the western region, deserve attention, but nothing 

 can be decided without a much more intimate acquaintance with their 

 dialect, manners and traditions, than we at present possess. 



* I am preparing a Vocabulary of the Todaver dialect with the explanations both in 

 Tamul and in English, to serve as a primer and elementary book for schools to be esta- 

 blished amongst them, and which I intend putting to the Press.— Since the Tamul alpha- 

 bet is not suited to express many Todaver words intelligibly, it is necessary to adopt 

 for this purpose the Roman alphabet with diacritical marks, whereby this work will, at 

 the 6am e time, become more generally accessible to the literary public. 



