OF RHARATAVARSA OR INDIA. 
rate and distinct languages. If the Limijrike [AifivpiKri) of 
Ptolemy (VII, 1, 8 and 85) is tlie Dimirica repeatedly men- 
tioned in the Cosmography of the anonymous geographer 
of Ravenna, as Bishop Caldwell has clearly pointed out by 
identifying it with Damiriee or the Tamil country (see p. 14 
of the Introduction to the second edition of the Comparatioe 
D'mddiaii Grammar), the work of Ptolemy contains th&- 
earliest mention of the word Tamil. 
All these permutations prove the continual interchange 
of m with the other labial consonants, and of / into the d and. 
r sounds. 
With respect to the above-mentioned conjectures a few observations 
are perhaps necessary. 
The change of a into i and vice versd is not rare, as in mala and mila, 
D-aiiiiriea and Dimirica,. tira, open, and tara, &c., kn. Tirhvd.i/ and its slang,, 
alteration into Taravdi/nre both Tamil words, though the latter common form; 
has been introduced into Telugu by Telugu Brahmans — especially by Vais. 
nava Telugu Brahmans — who live in the Tamil countrj', and has thus found 
its way even into modern Telugu dictionaries. The term Taravay ior Veda- 
dkyayana or Vedopakrama is neither found in Kanarese and Malayalam, 
nor in pure Telugu. The most important lesson which Brahman boys have 
to learn at and after their Upaiiai/anam or investiture with the holj' thread 
are Veda mintras. Children generally alter words so as to suit their pro- 
nunciation, and Tamil boys most probably invented Taravay for Tiruvdy as 
they say tara, open, instead of tvra. This corrupted form- found eventually 
access into common Tamil, for up to this moment Taravay is only considered 
a. slang term. The origin of the word once forgotten, tara of taravay, was 
connected with the word laram in the meaning of time (once, twice, &c.), 
and as every lesson in order to be known must be repeated,,so also the reciting 
of the Veda after so many times or taram. It seems to be overlooked by 
those, who prefer this explanation, that the term Taravay is only applied to the 
repetition of the Veda and not to any other rejietition, that if tara had been 
taken in the sen-s^i O'f " time," it ought to be at the end of the word, and that 
the syllable vdy gives no sense in taravay unless it is accepted as meaning 
Veda or holy word. Taravay, taruvdy, in taravdta and taruvdta,. occur in 
Telugu in the meaning of afterwards, as do in Kanarese taravdya and taru- 
vdya ; but these words have nothing in common mth the above-mentioned 
Tamil Taravay. The elision of an r is also not unfrequent, as trdguta, to 
drink, in Telugu becomes generally tdguta. Already Bishop Caldwell was 
struck with the strange formation of the word Dravida, for he says : " The 
compound dr is quite un-Dravidian. It would be tira in Tamil ; but even 
if we suppose some such word as Tiravida or Tiramida to have been con> 
verted into Dravida by the Sanski-it-speaking people, we get no nearer to 
