KERALA-DRAVIDIAN CONNECTION

DRAVIDIANS

There is general agreement among ethnologists that the Dravidian population is a branch of the Mediterranean race, or at least a closely allied one. while the Mediterranean race is White, the Dravidians are much darker, ranging from the dark Greek and Italian complexion to black. There is also a wide range of difference in the shape of the skull, the color and texture of the hair, the color of the eyes, and the shape of the nose. These deviations can be explained with a probable interbreeding between the Dravidians and Mundas, as it is still taking place in the Chotanagpur region between the Dravidian Oraons and the neighboring Mundas.

The Dravidians entered India before the Aryans, before 2000 B.C., after passing through Mesopotamia, Iran, and Baluchistan where the Brahuis, a Dravidian race, still live. On grounds of cultural affinities such as inheritance through women, snake cults, organization of society, and structure of temples, some historians connect the Dravidians with the Elamites and Mesopotamians. The evidence of Indian skulls from the Indus Valley indicates that the Mediter-ranean stock became established in north India before the Harappab Civilisation came into existence around 2000 B.C.

Granted that the Dravidians were,originally Mediterraneans and that they passed through Mesopotamia, Iran, and Baluchistan, exactly from which Mediter-ranean region did they come?

Of particular significance is archeologist B. B. Lal's contention that the Dravidians probably came from Nubia, Upper Egypt. This theory would give them among other things their Mediterranean features and dark complexion. Lal writes: "At Timos the Indian team dug up several megalithic sites of ancient Nubians which bear an uncanny resemblance to the cemeteries of early Dravidians which are found all over Western India from Kathiawar to Cape Comorin. The intriguing similarity extends from the subterranean structure found near them. Even the earthenware ring-stands used by the Dravidians and Nubians to hold pots were identical." According to Lal, the Nubian megaliths date from around 1000 B.C.

The linguistic studies of scholars like S. K. Chatterji have discovered many cognate words in ancient Egyptian and Nubian languages and Tamil. Fur-ther, the new findings on the Indus heiroglyphics by M. V. N. Krishna Rao, Fateh Singn, H. S. Parpola, K. A. Parpola, S. J. Koskenniemi, and Yu. Knorozov claim to have deciphered the script in terms of Proto-Dravidian and thus confirm the findings of the venerable Indian historian Father Heras that the Harappan people spoke a Dravidian language in the third millennium B.C.
Comparative analysis of the Dravidian myth of Kovalan and Kannaki celebrated in the ancient Tamil Shilappadikaram with the ancient Egyptian myth of Osiris and Isis confirms the Egyptian origin of the ancient Dravidians. These two myths are very similar in content and help explain each other and argue for a common ethnic origin. The long ships used by the Egyptians in the third millennium B.C. could have easily carried the Dravidians to the banks of the Indus River and/or all the way to South India. The sea-route-however, does not exclude the possibility of the early Dravidians taking a land route from the Phoenician shores through Iran and Baluchistan to India. No wonder, similar hieroglyphic writings are found both in Egypt and India.