Tamils were, like the Assyrians and Babylonians, a ferocious race of hunters and soldiers armed with bows and lances making war for the mere pleasure of slaying, ravaging and pillaging. Like them the Tamils believed in evil spirits, astrology, omens and sorcery. They cared little for death. The following quotations from the above work will bear testimony to the characteristics of that virile race:
(1) கூடலர் குடர் மாலை சூட்டி
வேறிரித்து விரும்பியா டின்று.
(2) நேராதார் வளநாட்டைக்
கூரெர கொளீயன்று.
(3) கூடார் முனைகொள்ளை சாற்றி
வீடறக் கவர்ந்த வினைமொழிந்தன்று.
(4) முடித் தலைய டுப்பிற் பிடர்த்தலைத்தாழித்
தொடித் தோட்டு டுப்பிற் றுழைஇய வூன்சோறு
மறப்பேய் வாலுவன் வயினறிந் தூட்ட.-Sil.
(1) Garlanded with the entrails of enemies they danced with lances held in their hands topside down. (2) They set fire to the fertile villages of their enemies; (3) and plundered their country and demolished their houses. (4) The devil's cook distıibuted the food boiled with the flesh of the slain, on the hearth of the crowned heads of fallen kings and stirred with the ladle of the bangled arm.
With these compare some passages from the Assyrian stories of campaigns. 'I had some of them flayed in my presence and had the wall hung with their skins. I arranged their heads like crowns and their transfixed bodies in the form of garlands ... I
