Portal:Tamils

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The Tamil people, also known as Tamilar (Tamil: தமிழர், romanized: Tamiḻar, pronounced [t̪amiɻaɾ] in the singular or தமிழர்கள், Tamiḻarkaḷ, [t̪amiɻaɾɡaɭ] in the plural), Tamilians, or simply Tamils (/ˈtæmɪlz, ˈtɑː-/ TAM-ilz, TAHM-), are an ethnolinguistic group who natively speak the Tamil language and trace their ancestry mainly to India's southern state of Tamil Nadu, to the union territory of Puducherry, and to Sri Lanka. The Tamil language is one of the world's longest-surviving classical languages, with over 2000 years of Tamil literature, including the Sangam poems, which were composed between 300 BCE and 300 CE. People who speak Tamil as their mother tongue and are born in are considered Tamils.

Tamils constitute 5.9% of the population in India (concentrated mainly in Tamil Nadu and Puducherry), 15% in Sri Lanka (excluding Eelam Moors), 7% in Malaysia, and 5% in Singapore.

From the 4th century BCE, urbanisation and mercantile activity along the western and eastern coasts of Tamilakam -- what is today Kerala and Tamil Nadu -- led to the development of four large Tamil empires, the Cheras, Cholas, Pandyas, Pallavas, and velirs and a number of smaller states, all of whom were warring amongst themselves for dominance. The Jaffna Kingdom, and vanni chieftaincies inhabited by Eelam Tamils, was once one of the strongest kingdoms of Sri Lanka and controlled much of the north of the island. (Full article...)

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There are literary, archaeological, epigraphic and numismatic sources of ancient Tamil history. The foremost among these sources is the Sangam literature, generally dated to 5th century BCE to 3rd century CE. The poems in Sangam literature contain vivid descriptions of the different aspects of life and society in Tamilakam during this age; scholars agree that, for the most part, these are reliable accounts. Greek and Roman literature, around the dawn of the Christian era, give details of the maritime trade between Tamilakam and the Roman empire, including the names and locations of many ports on both coasts of the Tamil country. There are evidences as could be seen comparing standard forms of Sumerian literature and those recovered through present form of Tamil, for example the word for father in Sumerian transliteration is given as, "a-ia" that could easily be compared with Tamil word, "ayya". This also places ancient form of Tamil to early Sumerian period, say as ancient as 3500 BC.

Archaeological excavations of several sites in Tamil Nadu and Kerala have yielded remnants from the Sangam era, such as different kinds of pottery, pottery with inscriptions, imported ceramic ware, industrial objects, brick structures and spinning whorls. Techniques such as stratigraphy and paleography have helped establish the date of these items to the Sangam era. The excavated artifacts have provided evidence for existence of different economic activities mentioned in Sangam literature such as agriculture, weaving, smithy, gem cutting, building construction, pearl fishing and painting. (Full article...)

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General images

Image 1Grey pottery with engravings, Arikamedu, 1st century CE (from Tamils)
Image 2One of the most popular overseas branches of Chennai-based Saravanaa Bhavan, the world's largest Indian vegetarian restaurant chain, is located in Edison, New Jersey, U.S. (from Tamil diaspora)
Image 3Expatriate Sri Lankan Tamil children in traditional clothes in Toronto, Ontario, Canada (from Tamil diaspora)
Image 4Sri Kandaswamy Temple, Brickfields, Malaysia. (from Tamil diaspora)
Image 5Tamiḻakam during Sangam Period (from Tamils)
Image 6Tamil girls in Malaysia (from Tamil diaspora)
Image 7Krishna with his consorts Rukmini and Satyabhama and his mount Garuda, Tamil Nadu, India, late 12th-13th century (from Tamils)
Image 8 Virampatnam jewelry from funerary burial, 2nd century BCE, Tamil Nadu (from Tamils)
Image 9A 400 years old hero stone in Salem depicting bull-taming sport Jallikattu. (from Tamils)
Image 10The Mahishasuramardhini cave bas relief at Mahabalipuram from 7th century CE (from Tamils)
Image 11Aiyanar, guardian folk deity of Tamil Nadu (from Tamils)
Image 12Katar, Tamil dagger which was popular throughout South Asia (from Tamils)
Image 13Murugan Temple, Sydney (from Tamil diaspora)
Image 14The Tamil Chola Empire at its height, 1030 CE (from Tamils)
Image 15Bharatanatyam dancers (from Tamils)
Image 16The Brihadeshswar Temple at Thanjavur, also known as the Great Temple, built by Rajaraja Chola I (from Tamils)
Image 17 Souttoukeny jewelry, 2nd century BCE, Tamil Nadu (from Tamils)
Image 18A Megalithic burial jar from north-western Sri Lanka, 5th-2nd century BCE, similar to South Indian and Deccan jars of the time. (from Tamils)
Image 19Tamil people in Medan, Indonesia (from Tamil diaspora)
Image 20The Om symbol in Tamil script (from Tamils)
Image 21Tamil woman in traditional attire, c. 1880, Sri Lanka. (from Tamils)
Image 22Two Tamil girls who follow Vaishnavaite Hinduism (from Tamils)
Image 23Megalithic sarcophagus burial from Tamil Nadu (from Tamils)
Image 24Distribution of Tamil speakers in South India and Sri Lanka (1981). (from Tamils)
Image 25Erwadi durgah in Ramanathapuram district is a major pilgrimage shrine of the Tamil Muslims. (from Tamils)
Image 26A Malbar temple in Réunion. (from Tamil diaspora)
Image 27Sri Kamakshi Ambaal temple in Hamm, Germany (from Tamil diaspora)
Image 28Batu Caves temple built by Tamil Malaysians in c. 1880s. (from Tamils)
Image 29The golden Vimana over the sanctum at Srirangam midst its gopurams, its gable with Paravasudeva image. (from Tamils)
Image 30Tamil girls dressed in traditional attire, ca. 1870, Tamil Nadu, India. (from Tamils)
Image 31The hall in front of Ranganayaki's shrine, Srirangam, where Kambar is said to have recited his works on Kamba Ramayanam (from Tamils)
Image 32Sage Agathiyar, one of the contributors of Old Tamil literature. (from Tamils)
Image 33The New York City Metropolitan Area, including Central New Jersey, as well as Long Island and Staten Island in New York, is home to the largest Tamil American population. (from Tamil diaspora)
Image 34Celebrations of Murugan by the Sri Lankan Tamil community in Paris, France (from Tamil diaspora)
Image 35 Map of ancient oceanic trade, and ports of Tamilakam (from Tamils)
Image 36Basilica of Our Lady of Good Health in Velankanni, Tamil Nadu (from Tamils)
Image 37Meenakshi Amman temple, dedicated to Goddess Meenakshi, tutelary deity of Madurai city (from Tamils)

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Ramakrishnan in 2015

Venkatraman Ramakrishnan (born 1952) is a British-American structural biologist. He shared the 2009 Nobel Prize in Chemistry with Thomas A. Steitz and Ada Yonath for research on the structure and function of ribosomes.

Since 1999, he has worked as a group leader at the Medical Research Council (MRC) Laboratory of Molecular Biology (LMB) on the Cambridge Biomedical Campus, UK and is a Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge. He served as President of the Royal Society from 2015 to 2020. (Full article...)

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Tamil People

Tamil People Countrywide: India • Sri Lanka • Canada • Malaysia • Singapore • South Africa • England

Related Ethnic Groups: Brahui • Gond • Kannadiga • Khonds • Kodava • Oraon • Malayali • Telugus • Tuluvas

Related indigenous Groups: Badagas • Toda • Kuruba

Tamil Nadu

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