Australian Aboriginals and Tamils

Australian Aboriginals and Tamils

Maravanpulavu K. Sachithananthan

Robert Caldwell (1856) refers to the remarkable general resemblances between the Dravidian pronouns and those of aboriginal tribes of Southern and Western Australia, (p.51-53, Comparative Grammar, 1856).

Candid expressions on the close resemblances between Australian Koori and Dravidian languages by W. H. Bleek (1872) in his paper, On the position of Australian Languages is an eye opener.

R. M. W. Dixon (1980) discusses the wider affiliation of Australian languages to assert that the Dravidian suggestion deserves to be taken seriously in, The languages of Australia (p.236)

Robert Lawler (1991) in his Voices of the First Day discusses the agglutinative nature of the Dravidian and Tasmanian languages and goes on to say that fishermen of the Coramendal coast will easily pick up words spoken by Tasmanian aboriginals (p.120)

There are many such notices on linguistic and other similarities. Padma Subramaniam, the dancer from Tamil Nadu, R. Mathivanan, P. Ramanathan, Sutha Seshaiyan, researchers in Tamilnadu and Mathahlai Somu, writer from Australia have touched upon this subject in the course of their treatises on Tamil ancestry.

Robert Lawler (1991) in his Voices of the First Day discussing the social face of love among aboriginals of Australia brings out a Dravidian connection (p.161).

Per Hage (2001) uses linguistic evidence to support her views on The Evolution of Dravidian Kinship Systems in Oceania, including the aboriginals of Australia. She quotes N. J. Allen extensively, using Allen’s world historical theory of kinship where the humanity began with a tetradic-Dravidian system based on cross cousin marriage.

Robert Lawler (1991) in his Voices of the First Day points to the physical resemblance of the Dravidians to the aboriginals of Australia indicating a racial similarity, goes on to clarify as to why modern anthropologists conveniently disregard it (p.121).

Spencer Wells (1969) in his Deep Ancestry describes how Ramasamy Pitchappan showed closer linkages using Y-chromosome markers (p.124). The Piraan Malai Kallar community near Madurai carries a piece of genetic trail as a direct genetic link to the Aboriginal community of Australia.

Josephine Flood (2006) discusses the biological angle in The Original Australians, Story of the Aboriginal People (p.185) quoting the work of Alan Redd and Mark Stoneking. These two geneticists studied Mitochondrion Deoxyribo Nucleic Acid from present day aboriginals to find that they are ten times closer to Indians than to New Guineans. They estimated that the time of separation of Australian Aboriginals from southern Indians was at 3390 years with 95% certainty. Josephine also quotes the study of geneticists Pellekaan linking southern Indians with Australian Aboriginals.

In almost all these treatises, authors have taken pains to show diagrammatically the migration of humans between southern India and Australia. These diagrams conceptually converge with the Tamil thought process - from Simon Casie Chetty through Na. Si. Kanthaia Pillai to Maraimalai Adikal, Neelakanta Sastri and K. K.Pillai on the once prosperous Tamilian land mass of Kumari Kandam, otherwise known as Lemuria. These and many other Tamil scholars have sourced from linguistic and literary master pieces of the Sangam and post Sangam era to write and discuss about this supposedly disappeared land mass.