Iravatham Mahadevan (2 October 1930 – 26 November 2018) was an Indian

epigraphist Epigraphy () is the study of inscriptions, or epigraphs, as writing; it is the science of identifying graphemes, clarifying their meanings, classifying their uses according to dates and cultural contexts, and drawing conclusions about the wr ...

and civil servant, known for his decipherment of

Tamil-Brahmi Tamil-Brahmi, also known as Tamizhi or Damili, was a variant of the Brahmi script in southern India. It was used to write inscriptions in the early form of Old Tamil.Richard Salomon (1998) ''Indian Epigraphy: A Guide to the Study of Inscription ...

inscriptions and for his expertise on the epigraphy of the

Indus Valley civilisation The Indus Valley Civilisation (IVC), also known as the Indus Civilisation was a Bronze Age civilisation in the northwestern regions of South Asia, lasting from 3300 BCE to 1300 BCE, and in its mature form 2600 BCE to 1900&n ...

Early life

Iravatham Mahadevan was born on 2 October 1930 in a

Tamil Brahmin Tamil Brahmins are an ethnoreligious community of Tamil-speaking Hindu Brahmins, predominantly living in Tamil Nadu, though they number significantly in Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, Karnataka, in addition to other regions of India, as wel ...

family of

Thanjavur district Thanjavur District is one of the Districts of Tamil Nadu, 38 districts of the States and territories of India, state of Tamil Nadu, in southeastern India. Its headquarters is Thanjavur. The district is located in the delta of the Cauvery River ...

. Mahadevan had his schooling in the town of

Tiruchirapalli Tiruchirappalli () ( formerly Trichinopoly in English), also called Tiruchi or Trichy, is a major tier II city in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu and the administrative headquarters of Tiruchirappalli district. The city is credited with bein ...

and graduated in

Chemistry Chemistry is the science, scientific study of the properties and behavior of matter. It is a natural science that covers the Chemical element, elements that make up matter to the chemical compound, compounds made of atoms, molecules and ions ...

from the Vivekananda College, Chennai and law from the

Madras Law College Dr. Ambedkar Government Law College, commonly known by its former name Madras Law College, is a law school, located in Chennai (Madras), Tamil Nadu, India. It is also referred to as Government Law College or GLC, Chennai. It was established in ...

. Mahadevan successfully passed the

Indian Administrative Service The Indian Administrative Service (IAS) is the administrative arm of the All India Services of Government of India. Considered the premier civil service of India, the IAS is one of the three arms of the All India Services along with the Indian ...

examinations held in 1953 and was allotted to the Tamil Nadu cadre.

Civil service

Mahadevan worked as an Assistant Collector in

Coimbatore district Coimbatore district is one of the 38 districts in the state of Tamil Nadu in India. Coimbatore is the administrative headquarters of the district. It is one of the most industrialized districts and a major textile, industrial, commercial, educ ...

and Sub-Collector at

Pollachi Pollachi is a town and a taluk headquarters in Coimbatore district, Tamil Nadu state, India. Located about to the south of Coimbatore, it is the second largest town in the district after Coimbatore. Pollachi is a popular Marketplace for ja ...

. In 1958, Mahadevan was transferred to

Delhi Delhi, officially the National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi, is a city and a union territory of India containing New Delhi, the capital of India. Straddling the Yamuna river, primarily its western or right bank, Delhi shares borders w ...

as Assistant Financial Adviser in India's Ministry of Commerce and Industry serving from 1958 to 1961. In 1961, Mahadevan was posted to Madras as Deputy Secretary in Government of Tamil Nadu's Industries Department and served as Director of Handlooms and Textiles Department from 1962 to 1966. Mahadevan voluntarily retired from the civil service in 1980.

Tamil-Brahmi inscriptions

According to an interview given to an e-journal ''Varalaaru'', Mahadevan revealed that he started researching the

script following a casual suggestion by Indian historian

K. A. Nilakanta Sastri Kallidaikurichi Aiyah Nilakanta Sastri (12 August 1892 – 15 June 1975) was an Indian historian who wrote on South Indian history. Many of his books form the standard reference works on the subject. Sastri was acclaimed for his scholarship and ...

during a meeting in 1961. Earlier, during his stint in the Ministry of Commerce and Industry in Delhi in 1958–61, Mahadevan had become acquainted with the noted epigraphist and art historian C. Sivaramamurti who was then working as a curator at the

Indian Museum The Indian Museum in Central Kolkata, West Bengal, India, also referred to as the Imperial Museum at Calcutta in colonial-era texts, is the ninth oldest museum in the world, the oldest and largest museum in India as well as in Asia. It has rare ...

next block. Sivaramamurti initiated him into the basics of South Indian epigraphy. Mahadevan first published his study of Tamil-Brahmi inscriptions at

Pugalur Pugalur is a municipality in Karur district in Tamil Nadu, India. It has two parts: Nanjai Pugalur and Punjai Pugalur. Nanjai refers to land with plenty of water, and Punjai refers to land with few bodies of water. Geography Pugalur is on th ...

in 1965 following those of Mangulam, the next year. In the same year, Mahadevan presented his paper on Tamil-Brahmi inscriptions in Madras which was later published as the book ''Corpus of the Tamil-Brahmi Inscriptions''. After a brief period of research with the

Indus script The Indus script, also known as the Harappan script, is a corpus of symbols produced by the Indus Valley Civilisation. Most inscriptions containing these symbols are extremely short, making it difficult to judge whether or not they constituted ...

, Mahadevan resumed his work on Tamil-Brahmi in 1992 with active support from the Tamil Nadu Archaeological Department. In 2003, he published a revised edition of the 1966 book which has since acquired the status of a classic.

Indus script

Mahadevan started his research on the

following a brush with W. W. Hunter's book on the Indus Script at India's Central Secretariat Library in Delhi. In 1970, Mahadevan was offered the Jawaharlal Nehru Fellowship to do his doctoral research on the Indus Script. Mahadevan continued his research even after his fellowship ended and published his first book ''Indus Script: Concordance and Tables'' in 1977. Following a break from 1991 to 2003 to complete his research on Tamil epigraphy, Mahadevan resumed his studies again in 2003.

Gregory Possehl Gregory Louis Possehl (July 21, 1941 – October 8, 2011) was a professor emeritus of anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania and curator of the Asian Collections at the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. ...

called Mahadevan a "careful, methodical worker, taking care to spell out his assumptions and methods. ... 'Tentative conclusions' and 'working hypotheses' are more his style than set ideas and fait accompli".

Significant contributions

Iravatham Mahadevan's ''The Indus Script: Texts, Concordance and Tables'' (1977) is the only openly available corpus of the Indus Script. He wrote over 40 papers to further the Dravidian hypothesis of the Indus Script and argues for a continuity between the written records of Indus and the oral transmissions from the Rig Veda. He was instrumental in firmly establishing the view of K.V. Subrahmanya Aiyer that the writings found in the caves of Tamil Nadu in a script similar to Brahmi are a variant of Brahmi, which Mahadevan calls Tamil Brahmi, and in ascertaining that the language of the script is indeed Tamil. Mahadevan went on to read the names and titles of several generations of Pandiya and Chera kings in Tamil Brahmi writings, all corroborated in early Tamil literature.

Awards and honours

Iravatham Mahadevan was awarded the

Jawaharlal Nehru Fellowship The Jawaharlal Nehru Trust Scholarship U.K. was founded by Admiral Lord Mountbatten of Burma in 1966 as a tribute to the India's first Prime Minister – Jawaharlal Nehru – after his death in 1964. The scholarship was funded by the Nehru Me ...

in 1970 for his research in Indus script and the National Fellowship of the

Indian Council of Historical Research The Indian Council of Historical Research (ICHR) is a captive body of the Ministry of Education, Government of India established by an Administrative Order. The body has provided financial assistance to historians and scholars through fellowshi ...

in 1992 for his work on Tamil-Brahmi inscriptions. In 1998, he was elected the president of the Annual Congress of the Epigraphical Society of India and in 2001 he became the general president of the

Indian History Congress Indian History Congress is the largest professional and academic body of Indian historians with over 35,000 members. It was established in 1935. The name of any new applicant for membership needs to be proposed and seconded by existing Ordinary or L ...

. He received the

Padma Shri award Padma Shri ( IAST: ''padma śrī''), also spelled Padma Shree, is the fourth-highest civilian award of the Republic of India, after the Bharat Ratna, the Padma Vibhushan and the Padma Bhushan. Instituted on 2 January 1954, the award is conferr ...

from the Government of India in 2009 for arts. He was conferred the Tolkappiyar award for lifetime achievement in classical Tamil by the Government of India for the year 2009–2010. He was conferred the Campbell Medal by the Asiatic Society of Mumbai, formerly the Royal Asiatic Society, in November 2014. A bronze bust of Mahadevan was created by artist G. Chandrasekaran and placed at the

Roja Muthiah Research Library The Roja Muthiah Research Library (RMRL), in Chennai, India, was founded in 1994, and opened to researchers in 1996; it provides research materials for Tamil studies in a variety of fields of the humanities, social sciences, and sciences. The Li ...

Publications

* ''Corpus of Tamil-Brahmi inscriptions'' (1966) * ''The Indus Script: Texts, Concordance and Tables'' (1977) * ''Early Tamil Epigraphy : From the Earliest Times to the Sixth Century A.D.'' (

Harvard Oriental Series The ''Harvard Oriental Series'' is a book series founded in 1891 by Charles Rockwell Lanman and Henry Clarke Warren. Lanman served as its inaugural editor (1891-1934) for the first 37 volumes. Other editors of the series include Walter Eugene Clark ...

, 62) (2003) * ''Early Tamil Epigraphy : Tamil-Brahmi Inscriptions''. Revised and Enlarged Second Edition: Volume 1 (

Central Institute of Classical Tamil The Central Institute of Classical Tamil (CICT) is a body established by the Government of India with a view to promoting the cause of Classical Tamil. It is located in Chennai. History The CICT was formerly known as the Centre of Excellence ...

) (2014) * ''Akam and Puram : 'Address' Signs of the Indus Script'' (2010) * ''Dravidian Proof of the Indus Script via the Rig Veda: A Case Study'' (2014) *''Toponyms, Directions and Tribal Names in the Indus Script'' (

Archaeopress Archaeopress is an academic publisher specialising in archaeology, based in Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west ...

) (2017)

References

External links

Biography at harappa.com

The Hindu ''The Hindu'' is an Indian English-language daily newspaper owned by The Hindu Group, headquartered in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. It began as a weekly in 1878 and became a daily in 1889. It is one of the Indian newspapers of record and the secon ...

Magazine, Sunday, 4 February 2007.
An interviewAkam and Puram : ‘Address’ Signs of the Indus Script – presented at World Classical Tamil Conference, June 2010 – The Hindu
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mahadevan, Iravatham 1930 births 2018 deaths Dravidologists Indian epigraphers Indian Indologists Jawaharlal Nehru Fellows People from Thanjavur district Recipients of the Padma Shri in arts Scholars from Tamil Nadu Tamil scholars Recipients of the Thiruvalluvar Award