Palayur Kodungallur Niranam Parur Quilon Nilakkal
KODUNGALLUR PALAYUR __Prof. George Menachery
The impressive facade and the granite obelisk rock-cross at OLLUR Thrissur Trichur City Kerala India
Released by H. Em. Joachim Cardinal Meisner on January 10, 2001 at Kodungallur
FOREWORD
By Prof. George Menachery
Kodungallur, known as Musiris in the whole ancient world, and where St. Thomas the Apostle first landed in our India, was till the 15th century the "Rome" of India both as the centre of the Indian Church and as its gateway to world-trade through its famous harbour at the mouth of the river Periyar.
Hence it was most appropriate to choose Azhikode-Kodungallur for the Mar Thoma Pontifical Shrine to deposit the relic of the right arm of Apostle Thomas brought by Cardinal Tisserant in the year 1953.
Although we do not claim to have presented all that could be said about Kodungallur or the Apostle’s visit to Kodungallur here in this brief study prepared at short notice, we hope that some of the new threads of thought traced therein could be the starting point for fresh studies on the Apostle and his mission to India and to Kerala. Our attempts to draw the attention of the reader to the vast body of resources on the topics dealt with we hope will be of special use in promoting research into the glorious past of the land and the people here and into the captivating story of the Church in India. Of especial use might be the many references to local sources from the fields of archaeology, anthropology, numismatics, customs, traditions, folklore, place-name studies, geography, trade and commerce, art and architecture, literatures...In this connection we are glad to inform our readers that many of the classical source books mentioned are now available in a reprinted form in such works as the Indian Church History Classics (The Nazranies), The Thomapedia, and various other such publications.
May Thomas and his Master guide and protect our Church and Country.
Ollur, Thrissur City
Christmas 2000
C O N T E N T S
Chapter I
Cranganore : Past and Present
The Glory that was Cranganore
Kodungallur Today
Ancient Primacy of Cranganore
Agreement of 20th Century Historians
Ancient Indian, Greek, and Roman Authors
Pepper : Yavana Priya
Roman Coins
Notes
Chapter II
ST. THOMAS AND CRANGANORE
Special Problems of Indian History
The "Thomas Question" in the course of centuries
APOSTLE THOMAS IN INDIA : Early Testimonies
Kodungallur as the See of St. Thomas
Notes
Chapter III
CHRISTIAN HISTORY OF KODUNGALLUR
The Secular Story
The Early Church of Kodungallur
Metropolitan of All-India
Mediaeval Church of Kodungallur
Pattern of Society in Mediaeval Kodungallur
Encounter with the Christian West
Century of Transition
Eclipse and the Dawn
Notes
Chapter IV
IMMORTAL BONES
Veneration of the Tomb in India
Translation of the Relics to Edessa
From Edessa to Chios
At Ortona
Mylapore Tomb down the Centuries
"Second Landing" of Thomas at Kodungallur
Chapter V
THE CRADLE OF CHRISTIANITY IN INDIA
An Afterword
Kodungallur : Mission Headquarters
Kodungallur : Mission Successful
The Seventy-two Privileges
Incidents at Kodungallur
The Cap - Bearer
The Royal Couple
Spread of christianity in kerala
Coastal Expansion
Geographical Dispersion
Common roots of christianity in india
Notes
CHAPTER 1
CRANGANORE: PAST AND PRESENT
THE GLORY THAT WAS CRANGANORE
K.P. Padmanabha Menon, writing at the dawn of this century, laments:
The present condition of Cranganore is, indeed, deplorable. Having continued to be prosperous and important almost from pre-historic times till the middle of the 14th century, it has since fallen into complete ruin and decay.
Cranganore was already on the decline when the Portuguese arrived in India. "Years ago," says the Revd. Richard Collins, "by one of those strange vicissitudes which so often mark the progress of time, Cranganore was shorn of her glory. It was no Nebuchadnezzar, no Alexander, no Titus, that blotted out her name from history, and ‘laid her stones and her timbers and her dust in the midst of the waters;’ and made her ‘a place to spread nets upon’ - a mere village, as she is now, of a few fishermen’s huts. She fell a prey to the geological instability of the coast, before referred to. Like so many things of the earth, the very foundation on which she was built was insecure; the entrance to her harbour became choked up; the remorseless monsoon washed away her bulwarks, and, losing her trade, she lost also her inhabitants".
The opening of the Cochin outlet for the discharge of the monsoon flood of waters into the sea and the consequent choking up of the Cranganore outlet led to the forming of the present beautiful harbour of Cochin. That tolled the deathknell of the commercial prosperity of Cranganore. Deprived of its natural harbour, it gradually dwindled into insignificance. Its trade fled northwards to Calicut and southwards to the new harbour of Cochin, and with its trade its prosperity also. The subsequent efforts of the Portuguese to revive Cranganore were of no avail, and it now remains only a name in history.
Pliny described Cranganore as primum emporium Indiae. Well did it deserve that proud distinction. Situated on the coast, eighteen miles to the north of Cochin, at a place where the great rivers that form the only means of comunication with the interior debouched into the sea, it attained an unrivalled prosperity from very early times.
It was through this port that the Hindus received from the Phoenicians their art of writing; it must have been from this port that the shipmen of Solomon of Israel, ‘that knew the sea’, obtained their valuable cargoes of gold, ivory, sandalwood, etc.
It was to this port that the Greek merchant and mariner Hippalos, that Columbus of ancient times, in his voyage for the discovery of a sea-route to India, was carried by the western monsoons.
It was here, according to common tradition, that the Apostle St. Thomas landed first, planted the Cross and preached Christianity in the opening years of the first century of the Christian Era (52 A.D).
It was here, not long after, that the Jews arrived after the destruction of the second temple and the final desolation of Jerusalem (A.D. 69) and founded a colony.
It was at this port, that the Romans had, according to one version of the Peutinger Tables, set up a temple of Augustus and stationed a garrison to protect their trade.
It was here that Thomas Cana landed from Syria, when he brought with him a fresh colony of Syrian Christians.
It was here that the early Chera Kings had their seat, and the Chera king Chenkudduvan held his prosperous court, and ruled over the Chera Empire in the first century of the Christian era.
St. Thomas stamp brought out by the Government of India in connection with the Bombay International Eucharistic Congress and the visit of Pope Paul VI to India in 1964.
Government of India's St. Thomas 19th death centenary stamp released on 3rd July 1973.
It was here that the great Cheraman Perumal, Bhaskara Ravi Varma, lived and ruled over Kerala prosperously for thrice the period of his allotted term. It was here that he was visited by certain Muhammadan pilgrims, who, according to tradition, succeeded in inducing the Perumal to turn Muhammadan and undertake the Haj; it was here that the Perumal, on the eve of his renunciation of religion and empire and embarkation for Mecca, is reputed to have distributed Malabar among the many princes who own it even now; it was here that his emissaries from Mecca founded a Muhammadan colony and built the first mosque in Malabar.
The Portuguese, the first European nation to arrive and to found an empire in India, had seriously thought of making Cranganore their seat of Government, but preferred Cochin, as that place offered, since the formation of the harbour there in the year 1341, a better site. Nevertheless, the Portuguese fortified Cranganore and made it the seat of the first Roman Catholic Arch-bishopric in India. The Dutch ousted the Portuguese, and were of opinion that Cranganore was the key of Malabar. Verily it proved to be too, when Hyder and Tippu led the Mysorean hordes to the west coast. The purchase by Travancore of the fort of Cranganore and its destruction by Tippu led to the third Mysorean war, at the close of which Malabar passed into the possession of the English, who had, as early as 1616, established a factory there, and entered into a treaty with the Zamorin, perhaps the very first treaty between the English and an Indian sovereign.
At present, the site of the fort is a wilderness which is being gradually cleared and brought under cultivation. Where once the noble Cathedral walls resounded to the sonorous prayers chanted by the Roman Catholic priests, the jackals now keep up a chorus of monotonous howling. The old fort is no more. It is in utter ruins. Even its very site is soon changing its configuration. Its old moat is a haunt of crocodiles and paddy birds. The solitary tower that had for years withstood the corroding influence of the dashing waves has at last succumbed and fallen into the backwater.
"The solitary stranger", says Day, "perhaps disturbs a snake in his path or an owl in the dense overhanging trees, but rarely a mortal will meet his eye." What strange tales would history unfold if only the gift of speech were allowed to the stones and pebbles that lie embedded in the bosom of the river that flows by the once famous fort of Cranganore! (History of Kerala , I)
AT THE CROSSROADS OF THE WORLD
The city of Kodungallur, known variously by Muziris, Shinkli, Cranganore and by many another name1 down the centuries, stood at the meeting-place of different trade routes connecting the East with the West and the North with the South. These trade - routes, which carried the bulk of the traffic passing by sea between India and foreign parts, played an all important part in the history of Cranganore, for it must have been mainly to them that the city owed its initial existence as well as its subsequent prosperity and greatness, and it was due to their diversion or decline, when trade contacts with foreign countries were interrupted, that Cranganore sank eventually into insignificance. 2
Oceanic Trade Routes to the West, North and the East
While the monsoon route connected Muziris (Cranganore) directly across the Arabian Sea with cities in the west (e.g. Alexandria, Aden) the West Coastal route gave its ships ready access to the Indus (leading to Taxila) and Ctesiphon by land and beyond to Ormuz and Mesopotamia. a third route, hugging the coast of East Asia linked the Imperial Capital of the Cheras with the Mouth of the Ganges and with China. 3
Backwaters/Lagoons
A chain of backwaters/lagoons running parallel to the sea receive the drainage of the rivers flowing down from the hills and meet the sea at Cranganore and nearby Chettuvai. These backwaters with their subsidiary canals stretch to Trivandrum, almost at the Southern end of Kerala, and to Ponnani in the the North and have numerous branches leading towards the interior. Almost throughout their length they are navigable for all sizes of country boats throughout the year.4 They are affected by flood tides twice in every 24 hours, except during the monsoon months, when the frequency is according to the volume of the freshes. 5 The accessibility of Cranganore, by sea and by the backwaters, made it the foremost trading station of Kerala and India both for internal and foreign commerce. 6
KODUNGALLUR TODAY
Kodungallur was in the administrative Taluk of Kodungallur in the Trichur District of the erstwhile Cochin State. The Trichur District of Kerala which is identical with the central region of Kerala is rich in history and cultural tradition. Of all the administrative divisions of Kerala State this district holds out the greatest fascination to the student of ancient history, archaeology and culture.
After the birth of the new Kerala State of the Indian Union on November 1, 1956 a number of changes have been effected in the administrative division of the District and Revenue Division of Trichur making comparison of demographic growth/decline figures somewhat complicated. At present Kodungallur Taluk consists of 9 villages with Kodungallur as headquarters. 7
This coastal town, situated 40 Kms. to South-West of Trichur lies in 10o 100 North latitude and 76o 10o East longitude. 8 According to the census of 1931 (Cochin State) Christians were 6% of the population in the Taluk compared with 29% in the Trichur Taluk, 32% in the Mukundapuram Taluk and 40% in the Cochin - Kanayannur Taluk.
The Marthoma Political Shrine, Azhikode is 46 kms, from Thrissur 45 kms, From Ernakulam and 6 kms, From Kodungallur. The nearest big town is Irinjalakuda some 16 Kms. away. Cochin is at a distance of 25 Km. by road after crossing a ferry(1984).
Azhicode
Azicode is the present harbour area near Kodungallur at the mouth of the river, which recalls the ancient Muziris harbour. This was what prompted the Shrine to receive the Relics of St. Thomas to be built in Azhikode. The area of Azhicode Village in 1971 was 18.27 Km2 with a population of 12580.
Temples and Mosques
Kodungallur is famous for its ancient temples which are among the worthy specimens of the Kerala style of architecture. One of the earliest is the Siva Temple at Tiruvanchikulam in Crangano
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Thomapedia Christian Encyclopaedia
Indian Christianity India Books Reference Research
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