Sangam Literature

One of the major change revealed mostly by archaeology was the transition from the proto-historical to the historical over a large part of India .For example in the south the early megalithic culture representing a tribal age was succeed by the early historical culture which accommodates the elements of culture from the north India. The process of this transition is of course not preserved in any literary document, but even so various details of early historical culture in the three southern kingdoms Chola, Pandya and Chera –may be bought out from the Sangam literature. Variously dated possibly incorporating both pre-Christian and post-Christian materials- the Sangam anthropologies represent a culture which had transcended the tribal stage

It was only later, that is, from the late ancient and early medieval period, that they started evolving a new angular script, called the Grantha script. The modern Tamil alphabet is derived from this angular script. Some of the contents of the Sangam literature are corroborated by the writings of some Greek and Roman classical writers of the first and second centuries AD (Ptolemy, Pling the Elder, Strabo and the anonymous author of the Periplus), leading us to fix the period of sangam age roughly between third century BC to third century AD. So most of the Sangam literature also must have been produced during this period, though it was finally complied in the form as it is found to today during the fourth and fifth centuries

Economic development

The material culture of the period spanning from 200 BC and 300 AD shows remarkable development of agriculture and irrigation, diversification of crafts and spectacular growth of trade and increasing use of coins .These five hundred years are especially noted for the proliferation of urban centres in virtually over the entire subcontinent. The second urbanization reached its peak during this phase. The spread of the state society and urban development seem to have taken place simultaneously and in an interrelated manner.

The early foreign invasions

Among the external powers reaching the subcontinent through its north-western borderlands, the Bacterian Greek rulers- originally subservient to the Seleucid house in west Asia –were the earliest to invade India, coinciding almost with the eclipse of the Mauryan Empire in 187