mper of the natives
who were relatively little moved by the winds of religion which blew
strong on the mainland, bearing with them now Jainism, now the worship
of Vishnu or Siva.

In the Tamil country Buddhism of an Asokan type appears to have been
prevalent about the time of our era. The poem Manimegalei, which by
general consent was composed in an early century A.D., is Buddhist but
shows no leanings to Mahayanism. It speaks of Sivaism and many
other systems[118] as flourishing, but contains no hint that Buddhism
was persecuted. But persecution or at least very unfavourable
conditions set in. Since at the time of Hsuan Chuang's visit Buddhism
was in an advanced stage of decadence, it seems probable that the
triumph of Sivaism began in the third or fourth century and that
Buddhism offered slight resistance, Jainism being the only serious
competitor for the first place. But for a long while, perhaps even
until the sixteenth century, monasteries were kept up in special
centres, and one of these is of peculiar importance, namely Kancipuram
or Conjeveram.[119] Hsuan Chuang found there 100 monasteries with more
than 10,000 brethren, all Sthaviras, and mentions that it was the
birthplace of Dharmapala.[120] We have some further information from
the Talaing chronicles[121] which suggests the interesting hypothesis
that the Buddhism of Burma was introduced or refreshed by missionaries
from southern India. They give a list of teachers who flourished in
that country, including Kaccayana and the philosopher Anuruddha.[122]
Of Dharmapala they say that he lived at the monastery of Bhadratittha
near Kancipura and wrote fourteen commentaries in Pali.[123] One was
on the Visuddhi-magga of Buddhaghosa and it is probable that he lived
shortly after that great writer and like him studied in Ceylon.

I shall recur to this question of south Indian Buddhism in treating
of Burma, but the data now available are very meagre.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 10: _E.g._ Burma in the reign of Anawrata and later in the
time of Chapata about 1200, and Siam in the time of Suryavamsa
Rama, 1361. On the other hand in 1752 the Sinhalese succession was
validated by obtaining monks from Burma.]

[Footnote 11: Geiger, _Literatur und Sprache der Singhalesen_, p. 91.]

[Footnote 12: Compare the history of Khotan. The first Indian
colonists seem to have introduced a Prakrit dialect. Buddhism and
Sanskrit came afterwards.]

[Footnote 13: Literally demons, that