points, which were usually the temple’s
tallest structures by far. The enclosed
area inside the temple complex was
often enormous, as in the estimated 500
acres at the temple of Shrirangam, but
most of the construction was only a single
story. (There would be taller towers over
the temple’s primary images, however.)
In the developed examples of the
Dravida style, this lessened emphasis on
soaring height was compensated by its
enormous horizontal spread. The best
examples of this later type are the
Ranganathaswamy temple in Shrirangam,
and the Minakshitemple in Madurai.
Dravida
(2) Brahmin (priestly) group that is one
of the five southern brahmin communi-
ties (Pancha Dravida). As their name
would indicate, the core region for the
Dravida brahmins is in deep southern
India, in the modern states of Tamil
Naduand Kerala. The most illustrious of
the Dravida subcommunities are the
Nambudiris, among whom the great
philosopher Shankaracharyais believed
to have been born.
Dravidian
In the strictest linguistic sense, the word
Dravidian is the name for a particular
family of languages in which the primary
members are the four southern Indian
languages: Tamil, Telegu, Kannada, and
Malayalam. Aside from these four lan-
guages, all located in the southernmost
part of the subcontinent, another lan-
guage in the Dravidian family is Brahui.
This is spoken by a small and fairly iso-
lated population in modern Pakistan, far
from any other Dravidian language
speakers, and completely surrounded
by people speaking Indo-Aryan lan-
guages. One theory to explain this irreg-
ularity is that the Dravidian languages
were originally spoken all over the sub-
continent, but were gradually displaced
toward the south as Indo-Aryan lan-
guage speakers—better known as the
Aryans—came into India. According to
this theory, the Brahui-speaking com-
munity is an isolated remnant of that
earlier time, which somehow managed
to remain intact.
This notion also affects how south-
ern Indians form their identities. The
word Dravidiancan be used to denote a
southern Indian or any person whose
mother tongue is one of the four primary
Dravidian languages. For southern
Indians with a strong regional identity, it
is a way for them to distinguish them-
selves from northern Indians and the
“imperialism” of northern Indian cul-
ture. It is also used with an underlying
tone of pride, that as Dravidians they are
descendants of the subcontinent’s origi-
nal inhabitants.Dreams
As symbol and reality, dreams have
multiple uses in Hindu thought.
Philosophically, dreams are often used
as examples to illustrate the illusory
nature of the world as it is perceived.
Just as a dream disappears when oneDreamsBuilt in the Dravida architectural style, the
Minakshi Temple contains enormous gopurams,
the gateways to the temple grounds.