Said to have been lost with an ancient Tamil civilization, Kumari Kandam (Tamil: குமரிக்கண்டம்; romanized: Kumarikkaṇṭam) is a mythical continent that is supposedly situated in the Indian Ocean south of modern-day India. Other names and spellings are Kumari Nadu and Kumarikkandam.
In order to explain the geological and other similarities between Africa, Australia, the Indian subcontinent, and Madagascar, some scholars from Europe and America conjectured in the 19th century that a submerged continent known as Lemuria might exist. This theory was modified by a group of Tamil revivalists who linked it to Pandyan legends found in ancient Tamil and Sanskrit literature, which tell of lands lost to the sea. These authors claim that Lemuria was home to an ancient Tamil civilization before it was destroyed by a natural disaster and lost to the sea.
Tamil authors began referring to this submerged continent as Kumari Kandam in the 20th century. Even though the continental drift (plate tectonics) theory eventually rendered the Lemuria theory obsolete, Tamil revivalists of the 20th century continued to find value in the idea. As stated.
Since Kumari Kandam is a mythical continent[1], attempts to incorporate this myth into Tamil history have faced criticism, dating back to the late 1800s.[56] M Seshagiri Sastri (1897) was among the first to criticize, calling the claims made for ante-diluvial sangams "a mere fiction originated by the prolific imagination of Tamil poets."[57] Soon after its release, Suryanarayana Sastri's Tamilmoliyin Varalaru (1903) was the subject of a critical review by CH Monahan, who charged the author of "abandoning scientific research for mythology".[58] Similar emphasis was placed in 1932 by K. N. Sivaraja Pillai on the necessity of closely examining the historical veracity of Sangam works and their commentaries.[59]
The Kumari Kandam theory was referred to as "all bosh" by K. A. Nilakanta Sastri in 1956, who said that geological theories concerning events occurring millions of
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