KOLLAR is the plural of Kullan. The pro minent Kollar or Colleri tribe are in the Tondi man country, in the Vasanga district, din the eighteen palliams or districts, and throughout the Madura district. Until the 19th century \ they were so predatory that in the south of \the Peninsula of India, Colleri became the ordinM7 designation of a thief, and their name is really derived from Kallara, thieves, plunderers. In ancient times they seem to have inhabited the woods from Trichinopoly to Cape Comorin.
Orme, writing of them, describes them in the middle of the 18th century as expert thieves and plunderers, and the Jesuit Father Martin says they were very cruel. Pennant, writing of them in the 18th century, says the adjacent countries are covered with thick forests and little cultivated by reason of the savage inhabitants, the Polygar and Collerie, who may be truly styled sylvestres homines ; they are predatory, and in their govern ment, as also that of the Polygars, feudal. They are 30,000 or 40,000 in number. Their country is billy. In the British wars against the French in the times of Clive and Dupleix, both the Kollar and Maravar became well known by their adhesion to the British or French standards, and for the fidelity and devotion to the cause of the party which they espoused. The chief Kollar districts
were the Tondaman country, Nattam, and Mylore ; the last two are in the Madura district. They have a first and second marriage, like the Maravar of Ramnad. The titular surname of all Kollar is Ambalakaren. Calicoil was the stronghold of the lord paramount, the raja of Tondamandalam, the country of the Tondaman, which was an ancient division of the Peninsula of India, of the part now occupied by the Arcot and Chingleput collectorates. 11.H. the raja Tondaman of Pudu cottah is now a petty chief, and his country is a small tract near Trichinopoly. It was an ancient custom in Tinnevelly when a stranger wanted a guide, to appoint a Kullan girl as his guardian, and if any of her caste did her charge violence, she tore her ears, and when the criminals were caught, the same was done to their ears.— Pennant's Hindustan, ii. p. 11 ; Orme's Hindustan ; Nilson.