QUILON, a seaport town on tho 3falabar coast, in lat. 8° 53' 28" N., long. 76° 36' 59* E. It is in tho Travancore State, and has been written Collam, Coulon, and Coilon, derived from the Tamil for a tank. Its population is about 15,000, and is occupied by a detachment of the Madras army. It has been known to western nations from very early times as a commercial town, and the Imperial Gazetteer hays it is mentioned as Coilon in letter of the Nestorian patriarch Joni Jabos of Adiabene, who died 4.1). 660. It appnara in Arabic AS early AA A.D. 851, under the name Kaulam-inall, when it was already frequented by ships from China ; and during the 13th and 14th centuries it continued to be the great port of trade with 31alabar, from China and from Arabia. It is the Coilinn of 3farco Polo, and the Columbum of several ecclesiastical writers of that age, one of whom, Friar Jordautts, was consecrated Bishop of Colutnbum about 1330. It was a great port for pepper, Brazil wood, and for ginger, the beat kind of which was known till late in the iniddle ages RS Columbine ginger. In the beginning of the 16th century, Varthetna speaks of it as a fine port, and Barbosa as la very great city,' and with many great merchants, Moors, and Gentooa, whose ships traded to all the eastern ports as far as Bengal, Pegu, and the Archipelago . . .
Throughout the middle ages it appears to have been one of the chief seats of the "Saint Thomas Christians," and formed with Kayal (Koilpatam, Koel church, Prttanam town), one of the seven churches ascribed by Indo-Syrian tradition to Saint Thomas himself ' (Col. Yule's 3farco Polo, p. 365, ed. 1874).
In 1503 the Portuguese established a factory and fort, captured by the Dutch 150 years later. Besides these changes, the town was at different times subject to Cochin, Cully Quilon, and Tra vancore. In 1741 Travancore unsuccessfully be sieged it, but the following year the Quilou raja submitted. The natives of the country begin their era from its foundation, in the same rnanner as the natives of Cochin begin theirs from the origin of the island of Vaipeen. In former clays there were a great many weaving-looms aud manufactures of cotton and stoneware here. Alexius Menezes, the first Archbishop of GOA built an excellent fortress here, which afterwards fell into ruins, being neglected by the Dutch.—CW. Heber Drury ; Gaz.