1856 R. Caldwell Compar. Gram. Dravidian Lang. Introd. 86 It is the concurrent voice of various traditions that Tiruvaḷḷuvar lived before the dissolution of the Madura Sangam; i.e., the college of literati, or board of literary examiners, at Madura.

1897 M. S. Sastri Ess. Tamil Lit. i. 40 We should therefore think that the Saṅgams contained only poets who eulogized their patrons by their poetical compositions and were supported by them, and that they were not like the Sanskrit colleges of the northern countries.

1955 K. A. N. Sastri Hist. S. India xiv. 348 The literature of the Śangam Age, the oldest body of works now known in the Tamil language.

1966 N. Subrahmanian Śaṅgam Polity i. 3 The Tamil Śaṅgam was a body of Tamil scholars or poets, a literary academy, which was established by the Pāṇḍyan kings; and it flourished at Madurai.

1975 K. Kripalani in A. L. Basham Cultural Hist. India xxi. 303 The extant Sangam poetry..was written in the second and third centuries A.D., if not earlier.

1984 UNESCO Courier Mar. 5 Some of the kings of these dynasties are mentioned in Sangam literature..and the age between the 3rd century BC and the 2nd century AD is called the Sangam Age.

1857 Lady Falkland Chow-chow I. xiii. 265 On reaching the Sungum..the landscape from the bridge is perfectly enchanting. Sungum means junction of rivers. Here the Moota and Moola join their waters.

1968 New Yorker 1 June 39/3 Among the four Khumba melas, the one at Prayaga is preëminent, because it takes place by the sangam..—the spot where the right bank of the Ganga meets the left bank of the Yamuna.

1973 Sunday Standard (New Delhi) 7 Jan. 9/3 The holy Sangam—confluence of the Ganga, Yamuna and invisible Saraswati at Allahabad.

1989 Adventurers Sept. 37/3 Through the mist waves of Naga Babas..run joyously down to the sangam—the point where the Ganges and the Jumna join the mythical Sarasvati River.