Thus the Dravidian people of Southern India were of Scythic origin, and they spoke a language from which the four modern ones of the Madras Presidency, Tamil, Telugu, Canarese, and Malayalam,[438] are derived. These are all grouped as Dravidian languages, and their source is no longer a matter of doubt. It was formerly supposed that they were Aryan, from the great number of apparently Indo-Germanic roots; but it is now known, from the structure of their grammar, that they belong to the great Turanian or Scythic group of tongues. Mr. Caldwell considers that the Scythian family to which they are most closely allied is the Finnish or Ugrian;[439] and in this view Professor Max Müller concurs with him.[440] The ancient Dravidian religion, before the people were converted to the belief taught in the Puranas, also favours Mr. Caldwell's view. If we may judge from the creed which still lingers in Tinnevelly and other districts, it consisted in the worship of evil spirits by means of bloody sacrifices and frantic dances, while a Supreme Being was acknowledged but not venerated, and there was no trace of worship of the elements. In these respects it closely resembled the Shamanism of the Scythic races of High Asia. It is tolerably certain that the Dravidian races had attained to some degree of civilization before the Aryans appeared in their country, and, with a system of castes, introduced the worship of Vishnu and Siva. One evidence of the ancient civilization of the Dravidians is that they possessed a system of numerals up to 1000, essentially the same in all the four languages; though in counting above 1000 they make use of Sanscrit numerals. From the existence of these native numerals among the Dravidian nations, Mr. Crawford draws the inference that these people must have attained a considerable measure of civilization before they adopted the Hinduism of the north, and hence stood in no need of foreign numerals.[441] From the time of Rama, who appears to have been assisted in his invasion of Lanka (Ceylon) by a Dravidian chief, now deified as the monkey God Hanuman, the influence of Hinduism rapidly increased, and caste prejudices spread over Southern India. But the annals are far too obscure, and too deeply buried under extravagant fable, to enable us to form any idea of the time and manner of the complete inoculation of the Dravidian races with Brahminical legends, caste observances, and Hindu religious ideas. It is clear, however, that "to the early Brahminical colonists the Dravidians are indebted for the higher arts of life, and the first elements of literary culture."[442]