Quilon Syrian copper plates

The Kollam (Quilon) Syrian copper plates, also known as the Kollam Tarisappalli copper plates, or Kottayam inscription of Sthanu Ravi, or Tabula Quilonensis (c. 849 CE) are a copper plate grant issued by Ayyan Adikal, the chieftain of Kollam, conferring privileges upon a Syrian Christian merchant named Maruvan Sapir Iso, in the name of the Tarissapalli in Kollam, southern India. The inscription — notably incomplete — is engraved on five copper plates (four horizontal and on vertical) in Tamil, using the Vattezhuthu script with necessary Grantha characters. It is considered the oldest available inscription from the Chera Perumal dynasty.

The charter is dated to the fifth regnal year of medieval Chera ruler Sthanu Ravi Kulasekhara (849/850 CE). Until 2013, it was believed that the five plates represented two separate grants (dated separately), issued at different times, to Syrian Christian merchants on the Malabar Coast. A second inscription mentioning another "Tarisappalli" was discovered in Periyapattinam in 2022 (Periyapattinam Inscription). The fifth plate contains signatures of witnesses to the grant in Arabic (Kufic script), Middle Persian (cursive Pahlavi script), and Judeo-Persian (standard square Hebrew script), possibly indicating the presence of Jewish and Muslim communities in Kerala. The record also contains few characters in some undeciphered script/language(s).

One part of the copper plates (four plates) is preserved at the Devalokam Aramana of the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church, while the other two smaller plates are kept at the Poolatheen Aramana in Thiruvalla, belonging to the Malankara Mar Thoma Syrian Church.