Colporul traces the unique history of the evolution of Tamil dictionaries and other reference works from the earliest times to the present. Gregory James treats lexicography in the wider context of reference science, from a sociolinguistic viewpoint. He relates the chronological development of Tamil dictionaries to their social, political and historical significance. So, for example, the missionary period is not treated as one homogeneous whole, but as a sequence of articulated developments, both on the Catholic and Protestant sides. The era of the British raj is discussed with the ramifications of the functional spread of Tamil in the numerous registers of a dynamic, modern language. A particular feature of the work is its extensive bibliography, and the detailed discussion of unpublished manuscripts of and about Tamil lexicography from over 70 libraries in 15 countries in Africa, America, Asia and Europe. Much of the source material is identified and catalogued here for the first time, and a number of Tamil dictionaries never before cited in the literature are discussed.

Colporul is the most comprehensive study of Tamil lexicography yet to be published in English.