Texts

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This is a fragmentary inscription of Aparā[jitavarman] dated in his 3rd year. It seems to register a remission of taxes by the assembly of Nallil[maṅgalam], which is also mentioned in a record of [Rāja]kēsarivarman from the same village (No. 61 of 1923). Nallilmaṅgalam is probably identical with the modern Puduppākkam itself.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0084.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This is a mutilted incription, also dated in the 3rd year of Vijaya-Aparājitavarman. It registers a gift of gold for a lamp and offerings to the god Tiruveḷḷikīḻ-Mahādēva at Māṅgāḍu by the mother of•• kka-Mahādēviyār, who was related to . . . piḍugu Taḷittēvanār of Kachchippēḍu.

The puḷḷi is invariably marked in this record.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0085.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This inscription, dated in the 4th year of Aparājitavarman, registers a gift of the village Tuṟaiyūr including its income in gold and puravu for conducting worship in the temple of Mahādēva at Tirumataṅgaṉpaḷḷi¹ in Tekkūr-nāḍu, a subdivision of Paiyyūr-Iḷaṅkōṭṭam, by Kumārandai Kuṟumbarādittan² alias Kāḍupaṭṭippēraraiyaṉ who is stated to have belonged to Śēra-nāḍu.

The term puravu³ may be explained as a tax on land, which was collected either in kind or coin (cf. puravu-poṉ: S.I.I. Vol. II, p. 512). A special department called puravuvari-tiṇaikkaḷam seems to have managed its collection. Tuṟaiyūr which is said to have been situated in Tekkūr-nāḍu may be identified with the village of the same name in the Madurantakam taluk of the Chingleput district.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0086.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This record of Vijaya-Aparājitavarman, dated in his 4th year, registers an agreement made by the sabhā and the amṛita-gaṇa of Ādambākkam, a suburb of Tiruvoṟṟiyūr to burn a perpetual lamp in the temple of Mahādēva at Tiruvoṟṟiyūr in lieu of the interest on 30 kaḻañju of gold received by them from Amatti alias Kuṟumbakōḷali, the mistress of Vayiramēgaṉ alias Vāṇakōvarayar, who is referred to as the son of a certain Perunaṅgai. The influence of Vāṇakōvarayar who was probably a local chieftain, seems to have extended as far as Maṇampūṇḍi in the South Arcot district (A.R. No. 233 of 1934-35).

The interest on 30 kaḻañju was calculated at 3 mañjāḍi per kaḻañju (i.e. at 15 per cent).

The puḷḷis are invariably marked in the record.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0087.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This is also dated in the 4th year of Vijaya-Aparājitavarman and it registers a similar agreement made by the sabhā and the amṛita-gaṇa of Ādambākkam to maintain a perpetual lamp in the same temple for the interest on 30 kaḻañju of gold received by them from Śappakkaṉ alias Pātradāni, the mistress of Vayiramēgaṉ alias Vāṇakōvaraiyar, son of Sāmi-Akkaṉ. As Vāṇakōvaraiyar is called the son of Perunaṅgai in the previous inscription, it is possible that the latter and Śāmi-Akkaṉ were identical. From the way in which this lady is introduced in the record, it is surmised that she should have been a mistress of the king (Ep. Rep. for 1913, p. 90.)

The term amṛita-gaṇa is mentioned only in the inscriptions of Aparājita at Tiruvoṟṟiyūr. It represents a committee which was probably connected with the āḷumgaṇattār who were the direct managing members of a village, and distinct from the general members of the village assembly.¹ [It was perhaps mainly connected with the management of the offerings and lamps of the god-Ed].

The puḷḷis are marked in this record also (See Plate VI).

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0088.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This inscription is dated in the 5th year of Aparājitavarman. It registers a gift of 100 sheep for burning a perpetual lamp in the temple of Mādēva (i. e., Mahādēva) at Tirumataṅgaṉpaḷḷi by Pōṟṟinaṅgai, wife of Kumārandai Kuṟumbarādittan alias Kāḍupaṭṭippēraraiyaṉ mentioned in No. 86 above. The liquid measure Viḍēlviḍugu mentioned in the inscription was probably named after the surname either of Nandivarman III or Nṛipatuṅgavarman.¹

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0089.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: On this slab of stone, three records are engraved one in continuation of another in the same hand. The name of the king in the first record is damaged, the second is dated in the 7th year of Kampavarman¹ while the third belongs to the 6th year of Aparājita. They appear, therefore, to have been engraved on the slab in the same time; but what necessitated the procedure is not clear. The last record registers an agreement made in the 6th year of Vijaya-Aparājitavikrama-Pōttaraiyar, by the assembly of Maṇali, hamlet of Tiruvoṟṟiyūr, to burn two perpetual lamps before the god Mahādēva at Tiruvoṟṟiyūr, in lieu of the interest on 60 kaḻañju of gold received by them from the community of Māhēśvaras.

The endowed amount was invested with the assembly as fixed deposit bearing interest at the usual rate of 3 mañjāḍi per kaḻañju. The assembly promised also to give two meals daily to the person who came to collect the interest and if they failed in their duty, they agreed to pay a fine of 8 1/2 kāṇam per day to the court of justice.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0090.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This is a document similar to the above, dated in the 7th year of Vijaya-Aparājitavarman. It registers the agreement made by the sabhā and the amṛita-gaṇa of Ādambākkam to burn a perpetual lamp in the same temple for the interest on 30 kaḻañju of gold received by them from Mādēvi-Aḍigaḷ, queen of Aparājita.

The puḷḷis are marked in this inscription.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0091.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This inscription records an endowment of 60 kaḻañju of gold, made in the 8th year of Vijaya-Aparājitavarma-Pōttaraiyar, by Paiytāṅgi Kaṇḍaṉ, chief of Kāṭṭūr in Vaḍakarai Iṉṉambar-nāḍu, a subdivision of Śōḻa-nāḍu, for providing on the day of his natal star Svātī, offerings to the deity and for burning a perpetual lamp in the temple of Mahādēva at Tiruvoṟṟiyūr. The money was deposited with the Karmakkīḻvar of Tiruvoṟṟiyūr and the offerings included rice, ghee, plantains, sugar, vegetables, arecanuts, betel-leaves, tender cocoanuts, pañchagavya, sandal paste and camphor.

Languages: Sanskrit, Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0092.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This is a verse inscription of Aparājitavikramavarman dated in his 12th year. It refers to a gift of land, after purchase from a resident of Igaṇaimūdūr, for offerings, perfume, incense and for a perpetual lamp to the god Chōḷamālyīśvara at Oṟṟimudūr (i.e.,) Tiruvoṟṟiyūr. The name Oṟṟiyūr with its Sanskrit equivalent Ādhipurī meaning a ‘mortgaged city’ is explained by a local tradition of the place.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0093.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This inscription in Tamil verse composed by a king, whose name is, however, not revealed, states that the temple at Tiruttaṇiyal was constructed of black granite by Nambi Appi. This person figures as donor in the next inscription belonging to Aparājita. The composer of the present record may, therefore, be taken as Aparājita himself. The structure of the Vīraṭṭānēśvara temple where the present inscription is found, therefore, affords a definite landmark for studying the evolution of Pallava temple architecture.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0094.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This inscription refers to a remission of taxes made by the assembly of Tiruttaṇiyal in the 18th year of Vijaya-Aparājitavikramavarman, on 1000 kuḻi of land situated to the north of the temple, purchased by Nambi Appi from the cultivators of the village and given over to the dharmigaḷ of the village for providing offerings to and burning two twilight lamps in the temple of Tiruvīraṭṭānattudēva in the same village. The donor is evidently identical with the builder of the temple mentioned in the above inscription.

The dharmigaḷ were perhaps a body that managed the charitable endowments and trust property in the village.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0095.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This record of Tribhuvanachakravartin Tribhuvanavīradēva (i. e. Kulōttuṅgachōḷa III), dated in his 37th year (corresponding to A.D. 1215, June 7, Sunday), is included here because it notices an inscription of Aparājita engraved on the walls of the temple of Tiruppulivaṉam-Uḍaiyār. A copy of this record is also found at Uttaramallūr (A.R. No. 67 of 1898). The assembly of Uttaramēlūr alias Rājēndraśōḻa-chaturvēdimaṅgalam, an independent village in Kāliyūr-kōṭṭam, a subdivision of Jayaṅgoṇḍaśōḻa-maṇḍalam, agreed to maintain before the god Tiruppulivaṉamuḍaiya-Nāyaṉār, all the perpetual lamps for which inscriptions were found in the temple. One such record belongs to Aparājitavikramavarman dated in the 14th year and it gives Rājamāttāṇḍaṉ as the surname of Aparājita. This epigraph states that on the day of solar eclipse, the king made a gift of 100 kaḻañju of gold for burning four lamps in the temple. The solar eclipse cited in the record is, however, not helpful in fixing the initial date of Aparājita.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0096.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: The subjoined inscription, engraved in Pallava-Grantha characters, states that this rock-cut Śiva temple called Śrī-Śikhari-Pallavēśvaram was caused to be made at Siṅhapura by king Chandrāditya. This is the only record hitherto found for the king (See Plate V). This rock-cut temple contains no sculptures or ornamentation of any kind and it may be said to correspond to ‘the Mahēndra Style’ of architecture. The palaeography of the present record also suggests that the king who bore this title or name probably flourished in the time of Mahēndravarman or Narasiṁhavarman I at the latest. As, however, this title does not occur among the numerous birudas found for these in any rock-cut shrine, we have to conclude that Chandrāditya was a Pallava prince of this time, about whom we have at present no information.

Siṅhapura is identical with Śiṅgavaram which is the name of a village close by. The present name of Mēlaichchēri must have been given later to this hamlet with reference to the principal village Śiṅgavaram.

Language: Sanskrit.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0115.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: In the third year of Jaṭāvarman Sundara-Chōḷa-Pāṇḍya in which this inscription is dated, a certain Veḷḷāḷa of Peruṅgulam alias Uttamaśōḻanallūr in Tiruvaḻudi-vaḷa nāḍu made a gift of sheep for burning a lamp in front of the goddess Durgaiyār in the temple of Tiruvaḻudīśvaram.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv14p1i0131.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This record dated in the 4th year of the reign of Jaṭāvarman Sundara-Chōḷa-Pāṇḍya states that the assembly having met in a hall of the ambalam, made some decision about the lands and houses granted to the gardeners, drummers, potters, garlandmakers, torch-bearers and dēvaraḍiyār of the temple of Śrī-Rājēndraśōḻa-viṇṇagar-Āḻvār at Rājarāja-chaturvēdimaṅgalam, a brahmadēya in Muḷḷi-nāḍu, a subdivision of Muḍigoṇḍaśōḻa-vaḷanāḍu, a district of Rājarāja-Pāṇḍināḍu. The record is incomplete and so the full details of the transaction are not available.

As stated in another inscription,¹ from the same temple, the temple of Rājēndraśōḻa-viṇṇagar-Āḷvār was erected by the Chēra king Rājasimha in the name of Rājēndraśōḻadēvar, the Chōla king who was apparently his overlord.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv14p1i0132.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This inscription records a gift of 3 kāḍi (of paddy) by five individuals for offerings and a lamp in the temple of Bhaṭāra at Vayalaikkā, in the 2nd year of Vijaya-Dantivikramavarman.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0039.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This inscription records the construction of a well called Mārppiḍugu¹-peruṅkiṇaṟu at Teṉṉūr in Tiruveḷḷaṟai by Kambaṉ Araiyaṉ, the younger brother of Viśayanalluḻāṉ of Ālambākkam, in the 4th year of Dantivarman. The well is designed in the form of a svastikā and it is reached by a flight of steps from each of the four directions.

Published in Epigraphia Indica, Vol. XI, p. 157.

Language: Undetermined.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0040.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This is dated in the 5th year of Vijaya-Dantipōttaraiyar and records the construction of a tank called ‘Vāli-ēri’ by Vāli-Vaḍugaṉ alias Kalimūrkka-Iḷavaraiyaṉ, a servant of Māṟppiḍuviṉār alias Pēradi-Araiyar.

Language: Undetermined.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0041.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This inscription¹ is dated in the 6th year of Vijaya-Dantivikramavarman and it registers a gift of 16 kaḻañju of gold by Viṇṇakōvaraiyar, probably a chieftain of the locality, to provide, from the interest on the amount, offerings to the goddess Ēṟṟuk-Kuṉṟaṉār-Bhaṭṭāri for the merit of Udāraḍi and Nambi . . . . . . who fell in an encounter. The food offered to the god was used for feeding pilgrims and the gold endowed was received by the assembly of Aruvāgūr in Śiṅgapura-nāḍu. Certain specified members of the Vārigam were nominated to see that the assembly maintained this charity properly. The village Aruvāgūr which is stated to have been situated to the east of the road, may be identified with Arugāvūr in the Gingee taluk.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0042.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This record registers a gift of 30 kaḻañju of gold by Śōḻaṉār Ulagaperumāṉār of Śōḻa-nāḍu for burning a perpetual lamp before the god Tiruviḷaṅkōyil Perumāṉaḍigaḷ set up in the temple of Tiruvēṅgaḍattu-Perumāṉaḍigaḷ at Tiruchchōgiṉūr in Kuḍavūr-nāḍu, a subdivision of Tiruvēṅgaḍa-kōṭṭam, in the 51st year of Vijaya-Dantivikramavarman.

Ulagaperumāṉār mentioned in the inscription was evidently a Chōḷa chief ruling Śōḻa-nāḍu under the overlordship of the Pallavas. A different Chōḷa chief is mentioned in No. 49 below.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0043.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This is a fragmentary record of Dantivikramavarman. It mentions a certain [Kā]ḍuveṭṭi-Muttaraiyaṉ at whose request an endowment of 4 paṭṭi of land was made to the old temple of Vishṇu called Tirumēṟṟaḷi at Iṟaiyāṉchēri and to a maṭha, probably attached to it.

Reference to a Kāḍuveṭṭi-Muttaraśan who made a raid on Kōyāttūr in the reign of the Bāṇa king Vijayāditya Vīrachūḷāmaṇi Prabhumēru is noticed in a record from Puṅganūr (No. 542 of 1906). This chief was probably identical with the Kāḍuveṭṭi-Muttaraiyaṉ mentioned in the present inscription as he lived about this period.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0044.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This Vaṭṭeḻuttu inscription dated in the 6th year of Māṟañjaḍaiyaṉ which is engraved in archaic letters, has been attributed to Jaṭila Parāntaka of the Āṉaimalai inscription noted above. It records the construction of the Tirukkōyil (shrine) and of the Śrī-taṭākam (tank) by Śāttaṉ-Gaṇapati, a resident of Karavandapura,¹ who is called Pāṇḍi-Amṛitamaṅgalavaraiyaṉ, and is stated to have belonged to the Vaidya caste and to have been the mahāsāmanta of the king. The shrines of Durgādēvī and Jyēshṭhādēvi were constructed by Nakkaṉ-Koṟṟi, who is described as the Dharma-patni probably of this mahāsāmanta. On account of the interest of this record, the text is reproduced here.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv14p1i0003.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This incomplete record is dated in the 4th year and 360th day of the Pāṇḍya king Māṟañjaḍaiyaṉ and mentions the gift of some donation by Māṟaṉ-Āchchaṉ, probably a petty chieftain of Pōliyūr, for a lamp in the temple of Tirukkuṟṟālattu-Bhaṭāra. This person a so figures in a record¹ from Tiruppattūr in the Rāmanāthapuram district, where he is mentioned with the other title of Teṉṉavaṉ Pallavaraiyaṉ.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv14p1i0004.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This bilingual inscription consists of a portion in Sanskrit and a portion in Tamil. The Sanskrit portion states that Teṉṉavaṉ-Pallavādhipa alias Māṟaṉ-Āditya born at Pōḻiyūr in Pōḻiyūr-nāḍu made a gift of 40 Kṛishṇa-kācha for burning a lamp in the temple of Śūlapāṇi at Śrīsthalī. The Tamil portion, dated the in the 4th+1st year and 593rd day of the reign of Māṟañjaḍaiyaṉ states that Māṟaṉ-Āchchaṉ of Pōḻiyūr in Pōḷiyūr-nāḍu gave a donation of 40 kaḻañju to the Sabhā of Maṇaṟkuḍi for a lamp to be burnt in the temple of Tirukkaṟṟaḷi-Bhaṭāra at Tirupputtūr, a brahmadēya in Mīkuṇḍāṟu in Koluvūr-kūṟṟam and another gift of kaḻañju to the vaṇṇār of the place. This chieftain Māṟaṉ-Āchchaṉ has figured in another record from Kuttalam in the Tirunelveli District.¹

Languages: Sanskrit, Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv14p1i0005.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This inscription of Māṟanjaḍaiyaṉ of the year opposite to the year which was itself opposite to the fourth year of the king comes from Āḍuturai. From a record of the Chōḻa king Uttama-Chōḻa it is learnt that this temple was rebuilt during his reign by his pious mother Sembiyaṉ-Mahādēviyār, and so the characters in which this record is engraved are later that the time of Varaguṇa to whom this and the next record can be attributed. This epigraph registers some provision made for the supply of one uri of oil daily to the temple of Mahādēva at Tirukkuraṅgāduturā in Tiraimūr-nāḍu. Kuraṅgāḍutuṟai has been curtailed into the modern name of Āḍutuṟai.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv14p1i0006.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: These two records engraved in early Grantha and Vaṭṭeḻuttu characters belong to Māṟañjaḍaiyaṉ who is also called Parāntaka. They are important because the Kali year 3871 is also quoted for this king, thus furnishing a valuable chronological land mark for early Pāṇḍya history. The rock-cut temple of Narasiṁha was begun by Māṟaṉ-Kāri alias Muvēndamaggalappēraraiyaṉ, a vaidya of Karavandapura alias Kaḷakkuḍi and an Uttaramantrin (minister) of the Pāṇḍya king,¹ but as he died subsequently, the work was completed by his brother Māṟaṉ-Eyiṉaṉ alias Pāṇḍimaṅgala-Viśaiyaraiyaṉ who succeeded him in the office of minister, who added the mukhamaṇḍapa and had the consecration ceremony performed. As the person first mentioned had also the title Madhurakavi, it has been tentatively assumed that he had some connection with the Vaishṇava Āḻvār named Kāri Māṟaṉ alias Nammāḷvār, the author of the Tiruvāymoḻi. Karavandapuram has been identified with Ukkiraṉkōṭṭai in the Tirunelveli taluk of the district of the same name, in the inscriptions copied from which, the village is called Kaḷakkuḍi and Kaḷandai.²

Languages: Sanskrit, Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv14p1i0001-0002.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: These are five copper-plates belonging to the Pārijātavanēśvara temple at Tirukkaḷar, a village ten miles south-east of Mannārguḍi in the Tanjore district¹. A short notice of these appeared in Dr. Hultzsch’s Annual Report on Epigraphy for 1902—03, paragraph 17. The report also contains a list of 23 stone inscriptions which were copied from the same temple.² These five copper-plates, strung on a copper-ring of 5" diameter, have flat rims, measure 1’(7/8)" x 5(1/2)" each, weigh together 566 tolas and have ring-holes bored in the middle of the left margin about an inch from the edge. They contain in them five complete inscriptions of different Chōḷa kings. The first of them, which is also the earliest, is a record of Parakēsarivarman Rājēndra-Chōḷa I who ascended the Chōḷa throne in A.D. 1012. It begins with the king’s usual historical introduction commencing with the words tiru maṉṉi vaḷara, enumerates his conquests up to the capture of Kaḍāram, is dated in the 18th year of his reign and registers the extent of the dēvadāna lands belong-ing to the temple of Mahādēva at Tirukkaḷar which is said to be a village in Puṟaṅgarambai-nāḍu, a subdivision of Arumoḻidēva-vaḷanāḍu.

Compared with the inscription of this king found at Tirumalai³, dated in the 13th year of reign and his Tanjore epigraph⁴, dated in the 19th year of reign, the present inscription furnishes a few differences in reading which are noticed in foot-notes.

The identification of all the place names occurring in the historical introduction has been made by Professor Hultzsch⁵, and it remains to note here only a few facts in this connection. Iḍaituṟai-nāḍu which has been taken to be Yeḍatore, a small village in the Mysore district by Mr. Rice, has since been shown by Dr. Fleet to be identical with the territorial division Eḍedoṟe, two thousand, a tract of country lying between the rivers Kṛishṇā on the north and Tuṅgabhadrā on the south, comprising a large part of the present Raichur district⁶. The Kanyākumāri inscription of Vīrarājēndra shows that Maṇṇaikaḍakkam is not to be identified with Maṇṇe in the Nelamaṅgala taluk of the Bangalore district but is the same as Mānyakhēṭa, which Rājēndra-Chōḷa is said to have made a playground for his armies⁷. Chakkara-kōṭṭam has been satisfactorily identified by Rai Bahadur Hira Lal with Chitrakūṭa or ºkōṭa, eight miles from Rājapura in the Bastar State: he has also adduced epigraphical evidence to show that its king was really Dhārāvarsha in A.D. 1111⁸, as stated in the epigraphs of Kulōttuṅga I. Dakshiṇa-Lāḍam has been taken to be Dakashiṇa-Virāṭa or Southern Berars; but it looks likely that it is identical with Dakshiṇa-Rāḍha in Bengal⁹. Śrī-Vijaya appears under the form Śrī-Vishaya in a Kaṇḍiyūr inscription¹⁰ of the same king; and the large Leyden grant states that Māravijayōt-tuṅgavarman was the overlord of this territory¹¹. This has been taken to be the same as San-fotsai of the Chinese annals and has been identified with Palembang, a residency of Sumatra¹².

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv03p0i0207.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This inscription in six lines is engraved on the second plate of the Tirukkaḷar set. It is dated in the 31st year of the reign of the Chōḷa king Rājakēsarivarman Rājādhirāja I and registers an arrangement made, by a certain Tirumaṇappichchaṉ, who bore the double surname Araiyaṉ Nāgaraiyaṉ and Mahīpālakulakālappēraraiyaṉ, whereby one brahmin had to perform worship in the temple at Tirukkaḷar in addition to another who was doing that service till then. From the short historical introduction which states that the king with the help of his army took the head of Vīra-Pāṇḍya, Śālai of the Chēra king and Ilaṅgai, it is clear that “Śālai is an important place in the Chēra dominions and not a feeding house” as the late Mr. T.A.Gopinatha Rao had taken to be.¹

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv03p0i0208.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This inscription in 19 lines is engraved on the third plate of the Tirukkaḷar set. It is dated in the twenty-eighth year of the reign of Tribhuvanachakravartin Kulōttuṅga-Chōḷadēva without any distinguishing epithet or historical introduc-tion. In the absence of these, though it is not generally possible to say to which of the three kings who bore that name this record must be attributed, yet it appears to be a record of Kulōttuṅga-Chōḷa I, since it is stated in the fourth inscription in this set in referring to this record that the king abolished tolls—which is generally a feat attributed to Kulōttuṅga I. It registers a gift of paddy made by a certain Śivaṉ Tillaināyakaṉ alias Śiṟuttoṇḍanambi of Taṇṇīrkuṉṟam in Neṉmali-nāḍu to the temple of Mahādēva at Tirukkaḷar in Puṟaṅgarambai-nāḍu which was a sub-division of Rājēndraśōḻa-vaḷanāḍu for the purpose of taking in proces-sion Aravābharaṇadēva, for offerings to Piḷḷaiyār and the god in the Mūlaṭṭānam and for feeding devotees on the days of the new-moon.

Taṇṇīrkuṉṟam, to which the donor belonged, is a village 7 miles to the east of Maṉṉārguḍi in the Tanjore District. The modern village of Nemmeli in the same Taluk, must have been the principal place in the division Neṉmali-nāḍu in which Taṇṇīrkuṉṟam is said to have been situated.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv03p0i0209.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This is the fourth inscription in the Tirukkaḷar set. It is engraved on the second side of the third plate and belongs to the 18th year of the reign of Tribhuvanachakravartin Rājarājadēva. It records that some of the families of the donees, who received the gift made by Śivaṉ Tillaināyagaṉ of Taṇṇīrkuṉṟam in the twenty-eighth year of the reign of Kulōttuṅga-Chōḷa; the abolisher of tolls, ceased to have male members and that in consequence a question arising as to how the feeding pertaining to these families should be conducted in future, the Māhēśvaras settled that the feeding stipulated in the grant to be done by the donees devolved on the female descendants as well and that arrangements were made in accordance with that order. The inscription may probably belong to the reign of Rājarāja II, though the distinguishing epithet of the king is missing and the characters appear to belong to a later period.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv03p0i0210.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This is the fifth inscription in the Tirukkaḷar set. It is engraved on both sides of the fourth plate and the inner side of the fifth. It is dated in the 29th year of the reign of Kulōttuṅga-Chōḷadēva (i.e., Kulōttuṅga III) who took Madura, Ceylon, Karuvūr and the crowned head of the Pāṇḍya king and furnishes a list of gold and silver ornaments belonging to the temple at Tirukkaḷar with their weights as measured by the standard weight called the kuḍiñai-kal and the fineness in each case.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv03p0i0211.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This short inscription is engraved on a pillar in the south-east corner of the veranda which surrounds the shrine of the Ujjīvanātha temple at Uyyakkoṇḍāṉ-Tirumalai, a village 3 miles west of Trichinopoly. It records the gift of a perpetual lamp in the 34th year of the reign of Madirai-koṇḍa Kō-Parakēsarivarman, i.e., of the Chōḷa king Parāntaka I.¹ The donor was Pirāntakaṉ-Mādēvaḍigaḷār, a queen of Pirāntakaṉ-Kaṇḍarādittadēvar. The only king with a similar name, of whom we know, is Gaṇḍarādityavarman, the second son of Parāntaka I.² As the inscription belongs to the time of Parāntaka I. himself, and as it prefixes the word Pirāntakaṉ to the name of Kaṇḍarādittadēvar,³ it is evident that Gaṇḍarādityavarman, the son of Parāntaka I., is actually meant here. The name Parāntaka also forms the first member of the name of the queen of Kaṇḍarādittadēvar; Pirāntakaṉ-Mādēv-aḍigaḷār probably means ‘the devotee (of the temple) of Mahādēva, (founded by) Parāntaka (I.).’

The hitberto published inscriptions of Parāntaka I. are dated in the 13th,⁴ 15th,⁵ 24th⁶ and 26th⁷ years of his reign. The latest sure date hitherto found is the 40th year in an inscription of the Pañchanadēśvara temple at Tiruvaiyāṟu.⁸

The large Leyden grant (l. 48 ff.) states that Gaṇḍarādityavarman, the second son of Parāntaka I., “founded, for the sake (of bliss) in another (world), a large village, (called) by his own name, in the country on the northern bank of Kavēra’s daughter (i.e., the Kāvērī river).” This village appears to be identical with Gaṇḍarāditya-chaturvēdimaṅgalam, which is mentioned in several Tanjore inscriptions⁹ as belonging to a district on the northern bank (of the Kāvērī), and with the modern Kaṇḍarādityam in the Uḍaiyārpāḷaiyam tālluqa.¹⁰ The fifth of the nine Śaiva hymns known as Tiruviśaippā was composed by Kaṇḍarādittaṉ, who calls himself ‘king of the people of Tañjai,’ i.e., Tanjore, and must be accordingly identified with the Chōḷa king Gaṇḍarādityavarman.¹¹ The carpenter Kaṇḍarāditta-Perundachchaṉ in No. 66, paragraph 505, is apparently named after Gaṇḍarādityavarman, the grand-uncle of the then reigning king Rājarājadēva.

According to the subjoined inscription, the ancient name of Uyyakkoṇḍāṉ-Tirumalai was Nandipanmamaṅgalam, which suggests that the place may have been founded by one of the Pallava kings named Nandivarman. The temple was called Tirukkaṟkuḍi-Paramēśvara. This enables us to identify it with Kaṟkuḍi, a shrine which is referred to in the Periyapurāṇam as situated in the Chōḷa country to the south of the Kāvērī river.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv02p0i0075.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: The subjoined inscription was first made known by the Rev. T.Foulkes in the Manual of the Salem District, Vol. II, p. 369 ff. It is engraved on one of the five sets of copper-plates, which appear to have been discovered at Udayēndiram in A.D. 1850 and are now in the possession of the Dharmakartā of the Saundararāja-Perumāḷ temple at Udayēndiram.¹ I owe the opportunity of using the original plates to the courtesy of Mr. F.A.Nicholson, I.C.S.

The copper-plates are seven in number. They measure about 8(3/4) to 8(7/8) by 3(1/4) inches. The edges of each plate are raised into rims for the protection of the writing, which is in very good preservation. The plates are strung on a copper ring, which had been already cut when Mr. Foulkes examined the plates. The ring is about (1/2) inch thick and measures about 5(1/4) inches in diameter. Its ends are soldered into the lower portion of a flower, which bears on its expanded petals a circular seal of about 2(1/8) inches in diameter. This seal, which I have figured in the Epigraphia Indica (Vol. III, p. 104, No. 4 of the Plate), bears, in relief, a bull couchant which faces the proper right and is flanked by two ornamented lampstands. Above the bull are an indistinct figure (perhaps a squatting male person) and a crescent, and above these a parasol between two chaurīs. Below the bull is the Grantha legend Prabhumēru. From the Udayēndiram plates of the Bāṇa king Vikramāditya II.² we learn that his great-grandfather had the name or surname Prabhumēru. The occurrence of this name on the seal of the subjoined grant suggests that the Gaṅga king Pṛithivīpati II. adopted a Bāṇa biruda and placed it on his seal when the Bāṇa kingdom was bestowed on him by the Chōḷa king Parāntaka I. As, however, the seal-ring had been already cut when Mr. Foulkes examined the plates, the possibility remains that, as in the case of the inscription No. 74,³ the present seal may have originally belonged to another set of plates, perhaps to those of Vikramāditya II.⁴

The first five plates bear 28 Sanskrit verses in the Grantha alphabet. The alphabet and language of the two last plates (and of a portion of the last line of plate Vb) is Tamil. A few Tamil letters are used in the middle of the Sanskrit portion, viz., ḻi of Vaimbalguṛi in line 42, ṟam of Śrīpuṟambiya in line 45, and ṟi of Paṟivi in line 62. A few words in Sanskrit prose and Grantha characters occur at the beginning of plate I and at the end of plate VII (svasti śri, l. 1, and ōn namō Nārāyaṇāya, l. 101).

The Sanskrit portion opens with invocations of Vishṇu and Śiva (verses 1 and 2). The next few verses (3 to 11) contain a genealogy of the Chōḷa king Parāntaka I. Then follows a genealogy of the Gaṅga-Bāṇa king Pṛithivīpati II. surnamed Hastimalla (vv. 12 to 23), and the information that, with the permission of his sovereign Parakēsarin or Parāntaka I., he granted the village of Kaḍaikkōṭṭūr to the village of Udayēnduchaturvēdimaṅgalam (vv. 24 to 26). Excluded from the grant was certain land which belonged to the Digambara Jainas (v. 27 f. and l. 97 f.). The Tamil portion contains a minute description of the boundaries of Kaḍaikkōṭṭūr and adds that the grant was made by Śembiyaṉ-Māvalivāṇarāya (i.e., the Gaṅga-Bāṇa king Pṛithivīpati II.) in the 15th year of the reign of Madirai-koṇḍa Kō-Parakēsarivarman (i.e., the Chōḷa king Parāntaka I.), and that the granted village was clubbed together with Udyaśandiramaṅgalam into one village, called Vīranārāyaṇachchēri in commemoration of Parāntaka’s surname Vīranārāyaṇa.

The Chōḷa genealogy (vv. 3 to 11) may be subdivided into three portions, viz., mythical ancestors, ancient Chōḷa kings, and direct predecessors of Parāntaka I. The mythical ancestors (v. 3) are Brahmā, Marīchi, Kāśyapa, the Sun, Rudrajit, Chandrajit and Śibi. The four first of these are named in the same order in the Udayēndiram plates of Vīra-Chōḷa⁵ and in the Kaliṅgattu-Paraṇi;⁶ in the Vikkirama-Śōṛaṉ-Ulā,⁷ Marīchi is placed after Kāśyapa. Śibi is mentioned by name in the large Leyden grant (l. 13) and alluded to in the Kaliṅgattu-Paraṇi (viii. 13) and in the Vikkirama-Śōṛaṉ-Ulā (ll. 20 to 22).

The ancient Chōḷa kings to whom the subjoined inscription refers (v. 4), are Kōkkiḷḷi, Chōḷa, Karikāla and Kōchchaṅkaṇ.⁸ The Leyden grant mentions the same persons in different order, viz., Chōḷa (l. 17), Karikāla (l. 24), Kōchchaṅkaṇṇān⁹ (l. 25) and Kōkkiḷḷi (l. 26). The Kaliṅgattu-Paraṇi alludes first to Kōkkiḷḷi as having wedded a Nāga princess (viii. 18), then to Kōchcheṅgaṇ as contemporary of the poet Poygai (ibid.), and last to Karikāla as having built embankments along the Kāvērī river (viii. 20), while the Vikkirama-Śōṛaṉ-Ulā alludes first to Kōkkiḷḷi (l. 19 f.), then to Karikāla (l. 26), and last to Kōchcheṅgaṇ (l. 27 f.). It will be observed that each of the four documents which record the names and achievements of these ancient Chōḷa kings, enumerates them in different order. One of the four kings, Kōkkiḷḷi, can hardly be considered a historical person, as he is credited with having entered a subterraneous cave and there to have contracted marriage with a serpent princess,¹⁰ and as the Vikkirama-Śōṛaṉ-Ulā places him before the two mythical kings Śibi and Kavēra; and the king Chōḷa of the Udayēndiram plates and of the Leyden grant is nothing more than a personification of the Chōḷa dynasty,—just as Pallava, the supposed son of the hero Aśvatthāman and founder of the Pallava race.¹¹

The two remaining kings, Kōchcheṅgaṇ and Karikāla, are the heroes of two Tamil poems, the Kaḷavaṛi by Poygaiyār and the Paṭṭinappālai by Rudraṅgaṇṇaṉār. These two poems must be considerably more ancient than the Kaliṅgattu-Paraṇi, which belongs to the time of Kulōttuṅga I. (A.D. 1063 to 1112), because the author of this poem (viii. 18 and 21) believed them to be actually composed before the time of Parāntaka I. and during the very reigns of Kōchcheṅgaṇ and Karikāla. While the Kaliṅgattu-Paraṇi places Kōchcheṅgaṇ before Karikāla, who is represented as having inscribed on Mount Mēru the history of his predecessors, and among them of Kōchcheṅgaṇ (viii. 19), the Leyden grant calls Kōchcheṅgaṇ a descendant of Karikāla, and the Vikkirama-Śōṛaṉ-Ulā refers to the two kings in the same order. The Leyden grant even represents the mythical king Kōkkiḷḷi as a descendant of Kōchcheṅgaṇ. A comparison of these conflicting statements shows that, at the time of the composition of the three documents referred to, no tradition remained regarding the order in which Kōchcheṅgaṇ and Karikāla succeeded each other. Probably their names were only known from ancient Tamil panegyrics of the same type as the Kaḷavaṛi and the Paṭṭiṉappālai. It would be a mistake to treat them as actual ancestors of that Chōḷa dynasty whose epigraphical records have come down to us. They must rather be considered as two representatives of extinct dynasties of the Chōḷa country, whose names had survived in Tamil literature either by chance or on account of their specially marked achievements.

To Karikāla the Leyden grant (l. 24 f.) attributes the building of embankments along the Kāvērī river. The same act is alluded to in the Kaliṅgattu-Paraṇi and the Vikkirama-Śōṛaṉ-Ulā. The Kaliṅgattu-Paraṇi (viii. 21) adds that he paid 1,600,000 gold pieces to the author of the Paṭṭiṉappālai. According to the Porunarāṟṟuppaḍai, a poem by Muḍattāmakkaṇṇiyār,¹² the name of the king’s father was Iḷañjēṭcheṉṉi. The king himself is there called Karigāl, i.e., ‘Black-leg’ or ‘Elephant-leg,’¹³ while the Sanskritised form of his name, Karikāla, would mean ‘the death to elephants.’ He is said to have defeated the Chēra and Pāṇḍya kings in a battle fought at Veṇṇil.¹⁴ According to the Śilappadigāram,¹⁵ his capital was Kāvirippūmbaṭṭiṉam.¹⁶ In one of his interesting contributions to the history of ancient Tamil literature,¹⁷ the Honourable P.Coomaraswamy allots Karikāla to the first century A.D. This opinion is based on the fact that the commentaries on the Śilappadigāram represent Karikāla as the maternal grandfather of the Chēra king Śeṅguṭṭuvaṉ, a contemporary of Gajabāhu of Ceylon. Mr. Coomaraswamy identifies the latter with Gajabāhu I., who, according to the Mahāvaṁsa, reigned from A.D. 113 to 135. With due respect to Mr. Coomaraswamy’s sagacity, I am not prepared to accept this view, unless the identity of the two Gajabāhus is not only supported by the mere identity of the name, but proved by internal reasons, and until the chronology of the earlier history of Ceylon has been subjected to a critical examination.

The last of the four ancient Chōḷa kings to whom the subjoined inscription refers, is Kōchcheṅgaṇ, i.e., ‘king Red-eye.’ Poygaiyār’s poem Kaḷavaṛi, which has been translated into English by Mr. Kanakasabhai Pillai,¹⁸ describes the battle of Kaṛumalam, in which Śeṅgaṇ defeated and captured a Chēra king. The Kaliṅgattu-Paraṇi and the Vikkirama-Śōṛaṉ-Ulā state that the prisoner was set at liberty by the king, after the Kaḷavaṛi had been recited in the presence of the latter. The Leyden grant (l. 26) calls him “a bee at the lotus feet of Śaṁbhu (Śiva).”¹⁹ By this it alludes to the fact that Śeṅgaṇ was considered as one of the sixty-three devotees of Śiva.²⁰ The Periyapurāṇam calls him the son of the Chōḷa king Śubhadēva by Kamalavatī, and attributes to him the foundation of the Jambukēśvara temple.²¹ His name is mentioned by two of the authors of the Dēvāram: Sundaramūrti invokes him in the Tiruttoṇḍattogai,²² and refers to a temple which Kōchcheṅgaṇāṉ had built at Naṉṉilam;²³ and Tiruñāṉaśambandar mentions two other temples which the Chōḷa king Śeyyagaṇ²⁴ had built at Ambar²⁵ and at Vaigal.²⁶ The last two references prove that Śeṅgaṇ must have lived before the 7th century, to which, as shown by Mr. Venkayya,²⁷ Tiruñāṉaśambandar belongs. Finally, Mr. Venkayya²⁸ has found that the Nālāyiraprabandham speaks of a visit of the Chōḷa king Kōchcheṅgaṇāṉ to the Vishṇu temple at Tirunaṟaiyūr.²⁹

Verses 4 and 5 of the Udayēndiram plates and lines 28 to 31 of the large Leyden grant mention the names of the grandfather and father of Parāntaka I., Vijayālaya and Āditya I. Both kings are described in general terms, and no special deeds or events are noticed in connection with them. It may be concluded from this that they were insignificant princes, and that Parāntaka I. was the actual founder of the Chōḷa power. The king during whose reign the present grant was issued, bore various names. The Leyden grant (ll. 32 and 40) calls him Parāntaka. The same name occurs in verses 21 and 25 of the Udayēndiram plates. He was also called Vīranārāyaṇa, a name which occurs in verse 6, and which is presupposed by Vīranārāyaṇachchēri, as the granted village was termed after the name of “His Majesty” (l. 73 f.). Another name of his was Parakēsarin (v. 24), which forms part of his Tamil designation Madirai-koṇḍa Kō-Parakēsarivarman (l. 71), i.e., ‘king Parakēsarivarman who took Madirai (Madhurā).’ The conquest of Madhurā and the defeat of its ruler, the Pāṇḍya king Rājasiṁha, is referred to in verses 9 and 11. Parāntaka I. is also reported to have repulsed an army of the king of Laṅkā (Ceylon) and to have earned by this feat the surname Saṁgrāmarāghava (v. 10). Hence he calls himself ‘Kō-Parakēsarivarman who took Madirai (i.e., Madhurā) and Īṛam (i.e., Ceylon)’ in some of his inscriptions.³⁰ He defeated, among others, the Vaidumba king,³¹ “uprooted by force two lords of the Bāṇa kings” (v. 9), and conferred the dignity of “lord of the Bāṇas” on the Gaṅga king Pṛithivīpati II. (v. 21). His queen was the daughter of a king of Kēraḷa (v. 8). The Leyden grant (l. 35 f.) reports that “(this) banner of the race of the Sun covered the temple of Śiva at Vyāghrāgrahāra with pure gold, brought from all regions, subdued by the power of his own arm.” As stated before,³² this verse refers to the gilding of the Kanakasabhā or ‘Golden Hall’ at Chidambaram. Mr. P. Sundaram Pillai has pointed out that the expression ‘Golden Hall’ (Poṉṉambalam) occurs already in the Dēvāram of Appar (alias Tirunāvukkaraiyar), the elder contemporary of Tiruñāṉaśambandar.³³ Consequently, it seems that Parāntaka I. did not gild the Chidambaram temple for the first time, but that he only re-gilded it. Mr. Sundaram adds that “Umāpati Śivāchārya, to whose statements we are bound to accord some consideration, ascribes, in the 14th century, the building of the Golden Hall and the town (Chidambaram) itself to a certain Hiraṇyavarman of immemorial antiquity.” Though the name Hiraṇyavarman actually occurs among the Pallava kings of Kāñchī,³⁴ it looks as if his alleged connection with the Golden Hall were only due to the circumstance that the word hiraṇya, ‘gold,’ happens to be a portion of his name. The gilding, or rather re-gilding, of the Chidambaram temple by Parāntaka I. is alluded to in the Vikkirama-Śōṛaṉ-Ulā (ll. 30 to 32). The Kaliṅgattu-Paraṇi (viii. 23) mentions his conquest of Ceylon and Madhurā. The same two conquests and the gilding of the Chidambaram temple are referred to in a hymn by Gaṇḍarāditya, the second son of Parāntaka I.³⁵ According to this hymn, the capital of Parāntaka I. was Kōṛi,³⁶ i.e., Uṟaiyūr, now a suburb of Trichinopoly.³⁷ The present inscription is dated in the 15th year of his reign (l. 71 f.). A list of other inscriptions of his was given on page 374 above.

The genealogy of the Chōḷa king Parāntaka I. is followed by an account of the ancestors of his feudatory Pṛithivīpati II. surnamed Hastimalla (vv. 12 to 23). This passage opens with a verse (12) glorifying the Gaṅga family, which is said to have had for its ancestor the sage Kaṇva of the race of Kāśyapa³⁸ and to have “obtained increase through the might of Siṁhanandin.”³⁹ As in the copper-plate grants of the Western Gaṅgas, the first king of the Gaṅga dynasty is stated to have been Koṅkaṇi, who resided at Kuvaḷālapura, the modern Kōlār,⁴⁰ “who was anointed to the conquest of the Bāṇa country,”⁴¹ and who, in his youth, accomplished the feat of splitting in two a huge stone pillar with a single stroke of his sword.⁴² The device on his banner is said to have been a swan (sitapiñchha, v. 14). To the period between this mythical ancestor and the great-grandfather of Pṛithivīpati II. the inscription (v. 15) allots the reigns of Vishṇugōpa, Hari, Mādhava, Durvinīta, Bhūvikrama, and “other kings” of Koṅkaṇi’s lineage. The remainder of the genealogical portion of the inscription supplies the following pedigree of the Gaṅga kings: Śivamāra. Pṛithivīpati I. surnamed Aparājita. Mārasiṁha. Pṛithivīpati II. surnamed Hastimalla.

Pṛithivīpati I. fought a battle at Vaimbalguṛi (v. 17) and lost his life in a battle with the Pāṇḍya king Varaguṇa at Śrīpuṟambiya (v. 18). Śrīpuṟambiya has to be identified with the village of Tiruppirambiyam near Kumbhakōṇam.⁴³ Mr. Venkayya has shown that this place is mentioned in the Dēvāram of Tiruñāṉaśambandar and Sundaramūrti, and that king Varaguṇa-Pāṇḍya is referred to in the Tiruviḷaiyāḍalpurāṇam.⁴⁴

Pṛithivīpati II. was a dependent of Parāntaka I. and received from him the dignity of ‘lord of the Bāṇas’ (v. 21), who had been conquered by the Chōḷa king (v. 9). He defeated the Hill-chiefs (Girīndra)⁴⁵ and the Pallavas (v. 23) and bore the titles ‘lord of Paṟivipurī’ and ‘lord of Nandi,’ i.e., of the Nandidurga hill near Bangalore. His banner bore the device of a black-buck, his crest was a bull, and his drum was called Paiśācha (v. 24). In the Tamil portion of the inscription, Pṛithivīpati II. is referred to under the title Śembiyaṉ-Māvalivāṇarāya (ll. 72 and 101). The second part of this name consists of Māvali, the Tamil form of Mahābali, i.e., ‘the great Bali,’ who is considered as the ancestor of the Bāṇa kings,⁴⁶ and Vāṇarāya, i.e., Bāṇarāja or ‘king of the Bāṇas.’ The first part of the name, Śembiyaṉ, is one of the titles of the Chōḷa kings. The whole surname appears to mean: ‘(he who was appointed) Mahābali-Bāṇarāja (by) the Chōḷa king.’

According to verse 16, the Gaṅga king Pṛithivīpati I. rendered assistance to two chiefs named Iriga and Nāgadanta, the sons of king Diṇḍi, and defended the former of these two against king Amōghavarsha. This king can be safely identified in the following manner. The Chōḷa king Rājarāja ascended the throne in A.D. 984-85;⁴⁷ Rājarāja’s granduncle Rājāditya was slain by the Gaṅga king Būtuga, who was a feudatory of the Rāshṭrakūṭa king Kṛishṇa III., before A.D. 949-50;⁴⁸ Rājāditya’s father Parāntaka I., who reigned at least 40 years,⁴⁹ may accordingly be placed about A.D. 900 to 940. As Parāntaka I. was a contemporary of the Gaṅga king Pṛithivīpati II.,—Amōghavarsha, the contemporary of Pṛithivīpati I., must be identical with the Rāshṭrakūṭa king Amōghavarsha I., who reigned from A.D. 814-15 to 876-78.⁵⁰ Accordingly Mārasiṁha, the son of Pṛithivīpati I., must have reigned about A.D. 878 to 900, and must be distinct from another Mārasiṁha, who reigned from A.D. 963-64 to 974-75.⁵¹

Of the localities mentioned in the grant proper, Udayēndu-chaturvēdimaṅgalam (v. 26) and Udayaśandiramaṅgalam (the Tamil spelling of Udayachandramaṅgalam, ll. 74 and 99 f.) are two different forms of the name of the modern village of Udayēndiram, where the plates were found.⁵² In mentioning the name Udayachandramaṅgalam, the subjoined inscription presupposes the existence of the lost original of the Udayēndiram plates of Nandivarman Pallavamalla (No. 74), which record the foundation of that village in honour of the general Udayachandra.⁵³ The village granted, Kaḍaikkōṭṭūr, must have been situated close to Udayēndiram, because it was clubbed together with the latter into one village, called Vīranārāyaṇachchēri. Kaḍaikkōṭṭūr was bounded on the south-east and north by the Pālāṟu river (ll. 78 and 96), which passed through the village near the eastern boundary of the latter (l. 75). The village belonged to Mēl-Aḍaiyāṟu-nāḍu, a subdivision of the district of Paḍuvūr-kōṭṭam (l. 73 f.).⁵⁴ As I have already stated on page 365, Mēl-Aḍaiyāṟu-nāḍu⁵⁵ is the Tamil equivalent of Paśchimāśrayanadī-vishaya, the Sanskrit name of the district to which Udayēndiram belonged in the time of Nandivarman Pallavamalla.

Languages: Sanskrit, Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv02p0i0076.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: In the first volume I published an inscription of Kambaṇa-Uḍaiyar, which records that, in the time of Kulōttuṅga-Chōḷadēva, the Rājasiṁhavarmēśvara temple at Kāñchipuram had been closed, its landed property sold, and its compound and environs transferred to the temple of Aṉaiyapataṅgā.¹ This temple is situated close to the Rājasiṁhavarmēśvara (now Kailāsanātha) temple. In its inscriptions and in the Dēvāram,² it bears the slightly different name Aṉēkataṅgāpadam. It contains three inscriptions, one of which records a private grant,³ while the two others (Nos. 77 and 78) are dated during the reign of Kulōttuṅga-Chōḷadēva.

The king to whose reign the inscriptions Nos. 77 and 78 belong, is identical with Kulōttuṅga-Chōḷadēva I. This follows from the fact that, in other inscriptions which open with the same introduction,⁴ he receives the surname Kō-Rājakēsarivarman, which was borne by Kulōttuṅga-Chōḷa I.,⁵ and that, in a few inscriptions with the same introduction,⁶ he is said to have put to flight Vikkala and Śiṅgaṇa, who must be identified with Vikramāditya VI. and Jayasiṁha IV. of the Western Chālukya dynasty.⁷

The subjoined inscription records that, in the 20th year of his reign, Kulōttuṅga-Chōḷadēva granted to the Śiva temple of Aṉēkataṅgāpadam in Kāñchipuram three vēlis of land in the village of Tāmar, alias Nittaviṉōdanallūr, in Tāmar-nāḍu, a subdivision of Tāmar-kōṭṭam. According to Mr. Crole’s Chingleput Manual (p. 439), the district of “Tamāl-kottam” was situated in the west of the Conjeeveram tālluqa. The village of Tāmar must be accordingly identified with the modern Dāmal.⁸ As in an inscription of Kambaṇṇa-Uḍaiyar (Vol. I, No. 88), Kāñchipuram is here said to have belonged to Eyiṟ-kōṭṭam, a district of Jayaṅkoṇḍa-Śōṛa-maṇḍalam. Eyil, after which the district of Eyiṟ-kōṭṭam was called, must be distinct from the distant village of Eyil in the South Arcot district, with which I proposed to identify it on a former occasion.⁹ Perhaps the term Eyil, i.e., ‘the Fort,’ refers to Kāñchipuram itself. Jayaṅkoṇḍa-Śōṛamaṇḍalam is another name of Toṇḍaimaṇḍalam.¹⁰

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv02p0i0077.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: Like No. 77, this inscription belongs to the time of Kulōttuṅga-Chōḷadēva I. It is dated in the 34th year of his reign, and records that the king granted 2 vēlis of land to the Aṉēkataṅgāpadam temple at Kāñchipuram. The land granted was situated in the southern portion of Kāñchipuram, to the north of the temple of Tirukkaṟṟaḷi-Mahādēva, i.e., of the Rājasiṁhavarmēśvara (now Kailāsanātha) temple,¹ to the east of the hamlet of Puttēri,² to the west of ‘the royal wall of Rājēndra-Chōḷa,’³ and to the south of the hamlet of Kīṛ-Puttēri, i.e., ‘Eastern Puttēri.’

As the land granted bordered on the Kailāsanātha temple, it is not impossible that it formed part of those gifts of Kulōttuṅga-Chōḷadēva, which were declared to be unlawful and were restored to the Kailāsanātha temple in the time of Kambaṇa-Uḍaiyar.⁴

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv02p0i0078.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: The rock-cut Śaiva shrine at Vallam near Chingleput¹ bears two Tamil inscriptions. One of them, which belongs to the 13th century A.D., is engraved on the lower portion of the right door-pillar.² It records the gift of a lamp in the 14th year of Sakalabhuvanachakravartin Kōpperuñjiṅgadēva³ (i.e., Kō-Perum-Siṁhadēva) to the temple of Vayandīśura (i.e., Vasantēśvara) at Vallam in Valla-nāḍu, (a subdivision) of Kaḷattūr-kōṭṭam.⁴ The second, very archaic inscription is engraved on the upper portions of both door-pillars and records that the temple was built by Skandasēna, the son of Vasantapriyarāja, who was a vassal of Mahēndrapōtarāja. From the later inscription of Kōpperuñjiṅgadēva, it follows further that Skandasēna called the temple Vasantēśvara after his father Vasanta. Mahēndrapōtarāja, whose vassal Vasanta professes to be, must have been a Pallava king. This is already suggested by the first part of his name, which occurs twice in the list of the Pallavas, as far as it is known (Vol. I, p. 11). The second part of the king’s name, Pōtarāja,⁵ forms part of Īśvarapōtarāja,⁶ as the Pallava king Paramēśvaravarman I. is called in a grant of Vikramāditya I. (Vol. I, p. 145), and of Nandipōtarāja,⁷ which is used as an equivalent of Nandivarman in the Kaśākūḍi plates (No. 73 below, line 90). Finally, the birudas which the king receives in the Vallam cave-inscription, have their parallels in other Pallava inscriptions. With Lalitāṅkura compare Lalita and Nayāṅkura in the Dharmarāja Ratha inscriptions (Vol. I, p. 3). Śatrumalla and Guṇabhara occur also in the two cave-inscriptions on the Trichinopoly rock (Vol. I, p. 29). Though birudas are a somewhat unsafe basis for identification, it may be provisionally assumed that both the Trichinopoly cave-inscriptions of Guṇabhara, alias Śatrumalla, and the Vallam cave-inscription of Mahēndrapōtarāja belong to one of the two Pallava kings called Mahēndravarman, i.e., to the first half of the seventh century of our era.⁸

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv02p0i0072.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: On the 30th April 1891, Professor Julien Vinson, of Paris, was good enough to send me a reprint¹ of his paper Spécimen de Paléographie Tamoule, which contains an analysis of, and extracts from, the subjoined copper-plate inscription. The original plates had been discovered in 1879 at Kaśākūḍi, 4 kilometres from Kāraikkāl (Karikal),² by M. Jules de la Fon, of Pondicherry. Professor Vinson’s paper, which is based on a tracing prepared by M. de la Fon, convinced me of the importance of the inscription and induced me to apply through Government to His Excellency the Governor of the French Settlements in India for a loan of the original plates. This request was most graciously and promptly complied with. After I had transcribed the plates and prepared impressions of them, they were returned to their present owner.

The Kaśākūḍi copper-plates, eleven in number, are strung on a ring. On this is soldered the royal seal, with the figure of a bull which faces the left and is surmounted by a liṅga. The bull was the crest of the Pallavas,³ while their banner bore the figure of Śiva’s club (khaṭvāṅga).⁴ The Grantha and Tamil characters of the inscription resemble those of the Kūram plates (Vol. I, No. 151). The major portion of the inscription is in the Sanskrit language (lines 1 to 104). The particulars of the grant are repeated, with considerable additions, in the Tamil language (ll. 104 to 133). The concluding portion of the inscription is again in Sanskrit (ll. 133 to 138), with a short parenthetical note in Tamil (l. 137).

The immediate object of the inscription is to record the grant of a village, made in the 22nd year of the reign (ll. 80 and 105) of the Pallava king Nandivarman (verses 27 and 30, and l. 79). As in other Pallava copper-plate inscriptions, the grant proper is preceded by a panegyrical account of the king’s ancestors, which adds a large number of new details to our knowledge of the Pallava history. After nine benedictory verses, the author names the following mythical ancestors of the Pallava dynasty:—

Brahmā (v. 10). Aṅgiras (11). Bṛihaspati (12). Śaṁyu (13). Bharadvāja (14). Drōṇa (15). Aśvatthāman (16). Pallava (17). Aśōkavarman (19).

This last king can scarcely be considered a historical person, but appears to be a modification of the ancient Maurya king Aśōka. Then follows a passage in prose, which informs us that, after this Aśōkavarman, there ruled a number of other Pallava kings, viz., [S]kandavarman, Kal[i]ndavarman, Kāṇagōpa, Vishṇugōpa, Vīrakū[r]cha, Vīrasiṁha, Siṁhavarman, Vishṇusiṁha and others (l. 48 f.). Some of these names actually occur in the inscriptions of that ancient branch of the Pallavas, whose grants are dated from Palakkada, Daśanapura and Kāñchīpura, viz., Skandavarman, Siṁhavarman, Vishṇugōpavarman,⁵ and Vīrakōrchavarman.⁶ The Amarāvatī pillar-inscription (Vol. I, No. 32) mentions two kings named Siṁhavarman. But the order in which these names are enumerated, is completely different in each of the three available sources for the history of the early Pallavas, viz., the Amarāvatī pillar, the early copper-inscriptions, and the prose introduction of the Kaśākūḍi plates. For this reason, and on account of the summary manner in which the early kings are referred to by the author of the Kaśākūḍi inscription, it is a mistake to derive a regular pedigree from the latter, as was done by Professor Vinson (l.c., p. 453); and it must be rather concluded that, at the time of Nandivarman, nothing was known of the predecessors of Siṁhavishṇu, but the names of some of them, and that the order of their succession, and their relation to each other and to the subsequent line of Siṁhavishṇu, were then entirely forgotten.

With verse 20 we enter on historical ground. The list of kings from Siṁhavishṇu to the immediate predecessor of Nandivarman agrees with the Udayēndiram plates of Nandivarman Pallavamalla (No. 74). Siṁhavishṇu appears to have borne the surname Avanisiṁha, and is stated to have defeated the Malaya, Kaḷabhra, Mālava, Chōḷa, Pāṇḍya, Siṁhaḷa and Kēraḷa kings.

His successor Mahēndravarman I. “annihilated his chief enemies at Puḷḷalūra” (v. 21). The ‘chief enemies’ were probably the Chalukyas, who, in their turn, considered the Pallavas their ‘natural enemies.’⁷ As Puḷḷalūr is the name of a village in the Conjeeveram tālluqa,⁸ it appears that the Chalukya army had made an inroad into the Pallava dominions, before it was repulsed by Mahēndravarman I.

His son Narasiṁhavarman I. is reported to have conquered Laṅkā, i.e., Ceylon, and to have captured Vātāpi,⁹ the capital of the Western Chalukyas. The Kūram and Udayēndiram plates supply the name of the conquered Chalukya king, Pulakēśin or Vallabharāja, i.e., Pulikēśin II.¹⁰ The conquest of Ceylon to which the Kaśākūḍi plates refer, is confirmed from an unexpected source. From the 47th chapter of the Mahāvaṁsa¹¹ we learn that the Singhalese prince Māṇavamma lived at the court of king Narasīha of India and helped him to crush his enemy, king Vallabha. The grateful Narasīha supplied Māṇavamma twice with an army to invade Ceylon. The second attack was successful. Māṇavamma occupied Ceylon, over which he is supposed to have ruled from A.D. 691 to 726. As both the Pallava inscriptions and the Mahāvaṁsa mention the war with Vallabha and the conquest of Ceylon, the identity of Narasīha and Narasiṁhavarman I. can hardly be doubted. As, however, the latest date of Pulikēśin II. is A.D. 642,¹² the accession of Māṇavamma must have taken place about half a century before A.D. 691.¹³

No details are given about the reign of Narasiṁhavarman’s son Mahēndravarman II. The latter was succeeded by his son Paramēśvarapōtavarman I. who, as we know from the Kūram and Udayēndiram plates, defeated the Western Chalukya king Vikramāditya I. at Peruvaḷanallūr. The Kaśākūḍi plates do not contain any historical information about him, nor about his son Narasiṁhavarman II. and his grandson Paramēśvarapōtavarman II.

According to the Udayēndiram plates, the next king, Nandivarman, was the son of Paramēśvaravarman II. The Kaśākūḍi plates contain an entirely different account of Nandivarman’s parentage. In line 72, he professes to be “engaged in ruling the kingdom of Paramēśvarapōtarāja;” and in verse 27, he is said to be ruling, at the time of the inscription, the kingdom of Paramēśvarapōtavarman II., i.e., to have succeeded or supplanted the latter on the throne, and to have been “chosen by the subjects.” This plebiscite may have taken place after the death of the legitimate king; or, more probably, Nandivarman may have been an usurper who ousted and destroyed him and his family. At any rate, he was a remote kinsman of his predecessor. For, he was the son of Hiraṇya (verses 9 and 30) by Rōhiṇī and belonged to the branch (varga) of Bhīma (verse 30). According to verse 28, this branch of Bhīma took its origin from Bhīmavarman, who was the younger brother of Siṁhavishṇu. The names of three princes who intervened between Bhīmavarman and Hiraṇya, are recorded in the same verse. The name Hiraṇyavarma-Mahārāja occurs several times in a much obliterated inscription of the Vaikuṇṭha-Perumāḷ temple at Kānchīpuram. At the beginning of this inscription, Paramēśvarappōttaraiyar of the Pallava-vaṁśa is mentioned as deceased (svargastha). It is therefore not improbable that the inscription recorded the accession of Hiraṇyavarman or of his son Nandivarman after the death of Paramēśvarapōtavarman II. The latter may have been the founder of the Vaikuṇṭha-Perumāḷ temple, which is called Paramēśvara-Vishṇugṛiha, i.e., ‘the Vishṇu temple of Paramēśvara,’ in another inscription of the Vaikuṇṭha-Perumāḷ temple.¹⁴ With the addition of the new branch, the list of the later Pallavas stands as follows:—

Unnamed ancestor.[C1]1. Siṁhavishṇu. [C1]2. Mahēndravarman I. [C2]Bhīmavarman. [C1]3. Narasiṁhavarman I. [C2]Buddhavarman. [C1]4. Mahēndravarman II. [C2]Ādityavarman. [C1]5. Paramēśvarapōtavarman or Paramēśvaravarman I. [C2]Gōvindavarman. [C1]6. Narasiṁhavarman II. [C2]Hiraṇya. [C1]7. Paramēśvarapōtavarman or Paramēśvaravarman II. [C2]8. Nandivarman.

Other forms of the name Nandivarman are Nandipōtarāja (l. 90) and simply Nandin (l. 88). The form Nandipōtavarman occurs in the Vakkalēri plates,¹⁵ which refer to the defeat of the Pallava king by the Western Chalukya king Vikramāditya II., and the form Nandippōttaraiyar in an inscription of his 18th year in the Ulagaḷanda-Perumāḷ temple at Kāñchīpuram.¹⁶ He bore the sovereign titles Mahārāja and Rājādhirāja-paramēśvara and the birudas Kshatriyamalla, Pallavamalla (l. 78), and Śrīdhara (verse 29). According to verse 30, he was a devotee of Vishṇu. At the request of his prime-minister (l. 89), Brahmaśrīrāja (l. 91) or Brahmayuvarāja (ll. 103 and 106), the king gave the village of Koḍukoḷḷi (ll. 99, 105 f.) to the Brāhmaṇa Jyēshṭhapāda-Sōmayājin (l. 93) or (in Tamil) Śēṭṭiṟeṅga-Sōmayājin (l. 108 f.), who belonged to the Bharadvāja (l. 94) or Bhāradvāja (l. 108) gōtra, followed the Chhandōgasūtra (ll. 94 and 108), and resided at Pūniya (l. 95) or Pūni (l. 108), a village in the Toṇḍāka-rāshṭra (l. 95). The village of Koḍukoḷḷi, on becoming a brahmadēya, received the new name Ēkadhīramaṅgalam (l. 100). It belonged to Ūṟṟukkāṭṭu-kōṭṭam (l. 105) or (in Sanskrit) Undivanakōshṭhaka (l. 98), a subdivision of Toṇḍāka-rāshṭra, and was bounded in the east and south by Pālaiyūr, in the west by Maṇaṟpākkam and Koḷḷipākkam, and in the north by Veḷimānallūr (ll. 98 f. and 111 ff.). Connected with the gift of the village was the right to dig channels from the Śēyāṟu or (in Sanskrit) Dūrasarit, the Veḥkā or Vēgavatī, and the tank of Tīraiyaṉ or Tīralaya (ll. 101 f. and 115 ff.).

Of these geographical names, the following can be identified. Toṇḍāka-rāshṭra is,—like Toṇḍīra-maṇḍala, Tuṇḍīra-maṇḍala and Tuṇḍāka-vishaya,¹⁷—a Sanskritised form of the Tamil term Toṇḍai-maṇḍalam. One of the 24 ancient divisions (kōṭṭam) of the latter was Ūṟṟukkāṭṭu-kōṭṭam, which owed its name to Ūṟṟukkāḍu, a village in the present Conjeeveram tālluqa.¹⁸ This kōṭṭam was divided into four subdivisions (nāḍu), one of which was Pālaiyūr-nāḍu.¹⁹ The head-village of this subdivision, Pālaiyūr, appears to be identical with the village of Pālaiyūr, which formed the south-eastern boundary of the granted village, and perhaps with the modern Pālūr at the north-western extremity of the Chingleput tālluqa.²⁰ The western boundary of the granted village, Maṇaṟpākkam, would then be represented by the modern Mēlamaṇappākkam.²¹ For the granted village, Koḍukoḷḷi, itself and for the two remaining villages which formed its boundaries, no equivalents are found on the maps at my disposal. The village at which the donee resided, Pūni, may be the modern Pūṇḍi, which belongs to the Conjeeveram tālluqa,²² but is in close proximity of Pālūr and Mēlamaṇappākkam in the Chingleput tālluqa. The proposed identification of these three villages is made more probable by the reference, made in the Kaśākūḍi plates, to two rivers near which the granted village of Koḍukoḷḷi was situated. Of these, the Vēgavatī or Veḥkā passes Conjeeveram and falls into the Pālāṟu near Villivalam.²³ The Śēyāṟu forms the southern boundary of the modern Conjeeveram tālluqa and joins the Pālāṟu opposite Mēlamaṇappākkam, which I have identified with Maṇaṟpākkam, the western boundary of Koḍukoḷḷi.

The executor (ājñapti) of the grant was Ghōraśarman (ll. 103 and 106), and the author of the Sanskrit portion, which, as in the Kūram plates (l. 89) and the Udayēndiram plates (ll. 101 and 105), is called a praśasti or eulogy, was a certain Trivikrama (verse 31). To the Sanskrit portion is affixed a Tamil endorsement (l. 104 f.), which directs the inhabitants of Ūṟṟukkāṭṭu-kōṭṭam to execute the order of the king. The subsequent Tamil passage (l. 105 ff.) records that, on receipt of the royal order, the representatives of Ūṟṟukkāṭṭu-kōṭṭam marked the boundaries of the granted village under the guidance of their headman, and formally assigned all rights to the donee. Another Tamil sentence (l. 132 f.) states that the grant was executed in the presence of the local authorities (?), the ministers and the secretaries.

Then follow, in Sanskrit, three imprecatory verses (l. 133 ff.) and the statement that the document was written by His Majesty’s great treasurer (l. 136). The inscription ends with a docket in Tamil (l. 137) and a few auspicious Sanskrit words.

Languages: Sanskrit, Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv02p0i0073.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This inscription has been already published by the Rev. T.Foulkes in the Indian Antiquary (Vol. VIII, p. 273 ff.) and in the Manual of the Salem District (Vol. II, p. 355 ff.). The original plates, together with the originals of four other copper-plate inscriptions¹ which were also edited by Mr. Foulkes, are preserved at Udayēndiram,² a village at the southwestern extremity of the Guḍiyātam tālluqa of the North Arcot district, and were kindly borrowed for me from their present owner by Mr. F.A.Nicholson, I.C.S., Acting Collector of North Arcot. The present whereabouts of two other copper-plate inscriptions from Udayēndiram,³ of which Mr. Foulkes obtained transcripts in the Telugu character, I was unable to ascertain. According to Mr. Foulkes, these two inscriptions formed part of a find of “five, or, by another account, seven sets of copper-plate inscriptions,” which was made in 1850 in a subterranean chamber in the Brāhmaṇa street at Udayēndiram. Mr. Foulkes then believed that the remaining three or five sets of the find were lost. As, however, Mr. Foulkes’ other grants (I, II, III, IV and V) are now preserved at Udayēndiram and are five in number, I think that they must be identical with the apparently missing five of the seven sets discovered at Udayēndiram in 1850.

The copper-plates which bear the subjoined inscription, are five in number. When they reached my hands, they were strung on a ring, which is cut and bears a circular seal. This contains, in high relief, on a counter-sunk surface, a recumbent bull, which faces the proper right and is placed on a pedestal between two lamps. Over the bull is a seated figure on a pedestal, and between two symbols which I cannot make out. The diameter of the seal is 3(1/4) inches, and that of the ring 4(1/2) to 4(7/8) inches. The ring is about (3/8) inch thick. A comparison of this description of the ring and seal with that given by Mr. Foulkes in the first paragraph of his edition of the plates, suggests that, when he examined the plates, they were accompanied by a different ring and seal. Besides, the seal which is now attached to the plates, does not resemble the seals of other Pallava grants, but is closely allied to the seal of the Udayēndiram plates of the Bāṇa king Vikramāditya II. (Mr. Foulkes’ No. V) and of the Gaṅga-Bāṇa king Pṛithivīpati II. Hastimalla (No. 76 below).⁴ I therefore believe that it may have originally belonged to one of the two Udayēndiram grants of the Bāṇa dynasty, which are now missing (Mr. Foulkes’ grants B and C), and that the original seal-ring of the Pallava plates may have been attached by mistake to one of these two grants and lost along with the latter.

The inscription consists of two distinct portions,—a grant of the Pallava king Nandivarman Pallavamalla in the Sanskrit language and the Grantha character (ll. 1 to 105), and a short inscription of the time of the Chōḷa king Madirai-koṇḍa Kō-Parakēsarivarman in the Tamil language and character (ll. 105 to 109), which, however, looks as if it had been written by the same hand as the first or Pallava part of the inscription. Further, the Grantha and Tamil alphabet of both portions of the inscription is considerably more modern than that of other Pallava grants, and even than that of two other copper-plate inscriptions of Madirai-koṇḍa Kō-Parakēsarivarman.⁵ Consequently, the plates are either a forgery, or they are a copy, made at a later date, of two inscriptions, one of Nandivarman Pallavamalla, and one Madirai-koṇḍa Kō-Parakēsarivarman, the originals of which are not within our reach.

The Sanskrit portion of the inscription records that, in the twenty-first year of his reign (l. 38), the Pallava king Nandivarman (v. 4, ll. 36 f. and 37 f.), surnamed Pallavamalla (ll. 36, 46 and 47), granted a village to one hundred and eight Brāhmaṇas (l. 64 f.). This grant was made at the request of one of his military officers or vassals, named Udayachandra (v. 1 and l. 61), who belonged to the race of Pūchān (v. 2, l. 45 f. and v. 7), that had been in the hereditary service of the Pallava race, and who resided at the city of Vilvala (v. 2 and l. 44) on the river Vēgavatī (l. 41). This river passes Conjeeveram, and falls into the Pālāṟu near the village of Villivalam,⁶ which accordingly must be the Tamil original of Vilvala, the Sanskrit name of the capital of Udayachandra. The three opening verses refer to the god Sadāśiva, the chief Udayachandra, and the race of the Pallavas, respectively. Then follows, in prose, a genealogy of the reigning Pallava king, the mythical portion of which (l. 8 ff.) contains the following names:— Brahmā. Aṅgiras. Bṛihaspati. Śaṁyu. Bharadvāja. Drōṇa. Aśvatthāman. Pallava.

The list of the historical descendants of Pallava from Siṁhavishṇu to Paramēśvaravarman II. (l. 11 ff.) need not be repeated here, because it agrees with the list in the Kaśākūḍi plates (p. 344), and because the battles which Narasiṁhavarman I. and Paramēśvaravarman I. are reported to have won,⁷ were noticed in the introduction to the Kūram plates (Vol. I, p. 145). A long prose passage (l. 19 ff.) opens with the words: “The son of this Paramēśvaravarman (II.) (was);” is interrupted by verses 4 to 6, which refer to the Pallava king Nandivarman; and appears to be taken up again by the words: “His son was Nandivarman Pallavamalla” (l. 36 f.). Mr. Foulkes concludes from this, that there were two successive Pallava kings of the name Nandivarman, the second of whom was the son of the first and bore the distinctive surname Pallavamalla.⁸ I do not think it probable that verses 4 to 6 are to be considered as forming one sentence with the first prose passage (l. 19 ff.), but would prefer to treat these verses as a parenthesis, and the second prose passage (l. 36 f.) as the end of the same sentence which begins with the first prose passage. In this way we obtain only one Pallava king named Nandivarman, who bore the surname Pallavamalla and was the son of Paramēśvaravarman II. This statement is at variance with the Kaśākūḍi plates, according to which Nandivarman Pallavamalla was not the son of his predecessor, but belonged to an entirely different branch of the Pallavas. Here is another point which might induce us to stamp the Udayēndiram plates as a forgery. For, it is difficult to understand how one and the same king could call himself the son of his predecessor in an inscription of his 21st year, and the son of somebody else in an inscription of his 22nd year. Two explanations might, however, be attempted. Nandivarman may have thought it political to give himself out for the adopted son of his predecessor; or it may be assumed that, through mere carelessness, the scribe who drafted the inscription, used the word putra, ‘son’ (ll. 19 and 37), while he wanted to represent Nandivarman only as a successor, and not as the son, of Paramēśvaravarman II.

The most interesting portion of the inscription is the account of the services which Udayachandra rendered to his royal master. When Pallavamalla was besieged in Nandipura by the Dramiḷa princes, Udayachandra came to his rescue and killed with his own hand the Pallava king Chitramāya and others (l. 46 ff.). The name Chitramāya sounds more like a biruda than a real name. Thus the ancient Pallava king Narasiṁha had the biruda Amēyamāya,⁹ and Rājasiṁha that of Māyāchāra.¹⁰ It is not improbable that the Dramiḷa princes whose leader was Chitramāya, were the relations and followers of Nandivarman’s predecessor Paramēśvaravarman II. and that they had to be overcome by force, before Nandivarman could establish himself on the throne. Further, Udayachandra is said to have bestowed the kingdom many times on Nandivarman by his victories at Nimba[vana], Chūtavana, Śaṁkaragrāma, Nellūr, Nelvēli, Śūṟāvaṛundūr, etc. (l. 48 ff.). Of these localities, Nellūr is the head-quarter station of the present Nellore district. Another of them, Nelvēli, is mentioned a second time immediately after, as the place near which Udayachandra killed the Śabara king Udayana (l. 52). The Śabaras are generally identified with the modern Sauras, a hill-tribe in the Gañjām and Vizagapatam districts. As, however, the different names of savage tribes are often treated as synonyms by Sanskrit writers, and as the Tamil name Nelvēli cannot possibly be located in the Telugu districts, it may be that the author of the inscription is referring to one of the hill-tribes of the Tamil country, and that Nelvēli is meant for the modern Tinnevelly.¹¹ An additional argument in favour of this view is that, immediately after the description of the war with the Śabaras, the author refers to Udayachandra’s achievements “in the Northern region also.” He there pursued and defeated the Nishāda chief Pṛithivivyāghra, who was performing an Aśvamēdha, and drove him out of the district of Vishṇurāja, which he subjected to the Pallava king (l. 55 ff.). Nishāda is, like Śabara, one of the words by which Sanskrit writers designate savage tribes. The district of Vishṇurāja, which was situated to the north of the Pallava country, can be identified with certainty. As Nandivarman was a contemporary of the Western Chalukya king Vikramāditya II. who reigned from A.D. 733-34 to 746-47,¹² he was also a contemporary of the Eastern Chalukya king Vishṇuvardhana III. whose reign is placed by Dr. Fleet between A.D. 709 and 746.¹³ He is evidently the Vishṇurāja of the Udayēndiram plates,¹⁴ and his district (vishaya) is the country of Vēṅgī, over which the Eastern Chalukyas ruled. The last two items in the list of Udayachandra’s deeds are, that he destroyed the fort of Kāḷidurga,¹⁵ and that he defeated the Pāṇḍya army at the village of Maṇṇaikuḍi (l. 59 ff.).

The grant which was made by Nandivarman Pallavamalla at the request of Udayachandra, consisted of the village of Kumāramaṅgala-Veḷḷaṭṭūr, which belonged to the district called Paśchimāśrayanadī-vishaya, and of two water-levers (jala-yantra) in the neighbouring village of Koṟṟagrāma, which appear to have been added in order to supply the former village with means of irrigation. As in the case of other grants, the original name of the village was changed into Udayachandramaṅgalam in commemoration of Udayachandra, at whose instance the donation was made (l. 62 ff.). The description of the boundaries of Udayachandramaṅgalam is given in great detail (l. 65 ff.). Among the boundaries we find, in the east, a small river; in the south, the temple of Koṟṟagrāma, the same village, a portion of which had been included in the granted village; in the north, the village of Kāñchidvāra, which, in its Tamil form Kāñchivāyil, is referred to in line 107 of the present inscription, and in another copper-plate grant from Udayēndiram;¹⁶ and in the north-east, the river Kshīranadī, the Tamil name of which is Pālāṟu. As the modern village of Udayēndiram is situated on the Pālāṟu river; as the original of the present inscription is preserved, and was most probably discovered, at Udayēndiram; and as the Tamil name Udayēndiram bears a close resemblance to the Sanskrit name Udayachandramaṅgalam, and still more so to the forms Udayēnduchaturvēdimaṅgalam and Udayēndumaṅgalam, which occur in two other Udayēndiram grants,¹⁷—there is no doubt that Mr. Le Fanu is correct in identifying the granted village of Udayachandramaṅgalam with the modern Udayēndiram.¹⁸ This village is now situated on the northern bank of the Pālāṟu, while Udayachandramaṅgalam is said to have been bounded by the Kshīranadī on the north-east, and by an unnamed small river on the east. It must be therefore assumed that either, as Mr. Le Fanu suggests, the Pālāṟu has changed its bed, or that the name Udayēndiram has travelled across the river in the course of the past eleven centuries. Paśchim-āśrayanadī-vishaya, the name of the district to which the granted village belonged, is a literal Sanskrit translation of the Tamil territorial term Mēl-Aḍaiyāṟu-nāḍu, which, according to another Udayēndiram grant (No. 76 below), was a subdivision of the district of Paḍuvūr-kōṭṭam.

The remainder of the prose portion enumerates the Brāhmaṇa donees (l. 75 ff.), who, according to line 64, were one hundred and eight in number. The actual number of the donees is, however, sixty-three, and that of the shares one hundred and thirty-three. This discrepancy is a third point which suggests that the inscription may be a forgery.

Of the two concluding verses, the first (v. 7) refers to the race of Pūchān, and the second (v. 8) informs us that the inscription,—which, like the Kūram and Kaśākūḍi inscriptions,¹⁹ is styled a eulogy (praśasti, ll. 101 and 105),—was composed by the poet Paramēśvara, who also received one of the shares of the granted village (l. 101 f.).

The Tamil endorsement (l. 105 ff.) is dated in the 26th year of the reign of Madiraikoṇḍa Kō-Parakēsarivarman, i.e., of the Chōḷa king Parāntaka I.,²⁰ and records that the villagers of Udayachandramaṅgalam agreed with those of the neighbouring village of Kāñchivāyil,²¹ which was also called Igaṉmaṟaimaṅgalam, to form one village of the two. Another copy of the Tamil endorsement has been added on the first, originally blank side of the first plate of another Udayēndiram grant.²²

Languages: Sanskrit, Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv02p0i0074.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This inscription is dated in the 23rd year of the reign of the ancient Chōḷa king Rāja-kēsarivarman.¹ It records that a certain Brahmādhirāja (ll. 4 and 11) deposited 200 kaḻañju of gold with the villagers, and that the latter pledged themselves to apply the interest of this sum to the feeding of twelve learned Brāhmaṇas.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv03p0i0001.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This is a highly damaged record of Vijaya-Kampavikramavarman dated in his 9th year. It registers a gift of 30 kaḻañju of gold by Amarnidi alias Pallavadiyaraiyar of Kañjanūr in Indaḷūr-nāḍu which was a subdivision of Śōḻa-nāḍu and another gift of a similar amount by a person whose name is lost, for burning two perpetual lamps in the temple at Tiruvoṟṟiyūr. It may be noted that Kañjanūr which may be identified with the village of the same name in the Kumbakonam taluk of the Tanjore district is not herein called Siṁhavishṇu-chaturvēdimaṅgalam, as is done in a record from Tiruviḍaimarudūr.¹

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0100.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This record dated in the 10th year of Vijaya-Kampavikramavarman states that, when the army of Pirudi-Gaṅgaraiyar was stationed at Kāvaṉṉūr in Miyāṟu-nāḍu, a subdivision of Paḍuvūr-kōṭṭam, the kāvidi ‘who took Perunagar’ and who was also a soldier of Vāṇaraiyar opposed it and fell in the encounter.

Language: Undetermined.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0101.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This inscription, dated in the 11th year of Vijaya-Kampavarman, registers a sale of the ērikkāḍi-right by the assembly of Kīḻppūdūr in Kāliyūr-kōṭṭam to Mādēvaṉār, son of Perumbāṇaṉ Śakkaḍi-Araiyar in return for the gold received from him. One kāḍi of paddy was ordered to be levied as ērikkāḍi (tank duty) on each paṭṭi of cultivated land, including those given to physicians as vaidya-bhōga.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0102.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: The date of this record of Vijaya-Kampavarman is not clear. It might be 11, 13 or 16. The inscription records an agreement made by the assembly (ūr) of Vaikkāṭṭūr to provide offerings to the god Mahādēva at Tiruvoṟṟiyūr, on the day of saṅkrānti, for the interest on 27 kaḻañju of gold received by them from Pūdi Aṟindigai, wife of Viḍēlviḍugu [Iḷaṅkōvē]ḷār of Koḍumbāḷūr¹ in Kō-nāḍu. The chiefs of Koḍumbāḷūr (in the Pudukkottai state) figure largely in inscriptions as subordinates of the Chōḷas, but their connection with the Pallavas is not so well known. A chief of this family is also mentioned in a mutilated record from Kīḻūr,² dated in the 11th year of Vijaya-Nandivikramavarman, where the donor is stated to be the wife of Śāttaṉ Maṟavaṉ and the daughter of Vikrama-Pūdi who is probably identical with Viḍēlviḍugu Iḷaṅkō-Adiaraiyaṉ mentioned in the same record.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0103.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: The subjoined record is dated in the 17th year of Vijaya-Kampavarman and in registers a gift of 736 kaḻañju of gold to the assembly of Chiṟṟambalam in Kāvadippākkam alias Avaṉinārāyaṇa-chaturvēdimaṅgalam for feeding a person daily, by a lady called Nampirāṭṭi, the elder sister of one Tiruvānaṅgamudi.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0104.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: The construction of a temple of Nirañjanēśvarattu-Mahādēva at Tiruvoṟṟiyūr by a certain Nirañjanaguravar of the place and the gift of 20,000 kuḻi of land by purchase from the assembly of Maṇali for its upkeep, are recorded in this inscription of Vijaya-Kampavarman dated in the 19th year. The document was drawn up by Rudrappōttar Kumāra-Kāḷan, the madhyastha of the village. The communities Mandirattār and Kombaṟuttār are mentioned in ll. 29-30.

The inscription is stated to have been engraved by Tiruvoṟṟiyūr-Āchāryaṉ alias Paramēśvaran, son of Śāmuṇḍāchārya.

The puḷḷis are marked in the inscription.

Languages: Sanskrit, Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0105.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This inscription of Kampavarman, dated in the 20th year, is engraved above the figure of a person holding his severed head by the tuft in his left hand, while the right hand grasps a sword (Plate VI). It registers a gift of land made by the ūrār of Tiruvāṉmūr to Paṭṭai-Pōttaṉ for the pious act of Okkoṇḍanāgaṉ Okkatīndaṉ Paṭṭai-Pōttaṉ, probably his father, in cutting off flesh from nine parts of his body and finally his head as an offering to the goddess Bhaṭārī, i.e., Durgā.

The rituals connected with human sacrifice offered to the goddess Durgā are described in the Kālikā-Purāṇa, Chapter 70.

The modern Mallām or an ancient suburb of it was known as Tiruvāṉmūr in inscriptions.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0106.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: It is stated in this record of Vijaya-Kampavarman, dated in the 20th year, that a member of the āḷum-gaṇattār of Kāvadippākkam in Paḍuvūr-kōṭṭam made a gift of 11 kaḻañju of gold for supplying, from the interest on this amount, water to the temple of Tiruppondaip-Perumānaḍigaḷ at Rājamalla-chaturvēdimaṅgalam. This village may be identified with Brahmadēśam itself where the present inscription is found. Since we find an inscription of the Gaṅga king Rājamalla, the grandson of Śrīpurusha at Vaḷḷimalai¹ not very far from Brahmadēśam, Rājamalla-chaturvēdimaṅgalam, may have been called so after this Gaṅga king. It may be mentioned that in the region surrounding Brahmadēśam there are villages called Srīpurushamaṅgalam² and Raṇavikrama chaturvēdimaṅgalam³ which must have been named after the Gaṅga kings Śrīpurusha and Raṇavikrama, the grandfather and father respectively of Rājamalla. The name of the god at Brahmadēśam viz., Tiruppondai-Perumānaḍigaḷ is uncommon in the Tamil country and it is probably to be traced to some Gaṅga or Western Chāḷukya⁴ princess.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0107.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This is dated in the 25th year of Vijaya-Kampavarman and registers the agreement made by the tirunāmakkiḻavar of Uḻaichchēri in Ūṟṟukkāḍu to burn three lamps and to provide offerings (to the god) for the money and land received by them from Pūśāli Vāmaṉaṉ a resident of the village. The name of the temple is not mentioned in the record, but from the reference made in it to the māhēśvaras, it seems to have been dedicated to Śiva.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0108.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary:

Summary: This is a damaged and incomplete record of Kampavikra[mavarman] dated in the 25th year. It registers an agreement made by the sabhā of Āṉiyūr to burn a perpetual lamp before the god Vambaṅkāṭṭu-Mahādēva for the interest on 40 kaḻañju of gold received by them from Periya Śrīdhara-Kramavittaṉ of Arivilimaṅgalam, a member of the āḷum-gaṇa, evidently of Āṉūr.

Language: Tamil.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv12p0i0109.