Pallava Architecture, Part I (MASI 17) c2.8

c2.8

We know that in the second century, the Āndhra king Pulumāvi II embellished the famous white marble stūpa at Amarāvatī on the southern bank of the Krishnā river, and that the Pallavas were the political successors of the Āndhras in that district shortly after this event. What position these early Pallavas occupied under the Āndhras and in what particular circumstances they rose into supreme power are questions which cannot be answered at present, but there is every reason to believe that future historians will eventually be able to give a fairly complete narrative of the doings of the Pallava rulers and lay open the secret of their origin.