South India and her Muhammadan Invaders c11.29

c11.29

Māravarman’s aggressive activity along this line was apparently put a stop to by the occupation of Kaṇṇanūr by the Hoysalas, and in his later campaigns at any rate, Māravarman probably took a more eastern road by way of Vallam, Tanjore and further east. There are visible signs of wanton destruction in the locality, which may be due to the Muhammadan invaders; and the last of all Kaḍambarmalai would be about seventy-five miles, and therefore five marches, from Madura. It therefore seems likely that Kaḍambavanam was the camping ground Kham of the Muhammadans after they left Trichinopoly. This identification receives further confirmation from an inscription of A.H. 761 (about A.D. 1359-60) in the Tirukkaḷākkuḍi temple which relates to a dispute between certain villagers in Pon-Amarāvati Nāḍu. A number of Muhammadan generals who went down to destroy Śūraikkuḍi are said to have been in camp at Māttūrkuḷam where they summoned the inhabitants of the two villages of Viraiyāchilai and Koṭṭiyūr, to settle their disputes. This apparently means that Māttūrkuḷam was in the high road from Pon-Amarāvati to Trichinopoly. Mātturkuḷam is just in the line from Kuḍumiyāmalai almost on the Trichinopoly-Pudukoṭṭa road now. The road therefore seems then to have run from Trichinopoly to Māttūrkuḷam, from there to Kuḍumiyāmalai across by way of Śittannavāśal, a few miles from Kuḍumiyāmalai, and straight along to Pon-Amarāvati, thence to Kaṇḍavarāyanpaṭṭi, Tiruppattūr, and thence along the present high road to Madura. And this seems clearly the road taken by Malik Kafur in his invasion of Madura.