The Rashtrakutas and their Times c14.3

c14.3

This wide empire must obviously have been divided into several provinces for administrative purposes. The Rāṣṭrakūṭa land-grants usually refer to Rāṣṭrapatis, Viṣayapatis and Grāmakūṭas in the stated order. The almost invariable precedence given to Rāṣṭrapatis makes is quite clear that Rāṣṭra was the largest administrative unit and Viṣaya was its subdivision. Under the Kalachuris and the early Chālukyas, who preceded the Rāṣṭrakūṭas in northern Maharashtra, Viṣaya was the larger and Rāṣṭra the smaller administrative unit; (1) but the Rāṣṭrakūṭas seem to have reversed this nomenclature, giving the name Rāṣṭra to the larger and Viṣaya to the smaller unit. The term Maṇḍala was used at this time in the neighbouring provinces to denote the territorial unit corresponding to Rāṣṭra; thus southern Gujarat was known as Lāṭa-Maṇḍala (2) and the Vengi kingdom as Āndhra maṇḍala. (3) The Rāṣṭrakūṭa documents, however, do not mention any Maṇḍala divisions in the home provinces.