History of Orissa from the Earliest Times to the British Period v1.c31.25

v1.c31.25

The death of Mukunda Harichandana, the last great Gajapati of Orissa, brought the solidarity of the country to an end. Up to this time the Gajapatis were in possession of almost the whole of the kingdom left to Pratāparudra at the time of the conclusion of the peace with Kṛṣṇadevarāya of Vijayanagara in 1519. The southern limit of the kingdom of Mukunda Harichandana is indicated by a short Telugu inscription on a pillar at Drākshārāmam on the Godāvari which has not been fully published as yet. The summary published by the late Rao Bahadur H. Krishna Sastri is not very reliable; "States that the king while ruling from his throne at Kataka (i. e., Cuttack) having conquered the Gauḍa (country), giving promise of favour to the Gauḍa king, and having performed the pearl Tulapurusha and other donations at the Gaṅgā (? Ganges), remitted the duties on the marriages in the 27th sthalas attached to Rajamahendravaram." The inscription is dated 10th Aṅka, di. 5, kri, 7, Akahaya Pushya, ba 7, a Thursday. The 10th Aṅka corresponds to the 8th year of the reign and the inscription must have been incised in 1568. This inscription calls Mukundadeva *Vira Mukunda-Gajapati-Mahadeva*.² The inscription is to be found on a pillar in the *Mandapa* in front of the western *Gopuram* of the temple of Bhimesvara in the village of Drākshārāmam of the Ramachandrapuram *taluga* of the Godāvari district. It proves that up to 1578 the Gajapatis had not lost any land to the north of the Godāvari.