Ancient History of the Deccan c4.s1.t2.27

c4.s1.t2.27

The interpretation of this inscription has given room to numerous errors and some of them great ones. A few of them have been corrected. For instance, the text contains the word "Kaurâla"; Fleet (Gupta Insc., page 7, footnote 1.) has said that this word "is obviously a mistake" and has corrected it into "Kairala" and then into Kêrala; thence it has been concluded that Samudra-Gupta advanced as far as the Chêra kingdom in South India. This identification of Kaurâla with the Malabar coast seemed to be confirmed by two other identifications: Kauttura with Kôttûra=Pollâchi (Coimbatore District) [see J. R. A. S., 1897, page 29] and Palakka with Pâlghât. But now Kauttura is identified with Kothoor in Ganjâm, and Palakka with a capital of the same name which was situated to the South of the Krishnâ and which is mentioned in many Pallava copper-plates (J. R. A. S., 1905, page 29). Moreover, I have myself, in 1917, in my work "The Pallavas," pages 14 and 15, said that the Pallavas reigned on the banks of the Krishnâ having their capital at Kâñchî; so, Samudra-Gupta was able to fight with Vishnugôpa of Kâñchî without any necessity to advance to the capital: and I ventured the opinion that they probably met on the banks of the Krishnâ and perhaps even in the north of the river as we may suppose that the Pallava king went forward to meet the Gupta emperor. Thus Samudra-Gupta's expedition turns out to be considerably reduced. However, I think that there are yet numerous errors to be corrected and that the whole history of Samudra-Gupta must be set right.