The Dynasties of the Kanarese Districts of the Bombay Presidency from the Earliest Historical Times to the Musalman Conquest c8.s11.182

Language: English

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The fact has already been stated, that mention is made of some Gangas, as being overthrown by the early Kadamba king Mrigêsavarman.² In the Mahâkûta pillar inscription, Gangas are included among the hostile peoples whose kings were conquered by Kîrtivarman I. between A. D. 567-68 and 597-98.³ They are referred to again, in the Aihole inscription, as being subjugated, with the Âlupas, by Pulikêsin II., about A. D. 608.⁴ And the Harihar grant of Vinayâditya, dated in A. D. 694, speaks of them, again in conjunction with the Âlupas,—here called Aluvas,—as hereditary servants of the Western Chalukya kings,⁵ to whose dynasty Kîrtivarman I., Pulikêsin II., and Vinayâditya belonged. These statements cannot all refer, if any of them do so, only to the Gangas of the east coast. And they suffice to shew that, in early times, there really was a reigning Ganga family in Western India. For the period, however, with which we are at present more directly concerned, the references are all impersonal; and no individual names are forthcoming until about a century after the latest date mentioned just above. There have, indeed, been known for a long time past various copper-plate charters,⁶ which purport to give an unbroken genealogical list going back to the first century A. D., and to furnish specific early dates in connection with certain names in it; thus, they would give the names of Harivarman with a date in A. D. 248,—of Vishnugôpa, with a date in A. D.

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351,—of Avinîta-Kongani, with dates in A. D. 454-55 and 466,—of Durvinîta-Kongani, with dates in A. D. 481-82 and 513-14,—and of Srîpurusha-Prithuvi-Kongani, with the dates of A. D. 762 and 776-77. And such supposed information as is derivable from them, from some other epigraphic records which have not yet been made available, and from a Tamil chronicle called Kongudêsa-Râjâkkal, has been compiled and published by Mr. Rice, with the result of a tolerably lengthy and circumstantial account, such as it is.⁷ But the charters in question are all spurious; the information given in them is absolutely unreliable; any similar statements, based on them or on the sources from which they were concocted, and included in later charters that may be genuine, are equally inadmissible; and the chronicle is absolutely worthless for any historical purposes.¹ Almost everything that has been written on the understanding that the records in question, and the chronicle, furnish authentic information, requires to be ignored and cancelled. And the general result is, that no individual Western Gaṅga names are as yet forthcoming for the early period with which this chapter specially deals; and we can treat here only of somewhat later times. Out of the names mentioned in the spurious charters, the first one which is certainly known to be authentic is that of the *Mahârâja* Srîpurusha-Prithuvî-Kongani, or, as he was more fully styled, Muttarasa-Srîpurusha-Prithuvî-Kongani.

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His existence is proved, not by the spurious grants, but by undeniably genuine but undated, inscriptions on stone at Talakâd, Sivâra, and Sivarapatna, in Mysore.¹ On general palæographic grounds, these records may be referred roughly to the eighth or ninth century A. D.; and one particular tell-tale character proves that they cannot have been engraved much after A. D. 804. It is, therefore, quite possible that the spurious Hosûr and Nâgamangala grants have hit off true dates for him, in A. D. 762 and 776-77,² though the person who concocted the Hosûr grant failed to compute the details of the date correctly. But all that can as yet be said with certainty about this Muttarasa-Srîpurusha-Prithuvî-Kongani or more shortly Srîpurusha-Muttarasa, is, that he was a reigning king, belonging, no doubt, to the Western Ganga lineage, and that, pending more precise discoveries, he may be placed in the period A. D. 750 to 850. There is, however, one name which may possibly be placed just before his. The spurious charters mention two persons named Sivamâra,—representing one of them as the father or grandfather, and the other as the son, of Srîpurusha-Muttarasa; and one of them, at Hallegere, purports to give for the first Sivamâra a date in A. D. 713, while another, at Suradhênupura,³ purports to give a date in A. D. 807-808 for the second Sivamâra.

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And, that there really was, just before or just after Muttarasa-Srîpurusha, a reigning king named Sivamâra, referable to the same lineage, is proved by a genuine, but undated, stone inscription, of his time, at Dêbûr in Mysore,⁴ engraved in well-formed characters of the same period. The record does not connect any title with his name; and it contains nothing that helps us to decide his identity: but it uses an expression which stamps him as a paramount sovereign. As far, therefore, as individual names go, the history of the Western Gangas starts with these two persons, Srîpurusha-Muttarasa and Sivamâra and either of them may be the Ganga king who was conquered and imprisoned by the Râshtrakûta king Dhruva (between A. D. 754 and 783-84), and was liberated, but afterwards had to be placed in confinement again, by that king's son Gôvinda III. (A. D. 783-84 to 814-815).⁵ Shortly after this,