The Dynasties of the Kanarese Districts of the Bombay Presidency from the Earliest Historical Times to the Musalman Conquest c8.s17.143

c8.s17.143

Siṅghaṇa was succeeded, probably early in A.D. 1247, by his grandson Krishna, whose name appears also in the Prâkṛit forms of Kaṇhaṭa, Kaṇhâra, Kandhara, and Kandhâra.² The Bêhaṭṭi grant, from the Dhârwâr District,³ dated on the new-moon day of the month Chaitra (March-April), falling in A.D. 1253, of the Pramâdin saṁvatsara, Saka-Saṁvat 1175, wrongly described as current instead of expired, says that that day fell in his seventh year; and this indicates the Plavaṅga saṁvatsara, S.-S. 1170 current, = A.D. 1247-48, as his first year. On the other hand, an inscription at Hulgûr, in the same district,⁴ represents the full-moon day of Phâlguna (Feb.-March), falling in A.D. 1255, of the Ânanda saṁvatsara (S.-S. 1177 current), as being in his ninth year; and this would point to the Parâbhava saṁvatsara, S.-S. 1169 current, = A.D. 1246-47, as his first year. But at any rate the whole of the Parâbhava saṁvatsara did not belong to his reign; for it is cited, with a date in November-December, A.D. 1246, as the thirty-seventh year of Siṅghaṇa.⁵ And possibly the explanation is that Krishna succeeded nearly at the end of that saṁvatsara, in the first three months of A.D. 1247; and that, consequently, the Plavaṅga saṁvatsara was more usually reckoned as the first year of his reign. In addition to the Bêhaṭṭi and Hulgûr records, others have been obtained at Beṇḍigeri,⁶ Chikka-Bâgewâḍi,⁷ Mamdâpur, and Manôḷi,⁸ in the Belgaum District, and at Chaudadâmpur, Gadag, Hûvina-Sigaḷḷi, Kallukeri, and Nâgâvi, in Dhârwâr. And, coupled with the statements in the Maṇôḷi and Bêhaṭṭi records that he reigned and held his court at Dêvagiri, the localities suffice to shew that he kept together the kingdom to which he had succeeded. The earliest of the records is the Chikka-Bâgewâḍi grant, dated in the month Âshâḍha (June-July), falling in A.D. 1249, of the Saumya saṁvatsara, Saka-Saṁvat 1171 expired; the latest is an inscription at Chaudadâmpur,¹ dated in Chaitra (March-April), falling in A.D. 1259, of the Siddhârthin samvatsara (S.-S. 1182 current). The Bêhatti grant gives him all the paramount epithets and titles, except samastabhuvanâśraya; and the records shew generally that he was styled, successively, Pratâpa-Chakravartin, Bhujabalapratâpa-Chakravartin, and Bhujabulapraudhapratâpa-Chakravartin. They mention, as officials, an Amâtya or minister and Sarvadêśâdhikârin named Malla or Mallisetti, an elder brother of the Vichaya who has been mentioned in connection with Singhana, who, in A.D. 1249, when residing at Mudgal in the Nizâm's Dominions, granted the village called Santeya-Bâgevâdi, i.e. the modern Hirê-Bâgewâdi in the Huvvalli or Mugutkhân-Hubli twelve in the Kuhundi country, which was one of the provinces subject to him, and in the same year granted the village of Tâmbrapuri in the Vênugrâma or Belgaum country; the Râyarâjaguru or royal preceptor Sômêśvaradêva, with the date of A.D. 1251; and Mallisetti's son, the Mahâmâtya and Mahâpradhâna Chaundisetti or Chaundarâja, who obtained the Chikka-Bâgewâdi and Bendigeri charters which register the above two grants, and who himself in A.D. 1253 visited Kukkanûr in the Nizâm's Dominions, in the course of a victorious progress through the country, and granted that town, the chief town of a circle of thirty villages in the Belvola country. They contain vague expressions which claim successes for Krishna against the Mâlavas, the Gurjaras, and the Chôlas, and in the Konkan; they say that he destroyed Tripura, which seems to be the modern Têwar near Jabalpur, the capital of the Kalachuris of Central India; and they call him, like Singhana, "an establisher of the Têlunga king:" but otherwise they do not disclose any historical facts.