History of the Pallavas of Kanchi c5.17.2

c5.17.2

Comparatively minor changes in the titles of rulers at a certain stage of their history, or of the existence of a number of rulers simultaneously in the same territory, are not reasons that would justify a hypothesis as grave as this. What seems actually to have taken place is this. The Pallava-Pandya struggle in the time of the great Pallavamalla seems to have been more or less for the overlordship of Kongu to begin with. At some period of his reign that overlordship, if it was at any time exercised by the Pallavamalla at all, passed over to the Pandyas. To fortify this position, they entered into a marriage alliance with the Gangas across the Kongu frontier and this brought down upon them a great Chālukya invasion, as the Gangas were perhaps regarded as Chālukya feudatories at the time. Feudatory or no, the Gangas in alliance with the Pandyas would be a real danger on the flank of the Chālukya, having regard to the fact that they regarded the Pallavas as their standing enemies. That brought on the battle of Veṇbai which had for its ultimate result the subversion of the dynasty of the Chālukyas and the establishment, in their stead, of the rule of the Rāṣṭrakūṭas who apparently fortified their position by an alliance with the Pallavas. This for the time settled the question of the political relationship between the Gangas, the Rāṣṭrakūṭas and the Pallavas.