History of the Pallavas of Kanchi c8.16

c8.16

*Mahārāja Bappa.*—It is not clear whether the immediate ancestor of Śivaskandavarman of the Prakrit charters, who is called Bappa in the record found at Mayidavolu, was the actual founder of the rule of the Pallavas at Kāñchīpuram. In all probability he was not. Because, if this had been so we may reasonably expect the mention of such an achievement in the record issued by his son and heir-apparent, and dated in his own reign. The kingdom over which Bappa ruled included in addition to the districts around Kāñchīpuram known as Toṇḍamaṇḍalam or Tuṇḍākarāṣṭra, the Telugu country on both banks of the Krishna which had Dharaṇikoṭa or Dhānyakaṭaka for its capital. It may be presumed that during this age the Pallava kingdom was divided into two parts, the northern part comprising the Telugu districts with Amarāvati as capital, and the Tamil districts around Kāñchī with Kāñchīpuram for its capital. Thus the region bounded by the Pālāṛ on the south and the Krishna on the north formed the kingdom of the Pallavas during this period. The close resemblance of the Mayidavolu plates with the Koṇḍamuḍi plates of Jayavarman which again resembles the Karle inscription of Gautamīputra Śātakarṇi and the Nasik inscription of Vasiṣṭhīputra-Puḷumāvi, fixes the period of Bappa and Śivaskandavarman approximately as the early part of the third century A.D.¹—Prof. Jouveau-Dubreuil supposed, in his *Pallavas*, that Yuvamahārāja Śivaskandavarman of the Mayidavolu record was the grandson of the Āndhra king Śivaskandavarman.² But as he himself admits, this is based entirely on similarity of names such as those of Yuvamahārāja Śivaskandavarman and Śivaskaṇḍa Śātakarṇi.³ Apart from this there is no positive evidence to prove that the Pallavas were directly connected with the ruling Śatavāhana royal family or descended from them.