The Aravidu Dynasty of Vijayanagara, Vol. I v1.c12.158

v1.c12.158

Achyuta, in great anger, summoned his general Nagama Nayaka, and ordered him to muster an army and march to the South, to chastise the refractory Chola and to reinstate the Pandya on his throne. Accordingly Nagama Nayaka set out against Vira Sekhara Chola, and defeated and killed him near Tanjore. He then proceeded to Madura and drove out the garrison stationed there by the Chola¹. Nagama Nayaka then offered the kingdom to the dispossessed Pandya. But the old Chandra Sekhara considered himself unable to rule over so turbulent a province (for there was not perfect order throughout the country, and several villages had not sent their revenues regularly to the treasury). So he answered that, since he had no legitimate son to succeed him as king, he would be content if Nagama Nayaka should rule the kingdom and give him an adequate allowance. Nagama closed with the Pandya's proposal. But later on, finding the allowance too Visvanatha, who must have been in Madura according to the *Tanjavuri Charitra*; and although it seems possible that Visvanatha was in that expedition, some authors think that he did not take part in it at all. Cf. p. 117, note 5. Even supposing this, how could Visvanatha tolerate the incursions of the Travancore sovereign into the territories belonging to his jurisdiction? Moreover, after the execution of Vira Sekhara Chola the Tanjore country was annexed to Madura; and Visvanatha was ruling for a time over the Chola and Pandya countries till the appointment of Sevvappa as Nayak of Tanjore. Nevertheless, if we suppose these events to have occurred in Krishna's reign, after the extinction of the Chola dynasty, another Chola appears in the reign of Achyuta invading the Madura country. Cf. above, No. 11. All these difficulties disappear at once if we suppose a mistake on the part of a copyist while writing, or a subsequent wrong addition. The other sources do not give the name of the emperor. As to the date of these events, it is evident that the war of the Chola against the Pandya took place after the removal of Visvanatha, and that was after two years and four months of administration; hence we cannot suppose that the war of the Chola was prior to 1539. Therefore, the appointment of Visvanatha as Viceroy of Madura in this second period took place at the end of Achyuta's reign.