The Aravidu Dynasty of Vijayanagara, Vol. I v1.c21.32

v1.c21.32

3. While speaking of the coronation of Venkata, we have seen that the *pattabhisheka* ceremony had been performed by his family guru, Tatacharya or Tatayarya. We shall now give some particulars of this man who exercised so much influence on the rule of Venkata, and of whom we shall have occasion to speak frequently in the course of this volume. He was, according to the *Prapannamrtam*, a descendant of the maternal uncle of the great reformer Ramanuja; and two of his ancestors had been the cause of the conversion of the Emperor Virupaksha to Vaishnavism ⁹. He was the son of Panchamata-bhajanam Tatacharya, according to the same poem ¹⁰; but a copper-plate grant of 1590 in the Government Museum, Madras, states that he was ‘grand-son of Etur-Tatayia, and son of Srinaivasa’ ¹¹. He is styled ‘the ornament of the wise’ ¹². He is mentioned in an inscription of Ranga I, along with the temple officer of Tiruppukkuli ¹³. Again, the *Prapannamrtam* informs us that Venkata ‘became a disciple of the Srivaishnava teacher Lakshmikumara Tatacharya' 1, this being his full name. Moreover, in the same poem we read that the King "entrusted the whole kingdom to his preceptor; and he himself led a life of retirement doing service to him, like Kulasekhara of old" 2. The second part of this statement is absolutely false. Venkata II was certainly not an idle sovereign; he actually ruled (as we shall see further on) except during the last years of his life, when disabled by age and sickness he made over the cares of Government to one of his wives and her brother. Nay, we have further grounds for doubting even the veracity of the first part of the same statement. The whole passage sounds merely like a poetical exaggeration of a real fact. According to the above-mentioned copper-plate grant in the Madras Museum, Venkata, on December 27th, 1590, made the gift of a village (which he named Venkatapura) to the Srivaishnava teacher Tataya; the village was situated in the Konadu district which formed a subdivision of Uttukkadu Kottam 3. Moreover, an inscription of the year 1600-1 at Tirunirmalai, Chingleput, shows that he was supervising several Vaishnava temples 4; he was also the manager of the temple at Tiruppukkuli 5, and the supervisor of the Vaishnava temples at Kanchivaram 6; we know of an agent of his named Punyakoti-Aiyan 7. According to tradition, Tatacharya was so famous for his virtues and talents that he was believed to have been born from the spirit of Vishnu 8.