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Mysore and Coorg from the Inscriptions c8.s3: 3. Mahāvalis or Bāṇas

Mysore and Coorg from the Inscriptions c8.s3

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3. Mahāvalis or Bāṇas

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The Mahāvalis held the country east from the Pālār river and north into the Madras districts. According to one inscription (IA. xiii. 6) their territory lay to the west of the Āndhra or Telugu country, and Mb 157 describes them as ruling a Seven-and-a-half Lakh country, having twelve thousand villages, in the Āndhra-maṇḍala. This seems to have been known as the Vaḍugavaḷi Twelve Thousand (SII. iii. 90), in Sanskrit the Āndhrāt-pathaḥ (EI. iii. 76). They claim descent from Mahāvali or Mahā Bali (Bali the Great) and his son Bāṇa, whence they are also called Bāṇas. They may have been connected with Mahābalipura, known as the Seven Pagodas, on the coast south of Madras. Their flag displayed a black buck, and their crest was a bull (Mb 126).

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Bali was a Daitya or Dānava (or, as we should say, Titan) king, who by the power of his penance defeated Indra, humbled the gods, and dominated the three worlds. The gods appealed for help to Vishnu, who assumed the Vāmana or Dwarf incarnation, and appearing before Bali as a Brāhman dwarf, begged for only three paces of ground. This being granted, he assumed his godlike dimensions, and with two strides having covered heaven and earth, there being no place for the third, planted his foot on Bali's head, and forced him down to Pātāla (the nether world and abode of the Nāgas or serpents), which on account of certain virtues was left in his possession. The germ of this legend is found in the Ṛig-vēda, where Vishnu is represented as taking three strides over heaven, earth, and the lower regions—typifying perhaps the rising, culmination, and setting of the sun.

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Bāṇa was Bali's eldest son, a giant with a thousand arms. He propitiated Śiva, who agreed to live in his capital,¹ and Bāṇa appointed him guardian of the gates, or doorkeeper, as the inscriptions put it. Bāṇa's daughter Ushā became enamoured of a prince she saw in a dream, whom, on being shown a number of portraits, she identified with Krishna's grandson Aniruddha. Him her female friend Chitralēkhā then contrived to introduce clandestinely into the princess's apartments. When discovered, he was seized and imprisoned by Bāṇa, and a war ensued. Krishna came in person from Dvāraka to besiege the capital. Śiva guarded the gates and fought for Bāṇa, who worshipped him with his thousand hands. But Krishna found means to overthrow Śiva, and having taken the city, cut off Bāṇa's thousand hands, except two, with which he obliged him to do homage.

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¹ According to the Vishnu Purāṇa (Bk. V. chap. xxxiii.) this was Śōṇitapura, said to be Dēvikōṭa, near the mouth of the Coleroon, on the Madras coast.

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This line of kings was first brought to notice by my discovery of the two big stone inscriptions, Sp 5 and 6 (vol. x), originally published by me in 1881 (*IA.* x. 36). The plates published in 1884 by the Rev. T. Foulkes (*IA.* xiii. 6)¹ added to the information regarding them. Many inscriptions were later found in the Kolar District (vol. x), and some further details were contributed by inscriptions at Tiruvallam, north of Vellore in North Arcot (*SII.* iii. 88), a place described as Vāṇapuram (Bāṇapuram), situated in Perum-Bāṇappāḍi, the great Bāṇa country, or country of the Great Bāṇa (see Bṛihad Bāṇa, farther on). The records in Mysore supply only three dates—338,² 909, and 961. Those at Tiruvallam add one—888—but do not specify the name of the Bāṇa king whose time it was.

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¹ Published again by Dr. Kielhorn in 1894 (*EI.* iii. 74).

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² This date has been examined by Dr. Kielhorn (*IA.* xxiv. 10) and Dr. Fleet (xvii. 239), who find only the week day disagrees.

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A table of the Mahāvali or Bāṇa kings so far as known is appended, with dates where given :—

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Bali, Mahābali, lord of the Dānavas, regent of the Asuras,

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Bāṇa, who made Paramēśvara (worshipped by all the three worlds, the lord of gods and demons) his doorkeeper. In his line was born Bāṇadhirāja. After many Bāṇa kings had passed away, there were Nandivarmma

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Vijayāditya

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Vadhūvallabha Malladēva Nandivarmma, 338 : Jaya-Nandivarmma

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Vijayāditya

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Malladēva Jagadēkamalla Bāṇa Vidyādhara, Vikramāditya Jayamēru, married Kundavvai, daughter of Pratipati (Prithuvipati I), the son of Kongunivarmmadharmma-mahārāja Śivamahārāja-Permmānaḍigal (the Ganga king Śivamāra II)

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Prabhumēru

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Vikramāditya, (?) 888

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Vijayāditya, Bejeyitta, Pugalvippavar-gaṇḍa, 909

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Vijayabāhu Vikramāditya, the friend of Krishna Rāja (? Rāshṭrakūṭa king, 884-913) : Sambayya, 961 ruling under the Pallava king Iriva-Nolamba or Dilīpa (943-966).

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The first Ganga king, Konguṇivarmma, who is assigned to the second century, is said (SII. ii. 187) to have been consecrated to conquer the Bāṇa country, and in DB 67 to be a wild-fire in consuming the stubble of the forest Bāṇa. Mayūraśarmma, the progenitor of the Kadambas, at about the same time is said (Sk 176), when an outlaw in the forests of Śrīparvata (Karnūl District), to have levied tribute from Bṛihad Bāṇa (the great Bāṇa¹) and other kings. The Chōla king Killi-Valavan, who reigned about 105 to 120, married the princess Sithathakai, claiming descent from Mahābali. She was probably the daughter of a king in the Mysore country² (no doubt a Bāṇa). The Kolar volume gives an account of such details as the various inscriptions there supply regarding the Bāṇas. The first Nandivarmma is said to have promoted the fortunes of his family, and obtained the crown and the throne amid the blessings of Brāhmans. He was possessed of mighty elephant and other forces, which secured him against conquest by the most powerful kings. Malladēva Nandivarmma is said to have been like a sun in waking up the lotus lake of the Bāṇa family, and in compassion for all living things in the three worlds was like Bōdhisattva or Buddha.

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¹ If this indicates the first Bāṇa, it furnishes a clue to his period.

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² Kanakasabhai's *The Tamils Eighteen Hundred Years Ago*, 77.

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For other references—the Chalukya king Vikramāditya (655-680) is said (*IA.* vi. 75; *Seven Pagodas*, 127) to have conquered Rājamalla of the Mahāmalla family, that is the kings of Māmallaipura, the common name for Mahābalipura—in other words the Mahāvalis. Under the Gangas in 776 the Nirgunda Yuvarāja, Duṇḍu, is said (Ng 85) to have put the Bāṇa family to confusion. The Ganga king Nitimārgga, in about 850, is said (Mb 228) to have captured Bāṇarasa’s Mahārājara-nāḍ, which was chiefly in the Kadapa District. The Chōla king Vīra-Nārāyaṇa or Parāntaka in 921 claims (*SII.* ii. 387) to have uprooted by force two Bāṇa kings, and conferred the title of Bāṇadhirāja on the Ganga prince Prithuvīpati II, great-grandson of Śivamāra I. The Bāṇas, therefore, though claiming friendship with Krishna Rāja, no doubt a Rāshṭrakūṭa king and an enemy of the Chōlas, seem to have lost their independence in the first half of the tenth century. Hence we find (Mb 126) Sambayya in 961 ruling a district under the Pallava king Iriva-Nolamba or Dilipa.

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But they by no means disappear from history. The Bāṇa kingdom is mentioned along with others in southern India of the twelfth century in Vaidyanātha’s *Pratāpa-Rudriya*. Trivikrama-dēva, the author of the Prākrit grammar *Trivikrama-vritti*, of probably the fifteenth century, claims to be a descendant of the Bāṇa family (*IA.* xiii. 13). Moreover, inscriptions at Śrīvilliputtūr in the Tinnivelly District show that two kings, named Sundara Tol and Muttarasa Tirumala, who obtained possession of the Pāṇdya throne in 1453 and 1476, call themselves Mahāvali Vāṇādhirāja (*ib.* xv. 173).

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