Mysore and Coorg from the Inscriptions c8.s5.33

c8.s5.33

Śrīpurusha’s son Śivamāra Saigoṭṭa came to the throne in the latter part of the eighth century.¹ In his reign the prosperity of the Gangas underwent a reverse, and they became subject to calamities which threatened the extinction of the Ganga power altogether. These arose from the Rāshṭrakūṭas, who had recently, under their king Krishna I, ousted the Western Chālukyas and established their own supremacy. Krishna’s son Dhōra, also called Dhruva, Nirupama, and Dhārāvarsha, who had superseded his elder brother (owing to the latter’s addiction to pleasure and indifference to his royal duties, *EI*. iv. 287), seized and imprisoned the king of the Gangas, who are expressly said (Nl 61; *EI*. vi. 248) never to have been conquered by others. The motive for this harsh step may possibly have been that Dhārāvarsha, having determined to set aside his elder son Kambha or Stambha in favour of a younger son Gōvinda,—whom he appointed yuvarāja or heir-apparent, and to ensure whose succession to the throne he even offered to abdicate,—had it in his mind to compensate the former by giving him the Ganga kingdom. But another account (*EI*. iii. 104) states that Ganga was one of the hostile kings whom Gōvinda brought into the country as an aid to himself. Hence the resentment against Ganga. In any case, we find Kambharasa in Hg 93 governing the Ninety-six Thousand (a common designation of the Ganga territory) under his father. In SB 24, where he is called Raṇāvalōka Kambaiya, he is said to be ruling the kingdom of the world; and in 802 was still in power (Nl 61). After him, in 812, when his younger brother Gōvinda Prabhūtavarsha was on the throne, we find (Gb 61) Chāki Rāja was chief ruler (*adhirāja*) of the entire (*aśēsha*) Gaṅga-maṇḍala. This is the latest date we have for the Rāshṭrakūṭa occupation.