Social and Political Life in the Vijayanagara Empire (A.D. 1346 – A.D. 1646) v1.c8.s3.15

v1.c8.s3.15

River transport was a source of revenue to the monarchs. The trade of the people of southern India was retarded to some extent by the rugged beds of the rivers, especially near the capital; nevertheless, it is interesting to note that by means of ferries, fords, and a peculiar type of boat, the Vijayanagara people solved successfully the question of the rivers. They were careful to make the rivers highways of traffic and to remove the impediments presented by them as advised by Śukra.³ In this as well as in other matters, old usuage was allowed to have its own way. The custom of ferrying people across a river with and without a fee was prevalent even in the times of Rājēndra Chōḷa Dēva.⁴ To facilitate free ferrying, fords were sometimes constructed at the royal bidding. Thus in about A.D. 1383 Kumāra Kampaṇa ordered the building of easy fords across the Tuṅgabhadrā.⁵ The ferrymen and their boats, especially near the capital, have figured in the inscriptions and in the accounts of foreigners. A ferryman was called harugola and a boatman ambiga; the peculiar boat of the former was known as harigōlu, and the raft went by the name of teppa.¹ The harigōlu was a coracle or round basket-boat, covered with hides, commonly used in Mysore at the ferries. These round boats are mentioned so late as A.D. 1671 when Keladi Sōmaśēkhara Nāyaka caused to be written, and gave to Harugōl Mudaliṅga and the other boatmen of the Tuṅgabhadrā river, near Simoge, a copper-śāsana as follows: "Whereas you have applied for the grant of an umbali,—so that you may remain under the control of the Simoge fort, and keeping harigōls, ferry across passengers going to and fro, taking money from them, and will when necessity arises provide abundance of harigōls, for the service of the palace—we have granted land to you etc".² This inscription of Sōmaśēkhara Nāyaka enables us to conjecture that the harigōls of Anegundi must also have been under the direct supervision of the governor of Anegundi, since the Tuṅgabhadrā joined that ancient city with the capital at a vulnerable point. Our supposition is strengthened by a lithic record of A.D. 1453 which confirms a grant made to ambigaru,³ and especially by an unpublished inscription dated A.D. 1556 which records that the ferrymen of Anegundi were entitled by royal permission to a fee of one kāśu per head.³