Social and Political Life in the Vijayanagara Empire (A.D. 1346 – A.D. 1646) v1.c9.s2.101

v1.c9.s2.101

Whatever may be the importance of this record for other purposes, so far as the history of Vijayanagara is concerned, no reliance can be placed on it. It gives the birudu of Mahārāya to Harihara. We have seen that that monarch never assumed the title Mahārāya. Further the unreliability of this copper-plate grant is apparent when we compare it with the grant called C.P. No. 6 of Śaka 1093 already cited, and with another grant called C.P. No. 16 of 1925. This last record is dated Śaka 1273, and it relates that Vīra-pratāpa Bukka-dēva Mahārāya, ruling at Vidyānagara, conferred the gauḍike rights over the village Nasana in Guṭṭi-rājya to Peḍa Chōḍama Reḍḍi.³ The conclusion which can be drawn from an examination of all these grants is that these records, which stick to the gauḍike rights in Guṭṭi-rājya, the donors whose birudus uniformly start with Vīra-pratāpa and the donees who are all Telugu Reḍḍis, must have emanated from some common source which sought to secure certain hereditary rights by fabricating documents of doubtful authenticity.¹