Social and Political Life in the Vijayanagara Empire (A.D. 1346 – A.D. 1646) v2.c18.s2.t2: B. Some Historical Notices of these Classes
Social and Political Life in the Vijayanagara Empire (A.D. 1346 – A.D. 1646) v2.c18.s2.t2
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B. Some Historical Notices of these Classes
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Although we know little about these classes themselves, their antiquity is proved beyond doubt by literature and inscriptions.¹ We shall very briefly allude to these two sources. The earliest reference, if it could be accepted,—and if we are justified in assuming that the eighteen castes were in some manner related to the two divisions,—is that contained in a copper-plate grant dated A. D. 459 of the reign of the Gaṅga king Koṅgaṇi Rāja. This inscription records the gift of ten khaṇḍuga of paddy land below the Mēlūr tank (in the Siḍlaghaṭṭa tāluka), to Kādasvāmiśva, a Taitiriya Brāhmaṇa, by the king "free from all eighteen castes".² Somewhere in the fifth century A. D., therefore, the two divisions may have originated.
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¹ *Ep Report* for 1921, p. 103.
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² E. C., IX, DB. 67, pp. 71-2; Rice, *I. A.*, V, p. 136; *My. Ins.*, pp. 289-90. But Fleet does not accept the evidence of this grant. *I. A.*, XXX, pp. 221-2. See also *Ep. Ind.*, III, pp. 160, n. (3), 162. The eighteen castes, as Dr. Barnett suggests, "is a conventional number going back to the Jātakas and continuing down through mediaeval times". But in view of the fact that these ten castes are, as will be shown in the next section, grouped as professional castes (221 of 1910), they are taken here to mean the 18 sub-divisions of the larger groups that formed the Iḍaṅgai and Valaṅgai class. See also section on the Guilds. B. A. S.
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In the early part of the eleventh century, they had already come to stay in the Karṇāṭaka. An inscription dated Śaka 976 (A. D. 1043) of the times of the Western Chālukya king Sōmēśvara, mentions interesting details about the dancing girls of the temple of Sūḍi or Sūṇḍi, Dhārwar district. Among them we have the names of the Right Hand dancing girls and Left Hand dancing girls.³ In the Tamil country the existence of these two factions in the eleventh century is proved by a record dated A.D. 1072 of the reign of Kōv-Irāja Kēsarivaṇmar, alias Śrī-Rājēndra Śōḷa Dēvar. The members of the two classes say the following: "We (the inhabitants of the Eighteen vishaiya), the great army of the right hand class armed with great weapons (*perumbaḍai-valaṅgai-mahāsēnai*) and (?) Paḍan-
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³ Barnett, *Ep. Ind.*, XV, ll. 23-6, p. 82, op. cit.
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Iḍaṅgai dancing girls". *Ep Report* for 1921, p. 103. As we have seen, the first time the two divisions are mentioned is in A. D. 459.
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gaṇḍu—have caused śāsanam to be engraved on stone to the effect that...”. The details that follow dwell at great length on the solidarity of the members of the Right Hand division, and on the social and customary sanction which these two classes had secured in the eleventh century.¹ A record of Rājēndra Chōḷa Dēva I., (A. D. 1101-41), mentions the Vaḷaṅgai classes.² Some grant was made by the representatives of the eighteen castes in A. D. 1189 in the times of the Hoysala king Vira Baḷḷāḷa.³ A record dated about A. D. 1206 informs us that Baḷava (Right) Jakkaiya’s (son) Eḍava (Left) Jakkiya was ruling in Diḍuga.⁴ Kāchi Dēva, a feudatory of Narasiṁha II, is said to have been the sēnā-nāyaka of the Left Hand section in an inscription dated A. D. 1224.⁵ “The eighteen castes with both sects of Nānā-Dēśis at their head”, as related in a record dated A. D. 1280, “having placed the diamond bayasaṇige in Harihara and sat down”, granted certain specified dues for the festival of the god of that town.⁶ In the thirteenth century, in the reign of Kuḷōttuṅga III, certain Śrutimāns of Uṛṛattūr, held a meeting in the maṇḍapa called Uttamaśōḷaṇ of the Siddha-ratnēśvara temple of Uttattūr, Trichinopoly district, on behalf of the ninety-eight subdivisions of the Iḍaṅgai classes.⁷ The eighteen samayas are mentioned in a record dated A. D. 1330.⁸
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¹ E.C., X., Mb. 49 (a), pp. 86-7, Mb. 119, p. 106. ² 341 of 1907. In the Ep. Report for 1921, p. 103, it is wrongly said that this epigraph is the earliest record which mentions the two factions. The fact that we have inscriptions in the Karṇāṭaka which speak of the two classes prior to the times of Rājēndra Chōḷa Dēva, explodes the theory that they originated only in the Tamil land in the eleventh century at the command of a Chōḷa king. B.A.S. ³ E.C., XII., Si. 104, p, 103, text, p. 303. ⁴ E.C., V., P. I., Cn. 265, p.
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References to these factions are also found in Tamil literature. In the Toṇḍaimaṇḍala-Śatakam there is reference to the curbing down of the insolence of the Kaṇṇāḷar (Kaṇṇāḷar-kurumbaḍakki) from which we may infer that the Veḷḷāḷas (agriculturists) and Kammāḷas (artisans) were not on friendly terms. The Tamil poet Kamban, though he makes no reference to the agricultural classes, in seven stanzas in his Erelu-pāḍu, praises the artisans who were naturally proud that nothing could be done without their help.¹
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²³⁷ This is a curious example of a father and son belonging to the opposite sides. B.A.S. ⁵ My. Arch. Report for 1914-15. p. 54. ⁶ E.C. XI., Dg. 59, p. 61. ⁷ 489 of 1912; S. K. Aiyangar, S, India. p. 22. ⁸ E.C. X., Kl. 70, p. 19.
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¹ *Ep. Report* for 1921, p. 103. ² *E.C.*, X., Ct. 95, p.