The Pandyan Kingdom from the Earliest Times to the Sixteenth Century c10: Chapter VI. The First Empire.—(Continued)

The Pāṇḍyan Kingdom from the Earliest Times to the Sixteenth Century c10

Language: English

Chapter VI. The First Empire.—(Continued)

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THE son and successor of Parāntaka Neḍunjaḍayan alias Varaguṇa was Śrī Māra Śrīvallabha whose reign may be taken to have extended from, say, A.D. 815 to A.D. 862. He also had the birudas *Ēkavīra* and *Paracakrakōlāhala*. All that we know of this king is derived from the larger Sinnamanūr plates. From the way these plates begin to furnish rather important historical data from this point onward, it would almost appear that the composer of this inscription had the Vēḷvikkuḍi grant before him and avoided, by design, dwelling on the events already recorded in that grant. However that may be, what we learn about Śrī Māra Śrīvallabha goes to show that he succeeded not only in maintaining the power handed down to him by his father, but even found it possible to extend it to Ceylon. The Sanskrit part of our record tells us that this king brought the whole world (a hyperbole for S. India ?) under the protection of his umbrella and became well-beloved of his subjects (*Prēma-pātram prajānām*) after defeating in battle such diverse foes as the Māyāpāndya, the Kēraḷa, the king of Simhaḷa, the Pallava and the Vallabha. The Tamil portion confirms this and adds further that the king won victories at Kunnūr and Viḷiñam as well as in Ceylon, and that he repulsed with great loss a confederation of Gangas, Pallavas, Cholas, Kalingas, Magadhas and others who offered battle at Kuḍamūkku or Kumbakonam. This victory would appear to have greatly increased the king's military reputation and furnished the occasion for the high-sounding title *Paracakrakōlāhala*.

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We seem to have no means of elucidating the references to the victory over the Kēraḷa and the fight at Viḷiñam except by supposing that trouble from this quarter seems to have been more or less permanent and that the western country never reconciled itself to the yoke of its Pāṇḍya neighbour. It is however possible to say something on the references to the conquest of Ceylon and the victory at Kuḍamūkku over the Pallava.

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The evidence of the *Mahāvaṃśa* confirms in some measure the statement in the Pāṇḍya grant regarding the conquest of Ceylon.¹ According to that chronicle there was a Pāṇḍya invasion of Ceylon during the reign of the Singhalese king Sēna I. The Pāṇḍyan victory in the battle fought at Mahatalita was complete ‘and the army of king Pāṇḍu spread destruction all over the land’. The Singhalese king fled from his capital and took refuge in the Malaya country. Prince Mahinda, the ‘sub-king’ committed suicide and was followed by others in this act and prince Kassapa, after an exhibition of personal valour, also fled. The Pāṇḍya forces took possession of the capital, carried away a large amount of booty ‘and made Lanka of none value whatsoever’ and eventually the Pāṇḍya king entered into a treaty with the fugitive king of Ceylon restoring the country to him. After this, the chronicle records a counter-invasion of the Pāṇḍya country by the Singhalese in the reign of their next king Sēna II. And this throws some light on the Māyāpāṇḍya, the Pāṇḍya pretender of the Pāṇḍyan inscription. When Sēna II was preparing for counter-attack on the Pāndyas, ‘it came to pass that at that very time a prince of the royal family of Pāndu was come hither, having formed a design to overthrow that kingdom because he had been ill-treated by his king’ (li. 27). Sēna II allied himself with the rebel Pāndya prince and invaded the mainland and succeeded in besieging the very capital of the Pāndyas. The king of the Pāndyas ‘fled from the field of battle on the back of an elephant, and gave up his life in the wrong place. And his queen also died with him at the same time’ (li. 38). ‘The Singhalese took possession of the city, crowned the Pāndya prince who had sought their help and returned to Ceylon with a large amount of booty including the treasures carried away by the Pāndyas when they invaded Ceylon’ (Venkayya).

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¹ A summary of chaps. l and li of Wijesinha's translation is given by Mr. Venkayya at pp. 55-6 of *A.R.E.* for 1907-08. It may be noticed here that M. Dubreuil, *The Pallavas*, pp. 70-71 in his account of these transactions considers only chap. li of the Ceylon accounts.

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This narrative of events given in the *Mahāvamśa* cannot all of it be accepted as history. First as to chronology. The traditional dates for Sēna I and Sēna II are A.D. 846 to 866 and A.D. 866 to 901. We have assigned to Śrīmāra, roughly, A.D. 815-862 so that the counter-invasion from Ceylon would fall in the reign of the successor of Śrīmāra; but it is not possible to accept this arrangement, if we propose to identify the Pāndya prince who appealed to Sēna II and the Māyāpāndya who was conquered by Śrīmāra. It has been pointed out that a correction of twenty-four years must be introduced into the *Mahāvamśa* chronology of this period in the light of the established dates of South Indian history with special reference to the early Cholas of the Vijayālaya line.¹ This correction will give the dates 822 to 842 and 842 to 877 roughly for the reigns of Sēna I and Sēna II and thus reconcile the chronology of the narrative in the *Mahāvamśa* with that of Śrīmāra’s reign as fixed by independent evidence. But then there are other difficulties as well. The Pāndyan side of the evidence makes the ruling king successful in repelling a Māyā-pāndya and thus keeping his throne to himself at the end of the struggle; the Ceylon account makes out a disaster of the first magnitude to the Pāndyan kingdom from the story of the counter-invasion undertaken by Sēna partly in support of the Pāndya prince. There is no possibility of reconciling these accounts; one of them must be rejected as untrustworthy. Now, on the face of it, it seems impossible to suppose that such a serious disaster befell the Pāndya power in the reign of Śrīmāra and that the Sinnamanūr plates suppressed the truth or deliberately gave a false account of the reign. On the other hand, the *Mahāvamśa* is a highly embellished and poetic account of the history of Ceylon.¹ And one cannot help feeling that in this chapter of the *Mahāvamśa* some transactions belonging to a later age (twelfth century A.D.) have been repeated perhaps to take off the edge from the story of the conquest of Ceylon by the Pāndya king, narrated a little earlier. When we come to the Pāndyan civil wars of the twelfth century in which Ceylonese kings often interfered, we shall see that the *Mahāvamśa* persistently colours the account favourably to the Ceylonese kings and commanders. Our conclusion, therefore, is that Śrīmāra did carry out a successful raid against Ceylon and that he repulsed the attempt at retaliation brought about partly by the intrigues of an impostor, about whose identity nothing is known at present.¹

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¹ See Dubreuil, *The Pallavas*, pp. 70-71; Hultzsch in *J. R. A. S.*, 1913 does not discuss chaps. 1 and li, a rather strange omission in an otherwise complete study of the synchronisms between Singhalese and South Indian history.

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¹ See *I.A.*, vol. xxxv, pp. 153 ff, for translation of an important criticism of this book and other Ceylon chronicles by Geiger.

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¹ Mr. Venkayya remarked (p. 56, *A. R. E.*, 1908) of Śrīmāra: ‘As he is also said to have conquered Māyāpāndya, who must have belonged to his own family, there is enough evidence that there were internal dissensions among the Pāndyas already in his reign’; and in this he has been followed by M. Dubreuil. But I do not think that Māyāpāndya means ‘a person belonging to the Pāndya family’; if anything it means just the contrary, and does not support the inferences of Venkayya about internal dissensions which are far-fetched indeed. We cannot of course get any light on this matter from the Ceylon account; for any impostor, to make himself accepted in Ceylon, must have claimed kinship with the Pāndya ruling family. Venkayya again is not any way more fortunate in his attempts to identify this Māyāpāndya. He says: (*ibid*) ‘In this connection it is worthy of note that the relationship of No. 11 (my number 9) Varagunavarman to his predecessor is not given in the Tamil portion of the larger Sinnamanūr plates, while the Sanskrit portion of the same plates mention the relationship only indirectly. No. 12 (my number 10) Parāntaka is said to have been the younger brother of Varaguna and the son of Śrīmāra. Consequently it is not impossible that it was Varaguna who sought help from the Singhalese in order to secure the Pāndya throne’. Mr. Venkayya appears in this case to have relaxed his usual standards about evidence in his anxiety to discover the identity of Māyāpāndya. His whole argument turns upon the Tamil portion not mentioning the relationship of Varagunavarman to his predecessor, and the Sanskrit portion mentioning it only indirectly. The Tamil portion not only fails to mention relationships, in other cases, but omits all reference to Jatila Parāntaka; the Sanskrit portion mentions the relationship, but only ‘indirectly.’ I am unable to see any logic in the inferences made by Mr. Venkayya from this supposed ‘indirectness’. Personally I am of opinion that much trouble might be avoided if the epigraphists give up the habit of treating the integral parts of one inscription in different languages as altogether different inscriptions. There is enough indication in the inscription that Varagunavarman ruled in his turn and enjoyed a fairly prosperous reign. This is the text:

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‘குரைழற்கா லரிறைஞ்சக் குவலயந் தனதாக்கின வரைபுரையு மணிநெடுந் தோள் மன்னர்கோன் வரகுணவர்மனும்.’

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But Mr. Venkayya is not himself satisfied with the result he arrives at. He continues: ‘There is still another alternative. No. 12 Parāntaka is said to have seized a certain Ugra, apparently in the battle of Kharagiri. It may be that this Ugra was a Pāndya prince with whom the former had to fight for the throne.’ This makes matters worse. This Parāntaka did not reign till after his brother’s defeat at Srī Purambiyam; his brother ruled at least eight years from the close of his father’s reign; and it is not clear how anything that took place in the reign or just before the accession of Parāntaka II can throw any light on the identity of Māyāpāndya whom his father dealt

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When we turn next to study the circumstances of Śrīmāra’s success at Kuḍamūkku, we get some light from the Pallava records of the period. Two facts are established beyond the range of doubt. *First*, Kuḍamūkku is Kumbakonam as this name is given to the place in a record of the eighth year of Mārañjaḍayan, most probably, Śrīmāra’s famous father. *Second*, the Pāṇḍya power was in this period fairly well established in the heart of the Tanjore district though there were frequent conflicts with Pallava forces across a shifting frontier in this direction,¹ the permanence of the Pāṇḍya occupation of this territory being shown by the presence of many Pāṇḍya inscriptions of this period in several places in the Tanjore district. From the provenance of the inscriptions of Nandivarman III it seems to be a reasonable inference that this contest continued through his reign with varying fortune. It seems not unlikely that the famous fight from which Nandi came to be known as Teḷḷaṟerinda Nandi occurred in the course of these

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¹ I may note here that I am not following M. Dubreuil’s arrangement by which Varaguṇa is made the opponent of Nandi at Teḷḷāṟu *c.* 830 A.D. If the opponent of Nandi at Teḷḷāṟu was a Pāṇḍya, as perhaps he was (see Dubreuil, *The Pallavas*, pp. 79-80) then he must have been Śrīmāra. It may also be observed that Dubreuil seems to exaggerate the significance of Teḷḷāṟu when he writes that ‘this glorious campaign enabled him to reign peacefully not only at Kāñchī but also on the banks of the Kāvērī.’ The poetry of the *Nandikkalambakam* should not be mistaken for history. *Contra* Gopalan, *The Pallavas of Kāñchī*, p. 137.

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with years before. The fact is, we know at present nothing more about both Māyāpāṇḍya and Ugra than what is mentioned of them in the Sinnamanūr plates and it is best to say so.

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Mr. Venkayya also adds: ‘If the story of the *Mahāvaṃśa* be true, the discontented Pāṇḍya prince whether he was Māyāpāṇḍya or Ugra Pāṇḍya must have been on the Pāṇḍyan throne for sometime before he was replaced by No. 12 Parāntaka.’ I am unable to concede that the story of the *Mahāvaṃśa* is true or that there was an interruption in the regular succession recorded in the Sinnamanūr plates. See however, K. V. S. Aiyar, *Ancient Dekhan*, pp. 140-1 who identifies Ugra with the protege of Sēna II.

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contests, and that in that battle Śrīmāra was the opponent who was beaten in the fight with Nandi. This must have been somewhere about A.D. 830. The victory of Kuḍamūkku won by Śrīmāra against the Pallavas and their confederates must then be taken to fall in Nandivarman's reign. It seems quite natural to connect this battle mentioned in the Pāndya inscription with another that is referred to in the Bāhūr plates of Nṛpatungavarman¹ who was the successor of Nandi of Teḷḷaru and came to power about A.D. 854. In the Bāhūr plates it is

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¹ I follow the text of Mr. Krishna Sastri as amended and translated by Gopinatha Rao; see Dubreuil, *The Pallavas*, pp. 47-50. But the verse is not easy and there is no means of controlling the readings. Dr. Hultzsch in his recent edition of the plates in the *E. I.*, vol. xviii, pp. 5 ff writes: 'Of him (Nṛpatunga) verse 16 tells us that he supplied a Pāndya king, whose proper name is not disclosed, with an army, and that he defeated some enemies, who are not specified either, on the further bank of the Aricit river. It may be concluded from verse 16 that Nṛpatunga allied himself with a Pāndya king and undertook an expedition into the domains of the Chola king'; and the text and translation as given by him support these statements. Looking at the verse from the Pāndyan side, it strikes me that Mr. Rao's translation supported by Mr. Sastri's text is the more probable; because (i) there seems to be little room for a Pāndya-Pallava alliance in this period, (ii) the Cholas actually figure as the allies of the Pallavas in the Sinnamanūr plates and (iii) it seems probable that in verse 16 (Bāhūr) Kuḍamūkku of the Sinnamanūr plates is referred to as having taken place before the accession of Nṛpatunga (*purā*) and mentioned as a sort of introduction to the reprisal that followed under Nṛpatunga on the banks of the Aricit. It may also be that Nṛpatunga fought as a prince before his accession.

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M. Dubreuil (*The Pallavas*, p. 71) may or may not be right in supposing 'that the Pallava Nṛpatunga profited by the invasion of the Pāndya kingdom by the Singhalese'; but he is clearly misquoting verse 17 of the Bāhūr plates in support of his theory of the alliance of Nṛpatunga and Sēna II, which, he says, 'seems to be confirmed by the Bāhūr plates which say that Nṛpatunga's fame had spread *beyond the seas as that of Rāma*'. (italics mine). The text is '*Khyāto na Kēvalam Bhumāvamusminnapi Rāmavat*' = famed not only on earth, but in other worlds like Rāma. I am also unable to follow him when he says that Śrīmāra was defeated at Kumbakonam in the face of the definite statement in the Sinnamanūr plates that Śrīmāra repulsed a great confederation of his foes at Kuḍamūkku. See also his remarks under Nṛpatunga at p. 81 of his *Pallavas*.

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said: ‘The army (of the Pallavas) which on a former occasion sustained defeat at the hands of the Pāndya, was, by the grace of this king (Nṛpatunga, i.e. by being led by him), able to burn down the hosts of the enemies together with the prosperity of their kingdoms on the bank of the river Aricit.’ From this reference it is not clear whether Nṛpatunga’s victory was won after he became ruler in his own right or earlier. Nor do we get any indication as to the interval between the defeat of the Pallava forces at the hands of the Pāndya and the retaliation under Nṛpatunga on the banks of the Aricit. The use of the phrase ‘on a former occasion’ with reference to the Pāndyan victory seems however to make it necessary to postulate some interval between the two engagements. We may conclude then, that if Nandi of Tellāru began his reign with a victory against Śrīmāra, he lived long enough to sustain a defeat in his turn at Kuḍamūkku in spite of the fact that on this occasion he seems to have been supported by several of his allies; the tide turned once more against the Pāndya on the accession of Nṛpatunga whose youthful success at the Aricit—the river Ariśil, a branch of the Kāvēri which enters the sea at Karaikkāl,¹ is recorded in the Bāhūr plates as we have seen.

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¹ Hultzsch, E.I., vol. xviii, p. 7. The fact that the Ariśil also passes near Kumbakonam may have led M. Dubreuil to identify the battles of Kuḍamūkku and Aricit; but we have no indication in the plates as to the site of the battle on the banks of the Aricit.

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The reign of Śrīmāra Śrīvallabha then appears to have been a mixed record of success and failure. The advent of an impostor to the throne, apparently aided in his rebellion by the Ceylonese troops, and the two defeats at Tellāru and the Aricit at the hands of the Pallavas are evidence that the empire has begun to strain the resources of the Pāndya country; and the operations at Viliñam may perhaps be accepted as proof that the conquered lands are not settled on a permanent basis and may assert their independence at the earliest opportunity. But there is no reason to doubt that Śrīmāra was a strong ruler who found it possible in the midst of so much trouble to maintain his power intact and hand it down at his death to his elder son Varaguṇavarman whose accession can be placed definitely in A.D. 862.

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About this Varaguṇavarman we learn nothing more than his name from the Śinnamanūr plates. The only fact that can be referred to his reign with any amount of certainty is his fighting a great battle at Śrī Purambiyam and losing it. It may also be that a record (690 of 1905) of Māraṇadaḍayan which incidentally mentions an expedition against Iḍavai also belongs to the time of this ruler.¹ Iḍavai has been identified with a village of the same name in the Chola country referred to in Chola inscriptions of a slightly later date. At the battle of Śrī Purambiyam the Western Ganga king Prithivīpati lost his life.² The latest date known for Prithivīpati³ is A.D. 879, so that the battle of Śrī Purambiyam must be placed about A.D. 880 at the earliest, and Varaguṇavarman must be taken to have reigned at least up to that date. Now the last incident we noticed in the long duel between the Pāndyas and their neighbours in the north, the Pallavas, was the battle of the Aricit. After that battle Nṛpatunga would appear to have had a peaceful time with the Pāndyas who were for the rest of the reign of Śrīmāra and for several years after the accession of Varaguṇavarman apparently compelled to recognize the position Nṛpatunga had established for himself by his early success. It is also interesting to observe that it was during this period that Vijayālaya captured Tanjore and made the city his own and it is not unlikely that the Cholas and the Pallavas were on friendly terms in this period as the Śinnamanūr plates imply. After the death of Nṛpatunga, when his successor Aparājita came to the Pallava throne about A.D. 880, it would seem that Varaguṇa made an attempt to reassert the waning power of the Pāṇdyas in Choḷamaṇḍalam and Toṇḍaināḍ. The expedition against Iḍavai may well have been directed against the rising power of the Cholas. The king then ruling was probably Āditya I, the son of Vijayālaya, who came to the throne almost at the same time as his Pallava contemporary Aparājita. This attack on Iḍavai was apparently successful and Varaguṇa was enabled to carry his arms further north. The Pallava king Aparājita was aided on this occasion by his Ganga feudatory Prithivīpati I and the opposing forces of the Pāṇdya and the Pallava had an encounter at Śrī Purambiyam identified with Tiruppurambiyam near Kumbakonam.¹ In this battle although the Western Ganga king Prithivīpati I lost his life, still victory was with Aparājita and the Pāndya advance was rolled back. It may be that Āditya I (the Chola) was also on the side of Aparājita and was able to get for himself some of the territory gained by the confederates on the repulse of the Pāndyan invader. All this must have been in A.D. 880 or very soon after.

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¹ See A.R.E., 1907, p. 54 and 1906, p. 53. Contra K. V. S. Aiyar, Ancient Dekhan, p. 142. But his reasoning is not conclusive.

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² See A.R.E., 1906, p. 47 or E.I., vol. ix, pp. 87-8.

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³ Dubreuil, The Pallavas, p. 82.

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¹ See A.R.E., 1906, pp. 47-8. I am unable to follow Mr. Gopinatha Rao in his statement: 'It is known from other records that Āditya and the Pāṇdya King Varaguṇa marched against the Pallava, Nṛpatunga-Varman, otherwise known also by the name of Aparājita Varman, defeated and killed him.' (E.I., vol. xv, p. 49.) But see Dubreuil, The Pallavas, pp. 83-4. I believe inscription No. 337 of 1912 does not mean that the Cholas were the friends of Varaguṇa. The appearance of the Cholas among the opponents of Śrīmāra at Kuḍamūkku and the expedition against Iḍavai strongly support the view that the Cholas were the friends of the Pallavas and the foes of the Pāṇdyas till the battle of Śrī Purambiyam. Again, as Dubreuil points out, if Aparājita is only a pseudonym of Nṛpatunga, there would be only one battle, that of Śrī Purambiyam. Then we shall have to assume that at this battle Aparājita was beaten by Āditya as mentioned in the Tiruvālaṅgāḍu plates of Rājendra; but this is contradicted by the Udayēndiram

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Varagunavarman does not appear to have long survived the defeat at Śrī Purambiyam. He seems to have died childless and was followed on the throne by his younger brother Śrī Parāntaka alias Vīranārayana Śadayan. Three verses in the Sanskrit part of the Śinnamanūr plates state (i) that he captured single-handed the haughty Ugra near Kharagiri together with his elephants whose tusks were reeking of the blood of opposing forces killed in battle, (ii) that this pious king endowed many agrahāras, and numberless devasthānas and tatākas, and (iii) that he had for his queen Śrī Vānavan Mahādevī who resembled Lakṣmī and Indrāṇī, the consorts of Viṣṇu and Indra. The Tamil account generally confirms these statements and says further that he destroyed Pennāgadam and fought in the

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plates of Prithivīpati II which state that victory in Śrī Purambiyam was with Aparājita and that Varaguna was beaten in the battle. The verse may be quoted.

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यः श्रीपुरंबियममहाहवमूर्ध्निघोरः पाण्ड्येश्वरं वरगुणं सहसाविजित्य ।
कृतार्थयुक्तमपराजितशब्दमात्रप्राणव्ययेन सुहृदस्त्रिविदवंजगाम ॥

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It is not likely that, if Varaguna was beaten, and Āditya was his friend in this battle, Āditya got the whole of the Pallava country or even a part of it as a result of this fight. On the other hand if Āditya helped Aparājita in his victory, he might have claimed a share of the spoil and later on proceeded to make the other attack which transferred the Pallava dominions to him as the Tiruvālangādu plates imply. And this, in my opinion, is what happened actually. I am unable to see why Dubreuil must place Śrī Purambiyam in Nṛpatunga's reign or ‘admit that Nṛpatunga was killed in the battle of Śrī Purambiyam’ (p. 83).

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Kongu country. It is not possible, in the present state of our knowledge, to attempt to elucidate the battle of Kharagiri, the destruction of Pennāgaḍam and the fight in Kongu. The last two events may be taken as some evidence that, though hard pressed by its foes, the Pāndya power was still struggling to maintain itself in foreign lands. And the name of the queen suggests that she was a Chera princess, and it may be tentatively assumed that the name of Śeravanmahādēvi, a flourishing little town adjacent to the railway station Shermadevi in the Tinnevelly district, has some connection with the name of this queen. Perhaps this marriage is also some indication that, for one reason or another, the reign of this king was marked by happier relations with the Chera kings than was usual in this age. We may assign conjecturally the last twenty years of the ninth century as the period of this king's rule.

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Parāntaka Vīranārāyaṇa was succeeded on the throne by his son by Vānavanmahādēvī, Māravarman Rājasimha II, the donor of the larger Śinnamanūr plates, the discovery of which has meant the recovery, to a very large extent, of the Pāndya history of this period. This grant is dated in the sixteenth year of the king's reign and it is likely that he reigned some years after. His rule may therefore be taken to have extended from about A.D. 900 to about 920 or a little later. The Sanskrit part of the record of the king's reign though it comprises four fair-sized ślokas contrives to tell us just nothing about the king or his achievements as a ruler. The Tamil account vies with the Sanskrit in fulsome flattery of the king, but happens to mention a few facts. But the obscurity of the diction and the gaps in the text render it extremely difficult to be sure of the ground. With this caution, it may be noted that a battle at Ulappilimangalam is mentioned, another fight with Tanjayarkōn (the king of Tanjore) and perhaps also an attack on Vanji.¹ We learn also that the king had the titles—Vikaṭapāṭava, Śrīkānta, Rājaśikhāmaṇi and Mandara Gaurava. Among his foundations are mentioned numberless Paḷḷiccandams which seem to be Jain temples or endowments in their favour.

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¹ It will be observed that Venkayya’s summary of the reign mentions only that the king defeated the Chola (p. 51 of A.R.E., 1907). He is perhaps right in the caution he observed. The text I have been using of this inscription is that given by Mr. A. S. Ramanatha Aiyar in the Sen Tamil, vol. xxiii. When I applied to the Government Epigraphist for a transcript of the text he had with him, I got the strange reply that the copy could not be given as it was undergoing publication in S.I.I. (Texts) series.

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Rājasimha II, however, may be surely identified with the Pāndya King Rājasimha who is said to have been beaten by the Chola Parāntaka I (vide the Udayēndiram plates of Prithivīpati II²) and this fact enables us to get some light on his fortunes from the records of the contemporary Chola monarch. This king Parāntaka I Chola came to the throne in A.D. 907.³ Before his accession the Chola power under Aditya I had risen into some prominence by important successes against the Pallava Aparājita who seems to have lost the bulk of his territory to his new foe. It is not unlikely that Aditya, late in his lifetime, undertook a campaign against his southern neighbour and that this campaign furnished the occasion for his son calling himself Madhurāntaka or Maduraikoṇḍa. This title of Parāntaka appears as early as the third year of his reign, A.D. 910. The Pāndya king Rājasimha had to look about for allies and he turned to Ceylon. The ruler of Ceylon at the time was not unwilling to aid the Pāndya king and sent an army to the mainland. Rājasimha, so reinforced, made an effort to retaliate on the Chola power and invaded the Chola country; and thus began the second war which Parāntaka fought against the Madura troops. A decisive battle was fought at Vēlūr (a place not identified) and the defeat of the Ceylon and Pāndya forces was complete. The Udayēndiram plates say of Parāntaka Chola: ‘His army, having crushed at the head of a battle the Pāndya king, together with an army of elephants, horses and soldiers, seized a herd of elephants together with (the city of) Madhura. Having slain in an instant, at the head of a battle, an immense army despatched by the lord of Lanka, which teemed with brave soldiers (and) was interspersed with troops of elephants and horses, he bears in the world the title Samgrāma Rāghava (i.e. “Rama in battle”) which is full of meaning. When he had defeated the Pāndya (king) Rājasimha, two persons experienced the same fear at the same time: (Kuvēra), the lord of wealth, on account of the death of his own friend, (and) Vibhīṣaṇa on account

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² S.I.I., vol. ii, p. 383.

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³ A.R.E., 1906, p. 51, para 21 for the date of accession of Parāntaka Chola. See A.R.E., 1907, pp. 58-9 for the wars of Parāntaka against Madura, a masterly account by Venkayya. Also Hultzsch in J.R.A.S., 1913, pp. 524-6 partly based on Venkayya. My version of the wars given in the text does not differ materially from Venkayya’s. The changes I am inclined to make are (i) to base the 1st war only on the reference in the Mahāvaṃśa and the probabilities suggested by Inscription No. 29 of 1907, dated in A.D. 910 (See A.R.E. 1911, part ii, para 4), (ii) to treat the entire series of stanzas in the Udayēndiram and Tiruvālaṅgāḍu plates as references to the second war of Venkayya, (iii) to follow Hultzsch in making the ‘unsuccessful effort to obtain the Pāndya crown, etc., from Ceylon an event of the last years of Parāntaka’s reign. Mr. Venkayya seems to have thought that Maduraiyum Īlamum-Koṇḍa was a brand new title justified by a fresh attack on Madura and Ceylon together: but this strikes me as an unnecessary assumption. The title Maduraikoṇḍa might simply have changed to Maduraiyum-Īlamum-Koṇḍa, after the invasion of Ceylon. I may add also that when he proposes to date the third war of Parāntaka against Madura towards the close of his reign and apparently c. 943 A.D. A.R.E., 1907, p. 59, he seems to be forgetting the inscription No. 63 of 1905 found near Madura and dated in the thirty-third year of Parāntaka to which he

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had drawn pointed attention two years previously (A.R.E., 1905, p. 42). See also A.R.E., 1926, part ii, para. 16.

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of the proximity (of the Chola dominions to Ceylon). The Tiruvālangādu plates are no less explicit and more graphic in the account they give.¹

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¹ > यस्य प्रतापदहनेन परीयमाण स्तत्तापशान्ति मिवकर्तुमनासवेगः ।

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This was the ruin of Rājasimha and the empire that had been reared by generations of his ancestors. Madura was lost and Rājasimha had to flee to Ceylon. There he made pitiful efforts to regain his fortune and, if we may follow the *Mahāvamśa* account, which is confirmed by the later Chola inscriptions of Rājendra I, Rājasimha after some fruitless waiting despaired of gaining anything by his stay in Ceylon, left behind his crown and other regalia (*thāpetvā makuṭādīni*) and betook himself to the Kērala country, the home of his mother Vānavanmahādēvi (*gato Kēraḷasantikam*). Such was the end of the First Empire of the Pāndyas, whose political fortunes we have traced through these two chapters. These last scenes may be placed about A.D. 920.

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Parāntaka I Chola made an attempt late in his reign to capture the Pāndya's *makuṭa* from the Ceylonese ruler and failed (*c.* A.D. 943) ; but this was actually accomplished later by the more fortunate Rājendra.

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सद्यस्समुद्रमविशन्रिज़राजलक्ष्मीं पृथ्वीं कुलक्रमगतां च विहायपाण्ड्याः ॥
यस्यकोपदहनो दहन्दिष्पशान्तिमाप न समुद्रवारिणि ।
शस्त्रकृतहतसिंहळा ङ्कतानेतवारिणि शमंअगाम च ॥

Linked texts (2)

Koṇḍaṇagūru grant of Indra Bhaṭṭāraka — Sanskrit
Mahāvaṃsa — Pāli