The Pandyan Kingdom from the Earliest Times to the Sixteenth Century c10.22

c10.22

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.