The Pandyan Kingdom from the Earliest Times to the Sixteenth Century c10.34

c10.34

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