The Pandyan Kingdom from the Earliest Times to the Sixteenth Century c17.2

c17.2

Of the co-regents who came to power after Kulaśēkhara’s accession, Jaṭāvarman Sundara Pāndya claims notice first. His rule began in A.D. 1276.¹ This king had apparently no distinguishing titles and the identification of his records is a matter of considerable difficulty. There is little to guide the student besides astronomical details given in the inscriptions and the latest regnal year so far traced by such indications is the seventeenth, which takes his rule up to A.D. 1292-1293 (No. 594 of 1907). He is the Sonder Bandi Davar of Marco Polo and the Sunder Pandi of Wassaf who was the Dewar ‘a few years since’ and whose death is mentioned by him as having occurred in 692 Hijra. His records are found in the Cuddapah and Salem districts, besides Tanjore, South Arcot and Chingleput. An inscription of his, recently discovered in the Tanjore district (No. 311 of 1927), refers to the foundation of a new Śaiva Maṭha by a Vidyāśiva Paṇḍita, which is no doubt connected with the revival of Śaiva activities in the thirteenth century by the Śaiva teachers (Santānaguravar) beginning with Meykaṇḍadēvar who popularized and spread the tenets of the Śaiva Siddhānta philosophy.¹