The Colas c12.42

c12.42

Kings often took the field in person and delighted to rejoice with the common soldiers in their successes; on the other hand, if a king was killed or even seriously wounded in the midst of the fight, his army gave up the struggle and accepted defeat.⁴⁴ Yet only a warrior’s death was held worthy of kings; one Cēra monarch, as we have seen, having been wounded in his back, decided to starve himself to death; another, less heroic, mourned his captivity in pitiful terms. It was a common practice to lay on a bed of *kuśa* grass the corpses of kings who died otherwise than in a fight, and cleave them with a sword before burial or cremation in order to ensure for them a place in the Valhalla of the Tamils.⁴⁵ The vanity of the victor often inflicted deep personal humiliations on his vanquished foe, the memories of which rankled and brought on further strife. The crowns of defeated kings furnished the gold for the anklets of the victor.⁴⁶ The horse, the elephant and war chariot, the sword, lance and bow, and the war-drum are among the paraphernalia of war most frequently described in the literature of the age. Elephants are often said to have carried flags in the battle-field, no doubt, the distinctive standards of each side which had, besides, other less prominent emblems like flowers and garlands of a particular variety. The *Kaḷavaḻi* is one of the most detailed descriptions we possess of the battle-field in the Tamil country, and the poem supplies in a casual way much interesting information on military affairs.⁴⁷ The soldiers, infantry and cavalry alike, wore leather sandals for the protection of their feet.⁴⁸ The nobles and princes rode on elephants, and the commanders drove in pennoned chariots. Poygaiyār mentions that women who had lost their husbands bewailed their loss on the field of Kaḷumalam;⁴⁹ unless this is mere rhetoric, we may suppose that women, at least of the higher orders, sometimes accompanied their husbands to the field.