The Colas c13.6

c13.6

The Chinese pilgrim Yuan Chwang, who spent several months at Amarāvatī and Kāñcīpuram in A.D. 639 and 640, took the kingdom of Culi-ya (Cōḷika?) on his way south. The bearings recorded in the pilgrim’s itinerary led Cunningham to find its modern representative in the Karnūl district.⁹ A number of stone inscriptions from the Cuddapah district¹⁰ and two interesting copper-plate grants which give the names of four generations attest the rule of a dynasty of kings bearing the Cōḷa name, tracing their descent from Karikāla and holding sway in this region. The territory ruled by them was called Rēnāṇḍu 7,000, and comprised the tract of land lying along the Kundēru river in the Cuddapah and Karnūl districts.¹¹ On palaeographical grounds the stone inscriptions have been held to be anterior to the 8th century¹² and very good reason can be shown for assigning them, together with the copper-plates from Mālēpāḍu, to the seventh century A.D.¹³ The titles borne by these kings show that they had rather intimate political connections with the Pallavas and the Cāḷukyas. It is possible that though they claimed independent status for themselves and for the most part maintained it with success, policy sometimes dictated to them the need for acknowledging in some vague manner the supremacy of their more powerful neighbours. Their crest, figured in the Mālēpāḍu plates, represents, not a tiger, but a maned lion with its tail twisted in a loop over the back; it resembles that of the Viṣṇukuṇḍins and the Pallavas, and was possibly Buddhist in origin.¹⁴ The genealogy of the Rēnāṇḍu Cōḷas given in the Mālēpāḍu plates is as follows:¹⁵