The Colas c18.51

c18.51

Why was this expedition against the king of Kaḍāram undertaken and what were its effects? As we can get no direct answer to these questions from contemporary records, we have to depend on the probabilities suggested by the known and relevant facts. The view that the overseas invasion was a continuation of the war for the complete subjugation of Kaliṅgam¹³² obtains no support from the records of Rājēndra's reign. That the Cōḷa empire of South India was in constant communication with the islands of the Archipelago and with China in this period is very clear. The construction of the Cūḍāmaṇi-vihāra in Negapatam by Māra-vijayōttunga-varman of the Śailēndra dynasty of Śrī Vijaya could not have been an isolated undertaking all by itself, but one of the normal results of a growing intercourse between the Eastern islands and South India for purposes of trade. As in ancient times, this trade was part of a flourishing maritime commerce between the countries of the Western world and China, in which Arabs, Indians and the people of the Malay peninsula and Archipelago acted as intermediaries. At the end of the tenth century a.d.¹³³ the Chinese government awoke to the value of the foreign trade which was just then reviving after a long interruption owing to the troubles which broke out in China in the latter part of ninth century, and with the object of increasing this trade 'a mission was sent abroad by the Emperor with credentials under the imperial seal and provisions of gold and piece-goods to induce "the foreign traders of the South Sea and those who went to foreign lands beyond the sea to trade" to come to China.' It must have been in response to such friendly invitations that the kings of Śrī Vijaya sent the embassies of the years 1003 and 1008 to which we have already made reference. The annals of the Song dynasty record that the first mission to China from Chu-lien (Cōḷa) reached that country in a.d. 1015 and state that the king of their country was Lo-ts'a-lo-ts'a (Rājarāja).¹³⁴ Another embassy from Shi-lo-lo-cha Yin-to-lo-chu-lo (Śrī Rāja Indra Cōḷa) reached China in 1033, and a third in 1077 from Kulōttunga-Cōḷa-Dēva. The commercial intercourse between southern India and China was therefore continuous and extensive. Writing in the latter half of the twelfth century, Cou-ku-fei states of San-fo-ts'i (Śrī Vijaya):¹³⁵ 'It is the most important port-of-call on the sea-routes of the foreigners, from the countries of Sho-po (Java) on the east and from the countries of the Ta-shi (Arabs) and Ku-lin (Quilon) on the west; they all pass through it on their way to China.'