The Colas c22.15

c22.15

Kulōttunga II must have been chosen as heir-apparent by his father Vikramacōḷa some time in May-July A.D. 1133 as his regnal years are counted in his inscriptions from this date as the starting point;⁴³ Vikramacōḷa's rule continued for a period of about two years thereafter. The *praśastis* in his inscriptions take many forms, all of them purely rhetorical and in hyperbolical praise of the excellence of his rule, but not vouchsafing a single fact of the history of the reign.⁴⁴ In one inscription he is described as 'the king who wore the crown in such wise as to add lustre to Tillainagar.'⁴⁵ This may mean that Kulōttunga II celebrated a coronation in the city of Cidambaram⁴⁶ or that in the reign of Kulōttunga II the city of Cidambaram was vastly improved and beautified. The renovation of the temple and city of Cidambaram is, in fact, the best known event of the reign and is explicitly mentioned for the first time in an inscription of the seventh year from Tiruppuṟambiyam,⁴⁷ though a title based on this act occurs as early as the third year. The *Kulōttunga-śōḻan-ulā* gives an elaborate account of the remodelling of the Cidambaram temple carried out by Kulōttunga.⁴⁸