The Colas c24.57

c24.57

At the close of Rājēndra’s reign, the Pāṇḍyan empire was at the height of its prosperity and had taken the place of the Cōḷa empire in the eyes of foreign observers like the Chinese and the Arabs. There is no evidence that Rājēndra was followed immediately by another Cōḷa prince, so that the Cōḷa kingdom was more completely absorbed in the Pāṇḍyan empire than the southern kingdom ever was in the Cōḷa empire in the days of its glory. The name Cōḷa-maṇḍalam long survived the Cōḷa kingdom itself and was subsequently corrupted into Coromandel. Chieftains of later times sometimes claimed descent from the Cōḷas either through branches of the Telugu-Cōḍa dynasty or more directly from the Cōḷas of the Tamil country. A certain Vīra Śaiva Vīra Pratāpa Cōḷa Rāja with many high-sounding titles is found ruling in the Bangalore district in Ś. 1223, A.D. 1301.⁹² About the same time Vīra Cōḍa and his son Vīra Campa are found in the North Arcot district.⁹³ An otherwise unknown branch of Telugu-Cōḍas is represented in the Madras Museum plates of Bhaktirāja dated Ś. 1277.⁹⁴ Very much later, in A.D. 1481 and 1530 we find inscriptions in the island of Śrīraṅgam recording gifts by Vālaka Kāmaya and Cennaya Bālaya, both bearing the characteristic Telugu-Cōḍa title, *Uṟaiyūrpuravarādhīśvara*.⁹⁵ The Cōḷas are mentioned in the Koḷiñjivāḍi plates of Acyutadēvarāya.⁹⁶ Among the latest references to chieftains of Cōḷa extraction must be counted an interesting record from Kumbakōṇam of the grant of two villages for worship and offerings to Ādi-Kumbhēśvara by Mahāmaṇḍalēśvara Gururāja Rudradēva-Śōḷa-Mahārāja in Ś. 1476 (A.D. 1554).⁹⁷ 4. Contra *ARE.* 1909, II, 51, 52. Rājendra is regarded by some as the son of Rājarāja III by Sōmaladēvī, daughter of Hoysaḷa Narasimha II, *ARE.* 1936-7 II 33 and 48; also 1938-9 II 24. *EI.* xxvii p. 194 makes him son of Kulōttunga III on very slender evidence.