The Colas c35.2

c35.2

The history of Art in the Tamil country begins for all practical purposes with the rise of the Pallavas of the Simhaviṣṇu line in the seventh century a.d. Having scooped out perhaps the first rock-cut shrine of his time at Maṇḍagappaṭṭu (Viluppuram taluq, S. Arcot), Mahendravarman records his achievement with boyish glee in an inscription which says that he caused a temple for Brahmā, Īśvara, and Viṣṇu to be made without the use of brick, timber, metal or mortar.¹ This is clear evidence that before his time temples were built of wood with the aid of metal nails or bands and raised over plinths of brick and mortar, or they may have been altogether brick and mortar structures in which timber and metal also found use. None of these early monuments have survived, but doubtless their forms and *motifs* must have been the basis for the Pallava structures, their pillars, capitals, and decorative designs. We have only literary references to palaces and temples, mansions and bazaars in cities, besides some detailed, but obviously overdrawn, descriptions which we have now no means of verifying. Under the Pallavas who ruled to the end of the ninth century, architecture and sculpture in stone made great advances; the Shore Temple of Māmallapuram, and the Kailāsanātha and Vaikuṇṭhaperumāḷ at Kāñcīpuram mark the zenith of Pallava art; they were followed by smaller structures bearing evidence of the dwindling resources of the Pallavas towards the end. No South Indian bronze can be said to have been identified as demonstrably Pallava in origin; but considering the heights attained in the art of metal-casting early in the period of Cōḷa rule, we may legitimately infer that the beginnings of the art must be placed also in the age of the Pallavas.