History of Kanauj to the Moslem Conquest c17.s2.21

Language: English

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Thus although there were some secessions in the outlying parts of the kingdom, in the home provinces themselves Indra III's campaign meant in effect no more than a successful raid, and it left no traces behind save the horrid marks of sanguinary war. Kanauj soon revived, and we have even indications that Mahīpāla resumed his predecessors' schemes of conquest. For the court-poet Rājaśekhara, who must have lived in the early part of Mahīpāla's reign, not only speaks of him as the "pearl-jewel of the race of Raghu," and the "Mahārājādhirāja of Āryāvarta," but also in a magniloquent verse in the introduction to the *Pracaṇḍa Pāṇḍava* of *Bāla-Bhārata* attributes to him the following victories in distant lands : "And in that (lineage of Raghu) there was born the glorious Mahīpāladeva who has bowed down the locks of hair on the tops of the heads of the Muralas; who has caused the Mekhalas to suppurate; who has driven the Kalingas before him in war; who has spoilt the pastime of (the king who is) the moon of the Keralas; who has conquered the Kulūtas; who is a very axe to the Kuntalas; and who by violence has appropriated the fortunes of the Ramaṭhas"¹. It is difficult to identify Murala in this passage; possibly it stands for the Narbada and the Muralas were consequently those who inhabited its banks. Some scholars on the other hand take it to signify the country watered by the river Muralā in or around the Kerala country (*Raghuvamśa*, IV, 55).

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Mekhala is another name for the Amarkantak hills, where the Narbada rises, and so the Mekhalas may be the people living in that region. The Kalingas were certainly the natives of the coast of Orissa, perhaps extending as far south as the Ganjam district. The Keralas or Ceras are the well-known kingdom in the south between the Western Ghats and the sea-coast. The Kulūtas, of course, were a people who dwelt in the Kangra district of the Panjab on the banks of the Bias river². The name Kulūta is probably represented by the modern Kullu. The Kuntalas lived in the western part of the Deccan. Indeed, Kuntala denoted more or less the old Cālukya kingdom in the highlands of the Western Ghats.³ The Ramaṭhas were, according to the *Kāvyamīmāṃsā* (ch. XVII, p. 94) of Rājaśekhara, a people who dwelt beyond the Pṛthūdaka in the north, and are mentioned with the Kulūtas and Kiras etc. Taking the passage literally, it would appear that Mahīpāla’s arms penetrated remote regions extending from the upper course of the river Bias in the north-west to Kalinga or Orissa in the south-east;

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and from the Himālayas to the Kerala or Cera country in the far south.¹ But as we have no epigraphic evidence to corroborate these claims of victories, it is more reasonable to hold that by attributing to him this conventional area of “world-conquest” the poet primarily intended to show in a general way that his patron was a mighty monarch, who undertook many warlike expeditions in Āryāvarta or Northern India, and struck terror into the hearts of his contemporary rulers. That Mahīpāla must have overrun the territories as far as the lower course of the Narbadā seems also evident from the Partabgarh inscription, which informs us that in the year 946 A. D. Ujjain was being ruled by a governor of his son Mahendrapāla II. Now the latter is nowhere credited with any achievements, and we have seen above that Ujjain was occupied by the Rāṣṭrakūṭas during the northern campaigns of Indra III. There can therefore be no doubt that the recovery of the Ujjain region was the work of Mahīpāla himself. Support for this conclusion is also lent by the Kahla plate, according to which Bhāmāna is said to have gained fame by conquering Dhārā.² This Bhāmāna must have been a contemporary and vassal of Mahīpāla, being the successor of Ullabha, who was preceded by Guṇāmbodhideva. the feudatory of Mahipāla’s grandfather Bhoja I.

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As it is unlikely that a minor prince like Bhāmāna would by himself lead an expedition from Gorakhpur District, where this Kalacuri family was settled, to distant Ujjain, we may reasonably suppose that he accompanied his suzerain Mahīpāla in his southern campaigns and helped him in his victories. Another chief who rendered him similar assistance was perhaps his Guhila contemporary, Bhaṭṭa, who is represented in the Cātsū inscription as having defeated the armies of the kings of the south at the behest of his overlord.¹ Presumably the progress of Mahīpāla’s arms was facilitated by the then moribund condition of the Rāṣṭrakūṭa monarchy, for we are told in the Karhad plates that Indra III’s successor, Govinda IV, instead of looking to the affairs of the state, had taken to “vicious courses” and had thus “with his intelligence caught in the noose of the eyes of women displeased all beings.”² The weakness of Govinda IV’s rule is also apparent from the fact that according to the *Vikramārjunavijaya* of the Kanarese poet Pampa he was defeated by one of his feudatories, Arikeśarin II of Puligere.³ This event must have occurred soon after Śaka 851 or 930 A. D., the date of the Kalas inscription, which bestows conventional praises on Govinda IV.⁴