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The Early History of the Deccan (Parts I–XI) v1.c11.s5.t2: Administrative Divisions

The Early History of the Deccan (Parts I–XI) v1.c11.s5.t2

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English

Contents

Administrative Divisions

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Turning now to provincial and local administration, the first question that comes up is that of the significance of the numbers attached to the names of particular divisions, the whole of the home territory of Kuntala being itself described as ‘seven-and-a-half-lakh’. The inscriptions sometimes record clearly that a particular division with a given number forms part of a larger division with a correspondingly larger figure attached to it—for example, Mugunda Thirty within Mahārājavāḍi nāḍu, itself contained in Palasige Twelve Thousand.¹ The meaning of these numbers has often been discussed but always with inconclusive results. This method of attaching conventional numbers to particular territorial names was not known to the Chāḷukyas of Bādāmi. It seems to have come into vogue under the Rāṣṭrakuṭas, and we can only say that their meaning is by no means clear. Nor can it be said that they played any part in settling the subdivision of the country for administrative supervision and control; for there is no obvious principle to be traced in the manner in which the areas are grouped for this purpose.

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¹ SII, xi (i), 78, ll. 41-2.

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Besides the proper names with conventional numbers attached to them, the most common territorial divisions were called *rāṣṭra*, *viṣaya*, *nāḍu*, *kampaṇa*, and *thāṇa*. The first three terms among these appear to have been used indifferently for the major divisions, though *viṣaya* and *nāḍu* were sometimes distinguished as divisions smaller than the *rāṣṭra*. The usual formula proclaiming grants made in copper-plate charters is addressed, to the extent to which it concerns them, to all *rāṣṭrapatis*, *viṣayapatis*, *grāmakūṭakas*, *āyuktakas*, *niyuktakas*, *adhikārikas*, *mahattaras*, and others.² This conventional formula, probably a continuation of Rāṣṭrakuṭa form, and not in itself very illuminating, yet gives some idea of the types of agency concerned in local administration.

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² EI, xii, 154, 303.

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Village Headman, Elders

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The *Grāmakūṭaka* was perhaps the village headman, the link between the government and the village throughout the whole of India’s long history; he is the *grāmaṇi* of the vedic times, the *grāmasvāmi* of the *Arthaśāstra* of Kauṭilya, and the *grāmbhojaka* and *ūroḍeya* of the other Chāḷukya inscriptions. The *Mahattaras* were the elders, the *élite* of the village, and generally of the whole of the particular division in question, who commanded with the people and the representatives of the government influence commensurate with their personal ability and character, the extent of their property, and other factors. The further categories mentioned were officers of the central government belonging to various grades. The exact correlation between these vague Sanskrit terms and the more precise Kannaḍa designations which occur in the inscriptions of the period is not always clear, but the live Kannaḍa terms coming straight from the life of the time clearly deserve more attention than do the stale repetitions of ancient classical formulae.

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The word *nāḍu* was applied to the larger territorial divisions with numbers attached to their names. Thus one inscription (A.D. 1079)¹ mentions Kanne Three Hundred, Peḍekal Eight Hundred, and Naravāḍi Three Hundred separately, and sums them up in the phrase *inti mūrum nāḍumam*—these three *nāḍus*. Below the *nāḍu* was its subdivision called *kampaṇa*; thus *Kogaḷi aynūrar kampaṇam Bikkigan-erppaṭṭar olagana Talavage*,² i.e. Talavage included in the *Kampaṇa* Bikkiga Seventy which was part of Kogaḷi Five Hundred. The *thāṇa* was perhaps another minor territorial division, either the same as the *kampaṇa* or smaller. An inscription of A.D. 1072 from Kuṇṭoji (Dharwar) calls the place the *thāṇa* of Kumtige Thirty and refers to the *śunkaverggaḍe* (octroi officer) of the place.³ Possibly the *thāṇa* was more nearly a fiscal division than a territorial area marked out for general administration.⁴

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¹ SII, ix (i), 147, ll. 11-13.

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² Ibid., 87 (A.D. 1034), ll. 13-14.

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³ Ibid., xi (i), 112, ll. 21-3.

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⁴ Cf. N. Venkataramanayya—*Third Dynasty of Vijayanagar*, pp. 238-9.

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Nāḍarasa, Nāḷgāvuṇḍa

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Each *nāḍu* was for general administration a separate charge under a *Nāḍarasa* assisted by a *Nāḷgāvuṇḍa*, and there are occasional references to a *mahā-nāḷprabhu*, a term in which *prabhu* seems to be the same as *arasa*, and *mahā* (great) only an honorific prefix—for there is no evidence that the *mahā-nāḍu* was a larger territorial division than the *nāḍu*. That the *nāḍarasa's* duties were entirely general and all-embracing is easily shown; an inscription of A.D. 1045 from Morigeri⁵ records certain endowments in favour of a *maṭha* in the place, and adds that the *maṭha* was a *naiṣṭhikasthāna*, a place meant only for celibates; if any of its occupants swerved from the path of celibacy or became otherwise obnoxious to the institution, it would be the duty of the *arasa* who was ruling the *nāḍu*, acting with the *manneya*, the Twelve of Morigeri and the *ūroḍeya* to expel them and install others, of the same families if possible, who would observe the vows correctly.⁶ Again the *nāḍarasa* and *nāḷgāvuṇḍa* were present together when in A.D. 1058-9 Āychagāvuṇḍa of Posavūr made the gift of an areca-garden and four house-sites to a *basadi* built by him in memory of his wife Kamchikabbe.⁷ The duties of the *nāḍarasa* and *nāḷgāvuṇḍa* and their mutual relations receive little elucidation from our sources. We may guess from their designations that while the *nāḷgāvuṇḍa* had duties relating to the collection of revenue, particularly land-revenue, the *nāḍarasa*, also called *nāḷ prabhu*, was the head of the district in charge of its general administration. It may be noted that Keśava-gāvuṇḍa (of Hoṭṭūr) held the *gāvundu* of Poṭṭiyūr together with the *nāḷ prabhutva*⁸—a rather interesting combination of offices the holding of which simultaneously by one person runs counter to modern notions of administrative propriety. A *nāḷ prabhu* Malla-Gāvuṇḍa of Nerilage is definitely described as a man of the fourth caste (A.D. 1147-8).⁹

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⁵ SII, ix (i), 101, ll. 57-9.

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⁶ Ibid., ll. 56-9.

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⁷ SII, xi (i), 65, l. 45.

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⁸ EI, xvi, 84, l. 22.

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⁹ BK, 61 of 1935-4.

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Towns and Villages

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When we come to the towns and villages, we reach the region where local autonomy prevails unchecked in almost everything that does not concern the imperial fisc, and so long as no irreconcilable differences arose among them, the people of each locality organized in different ways for various purposes were allowed to carry on affairs according to their own lights. Larger centres of population, the towns, were designated as *nagara*, *paṭṭaṇa*, or *pura*; though some of the *nagaras* like Aihoḷe and Ḍambal are well known to have been large mercantile settlements, it is not clear that here, as in the Tamil country, the term *nagara* was reserved exclusively for mercantile centres and *paṭṭaṇa* for seaports. We hear casually of *paṭṭaṇasvāmis* and *nagara seṭṭis*, but get little light on even the outlines of the constitutions under which the administration of the cities was carried on in general. Some of the cities were clearly more important than others, being the residences of hereditary ruling princes subject to the empire and called for that reason *rājadhānis*. However from *rājadhāni* Puḷigere (modern Lakshmeśvar in the Miraj State) we do possess several inscriptions giving interesting details having to do with its administrative organization. An inscription of A.D. 1082 contains the record of a purchase of land from the Brāhmans of the city by the Five Hundred headed by Śānti Seṭṭi.¹ Another dated A.D. 1111 records the purchase of land by *Daṇḍanāyaka* Anantamayya from the *mahājanas* of the *nagara*, the *gāvuṇḍas*, and others.² Yet another sale of land to *Daṇḍanāyaka* Nāgavarmaya by the 120 *mahājanas* of the Brahmeśvarageri of the *rājadhānipaṭṭaṇa* Puḷigere occurred in A.D. 1122.³ Seven or eight years later Jayakeśi endowed a college (*ghaḷige*) attached to a Śiva temple of the same place.⁴ Lastly, the *mahājanas* of the *rājadhānipaṭṭaṇa* Purigere were present with two *daṇḍanāyakas* and some others on the occasion when, in A.D. 1138, the Kadamba prince Jayakeśi made an important gift to the Śiva temple of the locality.⁵ We thus see clearly that this large city had three general assemblies each called *mahājanas*,⁶ one for the general concerns of the city as a whole, another comprising the Brāhman inhabitants and dealing with problems relating to their residential quarters, properties, and so on, while a third, which represented the mercantile community in the city, controlled and regulated matters affecting that body. The numbers, 120 for the Brāhman assembly and 500 for the *seṭṭis*, are perhaps only approximate and conventional; each of these assemblies had a corporate capacity, owned common property, and could buy and sell, sue and be sued, as we say now. Incidentally we learn that there was a college for advanced studies, a *ghaṭikā*, which doubtless was worthy of the large city and its place in the empire.

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¹ BK, 12 of 1935-6.

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² Ibid., 2.

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³ Ibid., 15.

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⁴ Ibid., 3.

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⁵ Ibid., 1.

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⁶ Fleet's remarks on the *mahājanas* at EI, v, 10-11 and n. hold good no longer.

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That other towns had separate constitutions of their own we may postulate from the ancient practice of the whole of India which distinguished urban from rural administration, and from the occurrence in inscriptions of the usual phrase indicating this distinction, viz. *paura-Jānapada*.¹ An inscription from Lakshmeśvar dated A.D. 1074 in the reign of Bhuvanaikamalla Someśvara II states that Mahāsāmanta Jayakeśiyarasa, who was the Rāṣṭrakūṭaka of the Purigere-300 district, visited Permāḍi-Basadi at Purigere and made it into a *pura* at the request of Tribhuvanachandrapaṇḍita;² here is a clear indication that the name *pura* signified a definite constitutional status with certain specific privileges, that the *puras* had to be particularly recognized as such, and that it was within the competence of the heads of the executive government in the provinces to grant such recognition. Such a grant or charter certainly implied the enjoyment of a much more extensive autonomy than was general, and in the case of a *basadi* it may even have included a limited right of asylum. The urban assemblies certainly had executive committees whose numbers were fixed, though it is not known how the committees were formed or how vacancies in them were filled. On important occasions the executive acted together with the general body just as the sixteen *seṭṭis* of Dambal acted with the *Mahānagaram* in A.D. 1095/6,³ while the ordinary daily administration must have been carried on by the executive committee.

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¹ e.g. in Kharepatan plates of Raṭṭarāja (A.D. 1008), EI, iii, 297.

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² BK, 29 of 1935-6.

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³ IA, x, 186

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Village Economy

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Of the villages and their administration we hear rather more though not nearly as much as in the contemporary Chōḷa inscriptions of the Tamil country. An inscription of A.D. 981 from Agrahāra Kamchagāra Belguḷi (Bellary District) records the confirmation by the new Chāḷukya conqueror of the old *mānyas* which had prevailed in the village before the conquest, and these include three *sthānamānyas* (lands free of taxes and earmarked for the priests) of 18 *mattar* for the Śiva temple, for the Pañchikeśvara temple, and for the Bhaṭārī temple; a *bhaṭṭageyi* or field for the village teacher, of 6 *mattar* in extent; a *chaṭṭageyi*, or field for pupils, of 6 *mattar*; a *perggaḍe geyi*, or field for the *perggaḍe* (clerk?), of 8 *mattar*; *ambigageyi* (for the boatman) of 8 *mattar*; and a *taḷārigeyi* of 12 *mattar*.⁴ The above grants give some idea of the internal economy of a moderate sized village, and of how the continuity of local institutions was largely undisturbed by big political changes occurring at the centre. The Sogal inscription of A.D. 980 records a land-gift for the benefit of the Suvarṇākshi temple and a feeding house for ascetics performing austerities in the Suvarṇākshi-tirtha, and the record is interesting in several ways.⁵ It records a foundation legend relating to the shrine, according to which it was established by the Dānava kings Māli and Sumāli at the end of the Tertā-age, the name Soval or Sol of the place being derived from that of King Sumāli. The Thirty of Sol here take part in measuring out the land and marking it off as a separate estate which formed the subject of the endowment. The relative positions of the quarters of the barbers and the washermen, and a road passing through the town, are indicated incidentally in describing the exact location of the building where the ascetics were to be fed. Most interesting of all is the watch and ward arrangement for the continued maintenance and proper administration of the endowment; it is expressly stated that *sthāna-āchāryas* (the priests of the temple) and the *ūr* (i.e. the Thirty) shall jointly guard it against assaults from princes (*bhūnāthar*) representative of the central government; the *sthāna-āchāryas* are to protect it from harm by the *ūr*; whilst the Thirty will guard it against the *sthāna-āchāryas*. Here the system of mutual checks, always tacitly understood, is for once stated in express terms and the existence of such a form of organization goes far to explain the stability of India's ancient institutions.

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⁴ SII, ix (i), 74.

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⁵ EI, xvi, 1-9.

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Bālguḷi, modern Bāgali in the Bellary District, comes early under our notice and long retains our attention owing to the number and interest of its inscriptions. The success achieved by the Fifty of Bālguḷi, acting in concert with the *tambuligas* and the Five Hundred in invoking the aid of the emperor against an unjust enhancement of taxation by a governor, has been noted above. In A.D. 987¹ they made a gift of a garden for the service of a new Ādityadeva (Sun-god) shrine in the village, fixed the annual contribution from the garden to the temple at six *gadyāṇas* of *āneya-ponnu* and one *gadyāṇa* of *dharaṇa-ponnu*, and named the family of tenants who were to cultivate the garden in heredity and remit to the temple the prescribed amount of gold; a gap in the record unfortunately obscures the exact extent of the garden which was a fraction of a *mattar*. The village is described as a gift of the Chālukya emperor in some inscriptions² and as a gift of Hariśchandra in some later epigraphs;³ the Fifty are called the constant worshippers of Nārāyaṇa in one record, and the worshippers of Svayambhu Kalideva and the favoured of Śrī Mahālakshmi in another.⁴ Whatever their correct explanation, these divergences recorded in the *praśastis* of the *mahājanas* at different dates deserve to be noted. Their meeting is once described as having been held in the temple of Kalidevasvāmi and attended by the whole of the population, young and old alike (*sabāla vṛddhasahitavaśesham*).⁵ The phrase ‘all *mahājanas* led by the *ūroḍeya*’ seems once to be applied, however, to the Fifty themselves in a record of A.D. 1079 in the expression—*Bālguḷiy-ūroḍeya-pramukhav-aśesha-mahājanangal-aivadimbar*.⁶ A long inscription of A.D. 1160 records a substantial grant of an areca-plantation by a Brāhman lady Dharmiyakka for the maintenance of a new temple of Lakshmī-Nārāyaṇa built by her; 130 trees in the plantation of another named person were to be allowed water from the well belonging to the garden which was the subject of the gift—evidently the recognition of some prior right which the gift could not affect; the garden was placed in the hands of the Fifty after a *pādapūjā* had been performed to them; the garden was to be free of all obligations and to belong to the temple in absolute ownership: *sarvabādhāparihāramam sarvanamasyamam sarvamānyamam paḍedu*. The purposes for which the income from the garden was to be spent included the cost of conducting the worship of the deity in due form together with offerings (*nivedya*), repairs to the temple as and when necessary, a remuneration of seven *Bāguḷi gadyāṇas* yearly to a teacher (*upādhyāya*) who was to expound *śāstra* and *purāṇa* before the deity—*ā devaralli śāstra-byākhyānamam māḍalum purāṇamam heḷalu-vorbbar-upādhyāyargge*; and the feeding of the Brāhmans in the service of the deity—*ā devaragrāsanada brāhmaṇa bhōjanakkam*.¹ The institutions of several other villages may be studied in a similar way from the evidence of the inscriptions.²

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¹ SII, ix (i), 75.

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² Ibid., 80, ll. 22-3 (A.D. 1018).

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³ Ibid., 145 (A.D. 1079), l. 21; 168 (A.D. 1103), l. 18.

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⁴ Ibid., 132, ll. 18-19, and 145, ll. 20-1.

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⁵ Ibid., 89, ll. 11-12.

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⁶ Ibid., 145, ll. 21-2; 168, ll. 18-20.

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¹ *SII*, ix (i) 267, ll. 60-4.

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² e.g. Kogaḷi, ibid., 77 and 130.

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From Ummachige (Mod. Kotavumachgi) comes an inscription of the reign of Vikramāditya V³ giving an account of the foundation of a new *agrahāra* in A.D. 1012, which is of unusual interest for its details regarding the internal economy of the settlement. Daṇḍanāyaka Keśavayya obtained the permission of the emperor to hand over the village of Ummachige to Maunara Śrīdhara-bhaṭṭa of Roṇa together with a charter (*śāsana*), a white umbrella, and an assembly-hall (*ghaḷige*) as a *sarvanamasya* with complete ownership of internal rights; after getting it on these terms, the *bhaṭṭa* conveyed it to the 104 *mahājanas* subject to regulations (*vyavasthā*) to be observed by himself and by the *mahājanas* and the other people (*prajegam*) of the village. The terms of these regulations comprised specifications of lands and houses set apart for particular charities and services to be maintained in the locality, and briefly they were the following: the income from 500 *mattar* of land and thirteen houses were earmarked for the support of charities and services auxiliary to them: of these, 50 *mattar* of land and four houses, divided among six shrines and a feeding-house for *elkoṭi* ascetics in the manner stated, were to be held and administered by celibates (*naiṣṭhikas*) of the line of Bendeyabhaṭāra—perhaps the spiritual line to which the *elkoṭi* ascetics and Maunara Śrīdhara-bhaṭṭa himself belonged;

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next, a Bhaṭārī temple got 12 *mattar* and a house: 100 *mattar* and 2 houses were set apart for education in two stages—higher education comprising the study of *Nyāsa* and *Prābhākara* provided for by 50 *mattar* of land and a house for a teacher, and 25 *mattar* for pupils, and education of a more elementary character to be imparted by Nāgadēśiga who was an expert teacher of *gaṇita* (mathematics), *jōsiya* (astrology), *chanda* (prosody), and *alaṃkāra* (rhetoric), besides reading and writing; Nāgadēśiga was to feed his pupils once a day and supply each of them with one cloth every year, and he was to get 25 *mattar* of land and 1 house as *akkariga-vritti*. Then follow the endowments for auxiliary services comprising *kuruvagey* (black land) of 12 *mattar* and a house, to ensure a supply of tender coco-nuts (?), a *galamtige* (?) gey of 6 *mattar* and a house for the supply of special vessels for *abhisheka*, 8 *mattar* and 1 house for a barber, 12 *mattar* and a house for a drummer, and lastly, 100 *mattar* and 2 houses for a free feeding-house where only men of good character were to be fed. So far charities.

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Following these the allotment (*mānya*) to the *ūroḍeya* (headman) comprised 200 *mattar* and 3 house-sites, each 8 hands broad and 25 hands long, besides which he was to receive as permanent contributions (*śāśvata śunka*) certain payments including, among others, 1 *gadyāṇa* for a vedic sacrifice (*yajña*), 2 *paṇas* for a marriage, 1 *paṇa* for an *upanayana*, and 1 *gadyāṇa* for *dīpāli* (though it is not stated who were to pay this last contribution), and some others like it. Several sources of income are then set apart for the maintenance of the tank called Deyimgere which obviously supplied water for irrigating the village lands. These sources were: a fine of 2 *paṇas* from one who abused another, 12 *paṇas* for beating a man, 3 *gadyāṇas* for threatening with a drawn dagger (*surige giltade*), 12 *gadyāṇas* for stabbing—such amounts to be varied, however, in consideration of differences in caste:¹ a bachelor who commits rape is to pay a fine of 3 *gadyāṇas*, and to make another payment of equal amount when he undergoes religious expiation (*prāyaścitta*) for his offence. A bachelor who reaches the *maṇḍapa* (sanctuary) weapon in hand (after an offence) escapes unpunished. Houses are also to be specially set apart one each for a keeper of the cowpen, for the *gāmuṇḍas*, and for the chiefs of the lower castes (*Kiljātiya Mukhyarggam*).

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It is a pity that this interesting record omits to give the total extent of the cultivated land in the village, and says little of the other castes whose existence it apparently takes for granted. But even as it is, its value is very great for the light which it throws on the position of the *ūroḍeya*, on the educational system, on the religious and charitable establishment, and on the extent of local autonomy in the administration of justice and the disposal of judicial fines.

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³ *EI*, xx, 67.

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¹ Fines for same offences on a lower scale were assigned to a tank in Mailam by the emperor in A.D. 1046. SII, ix (i), 102, ll. 44-7.

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Mention is made in several inscriptions of the 32,000 Brāhmans of the primeval (*anādi*) *agrahāra* Sthānakundūra (Tālguṇḍa),² and they have a long *praśasti* stating that they came from Ahicchatra and that they obtained 144 villages as the sacrificial fees for the eighteen *aśvamedhas* of King Mayūra-varmma. These legends apart, the *praśasti* makes particular reference to the fact that the Thirty-two Thousand received the first honour in all Brāhman and royal assemblies—*Brahma-rāja-sabhā-pūjāgra-grāhigaḷ*, and this statement is of interest as suggesting the probable meaning of the phrase about the welcome according to the *samaya* of the Thirty-two-Thousand—which indeed may be just nothing more than a conventional expression meaning the most honoured place. As the *agrahāra* of Ganj claimed also to be 32,000 *mahājanas*,¹ it seems probable that it was one of the 144 villages mentioned in the *praśasti*, and that each of the villages which belonged to the group described itself as comprising 32,000 *mahājanas*, irrespective of its actual size.

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² EC, vii, Sk. 177-8.

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¹ *EC*, vii, Sk. 50.

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Three *gāvuṇḍas* of Siruvūr, the holders of the *Pañcamaṭhasthānas* (headship of the five *maṭhas*), and the 200 *Mahājanas* led by the *ūrodeya* of Jentevāḍi were present on the occasion when a large gift of land was made in A.D. 1040 to a feeding-house, and the supervision of its administration was entrusted to the *gāvuṇḍas* and the heads of the *maṭhas*.² Puliyūr (Huli) near Saundatti was a *Mahāgrahāra* which had an *ūrodeya* and a thousand *mahājanas* who had the privileges of the golden pot, six white umbrellas, cauris, the five great sounds (*pañcamahāśabda*), the *ghaṭikā* (assembly hall), and the big drum; they were all of them learned in the *vedas*, *śāstras*, grammar, rhetoric, *purāṇa*, and *kāvya*, performers of *Sōma* sacrifices, regular in their daily routine of religious duties, and exemplary citizens of noble character; their settlement had been originally established as a *Brahmapuri-sthāna* by the Chālukya emperor.³ An inscription of A.D. 1049 from Hombaḷ mentions the 120 *mahājanas* of Pombuḷcha and also its *aśeshabrahmasabhe*—the assembly of all the Brāhmans of the place—one of the few clear indications that the *mahājanas* of a place did not always comprise the entire body of its householders, and that the general body of inhabitants also met on important occasions, though not as regularly as did the *mahājanas*.⁴ Another record of the same date from Shirūr (Bijapur District) lays on the *grāmarājas* (the rulers of the village) the duty of expelling from the local *maṭha* ascetics who had turned aside from the path of celibacy;⁵ the vagueness of the expression used is perhaps intentional, for in the conditions contemplated, either the officers of the central government or the local authorities might take the initiative in putting matters right.

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² *EI*, xv, 335.

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³ *SII*, v, 849 (A.D. 1044).

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⁴ Ibid., xi (i), 84, ll. 11-12.

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⁵ Ibid., 85, l. 39.

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Religious Corporations

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A record of A.D. 1058 from Nāgai mentions among other things a large gift of 1,000 *mattar* of wet land to the *mānis* (bachelors) of the *parishad* (assembly) of the *śālā*, feeding-house, of the shrine of Traipurushadeva⁶—which shows that even charitable establishments of a quasi-religious character had corporate constitutions of their own, and that the inmates of our *maṭhas* and *śālās*, though they were ascetics and single men who had renounced the world and held no personal possessions, were quite able, and were trusted by the general public, to take care of the material interests of their establishments. They seem to have differed little from the monastic orders of medieval Europe in this respect.

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⁶ *HAS*, viii, 16, ll. 199-202.

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*Growth of Towns*

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The purchase of some land and its gift to a *matha* attached to a temple in Mulgund in A.D. 1062¹ is witnessed to by the Three Hundred of the *ādipattana* (original town) Mulugunda headed by 4 *seṭṭis* whose names are recorded, the *gāvuṇḍas*, the 120 *mahājanas*, the 50 *sāligas* (weavers), the 120 *telligas* (oil-mongers), and the 58 (?) *mālāgāras* (florists), besides the *pañchamaṭha-sthāna*; the reference to *ādipattana* throws light on the history of the growth of the city, which had obviously begun as a trade-centre. An inscription in Uchchangidurg dated A.D. 1064 places a *kālāmukha-sthāna*, a Śaiva religious centre, under the protection of the *nakara* (merchant guild) of the locality.² In A.D. 1071, when Vikramāditya was ruling at Govindavāḍi and was particularly happy over his victory against Daṇḍanāyaka Chiddaya (a general of Someśvara II), the 120 *mahājanas* of Agrahāram Puvina-Vaḍangili came to him, praised him in verse and blessed him (*bamḍu ślokārthamam perddāśirvādamam koṭṭeḍe*), and obtained gifts from him in return;³ this was clearly a political move on the part of the *mahājanas* intended to show their loyalty to Vikramāditya in his war with Someśvara II. A long *praśasti* of these *mahājanas* occurs in two later inscriptions of A.D. 1090 and 1144.⁴ The deity Gavareśvara of Gaṇḍarāditya-Chaturvedimangalam (Bellary District) had gifts in 1074 from the 120 (*mahājanas*) of the place, the fifty *telliga* (oil-monger) families, the *mummuridaṇḍas*, and four *seṭṭi putras* who are mentioned by name; there is reference also to the Five Hundred and to sixty families of oil-mongers when the details of the gifts are enumerated immediately afterwards, the *mahājanas* are mentioned again in two later undated inscriptions.⁵

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¹ *SII*, xi (i), 97, ll. 26-7 and 29.

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² Ibid., 126, l. 18.

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³ Ibid., ix (i), 135, ll. 5-8.

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⁴ Ibid., 158, ll. 41-6; 254, ll. 59-60.

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⁵ Ibid., 139, ll. 34-42; 285, 286.

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*Co-operation in Local Affairs*

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From Niḍugundi (Dhārwar District) comes an inscription of the reign of Someśvara II (A.D. 1076)⁶ which gives a good idea of the co-operation that existed among different authorities for providing for the common needs of a place; it contains a casual statement that the total royal revenue from the place was fixed by statute (*śāsana maryāde*) at 500 *gadyāṇas*—a remark which may well justify the assumption that such settlements were reached with all important places, subject, of course, to revision according to subsequent exigencies. The Four Hundred *mahājanas* of the village agreed to continue as of old (*pūrvasthitiyim*) the provision of 3 1/32 *pārikhāyada pon* for honouring the visiting *mahājanas* from other places—*parasthānada mahājanadabhayāgata pūjege*; Singannadeva, the governor of the district in which the village was situated, allowed ten *gadyāṇas* out of the statutory income of 500 *gadyāṇas* from the village for the *pavitrārohaṇa* festival and the fee and food for the Brāhmans reciting the scriptures during the festival in the Svayambhu Kalidevasvāmi temple; and lastly, Suggaladevi, the sister of the emperor, who had the rule of the agrahāra with tribhogā bhyantarasiddhi, obtained the permission of her brother, then encamped at Avagevāḍi, to make a grant of money and one oil-mill for repairs and a perpetual lamp in the same temple, and of another oil-mill for a perpetual lamp at the shrine of the village-goddess, Bhagavatis (grāmādhi-devvam Bhagavatis). An inscription from Niralgi of A.D. 1074 mentions that the 300 mahājanas of the place were summoned by a messenger being sent round.¹

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⁶ Ibid., xi (i), 117.

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¹ EI, xvi, 71, l. 33.

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Voluntary Levies

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The four hundred mahājanas of Nāgavāvi (Nāgai) and all the merchants of the place (alliya samasta nakaramum) met in A.D. 1092 to make provision for the requirements of a subsidiary shrine in the Rāmeśvara temple and the repairs of the gopura in front of the main temple; they resolved that for the regular worship including offerings (nivedya) and periodical festivals in the shrine of Lakshmaṇa in front of the Rāma temple, a contribution of one-sixteenth of the proceeds of the sale of cloth (sire) and areca-nuts should be paid in gold by the local merchants as well as by itinerant merchants visiting the village; and for effecting repairs to the gōpura were to be set apart all moneys including mudrā paṇa paid by those who fulfilled their vows before the deity. The proceeds from all these sources were to be entrusted to respectable merchants in the locality and drawn upon for the particular expenses mentioned to the extent necessary.² While throwing some light on the working of local institutions, an occasional resolution like this appears to raise several questions to which no immediate answer can be given. How, for instance, were the expenses now provided for on Lakshmaṇa's shrine met previously? Was no provision made earlier for the repairs to the gopura? And was the levy on the proceeds of the sale of cloth and areca-nuts a new one, and were these trades free of all such levies before? If we possessed the full record of the transactions of the local bodies of Nāgavāvi we should be in a position to find the answer to all such questions; as it is we get only cross-sections at particular points; but what we do get does not leave us altogether without guidance in framing plausible answers to such questions, though the detailed course of actual events must remain unknown in the absence of definite information from the inscriptions.

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² HAS, viii, 3, ll. 6-11.

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Changes in Tenure

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The agrahāra Māngola was under the rule of Vikramāditya's queen Padmaladevi in A.D. 1116; the 200 mahājanas of the agrahāra made a petition to the queen, and in gracious response (kāruṇyavacana) to it she ordered that enough land should be set apart for the worship of Narasingadeva, and the order was implemented by Puliyama Nāyaka who provided eleven mattar of tax-free land for the purpose.¹ In 1124 the entire agrahāra of Muḍivēmu was handed over to its 108 mahājanas by Atyaṇachola, the feudatory of Vikramāditya VI, after he had obtained the emperor's permission on a tribhoga tenure—by which the income was shared equally by three parties, viz. the ruler, the Brāhmans and the gods of the locality;² this was evidently an important and permanent change in the revenue status of the village such as even a hereditary ruling prince did not feel free to effect without previous approval from his suzerain.

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¹ SII, ix (i), 195.

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² Ibid., 207; IA, xix, 271 for Tribhoga. But the interpretation is not free from doubt.

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A village in the Banvasi area bore the name Paruvanapalli Sare, i.e. Sare which is the village of the Brāhmans. It desired to have its name changed to simple Sare, evidently because in course of time, owing to the accession of other elements to its population, the prefixed addition Paruvanapalli had become misleading; the change of name became the subject-matter of a śāsana (charter) granted by Brahmayyadeva, the governor of the province, in the presence of his house ministers—maneya pradhānam. The charter bears the date A.D. 1032.³

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³ EC, viii, sb. 191.

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This survey of rural administration in the Chālukya empire has sought to give a rapid summary of the primary material arranged as far as possible chronologically. The time for a definitive study of this subject has not yet come, the texts of many inscriptions are still inaccessible, and experience warns us against too much reliance being placed on summaries in official reports, while even in the published records not everything is clear, and there is often scope for rival and contradictory interpretations. But the evidence cited is enough to show the strong tendency towards self-government which characterized the various forms of corporate activity that filled the whole area of social life; the emperor and his officers and vassals formed a more or less external authority capable of securing conformity to the laws and regulations of these corporate bodies. The stress was throughout more on duties than on rights; individuals found their proper places in the natural group or groups to which they belonged, and in these positions they did not lack freedom and opportunity for self-expression, each according to his ability. The concept of the organic unity of society and of the interdependence of its parts was the keynote of the whole system, and the impression left on the mind after a perusal of the numerous records of day-to-day transactions found in the inscriptions is in fact one of harmonious and well-articulated co-operation among different groups. The territorial assemblies of the village, town, and larger divisions were primary assemblies, each with cherished traditions and privileges of its own and comprising all the heads of families in the area concerned: they had charge of everything, including justice, that was not the special province of any particular smaller group; they were confined to Brāhmans only in *agrahāras*, i.e. Brāhman villages; the village staff was usually remunerated for its work by means of assignments from common village lands, and it generally included a village teacher. Guilds of artisans and merchants, of which more presently, seem to have come next in importance, owing to their financial position in the community and their readiness to endow and maintain public institutions like temples, schools, hospitals, irrigation tanks, and so on, either from the proceeds of voluntary levies of a periodical nature or with capital endowments in cash or land. There were many other corporations for the administration of temples, *śālas* (feeding-houses), *maṭhas*, and other public foundations. Such a large number of organizations working in close proximity to one another were able to carry on without much friction or disorder only because of their common allegiance to the principles of *dharma* in the conduct of their daily life; these principles included a certain readiness, in cases of persistent differences, to refer matters to the arbitration of third parties and to abide by the decision of the *élite* or, in the last resort, of the emperor and his advisers.

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Among the village officials, the *ūrodeya* (headman) was the chief, and to judge from the allotment he gets in the Ummachige inscription cited above, his position must have been a highly respected one. There are mentioned also the *perggaḍe*, the *gāvuṇḍa*, the *senabova*, and the *kulakarṇi*—the two last being perhaps best described as accountant and clerk. No authentic information is available regarding the exact demarcation of duties among these officials. The corresponding feminine terms occurring in inscriptions like *gāvuṇḍigi*, *heggaḍiti*, or *gauḍi*,¹ to which we may add *arasi*, *nāyakitti*, and *daṇḍanāyakiti*, should in most cases be understood as honorific descriptions of the wives of the officers concerned rather than as instances of women holding these positions in their own right, though some of the *arasis* certainly did do so.

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¹ SII, ix (i), 298; xi (i), 68.

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Taxation

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The taxes and levies, provincial and local, next claim our attention. Some of these have been mentioned incidentally in our discussion of other subjects and need not be repeated here. The king’s government had no monopoly of the fiscal rights, for every local assembly and corporation could exercise these within its own sphere for purposes germane to its objects and duties. Our knowledge of the nature of the levies and rates in the few instances where they are mentioned is derived, not from any direct description of the system of taxation, but indirectly from a study of charters relating to gifts, exemptions, and so on. Any attempt therefore to determine the incidences of the fiscal system or to compare it with those of other times and countries is out of the question for the present. The regulation of the total burden laid on any class or group was a matter, so far as we can see, carried out in a rough and ready manner in the light of a general sense of fairness and equity. It must be noticed particularly that most of the minor levies were not general taxes paid by all, but only sectional dues; if this fact is not firmly grasped, the large number of the taxes named may give rise to a false impression regarding the general burden of imposts.

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The subjects of gifts were of various kinds, all of which were liable to sundry levies and therefore eligible for exemptions from these. They comprised garden land (*tōṇṭa*), areca gardens (*aḍakeya tōṇṭa*), land under wet cultivation (*key*), and land under dry cultivation (*gaḷde*). Oil-mills (*gāṇa*) and houses and house-sites (*mane and mane nivēśana*), and cash gifts in money in the form of golden *gadyāṇas* (*pon gadyāṇa*) occur frequently. Lastly, particular taxes and levies become themselves the subjects of gifts earmarked for specific purposes; voluntary cesses of an *ad hoc* character, particularly those allowed by mercantile associations, were also common. These general statements will receive ample illustration from the details of inscriptions to be set forth in the course of this study.

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Exemptions

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We may begin with a discussion of the *parihāras*, or exemptions accompanying gifts of land, and the allied subject of tenures before entering upon a study of the details of particular taxes properly so called. The Kharēpaṭan plates of the Silāra Maṇḍalika Raṭṭarāja dated A.D. 1008 record a gift of three villages with their boundaries marked out, inclusive of all the royal income arising from them (*sarva-rājakiya-āyābh-yantarasiddham*), which were not to be entered by *chāṭas* and *bhaṭas* (troops and retainers), and of which the said income was to be exclusive of prior gifts to gods and Brāhmans, and was placed in perpetuity under the control of a learned celibate *āchārya* of the spiritual descent (*samtati*) of Kārkarōṇi of the line (*anvaya*) of the Mattamayūras, a well-known group of Śaiva ascetics.¹ In the Miraj plates² (A.D. 1024) and other charters of the eleventh century the formula of grant usually states that the village is given complete with its grain and gold income, its treasures and deposits; it is not to be pointed at (for any purpose) by the fingers of royal officials; the *śulka* is included in the gift, and no tax (*kara*) or impost (*bādha*) of any kind is to be laid on the village, which is to be respected by all (*sarva namasya*), a phrase which seems to mean that what applies to the king's officials applies to all others and that no one was permitted to contemplate the raising of any contribution from the village on any account whatever. But sometimes a fixed assessment of a lump sum was prescribed as due from the lands in the enjoyment of these sweeping exemptions; thus in the Nilguṇḍ plates we read that when the gift of the village to the 300 Brāhmans from the Drāviḍadēśa was renewed in the year 48 of the Cālukya-Vikrama era and the hamlet Kṛṣṇapallikā was added to the gift, the emperor ordered that these Brāhmans were to pay 400 gold pieces (*suvarṇas*) as consolidated revenue (*piṇḍadāna*) to the ruler of the dēśa (*dēśasvāmi*), and though it is not expressly stated, this has perhaps to be understood as an annual payment. Thus the term *sarvamānya* (*namasya*) does not always have its exact literal meaning, and sometimes implies, not total exemption from all dues, but exemption from all dues other than those named in the charter itself; thus we get some indication that a due regard for the stability of the public fisc was actually maintained, even when the desire to win fame and merit by means of *dānas* (gifts) on a large scale was being indulged. Instances of smaller gifts being likewise subject to obligations to the fisc are not unknown; thus an *aruvaṇa* of five *gadyāṇas* is prescribed for six *mattar* of land given by Sōbhanarasa to Revabbe Goravi of the temple of Mūlasthāna in Sirivūr in A.D. 1005, besides one *balli* (creeper) in the garden given on the same occasion—one *balli* meaning the produce of betel leaves growing on one creeper in the garden mentioned.¹ The nature of the *aruvaṇa* is not clear, but we find it mentioned in one instance as equally due from cultivated land (*key*), house (*mane*), and garden land (*tōṇṭa*).²

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¹ EI, iii, 297 ff.

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² Ibid., xii, 303.

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¹ SII, xi (i), 50, ll. 19-20; also ibid., 52, ll. 58-9 (A.D. 1007).

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² Ibid., 78, l. 56 (A.D. 1045).

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Land Tenure

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Lands with varying degrees and kinds of immunities were held on different tenures by different classes of persons and institutions; temples, *maṭhas*, village-assemblies and other permanent corporations held them on a perpetual tenure, little liable to change except in extraordinary situations arising out of war, invasion, and so on, or by mutual agreement between the state and the corporation; the highest title for this class of holding was obviously the *parameśvaradatti*, the gift of the emperor, a term covering not only gifts directly made by the emperor, but all those made with his sanction.³ In one instance in A.D. 1037 a sale of land followed by a gift of the land to a temple is expressly declared to be irrevocable—*ā keyge bennirkkey-illa*, meaning ‘of that field there is no resumption’.⁴

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³ e.g. HAS, Nāgai Inscr., pp. 15, 22 n.

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⁴ EI, xix, 219, l. 8.

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Tala-vṛtti

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Gifts to temples for the maintenance of services in them are sometimes designated by the special term *tala-vṛtti*; the term *vṛtti* is usually employed to designate a service-tenure, and adjectives are prefixed to it calculated to give some idea of the nature of the services implied—thus we have terms already noticed such as *bhaṭṭa-vṛtti*—free land for the teacher of *Śāstras*, or *akkarika-vṛtti*—free land for the village teacher who taught the three R’s. *Tala-vṛtti* obviously means free land for the maintenance of services in the tala (Skt. sthala) shrine, to which the gift is made. The village of Suruki was given as tala-vritti by Attimabbe to the Brāhma Jinālaya, a Jain basadi built by her at Lokkiguṇḍi in A.D. 1007.¹ The village Sivuṇūr was made into a tala-vritti for the Śiva temple of Nāgēśvara in Sūṇḍi erected by Nāgadeva;² Sivuṇūr is also called a deva-bhoga and its boundaries are specified in detail; then occurs the statement that everything within the boundaries so laid down was constituted a tala-vritti divided among the various heads in the following manner: for sandal and other ingredients for the regular worship of the deity and repairs to the structure of the temple as and when required, 150 mattar; for feeding resident ascetics, 300 mattar; to the bhaṭṭa who discoursed to these ascetics, 30 mattar; to the teacher (ōjha) engaged in instructing the young celibates (māṇi) in the matha, 8 mattar; to 2 Brāhmans who performed the hōma, 8 mattar;

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to the 4 māṇis of the ghaliga (assembly hall), 20 mattar; for the lake Nāga-goṇḍa, 20 mattar; to 16 dancing-girls performing various specified duties—one getting 20 mattar, another 15, and the rest 12 each, total 203; to a drummer, 24 mattar; to the flutist, 12 mattar; to the Sūle-vāḷa (?), 12 mattar; to the stone-cutter Chandoja, 30 mattar. It must be added that the seigniorial dues from the village (manneya sāmyada tereyam) of Sivuṇūr were also surrendered to the temple in perpetuity by the three seigniors of the place on their own behalf and that of their descendants. The role of the temple in the economy of its neighbourhood is very well brought out in the dispositions made in this record, and in many others of a similar nature. An inscription dated A.D. 1148³ mentions that the village of Tohi was divided into 80 vrittis distributed among several learned Brāhmans and institutions, including an expounder of the Purāṇa, a veda teacher, a śāstra teacher and a keeper of fire, the whole being handed over to the mahājanas as tribhōgābhyantara-sarvanamasya. Incidentally we may note that several of the Brāhmans named in the record are called arasas and nāyakas, and that they were prepared on occasion to exchange their priestly ladles for swords; among them was one called Uyyakoṇḍa-bhaṭṭa Sōmayāji, which sounds very much like a Tamil name.

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The expression kumāra-vritti, ‘the holding of the prince’, is employed to describe the relation of Vikramāditya to Banavase and Noḷambavāḍi in an inscription of A.D. 1057⁴ in the lifetime of his father; though not of frequent occurrence, the expression is definite proof that the princes of the royal family held definite assignments of the entire revenues of considerable areas and maintained themselves and their courts out of the proceeds. Similar assignments were made to the servants of the State either individually or in groups.⁵ The term anuga-jīvita, lit. the subsistence of a subordinate, describes the tenure on which Taila II himself held Tarddavāḍi of the Rāṣṭrakūṭa king Kṛṣṇa III in A.D. 965;⁶ it also applies to six villages held by the 1,000 Lenkas (guards) in the middle of the eleventh century, the *jivita* being held with rights of *tribhōgābhyantara siddhi*.¹ A little later, in A.D. 1067, *mahāmaṇḍalēśvara* Jēmarasa held Poṭṭiyūr and some other towns as *anuga-jivita*, and his son Jōyimarasa held Poṭṭiyūr itself from his father as his *kumāra-vritti*—a case of what we may perhaps call sub-infeudation.² Before leaving tenures we must note the term *dasavanda* or *dasabandha*, of which the best interpretation seems to be the earmarking for a specified public purpose of one-tenth of a given source of revenue;³ this interpretation is directly favoured by an inscription of A.D.

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1108 cited by Fleet,⁴ and by another record dated more than a century later.⁵ Such an arrangement may be made regarding the rent of lands as in some of the Nāgai and Lakshmēśvar inscriptions,⁶ or may be attached to other sources of cash revenue as in further instances just mentioned.

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¹ SII, xi (i), 52, l. 56.

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² SII, ix (i), 250.

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³ Ibid., 83, l. 15 (A.D. 1049).

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⁴ EI, xv, 89.

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⁵ Ibid., 118, l. 22.

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⁶ Ibid., xi (i), 40.

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¹ *SII*, ix (i), 101, ll. 21-2; 104, ll. 4-5.

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² *EI*, xvi, 83, ll. 6, 8.

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³ *IA*, xxx, 267, n. 2.

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⁴ Ibid., p. 107.

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⁵ *SII*, ix (i), 239.

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⁶ *HAS*, no. viii, p. 32, l. 268, and p. 33, l. 301; *EI*, xvi, 48, l. 52.

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Tax Rates

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We may now consider some concrete instances of taxes and levies and their rates recorded either for specified purposes or as items from which exemption is granted in particular instances. Some of these have already been mentioned incidentally, as, for example, *aruvana*, *balli*, and the *śunka* on betel leaves. The Lakkuṇḍi inscription of Attiyabbe (A.D. 1007)⁷ states that a garden and an oil-mill given to a *basadi* were each exempted from all dues like *karavanda*, *talabhoga*, and *masatu*; the nature of these apparently small cesses is by no means clear at present. An inscription of A.D. 1045 from the Bellary District⁸ records the grant by Udayāditya Sindarasa of all the taxes due to him for the *manneya* of the village of Doṇḍavaṭṭi, for the maintenance of an irrigation tank; though lacking details of the levies or their rates, this document is valuable as clearly establishing two things only vaguely hinted at by other records: that the *manneya* is the overlordship or seigniory of a village which carried certain fiscal rights with it, and that the total sum of these rights, together with the *manneya* itself, was transferable and could become the subject of a charitable gift; the question naturally arises whether such assignments could be made permanent or were valid only for the period during which the *manneya* vested in the donor; our inscription says that Udayāditya’s gift was to last ‘for all time’—*chandrārkatārambaram*, and there is no indication that the emperor’s approval had been obtained. It is, however, possible that provincial governors had the power to dispose permanently of the *manneya* of particular places in this manner; the case of the perpetual suspension by the emperor of the *manneya* of Hoḷalu after the tyranny of Boppaya has been already noticed.⁹ An inscription of A.D. 1054 mentions that four *dēvadāsis* of a temple were exempted from the payment of house-tax (*mane-vaṇa*) and mirror tax (*kaṇṇaḍi-vaṇa*);¹ the house-tax was most likely a tax of a general nature which not only *dēvadāsis* but all the inhabitants had to pay, as can be seen from other inscriptions;² but the mirror tax may well have been a special levy, of the nature of an occupation tax, levied only on the class of dancing-girls; we find it mentioned again in a record of twenty years later, this time as forming part of an endowment given to a temple,³ the other part of the gift comprising a levy on pandals erected during marriages among the seventy families of the locality—*elpaṭṭokkala maduveya paṇḍara paṇam*. In all these instances the rates are not specified. A tax on barbers (*nāvida-vāriyam*) is mentioned in A.D. 1068 in an inscription from Bāgali in the Bellary District.⁴

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⁷ *SII*, xi (i), 52, ll. 74-5.

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⁸ Ibid., ix (i), l. 100.

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⁹ Above, pp. 386-7, *SII*, ix (i), 169.

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¹ *SII*, ix (i), 113, ll. 14-15.

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Cites (18)