The Early History of the Deccan (Parts I–XI) v1.c11.s8.5

v1.c11.s8.5

The Kalachuris of Kalyāṇī were obviously scions of the same family or clan, but the exact lines of connexion are no longer traceable. The Kalyāṇī branch developed its own traditions, and these are found embodied in a Kannaḍa inscription found at Harihar.² The founder of the family is said to be a certain Kṛṣṇa, an incarnation born of a Brāhmin girl who conceived by Śiva in a dream. Passing himself off as a barber, he contrived to kill at Kālañjara an evil-minded king who practised cannibalism, and to take possession of the nine-lakh Ḍāhala country. He thus became an ornament of the 'Kalachuri' family, *kala* (*kaḷi*) meaning 'to kill' and *churi* (*surige*) meaning 'a razor' in Kannaḍa, as Fleet pointed out³—one of the many obvious instances of euhemerism in Indian legends. Many kings of his line followed one another on the throne; finally arose Kannama-Deva who had two sons, Bijjaḷa, the elder, who succeeded him in the sovereignty, and Sandarāja, to whom were born four sons: Ammugi, Saṅkhavarman, Kannara, and Jogama; of these Ammugi ruled first and was followed by Jogama. To Jogama's son Permāḍi was born Bijjaḷa, the reigning king at the time when the record was drawn up. There are other accounts, equally fictitious and with names differing from those given above, of the early kings; these are found in the inscriptions of Bijjaḷa, and need not be reproduced here. But it is worth noting that some of these later accounts are simpler and closer to the facts than those earlier in actual date. Thus, as Fleet points out,¹ two grants of Sovideva and Siṅghaṇa dated respectively A.D. 1174 and 1183 simply state that Jogama was the son of a certain Kṛishṇa of the Kalachuri family, and say nothing at all about any antecedents; while an inscription of Bijjaḷa's second son, Saṅkama, dated in A.D. 1178 at Kukkanur in the Hyderabad State, merely says that in the lineage of the Kalachuris, who were believed to be descended from the God Īśvara (Śiva), there was a 'certain king Kannama. His sons were Bijjaḷa and Rājala. And the son of Rājala was the Jogama of the other accounts.'