Administration and Social Life under Vijayanagar c8.80

c8.80

In this connection an inscription from Tiruviḍaimarudūr is of special interest to us. According to it, two villages, Āvaṇam and Śirrāḍi, were originally granted to the temple at the place as a Marudappar tirunāmattukkāṇi, but were subsequently taken possession of by the government, and they became a paṇḍāravāḍai. When Rāma Rāja Viṭṭaladēva Mahārāja was in Tiruvaḍi (Travancore), Tiruccirrambala Bhaṭṭar and Maṅgamarkāttār, two of the temple servants, made petition to him many times about the villages being returned to the temple. Therefore he sent Tulināyaṇār and a Muttirai vāngi ilingayar (an examiner of the seals (?) analogous to the Revenue Inspectors of the modern day) to see if the boundary stones in the two villages contained the marks of Marudappar. He soon returned and deposed that they bore his marks. On their evidence Viṭṭaladēva decided that the villages belonged to the temple, and restored them to it.48 This inscription clearly shows how the royal officers enquired into cases to ascertain the truth.