Studies in Cola History and Administration c9.41

c9.41

We find further that the *Sabhā* often sells land (4-6), leases it for cultivation (13) or makes gifts (2) of it. Similar powers are exercised by assemblies of other types like the *Ur*, and *Nagaram*. As it is not possible for anyone to give away or sell what is not his own, we have necessarily to conclude that there was some land in the village which was held and administered in common by the whole village besides the individual holdings of each household in it. In one instance the *Sabhā* sells some of its land to an individual in the village (17). Lastly, we find that in late Cōḷa times, in the reign of Rājarāja III, the *Sabhā* of Nālūr met under a tamarind tree outside the village. So also did another *Sabhā* (Brahmadēśam, N. A.) in A. D. 1044 * At that meeting the *Sabhā* sold some land to a Sēnāpati who was the brother of Viramahādēvi. This queen had died perhaps committing suttee we are told that ‘she entered the supreme feet of Brahma in the very same tomb in which the body of King Rājēndra Cōḷa was interred’—and her brother wanted to endow a drinking place to quench her thirst and that of her deceased husband, the Cōḷa king, and the sale of land by the assembly was to enable the Sēnāpati to start this propitiatory foundation. Is it far-fetched to suggest that the assembly met outside the village beneath a tamarind tree because it was engaged in some work not of auspicious import? A similar explanation may hold also in the case from Nālūr Tirumayāṇam. From the decisions recorded, it seems probable that on this occasion the *Sabhā* assembled in the midst of a great commotion caused by some serious misconduct of