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The Indian Analyst
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South Indian Inscriptions |
EPIGRAPHIA INDICA giving the full name of the king as Bhuvana-trinētra Irugeya(a variant of Irigāya of the Animala record)-mahārāja. Though not dated, the epigraph under review states that the grant recorded in it marked the occasion of the coronation of Bhuvana-triṇētra Irugeya-mahāraja. As the Upparapalle record quotes Śaka 894 as the date on which Bhuvana-triṇētra i.e. Irugeya, was crowned (sakavarshammu 894-gu nēṇḍu pṛithivīrājya-paṭṭabaddhuṇḍ=ayen), the record under review, which registers a gift made by the king on the same occasion, may also be reasonably assigned to the same year, viz. Śaka 894 or 972 A.D. The Animala inscription dated four years later, i.e. in 976 A.D., states that Irigāya (i.e. Irugeya) made a gift of land on the eleventh day’s obsequies of his father (ayya) Bejayita-mahārāja. No inscriptions of Bejayita-mahārāja mentioning him by name are known so far. The copper-plate grant of Bhuvana-triṇētra, i.e. Irugeya-mahārāja, mentioned above, refers to Bhīmarāja and Bāchavva as the persons for whose merit the gift was made. It is doubtful if these persons could be the parents of Irugeya-mahārāja, in view of the evidence of the Animala inscription furnishing the name of Irugeya’s father as Bejayita-mahārāja. It may also be observed that Bhīmarāja is not called a Mahārāja. He was in all probability a close relative of the king. If the event recorded in the Animala epigraph, namely, the ceremony of the eleventh day’s obsequies of Bejayita-mahārāja, was a contemporary one, Irugeya’s father must have lived till 976 A.D. In that case, Irugeya appears to have succeeded t the throne even during the life time of his father who probably abdicated in favour of his son as early as Śaka 894 (972 A.D.) on the latter’s coronation or even slightly earlier according to the copper-plate grant.
Bhīmarāja, it has been pointed out, could not have been the father of Irugeya-mahārāja. But undoubtedly he was a close relation of the king and a person of high rank inasmuch as the monarch made the grant for his merit. In this connection we may consider three epigraphs from Uḍyaiyārguḍi[1] in the Chidambaram Taluk of the South Arcot District, which mention the Chōḷa queen, Uḍaiyapirāṭṭiyār-Vīman-Kundavvaiyār. One of them[2] refers to her as the mother (āchchiyār) of prince Ariñjiya-Pirāntakadēva, i.e. Parāntaka, son of Ariñjaya. There is no clue in these epigraphs regarding the lineage of the Chōḷa queen. It has been surmised that she was an Eastern Chālukya princess, probably a daughter of Chālukya Bhima II (934-945 A.D.) or the daughter of Ādittaṇ Vīmaṇ, the chief of Aṇḍurai.[3] But the Anbil plates of Sundara-chōḷa refer to the prince’s mother, i.e. the queen of Ariñjaya, as born of the Vaidumba family.[4] It may therefore be surmised that Vīman-Kundavvaiyār of the lithic records was the daughter of Vaidumba Bhīmarāja, the queen of Ariñjaya (956-957 A. D.) and the mother of Sundara-chōḷa Parāntaka II (956-973 A.D.). It was evidently after this Kundavai that her granddaughter, i.e. the daughter of her son Sundara-chōḷa and sister of the great Rājarāja I, was named. Most of the recipients of the grant referred to as the Kāṁpus of Vēnāḍu associate their proper names with place-names such as Vēṁbaḷḷi, Rākuṇda, Mēlkurti, Pichchali, Vuddini, etc. Some of the localities may be identified with villages of the same or similar names in the neighborhood of Kalakaḍa such as Mēḍikurti, Rātiguṇṭapalle (Rākuṇḍa), etc., lying in the Vayalpad Taluk, and Pichchalivāṇḍlapalle (Pichchali) and Vēmpalle (Vēṁbaḷḷi) in the Madanapalle Taluk. Vēnāḍu, the native land of the Kāṁpus (tenants or farmers), must be looked for somewhere in the neighborhood of the Vayalpad and Madanapalle Taluks only. However, there is no evidence to show that any area round about these Taluks bore the name of Vēnāḍu. If vē is understood in _____________________________________________________________ [1] A. R. Ep., Nos. 572, 587, and 589 of 1920.
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