Indian Antiquary Vol 46

SR No.: 032538
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Richard Carnac Temple, Devadatta Ramkrishna Bhandarkar
Publisher: Swati Publications
Publication Year: 1984
Total Pages: 508
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 20 MB

Page 52

50
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY
(MARCH, 1917
of Madras. The Madras Epigraphists, Dr. Hultzch and his successors, have done their part in deciphering and interpreting the inscriptions. Others have been equally busy. There is a handy and very useful guide book recently published by Mr. Coombes of the Education Department, better known by his connection with the Chingloput Reformatory.
Last of all, there is the work of the Frenchman, Professor of Pondicherry, Jouveau-Dubreuil, whose recent work on South Indian Architecture and Iconography has perforce to allot considerable space to this locality.
With such an array of expository effort extending over a whole century and more, it would be rash indeed to attempt any further exposition of the subject which, at best, could result only in adding 'another hue unto the rainbow.' It turns out happily that it is not so, because so far no one has succeeded in expounding what actually this signifies in South Indian History. Even in respect of some of the details that have already been examined by archaeological specialists there has not been the co-ordination of evidence leading to conclusions for historical purposes. This it is proposed to attempt, with just the necessary amount of examination of various archæological details for coordination with a view to the historical significance of the antiquities of Mahabalipuram.
The modern name of the village is Mâvalivaram, or the Sanskritized Mahabalipuram, the city of Mahabali, the great emperor of the Asuras, who, legend has it, was too good and too powerful to be suffered by the gods gladly. The god Vishnu in his dwarf incarnation outwitted him. Praying for a gift of three feet of earth, he measured the nether and the other world in two, and demanded room for the third foot promised. Great Bali prayed that his humble head give the room demanded. When the foot of the Great One was placed upon it Bali sank under the earth, where he is said to reign supreme monarch of the world below. The unwary visitor to the shore-temple in the village is occasionally informed that the recumbent figure in the seaward chamber of the smaller shrine of the shore-temple is Bali on his couch.
There is a panel of Trivikrama in the Varahavatára cave and beyond this there is nothing particularly to associate this place with the demon-emperor Bali. This form of the name, perhaps, became familiar in connection with the dynasty which was known in the interior of this region as the Mahabalis (Mâvalis popularly) or Banas, with their capital at Tiruvallam in the North Arcot District, and with their territory taking in portions of Mysore also. So far as our knowledge of this dynasty goes at present, they seem to have flourished in the period intervening between the death of the last great Pallava king Nandivarman and the rise of the first great Chola king Parântaka. There is a reference to a Mahabali ruler, who was the father-in-law of the reigning Chola king kill in the Manimekhalar2. This work has to be referred to a period anterior to the Pallavas, as even the late Rai Bahadur V. Venkayya3 allots the great Chola Karikala to the sixth century A. D., the period of interregnum between the great Pallava Dyuasty, and the dynasty that preceded it.
2 நெடியோன் குறளூருவாகி நிமிர்ந்துத
னடியிற் படியை யடக்கி யவன்னாள் நீரிற் பெய்த மூரிவார் சிலை மாவலி மருமான் சீர்கெழு திருமகள்
சீர்த்தி யென்னுந் திருத்தகு தேவி, Marimekhalai. Canto XIX. 11, 51-55.
3 A. S. R. 1906-7. p. 224. nota 1.