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No. 11.]
TWO PALLAVA COPPER-PLATE GRANTS.
249
plate grant Dr. Hultzsch suggested that all the three must belong to the time of Simhavarman, the son of Vishộugopa, and rejected the supposition of Dr. Fleet that the first grant of Vishņugopa was dated possibly in the reign of his supposed elder brother Simhavarman. Accepting the statements of the records as they are, the three plates together supply five generations of kings from Skandavarman I, while the fourth gives three farther generations of kings from Skandavarman, whom Dr. Haltzsch is inclined to identify with the second Skandavarman, the grandson of Skandavarman the first. The Vėlirupālaiyam plates of the later Pallava king Nandi. varman III (published in Part V of Vol. II of the South Indian Inscriptions) give a long list of names of the early Pallavas and refer, in the order of succession of father and son, to the kings, Kalabhartri, Chitapallava, Virakurcha, Skandasishya, Kumārayishnu who conquered Kāñchi and Buddhavarman, who was a submarine fire to the ocean-like army of the Cholas. Here the last two dames, Kumāravishnu and Buddhavarman, correspond to the second two names of the Chendalär plates mentioned above and suggest that Skandasishya therein referred to as the father of Kumāravishņu must be the same as Skandavarman II. Virakūrcha or (Virakorchavarman) is apparently identical with Viravarman, as might be gathered also from a fragmentary copper-plate record from Darsi in the Podili division of the Nellore district (published by Dr. Hultzsch in Epigraphia Indica, Vol. I, p. 397). Thus we get from the several copperplates published so far six generations of the Pallavas with names of nine Pallava kings, who called themselves Pallava-Mahārājas or Pallava-Dharma-mabārājas of the Bhāradvāja gõtra and ruled from the capital towns Palakkada, Dasana para and Mēnmātura, until one of them, Kumaravishịu I, re-conquered Kāñchi-pura, evidently from the Cholas, who had taken possession of it some time subsequent to that of VisbộugOpa, the contemporary of Samudragupta, and had established themselves in the Tonda country.!
As to the order of succession of the first three kings in the genealogy, vis., Skandavayman I, Viravarman and Skandavarman II, there cannot be any doubt, inasmuch as all the records noted above mention them in the same order. None of these records, however, are contemporaneous with the kings in question. The importance, therefore, of the subjoined plates (A), which distinctly belong to the time of Skandavarman II, as I shall prove presently, is greatly enhanced
A.-OGODU GRANT OF VIJAYA-SKANDAVARMAN II : THE 33RD YEAR.
This set consists of four thin copper-plates, held together by a ring, which is 3' in diameter and 1" in thickness. The edges of the plates are not raised into rims, as we generally find done in most copper-plates, in order to protect the writing from being rubbed away by contact with the adjoining copper-sheets. The seal which is attached to the ring is almost circular and 11" in dinmeter. It is totally word away and does not show traces of any symbols, though it may be presumed to have had on it originally the recumbent bull, as in the case of other Pallava grants. The plates measure 8" and 21" each in length and breadth respectively, and they weigh with ring and seal 51 tolas.
The first and last sheets of the set bear writing only on their inner faces, while the two middle sheets are written on both their sides. Each sheet contains 3 lines of writing, the size of the letters ranging roughly from toto of an inch. The characters are of a type almost
In the time of the Chola king Karikäls, of about the 6th century A.D., there was, according to Tamil litera. tore, Pallava king ruling nt Kibichl (100 4rob. Suro. Rep. for 1965-6, p. 176, note 8). But the Tiruvalangadu plates of Rajendra-Chola I suggest that Kafichi was included in the dominions of Karikala (ibid., p. 174, ote 11). from the Tamil poem Kalingattuparani we learn that Kökkifli, another early Chola king, married & Näga princess and by her had an illegitimate son, to whom he assigned the Tondai-nadu. Evidently Kabcbi, which was acquirod by Karikala, was lost in the time of Kokkilli ; see Mr. K. Y. Subrahmanya Aiyar's Historical Sketches, pp. 188 ,
