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EPIGRAPHIA INDICA.
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Vijayanagara general Vitthala-dėva-Maharāya conducted an expedition against the Tiruvadi in the reign of Sadāsiva-deva-Rāya, some time before s. 1466 (=A.D. 1544-45), and that a Brahmaņa of Tiruvidaimarudar, named Tiruchchiqsambala-Bhattan,"joined Vitthala's army and continued to fight on his side from Anantasayanam in the south to Mudugal in the north.'" Visvanatha must have been one of the military officers who accompanied Vitthala; for, No. 17 of the Madras Epigraphist's Collection for 1912 distinctly affirms that Visvanatha obtained from Ramarajarayyan (i.6. Aliya Rāmarāja), the powerful minister of Sadāsiva, the Tiruvadi-dosa as amara-näyakam, and his son Krishnappa-Nayaka granted seven villages in this provinco to the god of the Kộishnapuram temple, which he had newly built. Trouble cropped up evidently once again in the Tiruvadi rajyam during the reign of Sadāsiva-deva-Raya, and a punitive expedition against the king of that conntry was necessary, and it was accordingly despatched under Vitthala. From one of the inscriptions in my collection we find that in the Kollam year 722 (=A.D. 1547), Bhatalavira Ramavarman, of the Jayatunga nadu branch, who calls himself the tēļaikkäran of the god ?) Sankaranārāyaṇamirti (probably of Nāvāykkolam, near Attingal), made arrangements for the monthly ?) celebration, in the Vishnu shrine at Suchodram, of the day of Rohiņi, the natal star of Vitthalēsvara-Mahäråyar. The Tiruvadi must bave lost a large portion of his territory on this occasion, and what was taken away from him appears to have been bestowed upou Visvanātha as an amura-ndyakam. The Tiruvadi was ruling, very probably, over what remained, as a vassal of the Vijayanagara king.
The kingdom of the Pandya king was situated on the way to the Tiruvadi rājyam, and had necessarily to be passed through. If the Pandya, as stated in the document, had also to lose his kingdom, it must surely be that he had offered resistance to the passage of the Vijayanagara army through his territories or offended Vitthala in some other way. Anyhow the Pandya does not appear to have been deprived altogether of his kingdom, but was subjugated and suffered to rule as a subordinate of the Vijayanagara Emperor.
The princes called Vāņāda-Rayars were the lineal descendants of the Bana kings, who, in the earlier period of South Indian History, were the vassals of the Pallavas and ruled over the North Arcot District and portions of the Mysore Province; their kingdom was known as Bānappadi or Perumbānappādi. When the Pallavas were subverted by the Cholas, they became subordinates of the Cholas, and the Vānāda-Rayars continued faithful to the latter till the reign of Kulottanga III. Rajaraja Vāņakovaraiyan, alias Ponparappinan Magadaipperamal, one of the vassals of Kulottunga III, rebelled against bis suzerain and entered into political compacts with some southern petty princes. He drifted on to the south and appears eventually to have joined the Pandyas, who were then growing in power and were soon to subvert the Chola supremacy during the reign of Rājarāja III and his son Rajendra-Chola III. The VaņādsRĀyars continued to be friends and subordinates of the Pandyas till the Musalman invasion of Madara under Malik Kafür. When the Pāndya king was taken prisonor and carried away by the Muhammadans, the Vāņāda-Rāyars took service under the Vijayanagara kings and ruled over the Madura country. They were Vaishnavas in religion, and they gave donations, as may be seen from their inscriptions, to the Vishņu temples at Alagarkoyil, Tiruppullaņi and Srivilliputtar. Visvanatha-Nayaka had evidently ousted the Vaņāda-Rayars from Madura and made it the capital of a kingdom which he formed from the districts of Madura and Tinnevelly and portions of the Travancore State.
In fact, Visvanatha was the founder of the Nayaka dynasty at Madura, and that in the reiga of Sadāsiva-deva-Raya. It is difficult to say how far credence can be given to the tradi. tion that Visvanatha fought against Någama-Nayaka, his own father, to regain for the Emperor of Vijayanagara the Madura country said to have been usurped by him. Unless it be presumed that he joined in a confederacy with the Vāņāda-Rayar, the Pandya and the Tiruvadi and asserted independence, the tradition cannot be upheld.
