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EPIGRAPHIA INDICA.
(VOL. XXIV.
North Arcot and Salem Districts as well as in the Kolar and Chittoor Districts. Būnavidyadhara figures as a subordinate of Pallava Dantivarman and Nandivarman III and prior to him a certain Banarasa who was probably Jayanandivarman or his son Malladēva held a subordinate position under Nandivarman Pallavamalla. Thus the Bāņas bad at this period thrown in their lot with the Pallavas who were waging constant wars with the Rashtrakūtas and Gangas in the north and the Pāņdyas in the south. In the 9th century A.D. their territory extended far beyond their ancestral home. A record of Dhavaleyarasa of the Mahabalikula dated in Saka 807 is found at Pottipadu which would show that the northern boundary of their dominions extended up to the Jammalamadugu taluk; in the west, portions of Goribidanür, Kolar and Muļbāgal were included in their province as their inscriptions are found in that area and in the east Kalahasti formed probably the extreme limit of their province. Their original home, however, lay between Kalahasti and Punganūr to the north of the Pālār which area constituted the Perumbånappādi of the Tamil inscriptions. This must have comprised the Vadugavali-twelve-thousand and Pulinādu-sixty. The occupation of the Cuddapah District as far north as Jammalamadugu must have brought them face to face with the Chõlas of Rênandu. Several Chola records are found in this area, but the king is represented by the general epithet Chõla-mabārāja which does not help us in determining the period of the inscription or of the chief mentioned therein. After a rule of over 200 years, the Chola power was probably not strong enough to resist the invasions of the Baņas who, as stated above, pushed forward their conquests as far north as Jammalamadugu which was purely a Chola country.
This Baņa-Chola conflict must have commenced much earlier. For we find at Chippili & stone record of Punyakumara who in all probability was the donor of the Mälepădu plates, and in the same place is discovered an epigraph of Sri-Malladēva who appears to have been referred to as Bānarasa in the record. If Malladēva is a Båņa chief, he must be identified with the father of Bånavidyadhara who flourished in the first half of the 9th century A.D. This would show that some time after Punyakumāra the Bānas must have subjugated the Cholas and occupied & portion of their territory. This event must have taken place after the time of Vikramāditya Satyadityunru, who ruled over Rēnāņdu-seven-thousand and Siddhi-one-thousand. The Cholas were possibly driven to the north towards Cuddapah, Proddatur and Siddhaut, where, too, their rule was not uninterrupted by the Båņas as evidenced by the Pottipādu record of Dhavaleyarasa. They probably continued as petty chieftains in a portion of Rēnindu awaiting an opportunity to avenge the defeat inflicted on them by the Baņas.
The Nolarbas who had become the faithful servants of the Rashtrakūtas? by about A.D. 770 and whose territory lay adjacent to that of the Bānas could not have remained unaffected by the
1 Madras Epigraphical Report for 1903-04, Part II, para. 28; ibid., for 1906-07, p. 65, and above, Vol. IX, pp. 231 and 233.
* Huien Tulang (cir. A.D. 642) mentions the Cholas as a ruling power in the Cuddapah region. I have shown (above. Vol. XXIII, p. 97) that one branch of the Cholas ruled in the Godavari District in the 6th century A.D. And it is likely that another branch ruled simultaneously in the Rönandu country which was ultimately over thrown by the Banas in the 9th century A.D.
No. 299 of 1905 of the Madras Epigraphical Collection. • Ibid., No. 301.
Recently a record of an early Punyakumara-apparently a Chole--engraved in characters of about the 8th century A.D. has been discovered at Tippalur in the Kamalapuram taluk of the Cuddapah District. This would show that the Chol were the earliest occupants of Rěnádu prior to the Bapm and the Vaidumbas.
No Chola records of the 9-10th century A.D. are found in the Madanapalle region whereas a number of Bapa epigraphs exista in that locality.
Two Challakere inscriptions of Prabhatavarsha Govinda (II) in which Chåruponnēra figures as the king's subordinate.
