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No. 43.]
VILAVATTI GRANT OF PALLAVA SIMHAVARMAN.
299
The epithets and eulogies applied in our grant to the several kings are almost the same as those found in the allied grants, viz., the Uruvupalli, Pikira and Omgödu ones with slight interchanges. The phraseology of the Māngaļūr grant is quite distinct from that of the other charters of the king, and its author Nēmi seems to have composed it in an almost independent and original style of his own without borrowing from any of the other grants of the family. The practice in the plates appears to bave been to apply a particular set of attributes to the particular generation irrespective of the actual king concerned. If we compare the text of the Uruvupalli grant with the rest we find that the same set of epithets is applied in all to the great grandfather, the grandfather, the father of the king and the king of the grant, irrespective of any particular king. Thus, epithets applied to Skandavarman I, the first member in the Uruvupalli grant, are applied to Viravarman, the first member in the other grants. But the epithets vasudhā-tal-aika-vīra or prithvi. tal-aika-vira is applied consistently in all to king Viravarman and this one appears to have been particularly his personal attribute. Skandavarman I, his son Viravarman and the latter's son Skandavaraman II of the Uruvupalli grant are mentioned in the earlier Omgodu grant of VijayaSkandavarman II but with quite a different set of attributes. Viravarman is not therein called the sole hero of the world. Some other epithets of the later grants are traceable in the earlier Omgodu grant, viz., anēka-samara-labdha-vijaya-yabah-pratāpat (for prakasa of later grants) and pratāp-Opanata-rāja-mandalah," which are applied to Viravarman. It therefore appears that the ornate eulogy of the several kings was for the first time composed and brought into use in the reign of Vishnugopa and uniformly adopted in all the known grants of his son Simhavarman except in the Māngaļūr grant as already remarked.
In connection with this and the allied grants there exists what we may call the “Simbavarman problem." Dr. Fleet assigned the Uruvupalli plates to Simhavarman, & supposed elder brother of Vishnugopa and made him Simhavarman I of the dynasty. Dr. Hultzsch, while editing the Pikira grant of Simhavarman, bas attempted to solve the difficulty by assuming the nonexistence of an elder brother of Vishnugopa by name Simhavarman and the passing of the succession from Skandavarman II to Simhavarman without Vishnugopa ever having ascended the throne, on the ground that he is entitled only Yuvarāja or Yuvamahārāja. If Vishnugopa did not succeed to the throne there is no meaning in saying that he made a gift' as the Uruyupalli charter states. I think there is not much justification for Dr. Hultzsch's supposition. The assumption of the title Yuvarāja or Yuvamahārāja which appears to have been due to some dynastic convention or exigency does not by itself deny accession to Vishnugopa as it did not in the case of the Eastern Chalukya king Mangi-Yuvarāja. The Mayidavõlu plates were issued by Yuvamahārāja Sivaskandavarman. Professor Dubreuil who has made a special study of the Pallava dynasty accepts that Vishņugõpa did rule, but follows Dr. Fleet in assuming a Simhavarman as the elder brother of Vishnugopa. Hultzsch and Dubreuil are partially right and partially wrong. We need not either suppose with the former that Vishņugõpa did not ascend the throne or agree with the latter and Dr. Fleet that he had an elder brother named Simhavarman. I would suggest that the difficulty can be solved by supposing that the Uruvupalli grant originally made by Vishnugopa was, for some reasons not known, formally issued by his son Simhavarman
1 In the Uruvupalli and other plates this epithet is applied to Viravarman's grandson Vishnugopa.
* In the Uruvupalli plates this epithet is given to Viravarman, but in the other grants of Simhavarman, to his son Skandavarman II. The eulogies applied to the several generations of kings in the Uruvupalli plates are indifferently applied to the kings figuring in the Chendalur plates of Kumaravishnu II (above, Vol. VIII, p. 235).
* Ind. Ant., Vol. V, PP. 50 and 154. Abore, Vol. VIII, p. 160. See my remarks in the article on the Churā grant of Vijaya Vishnugopavarman, above, p 188. • Ancient History of the Deccan, p. 63.
