Indian Antiquary Vol 48

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Devadatta Ramkrishna Bhandarkar
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 121

JULY, 1919] THE LIFE AND TIMES OF CHALUKYA VIKRAMADITYA
117
Vikramaditya V (A.D. 1009-1014) 45 and Ayyana II (A. D. 1014). Satyaáraya, dying childless, was succeeded by his nephews Vikramaditya, Ayyana and Jayasimha. The first two seem to have ruled but for a few years and nothing historical is known of them.
Jayasimha (A.D. 1015-1042).
48
Jayasimha calls himself in the Balagâmve inscription of A.D. 101946 a lion to the elephant Râjêndrachôla' and he is said to have ' again and again immersed the Chêra and the Chôla in the ocean.' The Chôla inscriptions 47 inform us that Râjêndrachôla, the son and successor of Râjarâja the Great, conquered from Jayasimha, Edatore, Banavâse and Koippâk and a few other towns in Raṭṭapadi. As both Jayasimha and Rajendrachôla boast of having conquered each other, the success was probably en both sides alternately or neither of them obtained any lasting advantage.' As for Paramâra relations it is narrated in Bhojacharita that, after Bhôja had come of age and begun to administer the affairs of his kingdom, on one occasion a play representing the fate of Muñja was acted before him and he thereupon resolved to avenge his uncle's death. He invaded the Dekkan with a large army, captured Tailapa, subjected him to the same indignities to which Muñja had been subjected by him and finally executed him. But Bhôja who was certainly dead in or before A.D. 1055 49 and who ruled over Målava for a long period of 55 years according to Bhojacharita must have ascended over the throne only about A.D. 1000 and so could not have wreaked his vengeance on Tailapa as recorded in Bhojacharita. 50 The tradition recorded there, however, might have some kernel of truth in it. The brutál murder of the uncle Muñja by Tailara
etween A.D. 995 to A.D. 997 would have sunk deep in the mind of his nephew Bhôja who was then a mere boy. As soon as he took the reins of Government in his own hands his first thought was to right the wrong inflicted and to retrieve the honour of the family. So he formed a confederacy, invaded the Châlukya dominions, vanquished the Karnâțas 51 and might have killed, not Tailapa, but some one of his immediate successors. Who then was the Châukya king that became the victim of Bhôja's revenge? An inscription of A.D. 1019 of Jayasimha calls him 'the moon to the lotus king Bhôja '52 (ie, the one that humbled Bhôja as the moon causes the lotus to close its eyes) and details that Jayasimha 'searched out, beset, pursued, ground down and put toflightthe confederacy of Malava.' The vindictive tone of the inscription leads one to infer that Bhôja must have inflicted some crushing
XLVII, 285-290 and XLVII-I 1-7. Ind. Ant., VIII, 18.
45A For the revised chronology vide above, 49 Ind. Ant., V, 15. Ept. Carn., VII, Sk. 125. 47 SII., I, 96, 99.
Mêrutunga's Prabandhachintamani.
48 Bhandarkar's Early Hist. of Dekkan, 60. 49 Epi. Ind., III, 46, 48; Mândhâta plate.
Vide infra Part II.
50 This is not the only historical inaccuracy in Bhojacharita. The work is not a safe or trustworthy guide in historical matters as it is founded exclusively on the traditions of bards. Even the order of succession to the Malava kingdom has been totally mistaken by its author. Muñja was the elder brother and the predecessor of Sindhuraja on the Majava throne but not his younger brother and successor, vide the land grants of Muñja and Bhoja (Ind. Ant., VI and XIV), Nagpur prasasti (Epi. Ind., II) and Padmagupta's Navasahasånkacharita in honour of Sindhuraja (Ind. Ant., XXXVI). The legend of the wicked uncle Mufija who is said to have thwarted the succession of the kingdom from the innocent nephew Bhoja must also be given up as baseless.
51 Epi. Ind., 1, 223, 230: Udepur prasash, Ind. Ant., XLI, 201: Banswara plates.
53 Ind. Ant., V, 17. The inscription reads as follows-a-Jayasinga-nripajam Bhoja-nripam-bñója. rajam. The translation of Mr. Fleet in the Bombay Gazetteer and that of Mr. Rice in the Epigraphia Carnatica are incorrect. Ambhoja lotus, not water-lily as Dr. Fleet takes it, and rajam moon, not king as Mr. Rice does.