Hostname: page-component-77c89778f8-5wvtr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-20T21:41:03.788Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Art. I.—On the Geographical Limits, History, and Chronology of the Chera Kingdom of Ancient India

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2011

Extract

Tradition and native records represent the southern portion of the Indian peninsula as being anciently divided into three contemporary kingdoms. 1. The Pándya. 2. Chola or Sora. 3. Chera, Sera or Konga. Of the first, a valuable account has been supplied by Professor Wilson, in Vol. III. of the Society's Journal; and of the other two, slight sketches have been given by the same learned writer, in the Introduction to his Catalogue of the M'Kenzie Collection: a more detailed notice of the last is the object of this paper.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 1846

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

page 2 note 1 A Telugu tribe. See Right, Elite's Mirasi, p. xii.Google Scholar

page 3 note 1 The writer of the MSS. has evidently understood the title Chatur-bhúja, “four armed,” as having a personal and literal reference to this prince; it is however a title of Vishnu, which is frequently assumed by his followers.

page 6 note 1 The introductory note calls him “Virata.”

page 6 note 2 A tribe of hunters, said to be the aborigines of the peninsula.

page 7 note 1 A note in the MSS. states, that “according to the Condatoor MSS. he reigned from Saliváhana 849 to 899 (a.d. 927 to 977).”

page 8 note 1 There is a place of this name in the Drávida desa; it is situated a little to the west of Vellore.

page 9 note 1 Taylor, 's MSS. App. vol. ii. p. 26.Google Scholar

page 9 note 2 Wilson's M'Kenzie Cat. i. 198.Google Scholar

page 10 note 1 Wilson's M'Kenzie Cat. Int. p. 92.Google Scholar

page 10 note 2 Wilks's Sketches of Mysore History, i. p. 8.Google Scholar

page 11 note 1 Buchanan's Mysore Journey, vol. ii., p. 183, 185, 237 and 248.Google Scholar

page 12 note 1 Buchanan's Mysore Journey, vol. ii., p. 242.Google Scholar

page 12 note 2 A list of titles of the Chera, Chola, and Pándya sovereigns, (Wilson's M'Kenzie Cat., vol. ii., p. cxxix., No. 24Google Scholar), gives the following among fourteen titles of the Chera Rajas. “Malayaman,” Lord of Malaya: “Colly verpen,” Lord of the Colly mountain in Salem.

page 12 note 3 Buchanan's Journey, vol. ii., p. 484.Google Scholar

page 12 note 4 Sketches, Wilks's, &c., vol. i., p. 8.Google Scholar; Buchanan's Journey, vol. ii., p. 183, 185, and 304.Google Scholar

page 13 note 1 Wilson's Catalogue of M'Kenzie's Collection, vol. i., Int. xcviii.Google Scholar

page 13 note 2 Journal of Royal Asiatic Society, vol. iv., p. 36.Google Scholar

page 13 note 3 Ib. p. 4.

page 13 note 4 Buchanan's Mysore Journey, vol. ii., p. 162.Google Scholar

page 14 note 1 Rottler's Dictionary.

page 14 note 2 Journal of Royal Asiatic Society, vol. iii., p. 203Google Scholar; Tamil verses, in Taylor, 's MSS., vol. ii., App. p. 25.Google Scholar

page 14 note 3 Wilson's M'Kenzie Catalogue, vol. i., Int., p. LxxxiGoogle Scholar; Tamil Terses, in Taylor, 's MSS. vol. ii., App. p. 26.Google Scholar

page 15 note 1 Wilson's M'Kenzie Catalogue, vol. i., Int., p. xxviii.Google Scholar

page 15 note 2 Buchanan's Mysore Journey, vol. iii., pp. 90 and 459.Google Scholar

page 15 note 3 Wilson's M'Kenzie Catalogue, vol. i., Int., pp. cxvii. and cxxii.Google Scholar

page 15 note 4 MrEllis, in Professor Wilson's M'Kenzie Catalogue, i., p. xlvGoogle Scholar. Buchanan's Mysore Journey, vol. ii., pp. 347, 474Google Scholar; vol. iii., p. 14, and map in vol. i.

page 16 note 1 Wilson's M'Kenzie Catalogue, vol., ii., App. pp. 125, 6.Google Scholar

In the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, for April, 1839, there is a translation of a copper grant, which Mr. H. T. Prinsep conjectured to have been made by a king of this dynasty. It is a grant of land by the Rája of Láta, a country mentioned in most of the lists of desas, but of which the exact locality has not been determined. Professor Wilson, in the second edition of his Dictionary, calls it “the upper part of the Dekhan,” and this agrees with the grant in question, from which we learn, that at the period at which it was made there were four kingdoms occupying part of the Dekhan and Hindustan, namely, Gúrjara, westward, Málwa, centrical, Gaura, eastward, and Láta, southward; the capital of the last named kingdom was Elapur, founded by Krishna Raya. The date of the grant is a.d. 812, and the princes mentioned in it are, 1. Govind Raja; 2. Karka, his son; 3. Krishna, his son; 4. Dhruva, his son, who died at Alláhábád; 5. Govind II., son of Dhruva; 6. Indra, brother of Govinda; 7. Karka, son of Indra, the author of the grant, whose heir presumptive was Danti Varma, his brother. The date agrees with that of our dynasty, and Mr. Prinsep, by supposing Karka to be the same with Kongani, traces all the above-mentioned princes in the Chera list with the exception of Indra. Independently, however, of the difference between the names Karka and Kongani, supposing them to belong to the same person, the succession of the princes differs entirely from that given in our MSS., in which neither the kingdom of Láta, nor any of the events recorded in the grant, are noticed. Hence it seems clear that the grant must belong to a different dynasty, ruling over a country far to the north of Chera, the Láta desa being probably situated immediately south of the Nerbadda river.

page 17 note 1 Ellis's Mirasi Right, p. xvi.Google Scholar

page 17 note 2 Wilson's M'Kenzie Catalogue, vol. i., Int., p. xcvii.Google Scholar

page 18 note 1 Wilson's Sanscrit Dictionary, Preface, p. xv.Google Scholar; Asiatic Researches, xvii., p. 177.Google Scholar

page 18 note 2 See Buchanan's Journey, vol. i., p. 143; ii., p. 74; iii., p. 91 and 301.Google Scholar

page 18 note 3 Ellis's Mirasi Right, p. xlvi.Google Scholar

page 18 note 4 Professor Wilson, in his Catalogue of the M'Kenzie Collection, states the number as twenty-six, omitting No. 12, Mádhava Mahádhí Ráya, and No. 15, Kongani Mahádhi Raya II., and an unnecessary comma has been inserted in the press between Chaturbhúja and Kumara or Kanara deva (No. 4), thus making the actual number of names twenty-seven. (See Catalogue, , vol. i., p. 199.Google Scholar) Mr. Taylor has adopted the list with its errors; (Taylor, 's MSS., vol. ii., p. 64Google Scholar;) as has also Mr. Prinsep, in his Tables, in the latter, however, Raja Malla deva (No. 24), is divided into two names, viz., Rája Deva and Malla Deva; and Malla Deva II. the last prince is entirely omitted. (Prinsep's Tables, p. 121.)Google Scholar

page 18 note 5 Journal of Royal Asiatic Society, vol. v., p. 343.Google Scholar

page 19 note 1 Wilson's M'Kenzie Catalogue, vol. i., Int lxxxviii., and p. 182Google Scholar; Journal of Royal Asiatic Society, vol. iv., p. 3.Google Scholar

page 19 note 2 See No. 16, 17, 21, 26 and 30.

page 19 note 3 Appendix, p. 135.

page 19 note 4 All the lists that have been obtained are given in an Appendix.

page 19 note 5 Ellis's Mirasi Right, p. xlvi.Google Scholar

page 19 note 6 Taylor's Analysis of the M'Kenzie Collection, p. 73.Google Scholar

page 19 note 7 Ellis's Mirasi Right, p. XLV.Google Scholar

page 20 note 1 Wilson's M'Kenzie Catalogue, vol. i., p. 163.Google Scholar

page 20 note 2 Appendix, No. 5.

page 20 note 3 “Varalar, &c.,” in Wilson's M'Kenzie Catalogue, vol. ii. clvi., No.24. Appendix, No. iii.Google Scholar

page 20 note 4 Wilson's M'Kenzie Catalogue, vol. i., p. 196.Google Scholar

page 21 note 1 Wilson's M'Kenzie Catalogue, p. lxxxviii.Google Scholar

page 21 note 2 MSS. at East India House.

page 21 note 3 Ib., vol. i., p 181.

page 22 note 1 Vol. iv., p. 13.

page 25 note 1 Lakmeswar is a little to the south-west of Dharwar, in the southern Mahratta country.

page 25 note 2 Wilson's M'Kenzie Catalogue, vol. i., Int. p. cix.Google Scholar