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The Indian Analyst
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South Indian Inscriptions |
BOMBAY KARNATAKA INSCRIPTIONS VOLUME III The Yadavas Simghana | Kannanara, Mahadeva | Ramachandra One outstanding feature of the records of the reign of king Simghana of this dynasty is that they fix various dated for the commencement of his rule. In fact, they show that the initial year of his reign was reckoned from six different dates. It is however, difficult to explain this unusual phenomenon or connect the various starting points with particular events of his reign. For easy reference these dates are given below in tabular form:
Among
the notable achievements of this king are mentioned the conquest of Mandava
and the destruction of the hill-fort of Bhambheri (No. 227).
Mandava is evidently Mandu in Rajasthan though the ruler whom he
vanquished is not specified. Bhambheri
is modern Bhamer is West Khandesh as suggested by Prof. Mirashi. The
spelling of this place-name found in the present record further supports
Prof. Mirashiâs
identification. From
another inscription (No. 230) of this reign it appears that Singhana had
a queen named Jetadevi, for he is therein described as Jetadevi-manoramah.
Coming to the reign of his successor Kannara, we are confronted with a passage in an inscription (No. 237) which seems t say that in Saka 1177 (A.D. 1255) both Kannara and his younger brother Mahadeva were ruling. The passage in question reads: anharadeva-Mahadeva-vijaya-raiyam-uttarottaram,
etc. Unless Mahadeva is
meant to stand for Maharaja or
a similar expression denoting paramountcy, it will have to be considered
that both he and his brother were ruling jointly.
But this supposition goes against the known periods of these two
rulers, the first of whom ruled till A.D. 1260, in which year he was
succeeded by Mahadeva. No
other epigraph so far known makes any reference to their
joint rule. However
Amalananda, the author of Vedantakalpataru also makes a similar
satement: Kirtya Yadava-vamsam=unnamayati Sri-Jaitradevatmaje Krishne
kshmabhriti bhutalam saha-Mahadevena sambibharati.
Another inscription of Kannara, (No. 233) dated in the cyclic
year Ananda (A.D. 1254) speaks of Mahamandalesvara Haripaladeva
as a person of rank and authority.
If this Haripaladeva is the same as the Harpal Deo who was the
son-in-law of Ramachandra of this dynasty and was captured and flayed
alive in 1318, then the present record would give the earliest date
known so far for him It may
also be pointed out that this record is one of the very few epigraphs
that make mention of him. Most of the inscriptions of the reign of Ramachandra are hero-stones. Three records, however, deserve to be noticed since they would fix an earlier date for the accession of this king than the one given by Fleet (i.e., A.D. 1271-72). These records are dated on the 19th (No. 264) 29th (269) and 30th (No. 270) years of his reign and the equivalents of these dates would be A.D. 1287 November, 1297 December and 1298 June respectively. They show that he counted his regnal years from some date before June 1269. But since we know that his predecessor Mahadeca was still on the throne in A.D. 1270 May-June, the discrepancy can be reconciled only by the assumption that Ramachandra was associated with Mahadeva in the governance of the kingdom, even from A.D. 1269. It may be observed here that No. 271 is one of the very few inscriptions of this reign issued after A.D. 1298, though Muslim chronicles carry his rule up to A.D. 1309. No.
197 (B.K.
No. 159 of 1933-34) Bijapur, Bijapur Taluk, Bijapur District Slab
(A-37) in the Musum Bhillama
(A.D. 1190?)
\D7
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