Last year. year would appear to be Çaka 1120, making his reign nine years. But the copperplates ascribe to him ten years, which, if ankas, would give eight years. This difference, if not due to mistake, is at present inexplicable. Title. Aniyanka Bhima Dēva has been once mentioned in the copperplates as Ananga Bhima Dēva, and is distinctly mentioned as such in the stone inscription at Cātēçvara temple, District Cuttack. [See Jour. As. Soc. Bengal, Vol. LXVII, 1898, Babu N. N. Vasu on "The Catēçvara Inscription," p. 320, 1.7; I have got a pencil rubbing of it on wax cloth]. He was the son of Coraganga, and brother of Rajarāja II. He and Mēghēçvara inscription, 1. 11]. Only one inscription of this king's time is known : 1 T. * MATERIALS. Çaka-varşambulu 11[2]8 gunenți çri- Ep. Rep., No. 381, of Verified. 1- varddhamāna-vijaya-rājya-samvatsa rambulu [1]1 çrāhi Kumbha kru[2] A little before 602 A.H., June or . Çrikūrmam. First year. = Çaka 1128 11th anka or 9th year; 1120 2nd anka or 1st year. No inscriptions with regnal years have yet been found of the next three kings, till one comes to Nrsimha Dēva II. Falling back upon the years given in the Puri and Kendupātnā copperplates, I find that if treated as ankas, they just fit in, thus : Last year. These do not disagree with the inscriptional or other dates attri butable to the times of the respective kings. Rājarāja III was son of Aniyanka Bhima Dēva by his chief First Mahomedan invasion. The first Mahomedan inroad into Orissa took place in his reign. "Trustworthy persons have related after this manner, that Muhammad-i-Sheran and Ahmad-i-Sheran were two brothers, two among the Khalj Amirs in the service of Muhammad-i-Bakht-yar; and when the latter led his troops towards the mountains of Kāmrūd and Tibbat, he had despatched Muhammad-i-Sheran and his brother, with a portion of his forces, towards Lakhan-or and Jāj-nagar. When the news of these events" (the retreat and death of Muhammad-i-Bakht-yār] "reached Muhammad-i-Sheran, he came back from that quarter and returned again to Diw-kot" (pp. 573-4). Orissa was known to Mahomedan historians under the name Jājnagar. The inroad of Muhammad-i-Sherān took place shortly before the assasination of Muhammad-i-Bakht-yār, in 602 A.H. (p. 513), and just about the time of his departure for Kamrūd, which according to Major Raverty, happened towards the close of 601 A.H. (note 4 to p. 560). Hence the approximate time of this inroad, the first Mahomedan invasion of Orissa, would be the close of 601 A.H, or about June or July of A.D. 1205. No. VII. Ananga Bhima Dēva III. [ Çaka 1133 - Çaka 1160.] The following inscriptions of the time of this king are known :-- MATERIALS. 2 3 S. 4 S. 5 Catēçvara inscription, Circa Çaka 1142 Jour. As. Soc. Beng., Jayati sakala-varna-jan-ālankṛta-rāja Cri-Bhima-dev-abda trtīyāyē guru-vārē Magha-nakşatrē, Çak-āvd-aikādaça-çatē cutvārisat-ad- ...... Between 608 and 622 A.H., say about Vol. LXVII, 1898, Inscription No. 1, on Ditto. Ditto. Verified. Tabakāt-i-Naşirī, Fight with Jour. As. Soc. Beng., Fight with No regnal year of this king being available, his first and last years First and last years. have been calculated by treating the year assigned to him in Puri and Kõndupātņā copperplates, as anka year [see supra, the remarks under Rājarāja III, p. 117]. He was son of Rājarāja III by his Queen Sadguņa or Mankuņa Relationship. p. 321. Dēvi of Cālukya race. He is styled "Trikalinga-nātha" in Cātēçvara inscription, 1. 12, He had a Brahmin minister named Vişnu who fought for him with “Tummāņa-prthvi-patēh" (Cat. ins., 11. 14-5), Historical Facts. and with the Yavanas, "Yavan-āvan-indusamarē" (Do., 1. 15). Babu N. N. Vasu reads Tummāņa as Tumghāna, and identifies this with Tughril-i-tughan Khan [J.A.S.B., XLV, 233-4; XLVII, p. 319]. The identification is open to objections. Firstly, the expression "Tummāna-prthvi-patch" means "of the king of the Tummāņa land," and therefore Tummāna cannot be applied to any person. Secondly, the fight with Tughan Khan took place on 13th Shawwäl, A.H. 642, or in March 1245 A.D., i.e., six or seven years after Ananga Bhima Dēva had ceased to rule. In fact, Tummāņa land was in the Central Provinces, and has been repeatedly mentioned in the inscriptions of the Cedi kings [Ep. Ind., Vol. I, pp. 34, 35, 40, 41, 47]. These Cēdi kings being rulers of the adjoining province, Daksinakōsala, were from time to time at war with the kings of Orissa. One of them, Ratna Dēva, is said to have defeated even Cōraganga. Their position is further indicated by the statement that the fight took place in the groves on the banks of the Bhima river at the foot of the Vindhya hills. They, too, apparently invaded Orissa, as fighting on the bank of the sea is also mentioned. The fight with the Yavanas, mentioned in verse 15, line 15, refers probably to some inroads of Ghiyās-ud-din 'Iwaz, the fourth Bengal ruler. Of him Tabakāt-i-Nasiri says: "In short, Ghiyāg-ud-din 'Iwaz, the Khalj, was a monarch worthy, just, and benevolent. The parts around about the state of Lakhanawati, such as Jāj-nagar, the countries of Bang, Kamrūd, and Tirhut, all sent tribute to him." (pp. 587-8). Sultan Ghiyās-ud-din 'Iwaz was raised to the throne in about 608 A.H.; and the sending of tribute by Jāj-nagar is mentioned before the invasion of Bengal by I-yal-timish in 622 A.H. The invasion of Jājnagar to gather tributes thus apparently fell between 608 and 622 A.H., or between A.D. 1211 and 1224. The Mahomedans make inroads very often when the ruler of the country had just ascended the throne, or the defences of the country had been neglected by some civil war. Ananga Bhima came to the throne in A.D. 1211-2, and the probability is that shortly after this time the Mahomedan inroad was made. This fixes the anterior limit of the Cātēçvara inscription also. Several years would have elapsed between the minister Vişnu's fight with the Yavanas and the finishing of the temple. So, Circa 1120 A.D. may be taken as the likely date of the composition of the temple inscription. G Dr. Hoernle published in Plate VI, one gold coin (No. 22), which has got the letters "Cri ana" and "sa" below them (Samvat), and two figures which I would read "24." Dr. Hultzsch took "ana" to mean Anantavarmman; but as I pointed out in my letter to Dr. Hoernle, dated 10th July, 1898, "ana" is more likely the abbreviation of a name, as Ananga Bhima, than an abbreviation of a common title like Anantavarmman. If this view be correct, then No. 22 is applicable only to Ananga Bhima Dēva III, whose regnal years exceeded 24. The temples of Mukhalingam or Çrikūrmam do not unfortunately contain any direct inscriptions of this king, but there are some which contain references to him. In No. 307 of Çrikūrmam, dated 1172 Çaka, Pratāpa-vira-Narasimha Dēva, son of Ananga Bhima Dēva, was ruling. In No. 349 of Çrikūrmam, dated Çaka 1177, certain lands in Ippili which had been previously granted by the king Ananga Bhima, were regranted; No. 298 of Çrikūrmam, dated Çaka 1205, mentions a gift of lamp by the wife of one Nrsimha Bhattōpādhyāya who was a contemporary of the king Ananga-Bhima; No. 296 of Çrikūrmam, dated Çaka 1205, mentions another grant of the same lady. In the Madaļā Pāñji, this king is said to have been the most powerful of the whole family, to have built (in one version finished) the temple of Jagannatha, to have surveyed the whole kingdom, and to have made numerous grants. None of these statements has as yet been corroborated by inscriptions. VIII. Nrsimha Dēva I. [Çaka 1160 - Çaka 1186.] Only one inscription of his time has hitherto been found: |