Sayampeta inscription of Dharma-ravu (1464)

What it is

This long Telugu inscription is on a stone pillar near Sayampeta.¹ The pillar stands about two furlongs from the Muccerla Venkatesvara temple, a mile from Sayampeta.¹ Sayampeta lies about 28 miles from Warangal, off the road to Parkhal.¹

The record gives the villages of Muccerla and Mada, in the Kottagattu sthala of the Varangallu (Warangal) sima.¹ (Sthala and sima were land divisions.) The villages were divided into shares (vrittis) for named donees.¹

The donor is the Velama chieftain Dharma-ravu.² He claims all the titles (birudas) of Anapota Nayaka.² P. Sreenivasachar noted that the record is full of mistakes of spelling and grammar.² See the Recherla Velamas.

Date

The Corpus of 1956 gives the date as Saka 1382 (Saka is an Indian way of counting years), the year Tarana, the fifteenth day of the bright half of Vaisakha.¹ The day was a Saturday (vaddavaramu), at a lunar eclipse.¹ Epigraphia Telanganica follows the later editions and reads the year as Saka 1386.³⁴ It converts the date to 21 April 1464.³⁴

The donor’s descent

According to the Corpus, Dharma-ravu was the son of Vennama-naya and Singamamba.² He was the grandson of Pedda-Singamma-naya and the great-grandson of Annavota-naya.²

Epigraphia Telanganica summarises the later editions.³⁴ These name his father as Pinnama-nayaka or Pinnamanayadu, and his ancestor as Peda Anapota-nayaka.³⁴ They note that his titles include Kakati-rajya-sthapanacharya, establisher of the Kakatiya kingdom.³⁴

The editor of the Corpus took this Dharmaraja for a son of Venna of Kandikonda, a grandson of Mada Nayaka.⁵² This does not agree with the descent from Annavota given in the same volume.⁵²

The gift

The Corpus notes that the shares were granted together with the cultivators allotted to them.¹ The record gives the gotra (clan), father and grandfather of each donee.¹

The summaries in Epigraphia Telanganica say that the gift was made on the occasion of the eclipse.³⁴ It went to the god Tiruvengalesvara (Tiruvengalanatha) of Muccerla, and to twelve ayyangars and twelve mahajanas (Brahmin donees).³⁴ The editions differ on the number of shares, and on how many went to the god.³⁴

Footnotes

1. P. Sreenivasachar (ed.), A Corpus of Inscriptions in the Telingana Districts of Andhra Pradesh, Part III (1956), p. 161, No. Wg. 18 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). Paraphrased. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹

2. Sreenivasachar (ed.), Corpus, Part III (1956), p. 162, No. Wg. 18 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). Paraphrased. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷

3. Gajjala Vasanta Lakshmi (ed.), Epigraphia Telanganica, vol. 4 (2023), p. 37, No. 22. Cite-only; paraphrased. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸

4. Epigraphia Telanganica, vol. 4 (2023), pp. 37–38, No. 23. Cite-only; paraphrased. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸

5. Sreenivasachar (ed.), Corpus, Part III (1956), p. 5, No. Km. 3 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). Paraphrased. ↩ ↩²