Ambadeva (Kayastha)

Ambadeva was a Kayastha chief who ruled a fief (land held from an overlord) in the Kadapa (then Cuddapah) country from 1272.¹² He set out to build an independent kingdom, and none of his inscriptions names an overlord.³⁴ Kakatiya forces took his town of Tripurantakam between June and August 1291.⁵⁶

A Kayastha chief

Ambadeva was a younger son of the Kayastha chief Ambadeva I, the brother-in-law of Gangaya Sahini.¹² He succeeded his brothers Jannigadeva and Tripurari as ruler of the Kayastha fief in the Kadapa country in 1272.¹²

His brothers had served the Kakatiya queen Rudramadevi loyally.³ Jannigadeva had driven the Pandyas out of the Nandaluru region on her behalf in 1264.³

N. Venkataramanayya and M. Somasekhara Sarma counted Ambadeva himself among the chiefs who helped the queen to defeat the rebels at her accession.⁷ They noted that inscriptions of 1275 to 1290 give him the title raya-sthapanacharya, “establisher of the king”.⁷ P. V. Parabrahma Sastry thought this title probably recalled loyal service before his revolt.⁸

An independent state

Both histories agree that Ambadeva set out to carve out his own kingdom from the start of his rule.³⁴ None of his inscriptions names an overlord.³⁴ His long Sanskrit inscription of 1290 at Tripurantakam lists his victories. He defeated Sripati Ganapati, chief of Gurindala in the Palnadu, and took his title Raya-sahasramalla.⁹⁴ He claimed to have cut off the heads of seventy-five kings, and to have killed Mallideva of the Eruva country.⁹⁴ He put to flight the Vaidumba chiefs Keshavadeva and Somideva and their ally Allu Ganga.⁹⁴ He took back Valluru, the Kayastha capital, and strengthened it with the hill fort of Gandikota.⁹⁴

He gave his daughter in marriage to Rajanna, son of a chief named Bolaya, with Nandanapura as her dowry.¹⁰⁴ He restored the Telugu Choda Manuma Gandagopala to the throne of Nellore before 1282.¹⁰⁴

The same inscription describes him as the friend of the Pandya kings, who sent him elephants and horses.¹¹ It also calls him the friend of the king of Devagiri, who sent him jewels.¹¹ An inscription of 1287 at Attirala shows him ruling from Valluru over Mulikinadu, Renadu, Pedakallu, Sakili, Eruva and Pottapinadu.¹⁰ His authority reached Gutti in the Anantapur district.¹⁰

The historians read these claims differently in detail. Parabrahma Sastry dated the defeat of Sripati Ganapati to 1273, and Venkataramanayya and Somasekhara Sarma to 1275. The latter took the seventy-five kings to stand for the whole of the queen’s army of seventy-five nayakas (commanders).⁹¹²¹³ They saw the claim as no more than a boast of victory over that army.⁹¹²¹³

Some scholars identified Bolaya and Rajanna with the Cheraku chiefs Veluri Bollaya and his son Rajarudra.¹⁴ That would make the Cherakus rebels too.¹⁴ Parabrahma Sastry rejected this, since Rajarudra issued grants in 1293 and 1295 as Prataparudra’s loyal subordinate.¹⁴

The death of Rudramadevi

The Tripurantakam inscription claims that Ambadeva conquered all the kings of the Andhra country. It also claims that he took from one Mallikarjuna-pati his “seven limbs”. Parabrahma Sastry read the seven limbs as the seven elements of a kingdom, among them its ruler.¹⁵¹⁶ He suggested that Rudramadevi and her general Mallikarjuna-nayaka were killed in Ambadeva’s war.¹⁵¹⁶ Their deaths are recorded at Chandupatla in November 1289.¹⁵¹⁶

Venkataramanayya and Somasekhara Sarma read the same passage as saying that he killed a Mallikarjuna described as an enemy of gods and Brahmans.⁴¹⁷ They placed the queen’s death later, at the end of 1294.⁴¹⁷ The Chandupatla inscription itself does not say how the queen died.¹⁵

Defeat

Parabrahma Sastry describes a three-pronged Kakatiya response under Prataparudra:¹⁸

• an army against Ambadeva at Tripurantakam¹⁸
• a second against Nellore¹⁸
• a third against the Yadavas¹⁸

Venkataramanayya and Somasekhara Sarma attribute the same campaign to Rudramadevi with Prataparudra’s generals.⁶

Ambadeva’s last inscription at Tripurantakam is dated 13 June 1291.⁵⁶ The first Kakatiya record there, of the Induluri ministers Annaya and Manuma Gannaya, is dated 11 August 1291.⁵⁶ So the town changed hands between those dates.⁵⁶

According to the Sivayogasara, a family history of the Induluri ministers, Manuma Gannaya captured all the forts of the “lord of seventy-two forts”, meaning Ambadeva.¹⁹²⁰ Induluri Annaya is credited with seizing seventy of them.¹⁹²⁰

Parabrahma Sastry found no inscription of Ambadeva later than 1294. He concluded that Prataparudra had rooted out the Kayasthas within about eight years. Venkataramanayya and Somasekhara Sarma gave Ambadeva a reign of thirty-two years. A son, Tripurari II, is known from two inscriptions, though one view identifies their donor with Ambadeva’s elder brother.²¹⁴

Footnotes

1. P. V. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), p. 158. ↩ ↩² ↩³

2. P. V. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), p. 159. ↩ ↩² ↩³

3. P. V. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), p. 122. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵

4. N. Venkataramanayya and M. Somasekhara Sarma, “The Kakatiyas of Warangal”, in G. Yazdani (ed.), The Early History of the Deccan, Parts VII–XI (1960), p. 629. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹ ↩¹⁰ ↩¹¹ ↩¹²

5. P. V. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), p. 130. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴

6. N. Venkataramanayya and M. Somasekhara Sarma, “The Kakatiyas of Warangal”, in G. Yazdani (ed.), The Early History of the Deccan, Parts VII–XI (1960), p. 635. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵

7. N. Venkataramanayya and M. Somasekhara Sarma, “The Kakatiyas of Warangal”, in G. Yazdani (ed.), The Early History of the Deccan, Parts VII–XI (1960), p. 622. ↩ ↩²

8. P. V. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), p. 127. ↩

9. P. V. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), p. 123. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶

10. P. V. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), p. 124. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴

11. P. V. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), pp. 122–123. ↩ ↩²

12. N. Venkataramanayya and M. Somasekhara Sarma, “The Kakatiyas of Warangal”, in G. Yazdani (ed.), The Early History of the Deccan, Parts VII–XI (1960), p. 630. ↩ ↩²

13. N. Venkataramanayya and M. Somasekhara Sarma, “The Kakatiyas of Warangal”, in G. Yazdani (ed.), The Early History of the Deccan, Parts VII–XI (1960), p. 631. ↩ ↩²

14. P. V. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), pp. 153–154. ↩ ↩² ↩³

15. P. V. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), pp. 125–126. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴

16. P. V. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), p. 160. ↩ ↩² ↩³

17. N. Venkataramanayya and M. Somasekhara Sarma, “The Kakatiyas of Warangal”, in G. Yazdani (ed.), The Early History of the Deccan, Parts VII–XI (1960), p. 642. ↩ ↩²

18. P. V. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), pp. 129–130. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴

19. P. V. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), p. 162. ↩ ↩²

20. P. V. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), p. 163. ↩ ↩²

21. P. V. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), p. 161. ↩