A new site, built from published sources. Spotted a mistake? Please tell us
Telugu Historyతెలుగు చరిత్ర

Kolanupaka

Village in the Nalgonda district of Telangana, the Kollipake of the Western Chalukya records. In the 11th and 12th centuries it was the seat of the Kollipake seven-thousand province. A Choda chief, the Paramara prince Jagaddeva and the prince Somesvara (the future Somesvara III) governed it for the kings of Kalyani. Kannada inscriptions there run from 1033 to the reign of Jagadekamalla II.

Kolanupaka lies about seventy kilometres south-west of Hanamkonda (Anumakonda).1 P. V. Parabrahma Sastry described the country west of the Kakatiya fief of Anumakonda as under the direct control of the Western Chalukya kings.1 Their officers ran it from Kolanupaka, also called Kollipaka.1 He described this province, the Kollipake seven-thousand, as governed by viceroys of the rank of mahamandalesvara (great feudal lord).2

Identifying Kollipake

In 1896 J. F. Fleet found Kollipake named as a minor capital of Jayasimha II, but he could not identify it.34 He noted that a Kollippakkai appears in Chola inscriptions.34 He also noted that the Lingayat poem Rajasekharavilasa names Kollipaki as the birthplace of the saint Renuka.34

An editor’s note in Robert Sewell’s book of 1932 identifies the Kollippakkai claimed by the Chola Rajendra I with Kulpak, between Hyderabad and Warangal.5 Sewell cited records of Somesvara I (1067) and Vikramaditya VI (1125) at “Kulpak, anciently Kollipaka, 45 miles N.E. of Hyderabad”.67 In 1961 P. B. Desai wrote that the inscriptions found at Kolanupaka show that it was Kollipake.8 He counted it among the early capitals of the Western Chalukyas.8

The Kannada inscriptions

The Kannada inscriptions of Kolanupaka summarised by Desai include these:981011

  • a grant of 1033 of the time of Jagadekamalla I
  • records of Vikramaditya VI’s reign naming the Choda chief Tondarasa of Kandur (1088) and the Paramara prince Jagaddeva (1104) as rulers of the province
  • a gift of 1107 to the temple of Jagaddeva-Narayana
  • the pillar of Prince Somesvara of 1125
  • a damaged record of Jagadekamalla II981011

See the inscription of Jagaddeva and the pillar of Kumara Somesvara.

Footnotes

  1. P. V. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), p. 51. ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  2. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), p. 69. ↩

  3. J. F. Fleet, “Dynasties of the Kanarese Districts”, Gazetteer of the Bombay Presidency I, pt. II (1896), p. 437 and note 6 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  4. Fleet, “Dynasties of the Kanarese Districts” (1896), p. 438, note (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  5. Robert Sewell, The Historical Inscriptions of Southern India (1932), p. 62, editor’s note (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). Paraphrased. ↩

  6. Sewell, Historical Inscriptions (1932), p. 81 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). Paraphrased except for the short phrase quoted. ↩

  7. Sewell, Historical Inscriptions (1932), p. 99 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). Paraphrased. ↩

  8. Desai, Kannada Inscriptions of Andhra Pradesh (1961), p. 17, Nos. 45–46 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). Paraphrased except for the short phrase quoted. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4

  9. P. B. Desai, introduction to P. Sreenivasachar, Kannada Inscriptions of Andhra Pradesh (Andhra Pradesh Government Archaeological Series 3, 1961), p. 16, Nos. 44–45 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). Paraphrased. ↩ ↩2

  10. Desai, Kannada Inscriptions of Andhra Pradesh (1961), p. 18, Nos. 46–48 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). Paraphrased. ↩ ↩2

  11. Desai, Kannada Inscriptions of Andhra Pradesh (1961), p. 19, Nos. 49–52 (archive.org (opens in a new tab)). Paraphrased. ↩ ↩2

Photos

People

Rajendra I (Chola)

c. 1012–1043 CE

Chola king from 1012, son of Rajaraja I and founder of Gangaikondacholapuram. As a prince he defeated the Eastern Chalukya Vimaladitya, his sister's husband, and set up a pillar of victory on Mahendragiri. As king he fought the Western Chalukya Jayasimha II and claimed Kollippakkai (Kolanupaka). His general marched to the Ganges while he himself waited on the Godavari, in a campaign that Krishna Sastri dated to 1028. His daughter Ammangadevi married the Eastern Chalukya Rajaraja Narendra and was the mother of Kulottunga I.

Jayasimha II (Western Chalukya)

c. 1015–1042 CE

Western Chalukya king of Kalyani, called Jagadekamalla, who reigned from about 1015 to 1042 and fought the Chola king Rajendra I. His records name Kollipake, now identified with Kolanupaka in the Nalgonda district, as one of his minor capitals. An inscription of his reign at Kolanupaka is dated January 1033.

Rajadhiraja I (Chola)

1018–1052 CE

Chola king, eldest son of Rajendra I and his co-regent from 1018, who fought the Western Chalukya Somesvara I. His Manimangalam inscription claims that he burnt the centre of Kollippakkai (Kolanupaka), a Western Chalukya city on the edge of Telangana, and counts the Andhra king among those who paid him tribute. An inscription of his 28th year is at Kalahasti. He fell in battle against Somesvara at Koppam in 1052.

Somesvara I

c. 1042–1068 CE

Western Chalukya king, called Trailokyamalla and Ahavamalla, who reigned from about 1042 to 1068 and made Kalyana (Kalyani) his capital. Records of his reign are found at Alampur, Bodhan and Kolanupaka in Telangana, and the early Kakatiya chiefs Beta I and Prola I served him. His wars with the Cholas reached the Vengi country. Chola inscriptions claim that his army sent to Vengi was destroyed and his sons beaten at Kudalasangamam. He drowned himself in the Tungabhadra in 1068.

Vikramaditya VI

c. 1076–1126 CE

Western Chalukya king of Kalyani, called Tribhuvanamalla. He deposed his brother Somesvara II in 1076 and reigned for fifty years, to 1126. He replaced the Saka era with his own Chalukya-Vikrama era, in which most Telangana records of the time are dated. As a prince he fought the Cholas and their Eastern Chalukya allies for Vengi. Late in his reign, after the Chola viceroy left in 1118, he was recognised as king in Vengi and the coastal Telugu country. His feudatories in Telangana included the Kakatiyas Beta II and Prola II and the Choda chiefs of Kandur.

Tondaya II (Tondarasa) of Kandur

c. 1088–1091 CE

Kandur Choda chief, the Mahamandalesvara Tondarasa Chola-maharaja of Kandur. In December 1088 he was governing the Kollipake seven-thousand province for the Western Chalukya Vikramaditya VI. P. V. Parabrahma Sastry made him the eldest son of Choda Bhima II and the husband of Mailamba. Her Panugallu inscription of 1124 names their three sons Udayaditya, Bhima and Gokarna.

Somesvara III

c. 1126–1138 CE

Western Chalukya king, called Bhulokamalla, who reigned from 1126 to 1138. He is credited with the encyclopaedic Sanskrit work Manasollasa. As Prince Somesvara he governed the Kollipake province from Kolanupaka in Telangana, where a pillar of 1125 celebrates his victory over the lord of Trikalinga. An inscription at Patancheru records grants made on the day of his coronation, 20 February 1127.

Sarvaya Papadu (Pap Rai)

c. 1708 CE

Telangana rebel of the early eighteenth century, a toddy-drawer by caste, whom the Mughal historian Khafi Khan calls Pap Rai. From forts at Shahpur in the Bhongir country and at a second stronghold, he plundered the roads and killed Mughal officers. In 1708 he sacked Warangal. He was betrayed, captured and executed, and his head was sent to the emperor's court. Telangana tradition remembers him as Sarvaya Papadu, a Goundla hero who robbed the rich, fed the poor and held Golconda for three hours.

Arutla Ramachandra Reddy

1909 CE

Worker of the Arya Samaj and the Andhra Mahasabha from Kolanupaka in Nalgonda district, born in 1909. He was beaten in police custody during the Vandemataram movement of 1938, confined to his village in 1945, and held for a year as an undertrial prisoner. The Razakars looted his house in 1947–48. He joined the Communist Party in 1952.

Arutla Lakshminarasimha Reddy

1918–1976 CE

Lawyer and communist leader from Kolanupaka in Nalgonda district (1918–1976). He organised campaigns against the jagirdars in Nalgonda in 1936–37, led a batch in the Hyderabad State Congress satyagraha of October 1938 and was jailed until April 1939. He joined the Communist Party in 1940, sat on the working committee of the Andhra Mahasabha, and was wanted by the Nizam's government in 1947. He later served in both houses of the Andhra Pradesh legislature.

Inscriptions

Kolanupaka inscription of Tondarasa

1088 CE

A Kannada inscription of 24 December 1088 at Kolanupaka, of the reign of the Western Chalukya Vikramaditya VI. In it the feudatory (subordinate ruler) Tondarasa Chola-maharaja of Kandur, ruling the Kollipake seven-thousand province, gives land and other gifts to the god Uttaresvara. P. V. Parabrahma Sastry identified Tondarasa with the Kandur Choda Tondaya II.

Kolanupaka inscription of Jagaddeva

1104 CE

A Sanskrit verse inscription at Kolanupaka (the old Kollipake) in the Nalgonda district, dated Chalukya-Vikrama year 29. P. B. Desai equated the date with 13 March 1104. It traces the Paramara kings of Malwa down to Jagaddeva, son of Udayaditya, whom the Western Chalukya king Vikramaditya VI 'treated as his own son'. It records that the king's general Somala built the temple of Jagaddeva-Narayana at Kollipake while Jagaddeva governed the province from there.

Kolanupaka pillar of Kumara Somesvara

1125 CE

A Kannada inscription on the four faces of a pillar at Kolanupaka, the old Kollipake. It is dated in Chalukya-Vikrama year 50 (24 March 1125 in P. B. Desai's reckoning). It was set up in the shrine of the Jaina goddess Ambika. It records a grant by Prince Somesvara, son of Vikramaditya VI and later king as Somesvara III, 'in his capital Kollipake'. It calls the pillar both the pillar of fame of his general Svamideva and the pillar of victory of the prince who defeated the lord of Trikalinga.

Kolanupaka inscription of Rudramadevi's reign

1279 CE

A Sanskrit pillar inscription of December 1279 in the Somanatha temple at Kolanupaka. It gives the Kakatiya line from Prola II to the reigning queen Rudradevi (Rudramadevi). It also records a canal and temple gifts made under her Chalukya relative Indushekhara, nephew of her husband Virabhadra.

References

Sources (4)
  1. Dr. P. SREENIVASACHAR, M.A., Ph. D. (London) & Prof. P. B. DESAI, M.A., Andhra Pradesh Government Archaeological Series No. 3. KANNADA INSCRIPTIONS OF ANDHRA PRADESH (opens in a new tab), 1961, pp. 16–19. P. B. Desai's summaries, Nos. 44–52; paraphrased. [Public domain in India]
  2. J. F. Fleet, R. G. Bhandarkar and others (Gazetteer of the Bombay Presidency), Gazetteer of the Bombay Presidency, Vol. I, Part II: History of the Konkan, Dakhan and Southern Maratha Country (opens in a new tab), Government Central Press, Bombay, 1896, pp. 437–438. [Public domain]
  3. Robert Sewell (ed. S. Krishnaswami Aiyangar), The Historical Inscriptions of Southern India (Collected till 1923) and Outlines of Political History (opens in a new tab), University of Madras, 1932, pp. 62, 81, 99. Paraphrased. [Public domain in India]
  4. P. V. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal, Government of Andhra Pradesh, 1978, pp. 51, 69. Cite-only; paraphrased. [All rights reserved (cited, not reproduced)]

Spotted an error on this page? Tell us

Last updated: