262 



MANUAL OF THE NILAGIRI DISTRICT. 



Early 



HiSTORV. 



CHAP. XI. a Sila-stambiia or pillar of victory, which may shadow forth a 

 conflict with the Buddhists, who inscribed edicts on such erec- 

 tions. In the fifth century a monarch of this race married the 

 sister of one of the Kadamba kings of Banawasi, an event which 

 shows the importance of the dynasty at the time. At the close 

 of this century the reigning monarch, Amrita or Drahva-niti, 

 was " a great magician in the mantras • whenever he might go to 

 war with his enemies, by the power of his mantras he would 

 make a loud sound ; the forces of his enemies remained mute and 

 motionless, with their warlike arms upright in their hands, and 

 without knowing how to make use of them.'' ^ Little wonder 

 then that he is reported as conquering Kerala, Pandya, Chola, 

 Dravida, Andhra, and Kalinga, and many other countries. We 

 find that in his reign South-west Mysore ^ was known as Punndd, 

 ten thousand. The last ruler of this dynasty seems to have 

 been Malladeva, at the close of the ninth century, when a Chola 

 king, Aditya Varmma, " being crowned in the Tanjavur-putnam, 

 came to Kongu-desam, and conquered the Vardar (huntsmen or 

 wild people) of the king of Kongu-desam and took the town of 

 Talikad; and, giving many free endowments to many agraharas, 

 he governed that country in addition to his own." The energy 

 and perseverance of this kingly race was great Driven from their 

 ancestral dominions by the Cholas, they are said to have pushed 

 their way to the north-east and ultimately to have founded the 

 Gangavamsa dynasty in Orissa.^ One of them, in the latter part 

 of the thirteenth century, " raised the lovely pile that now over- 

 looks the Bay of Bengal at Kanarak, the temple of the sun,* whose 

 luscious ornamentation forms at once the glory and the disgrace 

 of Orissa art." 



On these hills we have the representatives of this Kongu people 

 in the Kongas, a class of Badagas who wear the lingam and occupy 

 villages near Rangasdmi Peak, opposite the Gajalhatti Pass, the 

 ancient home of their race. They are second only to the W6deas 

 in rank. To this day do the hill-people call North Coimbatore 

 the Kongu country.^ The name survives inthe Kangiam Taluk 

 of that district. The South Mysoreans still call Tamil Kangi. 



This race may be described as that section of the Tamil 

 people who ruled the river-basin of the Kaveri below the gh^ts, 

 though at one time their empire was probably counterminous 

 with the Tamil language. In their progress towards the north 



Chdlas. 



' Kongu-d^sa RajakaL 



* Rice. May not this be pon-n&d, the district of gold?— a name which would 

 be most appropriate to the Waindd and its neighbourhood. 



^ Lassen, Ind. Alt., IV. 14, and Dr. Hunter's Orissa, Vol. I, pp. 277-290. 



* Known to sailors as the black pagoda. 



» Mr. Mbtz' Neilgherry Uills, p. 50 ; Wiles' Mysore, Vol. I, p. 4.. 



