Page:Castes and Tribes of Southern India, Volume 3.djvu/360

KOMATI end, found to contain, among the ashes, a golden likeness of herself, which was placed by the side of the image of Nagarēswara, to whom she had been married. Long afterwards, the golden image was removed, and one in stone substituted for it, in accordance, it is said, with the direction of Kanyakamma, who appeared to one of the townsmen in a dream. The temple of Nagarēsvaraswāmi has several inscriptions on slabs, built into its prākāra, and elsewhere. One of these is on the gateway inside the prākāra walls. It opens with a glowing description of the powers of Nagarēsvaraswāmi in giving blessings and gifts, and refers to Penugonda as one of the eighteen towns built by Visvakarma, and presented by Siva to the Kōmatis as a place of residence. The object of the inscription appears to be to record the restoration by one Kothalinga, a Kōmati whose genealogy is given, of the great town Penugonda), which had been burnt to ashes by a Gajapathi king. He is also stated to have made grants of tanks, wells, and pleasure gardens, for the benefit of Nagarēsvaraswāmi, for whose daily offerings and the celebration of festivals he provided by the grants of the villages of Mummadi, Ninagēpūdi, Vāranāsi, Kālkavēru, and Mathampūdi, all included in the town of Penugonda. Various inscriptions show that, from so early a time as 1488 A.D., if not from still earlier times, the temple had become popular with the Kōmatis, and got intertwined with the statements now found in the Purāna. Rai Bahādur V. Venkayya, Government Epigraphist, writes to say that the Tēki plates found in the Rāmachandrāpuram taluk of the Godāvari district, and published by Dr. E. Hultzsch,* may refer to some Kōmatis. The