Page:History of Indian and Eastern Architecture Vol 1.djvu/354

 306 DRAVIDIAN STYLE. BOOK III. kingdom, and westward of the Chola, stretching along the west or Malabar coast to Honawar: whether they ever occupied any considerable portion of Mysore or of Koimbatur is not so certain. The capital was Karur or Vanji, probably adjacent to Cranganor in the Cochin state. 1 Tradition assigns to the state a series of kings styled Perumal, who seem to have been elective, and are mentioned as Pandyas and Cholas, but the list ended with Cheruman Perumal, in the pth century, who is said to have become a Moslim. No Chera inscriptions have as yet come to light to help us to unravel their history, and the territory was probably divided into principalities, whose main defence was the mountain range, separating their country from their eastern neighbours. But however this may be, the old Chera region is best defined by its architecture, for the style of Hindu temple, Jaina basti, and Moslim mosque, is distinctly one throughout the country from the north of Kanara to the south of Travankor. Jainism probably penetrated into the country at an early date, and till late in the i6th century the Tuluva rajas were Jains, whilst the colossal statues at Kcirkala and Venur in South Kanara and at Sravan - Belgola in Mysore, with the bastis at Mudabidri, Bhatkal and elsewhere testify to their zeal. On the other hand, the Malayalis are snake worshippers to the present day ; in their gardens the Hindus usually provide a " Naga- kotta" or snake shrine. 2 A fourth dynasty, already mentioned, appears at an early date in the history of the Dekhan ; the Pallavas 3 possibly rose to power on the decay of the Andhra power in the third century, and they seem to have secured much of the Chola country, probably before the 5th. About A.D. 400 Samudragupta, among other princes, claimed to have overthrown Vishnugopa of Kanchi, who was doubtless a Pallava king, and recent epigraphical research has now brought to light details respecting this dynasty which ruled the country called Dravida from their capital at Kanchi, now Conjivaram. In the /th century they were at war with the Chalukyas of Badami, and Narasimhavarman I. claimed to have destroyed Badami during the reign of the Chalukya king Pulike^in II. (A.D. 609-642), whilst his father Mahendravarman had, at an earlier date, defeated the same king near Kanchi when 1 Ptolemy (' Geographia,' vii. 86) men- tions Karoura as the capital of Kero- bothras, probably intended for Keraput- ran, ' King of Chera.' 'Indian Anti- quary,' vol. xxxi., pp. 343-344; Logan's ' Malabar,' vol. i. pp. 252, 253. 2 Ante, p. 43, note 3. 1 The 'Mahabharata," Vishnu Purana,' and ' Varaha Mihira' (in the 6th century), frequently mention the Pahlavas among the tribes in the north-west, and some scholars have tried to identify them with the Pallavas, who were in the south-east of India as early as the 2nd century, but the similarity of names alone will hardly justify the assumption of identity.