Pulakeshin II conquers the east coast

01The lake ran red

The Aihole inscription moves fast here. Pulakeshin took Pishtapura, it says, with ease, and then fought at the lake of Kunala, whose waters were coloured by the blood of the slain, so that it looked like the sky at dusk. Kunala is identified with Kolleru, the great freshwater lake between the Godavari and Krishna deltas. The enemy were the rulers of the coast, probably the Vishnukundinas and their vassals, whose power ends in this period.

02A new kingdom

Pulakeshin left his younger brother Kubja Vishnuvardhana to govern the conquered coast. Within a few years Vishnuvardhana ruled in his own right, and his line, the Eastern Chalukyas of Vengi, lasted nearly five centuries, until it merged with the Cholas in Kulottunga I. The Telugu land’s first great literary age, the Mahabharata of Nannaya, came under their patronage. Nannaya wrote at the court of Rajaraja Narendra in the eleventh century, a direct descendant of Kubja Vishnuvardhana.

Place · Ancient kshetra; the present Kukkuteswara complex holds the shrine of Puruhutika and the Pada Gaya tankPuruhutika Devi and Kukkuteswara Temple, PithapuramPithikayam Puruhutika: one of the eighteen Maha Shakti Peethas, inside the temple of Shiva as Kukkuteswara. Pithapuram is also Pada Gaya, the feet of the three Gayas, and the birthplace of Sripada Srivallabha of the Datta tradition.Read →