Vikramaditya I takes Kanchi

01The Chalukya claim

Chalukya grants credit Vikramaditya with defeating three Pallava kings in turn, Narasimhavarman, Mahendravarman and Ishvarapotaraja, that is Parameshvaravarman I, and with taking Kanchi, the city whose walls were hard to cross. The Gadval plates, dated in his twentieth year, were issued from a camp at Uragapura, the old Chola capital Uraiyur near Tiruchirappalli. A Chalukya army on the Kaveri meant the Pallava heartland had been overrun.

02The Pallava answer

Parameshvaravarman I did not stay beaten. Pallava copper plates say he slipped past the invaders, struck into the Chalukya country, and then met Vikramaditya at Peruvalanallur near Tiruchirappalli, where he routed the Chalukya army and forced its king to flee with only a rag to cover him. Both sides claimed the war, and both claims can be true for different seasons. The boundary ended where it had begun.

Place · Capital of the early Cholas of the Sangam ageUraiyurThe inland capital of the early Chola kings of the Sangam poems, now a quarter of Tiruchirappalli. Ptolemy knew it as Orthoura, and its temples include the birthplace of Tiruppan Alvar.Read →