Rashtrakutas of Manyakheta

01A hill turned into a temple

Dantidurga recorded his rise in the Dashavatara cave at Ellora, and around 753 he displaced the last Chalukya of Badami. His uncle Krishna I then had his craftsmen cut the Kailasa: they began at the top of the basalt scarp and worked down, removing an estimated two lakh tonnes of rock to leave a complete temple of Shiva, with its Nandi mandapa, its gateway and its elephants standing free in a pit. The Baroda plates of 812 already speak of a temple at Elapura so wondrous that its own builder was astonished he had made it.

02Kannauj and the three-way war

Kannauj was the prize of the age, and three houses fought for it: the Pratiharas of the west, the Palas of Bengal and the Rashtrakutas. Dhruva came north and beat both Vatsaraja and Dharmapala. His son Govinda III defeated Nagabhata II and marched to the Himalaya. Indra III sacked Kannauj itself around 916. In the south Krishna III broke the Chola army at Takkolam in 949, where the Chola prince Rajaditya was killed on his elephant. The Arab merchant Sulaiman, writing in 851, counted the Balhara, as he called the Rashtrakuta king, among the four great kings of the world.

Person · Reigned c. 775–810 CEDharmapalaDharmapala, son of Gopala, carried the Pala power from Bengal up the Ganga to Kanyakubja, where he crowned a king of his own choosing before an assembly of northern rulers. He founded the monastery-university of Vikramashila and is remembered as the great patron of the Buddhist viharas.Read →

03Amoghavarsha and Manyakheta

Amoghavarsha I came to the throne as a boy in 814 and reigned for over sixty years. He built Manyakheta, now Malkhed in Kalaburagi district, as his capital. The Kavirajamarga, the oldest surviving work on Kannada poetics, was written at his court, and the Jain acharya Jinasena was his teacher. The end came fast. In 972 the Paramara Siyaka sacked Manyakheta, and in 973 the Chalukya Tailapa II overthrew Karka II. Indra IV, the last claimant, gave up food and died at Shravanabelagola in 982.

The rulers

1. 1DantidurgaOverthrew the Badami Chalukyasc. 735–756
2. 2Krishna IKailasa temple, Ellorac. 756–774
3. 3Govinda IIc. 774–780
4. 4Dhruva DharavarshaBeat Vatsaraja and Dharmapalac. 780–793
5. 5Govinda IIIDefeated Nagabhata II; reached the Himalayac. 793–814
6. 6Amoghavarsha IBuilt Manyakheta; Kavirajamarga written at his courtc. 814–878
7. 7Krishna IIc. 878–914
8. 8Indra IIISacked Kannaujc. 914–929
9. 9Govinda IVc. 930–936
10. 10Amoghavarsha IIIc. 936–939
11. 11Krishna IIIVictory over the Cholas at Takkolam, 949c. 939–967
12. 12KhottigaManyakheta sacked by the Paramarasc. 967–972
13. 13Karka IIOverthrown by Tailapa IIc. 972–973

What they left

• The Kailasa temple at Ellora (Cave 16)
• The Jain caves of Ellora, among them the Indra Sabha
• Kavirajamarga, the oldest surviving book on Kannada poetics
• Jain Narayana temple at Pattadakal