Amoghavarsha

For other uses, see Amoghavarsha (disambiguation).

Amoghavarsha
Nrupatunga
Atishadhavala
Veeranarayana
Rattamarthanda
Srivallabha
Amoghavarsha
Old Kannada inscription (876 CE) of Rashtrakuta Emperor Amoghavarsha I at the Veerabhadra temple in Kumsi
6th Rashtrakuta Emperor
Reignc. 815 – c. 877 CE (62 years)
PredecessorGovinda III
SuccessorKrishna II
BornSharva
800 CE
Died878 CE (aged 77-78)
possibly Manyakheta, Rashtrakuta Empire (present-day Malkhed, India)
ConsortAsagavve
IssueKrishna II
Chandrabbalabbe
Revakanimmadi
Regnal name
Amoghavarsha
FatherGovinda III
ReligionJainism
Rashtrakuta dynasty

Amoghavarsha I (also known as Amoghavarsha Nrupatunga I) (r. 814 – 878 CE) was the greatest emperor of the Rashtrakuta dynasty. His reign of 64 years is one of the longest precisely dated monarchical reigns on record. Many Kannada and Sanskrit scholars prospered during his rule, including the great Indian mathematician Mahaviracharya who wrote Ganita-sara-samgraha, Jinasena, Virasena, Shakatayan and Sri Vijaya (a Kannada language theorist).[1]

Amoghavarsha I was an accomplished poet and scholar. He wrote (or co-authored) the Kavirajamarga, the earliest extant literary work in Kannada,[2] and Prashnottara Ratnamalika, a religious work in Sanskrit. During his rule he held titles such as Nrupathunga, Atishadhavala, Veeranarayana, Rattamarthanda and Srivallabha. He moved the Rashtrakuta regnal capital from Mayurkhandi in the present-day Bidar district to Manyakheta in the present-day Kalaburagi district in the modern Karnataka state. He is said to have built the imperial capital city to "match that of Lord Indra". The capital city was planned to include elaborately designed buildings for the royalty using the finest of workmanship.[3]

The Arab traveler Sulaiman described Amoghavarsha as one of the "four great kings of the world."[4] For his dharmic temperament, his interest in the fine arts and literature and his peace-loving nature, historian Panchamukhi has compared him to the emperor Ashoka and given him the honorific "Ashoka of the South".[5] Amoghavarsha seems to have entertained the highest admiration for the language, literature and culture of the Kannada people as testified to in the text Kavirajamarga.[6]

  1. ^ Cite error: The named reference scholar was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ Sastri (1955), p. 355.
  3. ^ Sastri (1955), p. 146.
  4. ^ The Shaping of Modern Gujarat: Plurality, Hindutva, and Beyond; Acyuta Yājñika, Suchitra Sheth, Penguins Books, (2005), p.42, ISBN 978-0-14400-038-8
  5. ^ Panchamukhi in Kamath (2001), p80
  6. ^ M. V. Krishna Rao (1936), The Gangas of Talkad: A Monograph on the History of Mysore from the Fourth to the Close of the Eleventh Century, p.80