prominence. An unusually distinct picture of them is drawn by the Chinese pilgrim Hiuen Tsiang, who visited India between the years 629 and 644 A.D.:
'This disposition of the people is honest and simple; they are tall of stature and of a stern, vindictive character. To their benefactors they are grateful, to their enemies relentless. If they are insulted, they will risk their lives to avenge themselves. If they are asked to help one in distress, they will forget themselves in their haste to render assistance. If they are going to seek revenge they first give their enemy warning; then, each being armed, they attack each other with spears. When one turns to flee, the other pursues him, but they do not kill a man who submits. If a general losses a battle, they do not inflict punishment, but present him with woman's clothes, and so he is driven to seek death for himself. The country provides for a band of champions to the number of several hundred. When about to engage in conflict they intoxicate themselves with wine, and then one man with lance in hand will meet ten thousand and challenge them to fight. If one of these champions meets a man and kills him, the laws of the country do not punish him. Every time they go forth they beat drums before them. Moreover they make drunk many hundred head of elephants; and, taking them out to fight, and after themselves drinking wine, they rush forward in mass and trample everything down so that no enemy can stand before them. The king in consequence of his possessing these men and elephants treats his neighbours with contempt. He is of the Kshatriya caste and his name is Pulakési.'*[1]
The monarch here referred to (Pulakésin II, 609-42) extended his conquests throughout the Gódávari district and into Vizagapatam, drove the Pallavas to the walls of Conjeeveram and threatened the country of the Chólas of Tanjore.
His conquest of Gódávari is detailed in a stone inscription at Aihole (in the Bombay Presidency) in which he mentions the reduction of Pithápuram and Ellore.†[2] It took place about 615 A.D.
During his absence on this campaign, Pulakésin had made his younger brother Vishnuvardhana I his regent at his capital of Bádámi, and on his return he deputed him to govern the country he had recently conquered. By 632 Vishnuvardhana had established himself in these new territories as an independent sovereign of the kingdom of 'Vengi,' the capital of which was at Pedda Végi near Ellore and which included the Gódávari district, and there he founded the Eastern Chálukya dynasty, which held that country for at least five centuries
