The city founded by Rajendra I about 1025 after his Ganges expedition, with the great Brihadisvara (Gangaikondacholisvaram) temple, the brick palace mound at Maligaimedu and the Chola Gangam tank (a long embankment fed by the Vadavaru channel).
It was the imperial seat for about 250 years on the English Wikipedia's reckoning; by 1200 the court divides its time between here, Palaiyarai and Thanjavur, and the sources we reached do not say where Kulottunga III is on 1 January. The city is large, temple-centred and rich in bronze and stone work, but it is a ceremonial and administrative capital, not a trading town.
Who holds it
- Name
- Kulottunga III Chola, through the royal household officers and the temple managers; the court does not stay here the whole year
- Title
- see the lord or tenant line below
- Born
- not known
- Confidence
- medium
Lord in 1200
Kulottunga III Chola, through the royal household officers and the temple managers; the court does not stay here the whole year
How things stand that morning
Still the formal capital and the site of the greatest temple of the dynasty after Thanjavur. Kulottunga III has not moved the capital; the royal travelling court uses it with Palaiyarai and Thanjavur. No building work here is dated to 1200 in the pages we reached.
Wealth
Temple endowments, the tank-fed paddy of the Chola Gangam and the Vadavaru channel, bronze and gold work.
Military
No garrison figure is given; the royal guard travels with the court.
Threats
- The famine of the 23rd and 24th regnal years (from about July 1200): A famine of the king's 23rd and 24th regnal years begins in the second half of 1200 (a regnal-year statement from the brief and board, not a dated inscription): the likely course.
- A failure of the Vadavaru feed to the Chola Gangam
Charter
No municipal charter is known; the city is a royal foundation whose land, tank and temple are the crown's and the god's
Council
The temple managers (sri-karyam), the Brahmin assembly of the nearby brahmadeya villages and the royal secretariat officers; none is named for 1200
Communities
Brahmin temple servants, temple women (devadasi), bronze workers, weavers, royal officers and soldiers, merchants of the nagaram
Fairs and markets
Temple festivals; no dated fair
Militia
The royal guard (the Velaikkara and the king's personal troops) when the court is in residence; no figure
Walls and castle
A palace enclosure at Maligaimedu (brick foundations survive as a mound) and the walled precinct of the temple; no stone city wall is recorded in the pages we reached
Trade and crafts
Bronze and stone work for the temples, goldsmiths and weavers of the temple towns, the grain of the tank-fed fields; not a trade entrepot
What the year holds
What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.
- From about 7 July 1200The famine begins in the delta; the capital's temples and tanks are the first charge on the crown's relief.Depends on: A failed north-east monsoon over the Kaveri country, as the regnal-year statement implies. The famine is a regnal-year statement found only in the brief and the campaign board's calendar (no page read confirms it). Stopped by: A good monsoon.
- 1270 to 1299 (the late thirteenth century; outside 1200)The Pandya and their allies raze the city (the English Wikipedia suggests this; the date is not firm).Depends on: Chola decline after 1216. Stopped by: Chola survival.
Where the sources disagree
- The campaign board entry gangaikonda-cholapuram says the city is the formal capital: we agree it is the formal capital but the sources we reached do not place Kulottunga III here on any date, so the seat in January 1200 is not pinned.
- The campaign board entry maligaimedu-palace: the palace mound is a brick-foundation earthwork; the campaign board's word 'palace' is right for the 1020s and the later use under Kulottunga III is not shown by anything we read.
- Gazetteer: the town is not in the gazetteer; coordinates 11.2064,79.4483 (Wikipedia) and 11.2086,79.4496 (given here) are within a hundred metres of each other.
Evidence: The foundation and the monuments are well documented; the 1200 position of the court is not.
"The campaign board" is OMNIA's working map. These notes record where its earlier claims were checked against the sources.
Primary sources for Chola empire
Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.
- The Lesser Chronicle (the continuation of the Mahavamsa), Dhammakitti and later monks of the Mahavihara tradition (the first continuation about the 13th century (chapters 37 to 79), carried on in stages to the 18th century). The only narrative source for Lanka in 1200. Read online
- History of Song, chapters 488 and 489: Jiaozhi, Dali, Champa, Zhenla, Pagan, Srivijaya, Java, Brunei, Chola and Tambralinga, Toqto'a (Tuotuo) and the Yuan history office, from the Song court records (1343 to 1345, from Song veritable records and court diaries). The Chinese court's record of its southern neighbours, compiled from Song archives. Read online
- The Leiden grants of Rajaraja I and Kulottunga I concerning the Srivijaya vihara at Nagapattinam, The Chola chancery (Rajaraja I, Rajendra I, Kulottunga I) (the Larger plates about 1005 to 1014 (completed under Rajendra I); the Smaller plates 1090). Background documents for the relations between the Cholas and the Malay world. Read online
- Corpus of Inscriptions in the Telingana Districts, Various (Kakatiya chancery and temple scribes), edited by P. Sreenivasachar (inscriptions of the 10th to 15th centuries; edited 1940 to 1942). The Kakatiyas of Orugallu (Warangal) are known for 1200 almost entirely from inscriptions, and this Hyderabad Archaeological Series corpus is the main printed collection. Read online
- Epigraphia Carnatica: inscriptions of the Mysore country, Various (Hoysala chancery and temple scribes), edited by B. Lewis Rice and R. Narasimhachar (inscriptions of the 4th to 19th centuries; the series ran from 1886 to 1905, revised from 1972). The Hoysala kingdom of Veera Ballala II (reigning 1173 to 1220) is documented almost wholly by the inscriptions in this series, arranged by district and taluk with full English translations. Read online
- Epigraphia Zeylanica: lithic and other inscriptions of Ceylon, Various (the Polonnaruwa kings' chanceries), edited by D. M. de Zilva Wickremasinghe, H. W. Codrington and S. Paranavitana (inscriptions of the 3rd century BC to the 18th century; the series ran from 1904). Prints with translation the stone records of the Polonnaruwa kings who held or lost the throne around 1200. Read online
- South Indian Inscriptions (Archaeological Survey of India), Various (Chola, Pandya and other chanceries and temple scribes), edited by E. Hultzsch, V. Venkayya, H. Krishna Sastri and successors (inscriptions of the 7th to 17th centuries; the series ran from 1890). The temple inscriptions printed here are the primary record of the Tamil country in 1200. Read online
- Travancore Archaeological Series, Various (Kerala chiefs, temples and merchant guilds), edited by T. A. Gopinatha Rao, K. V. Subrahmanya Aiyer and A. S. Ramanatha Ayyar (inscriptions of the 9th to 18th centuries; the series ran from 1910 to 1938). The main corpus for the Kerala coast. Read online
4 more in the sources library for Southern India and Sri Lanka.
Sources and studies
Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.