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villages. In contrast, the sabha was an assembly channels to carry water to the fields. Besides the
found in villages where Brahmins owned all the ruler, the rich Chola temples played a major role in
land as brahmadeya grants . Parantaka’s inscription promoting agriculture. They invested a lot of
found inside the temple at Uttaramerur describes money in agriculture. There was a committee for
the functioning of the Sabha. It operated through proper maintenance of the irrigation canals.
committees. It had different committees to look Architecture
after various aspects of local administration,
including temples, gardens, irrigations, assessment The Cholas being great patrons of art and
of land revenue, maintenance of law and order architecture made significant contributions in
etc. these fields. The big temples of Tanjore (present-
day Thanjavur) and Gangaikonda Cholapuram built
The nagaram as the name suggests, was an by Rajaraja and Rajendra Chola are architectural
assembly found in towns and cities. Its members and sculptural marvels. The main feature of the
were mainly traders, merchants and sometimes Chola style is the buildings of tapering storey upon
artisans. The nagaram played an important role in storey above the main deity room (garbhagriha).
urban administration.
The entrance to the garbhagriha is through a large
Revenue hall called mandapam . Another main feature of
these temples is the vimana or the grand topmost
Revenue from land and taxes from trade were the
chief sources of income for the Cholas. Land tower, sitting upon these intricately carved storeys.
revenue was usually fixed at one-third of the The whole area of these temples is surrounded by a
produce. It could be waived in times of floods or high and decorated boundary wall, called gopuram .
famine. The kings carried out regular surveys of the The temples are beautifully carved and decorated
land under their control to assess its yield. with the images and paintings of gods and
goddesses. The Brihadisvara Temple in Thanjavur is
the best example of a Chola temple.
Info Bits
Info Bits
Besides Brahmins, land grants were given to non-
Brahmins peasants, schools, temples, and Jain
institutions. Land given to non-Brahmins peasants
was known as vellanvagai, land given to schools
was called shalabhoga. Land gifted to temples was
called devadhana and land donated to Jain
institutions was called pallichchhandam.
Public Works
Chola rulers paid particular attention to public Brihadisvara Temple
works. They built a network of roads that helped
the movement of commercial goods as well as the Just Think!
army. They also built a number of towns and
beautiful monuments. More importantly, they Why were the medieval Indian temples frequently
devoted great attention to improving the irrigation attacked during wars and foreign invasions?
system. They built embankments to prevent Literature
flooding and made special efforts to provide
irrigation facilities so that more areas could be Language and literature also progressed
brought under cultivation. They dug wells and significantly under the Cholas. They encouraged
constructed tanks to collect rainwater, built dams the study of grammar, astronomy, philosophy, art
on the Kaveri and other rivers flowing through etc. Many literary and religious works were
their region, and even constructed canals and translated from Sanskrit into Tamil, Telugu and
Contemporary Social Science-7
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