A History of Fine Art in India and Ceylon, from the Earliest Times to the Present Day c13.s5.t1.37

c13.s5.t1.37

In the year 1336 two Hindu brothers established a principality with its capital at Vijayanagar on the Tungabhadra river (15° 20' N., 76° 28' E.), which rapidly developed into an empire comprising all Southern India beyond the Krishnā (Kistna). The state attained the height of its prosperity early in the sixteenth century during the reign of Krishna Deva Rāya, the contemporary of Henry VIII of England, and stoutly maintained the Hindu cause against the Muslim Sultans of the Deccan until 1565, when the hosts of the Rāya were utterly defeated by the combined forces of the Muhammadan princes, and the capital was taken. The victors devoted their energies for five months to the deliberate destruction of the city, heaping up bonfires round the principal monuments, and hacking and mutilating the graven images. They succeeded in converting one of the richest and most splendid capitals of Asia into the abode of wild beasts, which has remained desolate to this day, save for the huts of a tiny hamlet nestling amidst the ruins.