Elements of South-Indian Palæography, from the Fourth to the Seventeenth Century A.D. c5.s4.28

c5.s4.28

The Muhammadan invasion of the Deccan in 1311, and the destruction of the old kingdoms, brought about the establishment of the Vijayanagara dynasty, under which not only the Sanskrit, but also the vernacular literatures were much cultivated. The early inscriptions of this dynasty are either in the Haḷa-kannaḍa or Nandināgarī character; the latest (of the 15th and 16th centuries) are almost exclusively in the last. In the South, Grantha was occasionally used. They constitute by far the largest class of S. Indian inscriptions, for the sovereigns of this dynasty at the end of the 15th and beginning of the 16th century repaired or endowed most of the large temples in the South².