South India and her Muhammadan Invaders c11.23

c11.23

The actual route taken from here to Madura is not quite so clear in the narrative. The only lead that the account gives us is that the army first moved on and encamped in a place called Kham, and from there it set forward and reached Madura in five marches. Taking it that the starting point of Malik Kafur was his camp at Kaṇṇanūr, there are three roads by which the advance could have been made. The one along the road following more or less the South India Railway line now to Dindigul and the Palnis, and thence along the road to Periakuḷam almost due west of Madura as far as a village called Butlaguṇḍu, and turning eastwards to Madura. Another a little to the east of it, proceeding straight down to Viralimalai, going further down through what is now the Zamindari of Marungāpuri through Koilpaṭṭi and Tovarankurichi, striking the great trunk road from Vaṭṭāṇam to Dindigul, at Nattam. The road thence leads between Śirumalai (the possible Sarmali of Amir Khusru) and Aḷagarmalai straight down to Madura. The third road of the present day, perhaps the most important at the present time, is the road leading from Trichinopoly by way of Kīranūr to the town of Pudukoṭṭa straight, and thence to Tirumeyyam; from there to Tiruppattūr and from Tiruppattūr to Madura.