A History of the Mahrattas v1.c12.88

v1.c12.88

² [The Rājās of Sonda (Soonda), now a small village in Sirsi tāluka, north Kanara District, were a branch of the Vijayanagar dynasty and settled at Sonda between 1570 and 1580. On the destruction of Sonda by Haidar Alī in 1764, the chief fled to Goa, where his descendants still hold a position of honour. It is possible that both the Sonda chiefs and the Rāyas of Vijayanagar belonged to the great Bēdar tribe of the Kanarese districts. If this hypothesis is true, writes Dr. V. A. Smith, it would account for the extraordinary diet of the Vijayanagar kings recorded by contemporary Portuguese travellers. See O.H.I., pp. 314-5. For full account of the Bēdars, see Thurston, C. and T.S.I., 1909. Sewell (p. 13) suggests that the Vijayanagar kings may have belonged to the Kuruba tribe, who are shepherds.]