The Cambridge History of India, Vol. III: Turks and Afghans v3.c27.23

v3.c27.23

The Hindu kingdom of Vijayanagar has already been mentioned. The founder of the dynasty which ruled it from 1339 to 1483 was Sangama I, a petty chieftain of Anagundi, on the north bank of the Tungabhadra and near the site of Vijayanagar. Sangama had never submitted to Muhammad Tughluq, but had maintained a rude independence in his stronghold, and was at first probably little more than a brigand chief; but the subjection of the Kākatīyas of Warangal, the destruction of the kingdom of Dvāravatīpura by the Sayyid sultan of Madura, and the rebellion in the Deccan, which left the Peninsula free from Muslim aggression, were the opportunity of Sangama and his successors, and there are few examples in history of a large and powerful state being established by adventurers in the short time which sufficed for the establishment of the kingdom of Vijayanagar. Unfortunately we lack the means of tracing the process by which the insignificant chieftains of Anagundī became, within the short space of thirty years, the unquestioned rulers of this great and wealthy kingdom, but we may form some idea of the course of events by imagining a great Hindu population exasperated by the sacrilegious oppression of foreign warriors with whom they had been powerless to cope, deprived of their hereditary rulers, and suddenly relieved of the hostile yoke by the intestine feuds of their enemies, joyfully acclaiming a national hero.