Social and Political Life in the Vijayanagara Empire (A.D. 1346 – A.D. 1646) v1.c8.s1.1

v1.c8.s1.1

THE Empire which thus arose on the soil of Karṇāṭaka gradually extended its sway over the whole of the peninsula south of the river Kṛishṇā. It was not an empty boast which the engravers recorded on stone when they said that "Sangama of the Yaduvamśa enabled Lakshmī the Karṇāṭaka Deśa to wear permanently her ear-rings".¹ The sons of Sangama had reason indeed to infuse new life into the old country. Known by the name of Punnaṭa (or Punnaḍ) in early history, it had withered till it rose under the general appellation of Gaṅgavāḍi 96,000; and when the warring peoples from the time of the Mauryas till those of the Hoysalas had pained it with their politics and soothed it with their songs, it reappeared again as Karṇāṭa of the Vijayanagara age.² According to an inscription dated in A.D. 1565, it was 126,000 yōjanas in extent, situated in the middle of the Jambūdvipa.³ With the roll of ages, Karṇāṭaka had not changed in its fertility and fame. Centuries before the rise of the Kurubas, the land of Karṇāṭaka had sheltered the Jaina sages of the north; and the nature of the country where the founders of the Vijayanagara Empire first made their appearance is thus described in an inscription of about A.D. 600. Bhadrabāhu, after having foretold in Ujjaini a period of twelve years of dire calamity, took his way to the south where his saṅgha made their abode. ". . .The whole of the saṅgha, leaving the northern regions, took their way to the south. And the ṛishi company arrived at a country counting many hundreds of villages, completely filled with the increase of people, money, gold, grain, cows, buffaloes, and goats.