Social and Political Life in the Vijayanagara Empire (A.D. 1346 – A.D. 1646) v1.c9.s5.14

v1.c9.s5.14

While the Vijayanagara monarchs partially realized the truth of the mediaeval precept that the capital was to be near the river with an access to the sea, they did their utmost to fulfil the main purpose which the mediaeval writers had in view when these latter dealt with the nearness of the capital to the sea, viz., that relating to the growth of the inland and foreign trade of the country. The selection of the site of the capital amidst a range of hills was indeed a violation of the principle enunciated in the *Sukranīti*. But this non-fulfilment on the part of the rulers was counterbalanced by persistent efforts to comply with another demand of the mediaeval theorists. The sea, according to Sukra, "is also an element of the sovereign's political importance and dignity. The ambition of swaying the destiny of an empire from sea to sea, or ruling the world encircled by the ocean has always fired the enthusiasm of the Hindu kings and statesmen. . ."¹ No southern monarchs have so conclusively proved the truth of these words as those of Vijayanagara, with whom the sovereignty of the seas as expressed in their great title "Master of the Eastern, Western, Southern and Northern Oceans"² was a necessary adjunct to their imperial grandeur. When we have thus understood some of the principles on which the Vijayanagara kings built their Empire and affixed titles to their names, we may modify the statement that they spoke in their grants in a style which was "purely conventional bombast", and which mentioned "fictitious conquests", "corresponding exactly with the ideal of a Hindu sovereign according to Alaṅkāra Śāstra and astrological imagination."³ We have it on the authority of foreign travellers, beginning with 'Abdur Razzāq, that the Empire of Vijayanagara was bounded on its three sides by the ocean; and, therefore, it is not difficult for us to imagine that the Vijayanagara rulers indeed followed the principles of the writers on Hindu polity even in the matter of appending laudatory titles to their names.