Social and Political Life in the Vijayanagara Empire (A.D. 1346 – A.D. 1646) v2.c25.s2.21

v2.c25.s2.21

It is superfluous to say that music was as highly cultivated in Vijayanagara as dancing. There are notices of some of the most important musical instruments in the inscription. So early as A. D. 994 mention is made of the vīṇā. A record of this date of the times of Rājarāja I registers a grant of land for the maintenance of a musician who was to play on the vīṇā and of a vocalist who was to accompany it in the Tiṇḍīśvara temple at Kiḍaṅgil in Kiṭkkai-nāḍu, (mod. Kiḍakkai-nāḍu) a subdivision of Ōymā-nāḍu.² Another instrument which was known in the Koṅgu country about the middle of the thirteenth century was the yāl.³