A History of South India from Prehistoric Times to the Fall of Vijayanagar c7.3

c7.3

IN this chapter we shall attempt to give a general description of the geography of the country to serve as the foundation for the historical chapters which follow. Our concern is primarily with the land lying to the south of the Vindhyas, that rugged mountainous tract varying much in width and elevation and stretching almost east to west along the Tropic of Cancer. On the northern side of the Vindhyas the slope is gentle and there are no well-marked spurs or steep valleys; on the southern side, however, there is a steep fall from the crest to the valley of the Narmada, and we have a mountain wall buttressed by several forest-clad spurs overlooking the deep, narrow trough of the river bounded on the south by the Satpura-Mahadeo-Maikal range. From the southern slopes of the Satpuras the Tapti flows parallel to the Narmada to the west and the Mahanadi to the Bay of Bengal in the east. This double wall effectively divides the peninsular South from the plains of North India, but not in a manner that hinders seriously the intercommunication between the two regions. From prehistorical times to the present day there has been no period when the two regions did not influence each other politically and culturally, and on at least three occasions before the advent of British rule both the North and the South formed parts of a single empire embracing nearly the whole of India.