The Early History of India, from 600 B.C. to the Muhammadan Conquest, including the Invasion of Alexander the Great c33.2

c33.2

THE term Deccan, a convenient and familiar corruption of the Sanskrit word (*dakshina*) meaning the South, may be, and sometimes is, extended so as to cover the whole of India south of the Narmadā ; but is usually understood as designating a more limited territory, in which Malabar and the Tamil countries of the extreme south are not included. Thus limited, the term connotes the whole region occupied by the Telugu-speaking populations, as well as Mahārāshtra, or the Marāthā country. Certain dynasties of Mysore, which had more concern with the Deccan than with the extreme south, are noticed in this chapter more conveniently than they could be in connexion with the Tamil powers. With reference to modern political divisions, the greater part of the Deccan in the restricted sense is occupied by the territories of the Nizam of Hyderabad.