The eighth prince, Mánik Rái, reigned in A. D. 695. His descendant, Visal, was the prince who conquered Delhi in 1050. The two states fell together.

It seems to have been before this in the hands of the Málwa kings. It was conquered by a race of Rájpúts from Oud, the same who founded the state of Guzerát.

Jesselmér was founded by a tribe of the family of Crishna, who came from the north-west of India, and who still possess it.

Founded by a Rájpút prince, of a family of descendants of Ráma, who had, some generations before, obtained the petty principality of Narwar.

Sindu is mentioned as one principality in the "Mahá Bhárat." It was divided into four in Alexander's time; but united in 711, when invaded by the Arabs. It was afterwards recovered by the Rájpút tribe of Samera, A. D. 750, and not finally conquered by the Mahometans until after the house of Ghór.

The historians of Cashmír claim about 1200 years earlier, but give no names of kings and no events. After five dynasties, they were conquered by Mahmúd of Ghazni, in A. D. 1015 according to Ferishta.

CHAP.

1.

CHAP. II.

THE DECKAN.

BOOK
IV.

Early state and divisions of the Deckan.

THE history of the Deckan, as it has no preten-
sions to equal antiquity, is less obscure than that
of Hindostan, but it is less interesting. We know
little of the early inhabitants; and the Hindús do
not attract so much attention where they are co-
lonists as they did in their native seats.*
" All
the traditions and records of the Peninsula (says
Professor Wilson) recognise, in every part of it, a
period when the natives were not Hindús ;" and
the aborigines are described, before their civilisa-
tion by the latter people, as foresters and moun-
taineers, or goblins and demons. Some circum-
stances, however, give rise to doubts whether the
early inhabitants of the Deckan could have been in
so rude a state as this account of them would lead
us to suppose.

The Támul language must have been formed and perfected before the introduction of the Shanscrit and though this fact may not be conclusive (since the North American Indians also possess a polished language), yet, if Mr. Ellis's opinion be

* The whole of the following information, down to the account of Orissa, is derived from Professor Wilson's Introduction to the Mackenzie Papers; though it may be sometimes modified by opinions for which that gentleman ought not to be answerable.

well founded, and there is an original Támul literature as well as language, it will be impossible to class the founders of it with foresters and mountaineers.* If any credit could be given to the Hindú legends, Rávan, who reigned over Ceylon and the southern part of the peninsula at the time of Ráma's invasion, was the head of a civilised and powerful state; but, by the same accounts, he was a Hindú, and a follower of Síva; which would lead us to infer that the story is much more recent than the times to which it refers, and that part of it at least is founded on the state of things when it was written, rather than when Ráma and Rávan lived.

It is probable that, after repeated invasions had opened the communication between the two countries, the first colonists from Hindostan would settle on the fruitful plains of the Carnatic and Tanjore, rather than in the bleak downs of the upper Deckan; and although the sea might not at first have influenced their choice of an abode, its neighbourhood would in time give access to traders from other nations, and would create a rapid increase of the towns along the coast.

* It is, perhaps, a proof of the establishment of Támul literature before the arrival of the Bramins, that some of its most esteemed authors are of the lowest cast, or what we call Pariars. These authors lived in comparatively modern times; but such a career would never have been thrown open to their class if the knowledge which led to it had been first imparted by the Bramins.

CHAP.

II.

BOOK
IV.

Drávira or

Támul country.

Carnáta or

country.

Such seems to have been the case about the beginning of our æra, when Pliny and the author of the "Periplus" describe that part of India.

Even the interior must, however, have received a considerable portion of refinement at a still earlier period; for the companions of Alexander, quoted in Strabo and Arrian, while they remark the points of difference which still subsist between the inhabitants of the south and north of India, take no notice of any contrast in their manners.

Professor Wilson surmises that the civilisation of the south may possibly be extended even to ten centuries before Christ.

It has been mentioned that there are five languages spoken in the Deckan; and as they doubtless mark an equal number of early national divisions, it is proper here to describe their limits.

Támul is spoken in the country called Drávira; which occupies the extreme south of the peninsula, and is bounded on the north by a line drawn from Pulicat (near Madras) to the Gháts between that and Bangalór, and so along the curve of those mountains westward to the boundary line between Malabár and Canara, which it follows to the sea so as to include Malabár.

Part of the northern limit of Drávira forms the Canarese southern one of Carnáta, which is bounded on the west by the sea, nearly as far as Goa, and then by the western Ghats up to the neighbourhood of Cólapúr.