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CHAPTER II.

POLITICAL HISTORY.

PREHISTORIC PEOPLES—Kistvaens—Paleolithic settlements. Earuy His- roryv—Asdéka, 258 B.C.—The Nalas, 7th century—The Nolambas, 8th to 10th centuries —The Gangas—The Western Chélukyas, 11th century— The Hoysalas and Yadavas, 12th century—The Muhammadan advance, 1910. VIJAYANAGAR KINGS, 1385-1565—Foundation of their empire, 1935—Its rapid extension—lts struggles with the Baéhmini kings—Disruption of the Bahmini kingdom—Necay of Vijayanagar—Réma Raja and his brothers—The Musalmans combine against Vijayanagar—The battle of Talikéta, 1565—The king flees to Penukonda—Tirumala seizes the throne—End of the Vijayanagar empire. THE MUHAMMADAN Prerrop—The Mardthas, 1677—Aurangzeb, 1687—The Nizam, 1723— Haidar Ali, 1761—The second Mysore War, 1792—The third Mysore War, 1799—The district ceded to the English, 1800. ENGLISH RULE —The poligars—Plot to seize Gooty, 1804.

The earliest dwellers in the district of whom any traces now survive are the prehistoric peoples who built the kistvaens found within it and fashioned the rude stone implements which have been discovered on the tops of some of its hills.

Kistvaens to the number of some hundreds occur at Mudigallu, three miles east of Kalyandrug, and on Dévadulabetta (the ‘ Devan- delbetta’ of the maps), the big hill which stands just north of the same town. These are referred to in the account of this place in Chapter XV below. Four complete examples and several others in ruins stand by the side of the road just north of Malyavantam in Anantapur taluk and isolated cases are reported! from Konddpuram and Puléru - in Hindupur.

Traces of palzolithic settlements occur in Gooty taluk at the following places?: The high ground south-west of Guntakal station, Vidapanakallu fort and main hills, the hills at Vélpumadugu, Lattava- ranu, and Karukumukkala, Kottakéta west hill, the low hill west of Vajra-Kariru, Uravakonda hill, the hill east of the great dyke to the east of this and Véligonda hill. Mr. Bruce Foote says that at Budihal hill in the same taluk, which is apparently the Budikonda of the maps, are several remarkable groups of the shallow elliptical troughs which were worn in the rocks by the efforts of the makers of the stone implements to grind and polish them after they had been roughly

1Meadows Taylor’s paper in Journ. Bombay Branch of H.A.8., iv, 412 (1852). ?See Mr, Bruce Foote’s paper in J.A.5.B., lvi., Pt. 2, No, 3, 1887,