Vijayanagara Empire

  General Description   The Vijayanagara Empire ruled over southern India: specifically, it comprised an area roughly equivalent to the modern-day Indian states of Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Goa, Kerala, and Tamil Nadu. ^[1] This polity could be said to have been founded with the establishment of the fortified city of Vijayanagara itself in 1340, and it fragmented into many smaller polities roughly three hundred years later, due to both civil wars and incursions from Islamic polities to the North. ^[2] Under Vijayanagara rule, architecture flourished (many temples were built or rebuilt, and the first permanent non-religious buildings, including royal palaces, were constructed), trade and agriculture boomed, new towns were founded, and new notions of legal rights emerged. ^[3]
Population and political organization
As with most preceding South Indian polities, the Vijayanagara ruler sat at the top of both administrative and military hierarchies. ^[4] He was assisted at court by several ministers, and in the provinces by governors. ^[5]
Assuming that the entire population of the Indian subcontinent at this time equalled 150 million, it seems reasonable to estimate that the population of the Vijayanagara empire was about 25 million. ^[6] Burton Stein estimates that the city of Vijayanagara at its height in the 16th century had over 100,000 inhabitants, ^[7] while Carla Sinopoli believes the population could have been over 250,000. ^[8]

[1]: (Kamath 1980, 329) Suryanath Kamath. 1980. A Concise History of Karnataka: From Pre-historic Times to the Present. Bangalore: Archana Prakashana.

[2]: (Stein 1990, 2, 13) Burton Stein. 1990. The New Cambridge History of India: Vijayanagara. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[3]: (Stein 1990, xii, 2) Burton Stein. 1990. The New Cambridge History of India: Vijayanagara. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[4]: (Majumdar, Raychaudhuri and Datta 1974, 373) R. C. Majumdar, H. C. Raychaudhuri, Kalikinkar Datta. 1974. An Advanced History of India. Delhi: Macmillan India.

[5]: (Majumdar, Raychaudhuri and Datta 1974, 373-74) R. C. Majumdar, H. C. Raychaudhuri, Kalikinkar Datta. 1974. An Advanced History of India. Delhi: Macmillan India.

[6]: (Stein 1990, 44) Burton Stein. 1990. The New Cambridge History of India: Vijayanagara. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[7]: (Stein 1990, 75) Burton Stein. 1990. The New Cambridge History of India: Vijayanagara. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[8]: (Sinopoli 2000, 370) Carla Sinopoli. 2000. ’From the Lion Throne: Political and Social Dynamics of the Vijayanagara Empire’. Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 43 (3): 364-98.