Southern India and Sri Lanka

The realms

1. The Yadavas (Seunas) of DevagiriJaitugiKingdom

   The Yadavas (Seunas) began as Chalukya feudatories at Sinnar (Seunapura) in the Nasik hills and grew under Bhillama V (rising about 1175) into the kingdom of the Deccan plateau.

2. The Kakatiyas of OrugalluGanapatiKingdom

   The Kakatiyas are a house of the Telugu upland who rose from Chalukya feudatories at Anumakonda (Hanamkonda) in the Sabbi-1000 country to sovereignty in 1163 under Rudradeva (Thousand Pillar Temple inscription, switching their records from Kannada to Telugu) a

3. The Velanati Chodas of the Andhra coastPrithviswaraChiefs of the Andhra coast

   The Velanati Chodas (Velanandu or Velanadu is the country of the Krishna delta and the Guntur plain) are a Telugu Choda house that rose as Chola deputies in the Telugu country in the later eleventh century and ruled the rich ground between the Godavari delta a

4. The Chola empire of Kulottunga IIIKulottunga IIIEmpire with a ring of feudatories

   The last strong Chola king rules a delta state ringed by chiefs.

5. The Pandya kingdom of MaduraiJatavarman Kulasekara IKingdom, a Chola client

   A dry-country kingdom made rich by the sea: the pearl banks of the Gulf of Mannar (fished for about six weeks in March and April), the chank beds, and the horses landed on the pearl coast between November and March for every Deccan and Tamil army.

6. The kingdom of Lanka at PolonnaruwaLilavatiKingdom in its last years at Polonnaruwa

   An irrigation civilisation at its peak of repair and its first signs of political collapse.

7. The Maldive kingdom of MaleIsland kingdom

   A scatter of coral atolls ruled from Male by a king of the Theemuge house, in the middle of the Indian Ocean's east-west and Ceylon-Bengal sea roads.

8. The Hoysala kingdom of Veera Ballala IIVeera Ballala IIKingdom of the Karnataka plateau

   The Hoysala kingdom is the strongest state of the south Deccan on the morning of 1 January 1200, and the one that has gained most from the break-up of the Chalukya empire of Kalyani.

9. The Kerala chiefdomsChiefdoms with no king

   Kerala is not a kingdom on 1 January 1200 and must not be drawn as one.

10. The Silaharas of Thana and KolhapurAnanta Deva II or Keshideva II: the king list changes inKingdom

    Two Silahara houses share one colour.

11. The Kadambas of GoaJayakeshi IIIPort kingdom of the Konkan

    The Kadambas of Goa are a coastal house of modest land and great income.

12. Self-governing peoples of Southern India and Sri LankaNone named for 1199 to 1200 in the sources readSelf-governing peoples

    Round and between the kingdoms of the peninsula lie forest, hill and dry scrub, and the peoples who live there answer to no king on 1 January 1200.

Primary sources for Southern India and Sri Lanka

• A Description of the Foreign Peoples (Records of Foreign Nations), Zhao Rukuo (Zhao Rugua) (1225 at Quanzhou). The best single text for the island world around 1200, written by the superintendent of maritime trade at Quanzhou from merchants' reports a generation after the date.
• Description of the Foreign Peoples (Chau Ju-kua), Zhao Rukuo (趙汝适) (about 1225, while superintendent of maritime trade at Quanzhou). The Song customs officer's survey of the overseas world, compiled from merchants and from Zhou Qufei, a generation after 1200 but describing trade routes that were the same in 1200.
• Corpus of Inscriptions in the Telingana Districts, Various (Kakatiya chancery and temple scribes), edited by P. Sreenivasachar (inscriptions of the 10th to 15th centuries; edited 1940 to 1942). The Kakatiyas of Orugallu (Warangal) are known for 1200 almost entirely from inscriptions, and this Hyderabad Archaeological Series corpus is the main printed collection.
• Epigraphia Carnatica: inscriptions of the Mysore country, Various (Hoysala chancery and temple scribes), edited by B. Lewis Rice and R. Narasimhachar (inscriptions of the 4th to 19th centuries; the series ran from 1886 to 1905, revised from 1972). The Hoysala kingdom of Veera Ballala II (reigning 1173 to 1220) is documented almost wholly by the inscriptions in this series, arranged by district and taluk with full English translations.
• Epigraphia Zeylanica: lithic and other inscriptions of Ceylon, Various (the Polonnaruwa kings' chanceries), edited by D. M. de Zilva Wickremasinghe, H. W. Codrington and S. Paranavitana (inscriptions of the 3rd century BC to the 18th century; the series ran from 1904). Prints with translation the stone records of the Polonnaruwa kings who held or lost the throne around 1200.
• Inscriptions of the Silaharas, Various (Silahara chanceries), edited by V. V. Mirashi (inscriptions of the 9th to 13th centuries; edited 1977). Collects the records of the three Silahara houses: North Konkan (Thana), South Konkan, and Kolhapur.
• Sanskrit and Old Canarese Inscriptions relating to the Yadava Kings of Devagiri, Various (Yadava chancery), edited by J. F. Fleet (inscriptions of the 12th and 13th centuries; edited 1876). The first collected edition of the Yadava (Seuna) records, with texts and translations, from the Indian Antiquary.
• South Indian Inscriptions (Archaeological Survey of India), Various (Chola, Pandya and other chanceries and temple scribes), edited by E. Hultzsch, V. Venkayya, H. Krishna Sastri and successors (inscriptions of the 7th to 17th centuries; the series ran from 1890). The temple inscriptions printed here are the primary record of the Tamil country in 1200.
• The Book of Roger (the Pleasure of Him who Longs to Cross the Horizons), Muhammad al-Idrisi (completed 1154 at Palermo). The nearest Arabic geography in time to 1200 for the Indian Ocean.
• The Leiden grants of Rajaraja I and Kulottunga I concerning the Srivijaya vihara at Nagapattinam, The Chola chancery (Rajaraja I, Rajendra I, Kulottunga I) (the Larger plates about 1005 to 1014 (completed under Rajendra I); the Smaller plates 1090). Background documents for the relations between the Cholas and the Malay world.
• The Lesser Chronicle (the continuation of the Mahavamsa), Dhammakitti and later monks of the Mahavihara tradition (the first continuation about the 13th century (chapters 37 to 79), carried on in stages to the 18th century). The only narrative source for Lanka in 1200.
• Travancore Archaeological Series, Various (Kerala chiefs, temples and merchant guilds), edited by T. A. Gopinatha Rao, K. V. Subrahmanya Aiyer and A. S. Ramanatha Ayyar (inscriptions of the 9th to 18th centuries; the series ran from 1910 to 1938). The main corpus for the Kerala coast.

The whole sources library

How these entries are made

Every entry describes one morning, 1 January 1200, and keeps later events in a dated "what the year holds" list with the conditions each depended on. Each entry names its sources, rates its confidence and says where the sources disagree. Published 4 November 2026. Corrections are welcome.