Carnatic (region)

Carnatic is a name given by Europeans to a region of southern India, between the Eastern Ghats and the Coromandel Coast, in the modern Indian states of Tamil Nadu and southern Andhra Pradesh. The name is likely derived from the South Indian Karnatak or Karnata, and there are several theories as to its derivation. Bishop Robert Caldwell in his Comparative Grammar of the Dravidian Languages, from kar, black, and nadu, country, i.e. the black country, a term very suitable to designate the black cotton soil, as it is called, of the plateau of the Southern Deccan. Hattangadi Narayan Rao suggests karu, elevated, + nadu, land, "an elevated land".

Properly the name is, in fact, applicable to Karnataka, the country of the Kannada extending between the Eastern and Western Ghats, over an irregular area narrowing northwards, from Palghat in the south to Bidar in the north, and including Mysore. The extension of the name to the country south of the Karnata was probably due to the Muslim conquerors who in the 16th century overthrew the kingdom of Vijayanagara, and who extended the name which they found used of the country north of the Ghats to that south of them. After this period the plain country of the south came to be called Karnata Payanghat, or lowlands, as distinguished from Karnata Balaghat, or highlands. The misapplication of the name Carnatic was carried by the British a step further than by the Muslims, it being confined by them to the country below the Ghats, Mysore not being included. The British stopped using the name officially by the end of the nineteenth century, although the term persisted as a geographical term. By the early 20th century the authorities of British India more correctly applied the name Carnatic, or rather Karnatak, to the southern portion of Bombay Province, (the northern portion of present-day Karnataka state) including the districts of Belgaum, Dharwar and Bijapur, part of North Kanara (Uttara Kannada) and the princely states of the Southern Maratha agency and Kolhapur.

The region known to Europeans as the Carnatic extended along India's eastern coast about 1000 km (600 miles) in length, and from 80 to 160 km in breadth. It was bounded on the north by the Guntur Circar, and thence it stretched southward to Cape Comorin. It was divided into the southern, central and northern Carnatic. The region south of the river Coleroon, which passes the town of Tiruchirapalli, was called the Southern Carnatic. The principal towns of this division were Thanjavur (Tanjore), Tiruchirapalli (Trichinopoly), Madurai, Tranquebar, Negapatam and Tirunelveli (Tinnevelly). The Central Carnatic extended from the Coleroon river to the Pennar River; its chief towns were Chennai, Pondicherry, Arcot, Vellore, Cuddalore, Pulicat, and Nellore. The Northern Carnatic extended from the Pennar to the northern limit of the country; and the chief town was Ongole.

Towards the close of the 17th century the country was conquered by the armies of Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb, who in 1692 appointed Zulfikar Ali Nawab of the Carnatic, with his seat at Arcot. Meanwhile, the Maratha power had begun to develop; in 1677 Shivaji had suppressed the last remnants of the Vijayanagara power in Vellore, Gingee and Kurnool, while his brother Ekoji, who in 1674 had overthrown the Nayaks of Thanjavur, established in that city a dynasty which lasted for a century. The collapse of Mughal Empire after the death of Aurangzeb produced further changes. The nawab Saadet-allah of Arcot (1710-1732) established his independence; his successor Dost Au (1732-1740) conquered and annexed Madurai in 1736, and his successors were confirmed in their position. as nawabs of the Carnatic by the Nizam of Hyderabad after that potentate had established his power in southern India. After the death of the nawab Mahommed Anwar-ud-din (1744-1749), the succession was disputed between Mahommed Au and Husein Dost. In this quarrel the French and British, then competing for influence in the Carnatic, took opposite sides. The victory of the British established Mahommed Ali in power over part of the Carnatic till his death in 1795. Meanwhile, however, the country had been exposed to other troubles. In 1741 Madurai, which the nawab Dost Ali (1732-1740) had added to his dominions in 1736, was conquered by the Marathas; and in 1743 Hyder Ali of the Kingdom of Mysore overran the central Carnatic. The latter was reconquered by the British, to whom Madurai had fallen in 1758; and, finally, in 1801 all the possessions of the nawab of the Carnatic were transferred to them by a treaty which stipulated that an annual revenue of several lakhs of pagodas should be reserved to the nawab, and that the British should undertake to support a sufficient civil and military force for the protection of the country and the collection. of the revenue. On the death of the nawab in 1853 the British put an end to the nominal sovereignty of the nawabs, and provided a pension to the family.

The southern Carnatic, when it came into the possession of the British, was occupied by military chieftains called Poligars, who ruled over the country. Under British rule their forts and military establishments were destroyed.