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Kingdoms of Kerala

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Medieval History

After the fall of the second Chera dynasty, a lot of independent feudal small kingdoms rose up. The kingdoms of Venad, Kolathunadu, Calicut and Cochin dominated them politically, financially and also in terms of miitary strength. The other kingdoms and their kings were subordinates to these main kingdoms and were usually under their control. Later, the kingdoms of Kochi and Kolathunadu came under the Kingdom of Calicut due to political pressures over time. By the time the British came to India, a lot of these kingdoms had been subsumed into one or the other main kingdoms.

The emergence of a lot of feudal kingdoms started happening when the Nair and Nambudiri lords started breaking up the kingdoms into more smaller kingdoms under their own rule. The Edapally royal family is one of the Brahmin royal families of Kerala. Namboodiris who had some roles in governing but stayed out of the ruing family started governing the provinces directly. Some lords who were not in the control of the kings even used to murder the common people. During this era of Nambuthiri and Nair leadership, the culture and political condition of Kerala went on a rapid change. This period witnessed an unstable, chaotic political condition and also saw the rise of rigid social systems. Although this period is viewed by many as a ‘dark age’ in Kerala history, literature, art forms, temples, mathematics, astronomy, external trade etc flourished during this period. These small kingdoms due to their rivalry and political plays, had stagnated by 1498, when the Portuguese landed in Kerala. The kingdom of Calicut had been the main kingdom in Kerala during that time, however it's predominance decreased in the next century when the Portuguese and the Dutch started fighting the Arabs for control of the Indian Ocean.

Modern History

After the English East India company came into the picture, the Portuguese, Dutch and the French slowly started losing the control they had and by 1750s, almost all the control of the Indian Ocean trade pertaining to Kerala had come to their hands. By this time, the Kingdoms of Calicut and Kolathunadu had declined and during Tipu Sultan's invasion of Malabar, their royal families escaped, with some families coming to the Kingdom of Travancore. By 1790s, the British had taken control of the entirety of Northern Malabar and only the Kingdoms of Cochin and Travancore remained, with the small feudal kingdoms in the rest of Kerala merged or annexed into either of these two. The kingdoms of Cochin and Travancore retained semi-independence status by accepting British suzerainty.

List of Kingdoms

The list of these kingdoms are given below.

References

  1. Menon, Indudharan. Hereditary Physicians of Kerala: Traditional Medicine and Ayurveda in Modern India. United Kingdom, Taylor & Francis, 2018.
  2. ^ Sreedhara Menon, A.. A Survey of Kerala History. India, Sahitya Pravarthaka Co-operative Society ; National Book Stall, 1967.
  3. ^ Pillai, Manu S. The Ivory Throne : Chronicles of the House of Travancore. HarperCollins Publishers, India, 2015.
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