Krishnadevaraya of Vijayanagara and His Times

At the outset I must acknowledge the usefulness to me of the Kannada book Sri Krishnadevaraya - Jeevana, Sadhane written jointly by Prof. G.S. Dikshit, Prof. B. Ramaswamy and Dr. Bhargavi Shivaiah, and published by the Directorate of Karnataka State Archaeology and Museums, Govt.of Karnataka. This book has helped me to know about the latest researches on the subject. Whenever I quote Dr. Dikshit in the text, it is this book, jointly written by these three scholars. Dr. Dikshit had been my teacher when I studied for M. A. degree. Later, he had lent me the dissertation on Krishnadevaraya he had written when he was a B. A. (Hons) student at the Mysore University, more than 70 years ago. I made use of the book to pen a Kannada novel on Krishnadevaraya in 1967. This novel was serialised in Kannada Prabha Kannada daily (of the Indian Express group), and then was published in a book form in three editions. The Hindi translation of this novel was also serialized in Yugaprabhat, fortnightly from Trivandrum, and has been brought out in a book form by Prabhat Prakashan, New Delhi. This is 500th Anniversary of Krishnadevaraya's Coronation (1510).

Both Prof. Dikshit and Dr. B. A. Saletore had been my teachers and were specialists on the Vijayanagara Empire and had been the source of inspiration to me. My own thesis for Ph. D. degree, submitted to the Bombay University was on some aspects of Vijayanagara Empire. I have continued my studies on the subject and have written booklets in Kannada (1973) and English (2004) on the Empire. The ICSSR had sponsored a lecture on Krishnadevaraya by me at Tirupathi in 2004. I have outlined the administrative, social and economic developments of the time here in the work in a limited space.

I thank Kum. H. V. Vani for her neat type-setting. The IBH Prakashana have published my many Kannada books, and I am thankful to them for publishing this, and also Dr. S. Srinivas for reading the proof.

**Contents and Sample Pages**