Exploring the notion of early medieval , this book re-examines and presents an alternative history of south India. It covers problems and history of Tamilakam in general and early medieval Karnataka and Kerala in particular.

Contributed articles presented at the National Seminar on State and Society in Pre-modern South India, held in 2002 at Post Graduate Department of History, Sri. C. Achutha Menon Government College, Thrissur on political sociology of medieval South India.

Publisher Description

Sociopolitical and cultural history, A.D. 900-1500.

The book analyses the transition from the ancient to the medieval period in polity, economy, the caste system and culture. It examines the form of peasant protest and the reasons for their failure and infrequency. The author also examines the development of tantrism and the mentality that feudalism created.

In this compelling new study, Whitney Cox presents a fundamental re-imagining of the politics of pre-modern India through the reinterpretation of the contested accession of Kulottunga I (r.1070–1120) as the ruler of the imperial Chola dynasty. By focusing on this complex event and its ramifications over time, Cox traces far-reaching transformations throughout the kingdom and beyond. Through a methodologically innovative combination of history, theory and the close reading of a rich series of Sanskrit and Tamil textual sources, Cox reconstructs the nature of political society in medieval India. A major intervention in the fields of South Asian social, political and cultural history, religion and comparative political thought, this book poses fresh comparative and conceptual questions about politics, history, agency and representation in the pre-modern world.