Vaduga

The Vaduga or Vadugar comprise three distinct Telugu caste-based communities found in present-day Tamil Nadu, India. Their caste identities are as Kamma, Balijas, and Rajakambalathars. They rose to prominence within the Vijayanagara imperial court and migrated southward following the defeat of the Vijayanagara Empire by Muslim forces in 1556.[1]

History

The term Vadugar was used initially to refer to the people occupying the regions north of Tamil Nadu. In Sangam literature it was applied to the chief of Erumainadu (roughly Southern Karnataka) and to the people of Vengadam (roughly the regions around Tirupathi).[2] Sekkiliar used the term "Vaduka Karunadar Mannan" to refer to the Kalabhra invaders of Madurai in Periya Puranam.[3] The Hoysalas invasions were called "Periya Vadukan Kalaham" in inscriptions.[3] Badaga is derived from Vaduga.[3] Therefore historians believe the term was initially used to refer to Kannadigas.[3] However it was largely used to refer to Telugu people later.[4]

Historical figures such as Veerapandiya Kattabomman, Tirumala Nayaka, Maharaani Mangammal, and Virupatchi Gopala Naicker were prominent leaders and rulers of the Vaduga Nayaka kingdoms in Tamil Nadu.[1]

References

  1. ^ a b Dirks, Nicholas B. (1987). The Hollow Crown: Ethnohistory of an Indian Kingdom. Cambridge University Press. pp. 60–70, 174. ISBN 0-521-32604-4.
  2. ^ Andhra Parishattu Varidhi, Kashi. Rajata Utsava Samputamu 1911 1935 Andhra Parishattu Varidhi, Kashi.
  3. ^ a b c d Andhra Parishattu Varidhi, Kashi. Rajata Utsava Samputamu 1911 1935 Andhra Parishattu Varidhi, Kashi. This is confirmed by the fact that the Periya-Puranam refers to an invader of Madura as the king of the Vaduka Karnatakas (Vaduka Karunadar Mannan). The Vadukas are therefore here identified with the Karnatakas themselves justifying the Badagas being equated with the Vudukas of the northern frontier. This is still further confirmed by inscriptional references to the Hoysala invasions of the south being referred to as Periya Vadukan Kalaham, the confusion or the revolution created by the invasion of the great Vadukan. These references are to the Hoysala invasions. Therefore it is clear that the Kannada speaking people, Sanskritised into Karnatakas, (Kannada being known in pure Tamil Karunadam as the language) were known to the Tamils as Vudukas.
  4. ^ Andhra Parishattu Varidhi, Kashi. Rajata Utsava Samputamu 1911 1935 Andhra Parishattu Varidhi, Kashi. Somehow or other that name for the Kanarese folk seems to have been forgotten, and modern usage in Tamil restricts the term Vudukar to that section of the Vadukar who occupied the eastern borderland of the Tamil land; and the Telugus proper as well as those living to the South of them are known-now a daysas Vudukar and the language Telugu itself is known Vaduka.
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