Historical Geography of Natu in South India with Special Reference to Kerala

Abstract

Natus, as agricultural regions that went into the making of the medieval south Indian states, have already been well researched. While natu has been identified as Vellanvagai villages, distinct from the Brahmadeyas, it has been pointed out that natu also developed as a region controlled by the chiefs. Historians have argued that natu in Kerala developed more as political entities, comparable to the rashtra under the Rashtrakutas and padi under the Colas. Close examination of the natus in Kerala shows that they developed as production regions, starting from food crops, particularly paddy cultivation, but expanded to include garden lands, cash crop areas and forests. Because of the mixed character of the topography occupied by the natus, they came to develop as political entities, controlled by hereditary chiefs or by households, both acting with the help of a military retinue. Under the rule of the Cheras or Perumals from ninth to twelfth centuries, natus came to occupy central importance in the structuring of the Chera state, and they continued to exist even after the decline of the Chera rule during the beginning of the twelfth century.