- Karnataka
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/kahr naht"euh keuh/, n.
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State (pop., 2001 prelim.: 52,733,958), southwestern India.Lying on the Arabian Sea, it is bordered by the states of Goa, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, and Kerala. It has an area of 74,051 sq mi (191,791 sq km); its capital is Bangalore. It occupies the plateau region of the southern Deccan and the hill region of the Western Ghats. The area was ruled by a series of Hindu dynasties before coming under British control in 1831. Mysore returned to native rule in 1881 as a princely state. Its name was changed to Karnataka ("lofty land") in 1973. About 80% of the population is engaged in agriculture. Rice and sugarcane are cultivated on the coastal plain, and coffee and tea are grown in the hill region. The population is largely Dravidian, and the Kannada language is widely spoken.* * *
▪ linguistic region, Indiaalso called Carnatic or Karnaticlinguistic region of the Deccan plateau (Deccan), south-central India, generally corresponding to Karnataka (Karnātaka) state. Of irregular shape, and defined as the area in which Kannada (Kannada language) (Kanarese) is spoken, Karnataka was unified during the Vijayanagar kingdom (c. 1300–1600) until successive conquests by the Muslim kings of the Deccan, the Mughals, and the states of Maratha and Hyderabad greatly reduced its size. (The term has also been applied to the southern Coromandel Coast of the Bay of Bengal because the Vijayanagars retired there in defeat.) The remaining kingdom continued as the independent Hindu state of Mysore until the British conquest in 1799, following the Mysore Wars. The Kannada-speaking people were leaders in the successful movement for the linguistic reorganization of India (1953 and 1956), which resulted in the addition of territories from Bombay (now Mumbai), Hyderabad, and Madras (now Chennai) to form Mysore state. The state was renamed Karnataka in 1973.* * *
Universalium. 2010.
