South
India includes major states in peninsular India and the two island groups
of Lakshadweep and Andaman and Nicobar. One typically can understand by
simple sights and sounds, the big air of difference between Southern
Indian with rest of the parts of the country. The basic culture of south
is essentially Dravidian culture, quite different from North India's Aryan
culture. The South India has a glorious history of more than 3000 years
years. With advent of Aryan civilization in early BC centuries, much of
the Dravidian civilizations (said to be even base for Indus Valley
civilization) resided to southern India, which soon became a major
Dravidian bastion. Though Hinduism remained as the invisible thread that
connected North and South, much of the culture and outlook remained
different with both parts of the country, thanks the mighty Vindhya Ranges
that could successful prevent Northern cultural dominance into south
untill Medieval periods. The ancient history of South India was much
attributed to 3 large empires, namely Chola, Pandya and Chera, all hailing
from same roots. Whereas Cholas were more famous through its large
empires, cultural monuments and navy which brought much of South East Asia
under its domination, the popularity of other houses, Chera and Pandiyas
were nevertheless. Cheras ruled much of the modern Kerala and Karnataka
was extremely popular through its extensive trading relations with West,
particularly Roman and Greek Empires as well as with Egyptians. Pandiyas
were renowned for their cultural achievements, concenrated much of
Southern Tamil Nadu. Towards early AD Centuries, several other Hindu
Dynasties like Chalukyas, Vijayanagar, Pallavas etc scrambled much of the
Southern peninsula barring Kerala, which remained under Cheras.
