Tondai Nadu

Tondai Nadu is a region of Tamil Nadu state in southern India. Tondai Nadu includes the northeastern part of the state, including the districts of Kanchipuram and Tiruvallur and the Tamil Nadu's capital Chennai. Tondai Nadu is the home country of the Pallava dynasty, who ruled from the 4th to the 9th centuries from their capital at Kanchipuram.

The Thondaiman dynasty

Raghunatha Raya Tondiman, founder of the princely state of Pudukkotai, was a distinguished general and had served as a governor of Thirumayam under his brother-in-law, Maharaja Regunatha Kilavan Setupati of Ramnad. In appreciation of his services, the Maharaja conferred upon him an extensive fief in 1686, comprising of the fort of Pudukkotai and surrounding lands.

In later centuries, the Thondaiman rulers, while nominally feudatories of the Ramnad state, often pursued an independent foreign policy, a trend common in all parts of India at that time. Certainly the most consequential of such ventures was their alliance with the British in the 18th century, first against the Nawab of Arcot and later against the Kingdom of Mysore. Pudukkotai finally came under formal British protection in 1763. This was arguably unavoidable, since the Thondaimans were much menaced in that period by a resurgent Mysore ruled by Hyder Ali and Tipu Sultan. Tipu Sultan had sought to leverage the power of the French against his British adversaries, and Pudukkotai, in common with its neighbours such as Thanjavur and Travancore, found it expedient to ally with the British.