Veera Ballala III

Veera Ballala III (c. 1262 – 8 September 1342) was the last great king of the Hoysala Empire. During his rule, the northern and southern branches of the Hoysala empire (which included much of modern Karnataka and northern Tamil Nadu in India) were consolidated and administered from Halebidu (also known as Dwarasamudra). During his rule, he fought numerous wars with the Yadavas of Devagiri, the Pandyan Dynasty of Madurai and other minor dynasties of South India. But it was his conflict with the invading forces of Alauddin Khalji, and later those of Muhammad bin Tughluq, the Sultan of Delhi, that would alter the course of history of South India. For his courage and fortitude, the historians Suryanath Kamath, Chopra, Ravindran and Subrahmanian have called him a "great ruler". With his death in c. 1343, South India saw the rise of a new Hindu empire, the Vijayanagara Empire. In the words of the historian Sen "the Hoysalas were the greatest among those who claim to be the makers of modern Mysore". Harihara I and Bukka Raya I, the brothers who founded the Vijayanagara Empire had served the king in a military capacity.