9 A. The state

Simraungadh (in today's Bara district, on the tarai) was the capital of the Karnata dynasty — a line which, by tradition, traced origin to the south (Karnataka), took Mithila's throne in the 11th– 12th century. Key names:1. Nanyadeva (c. 1097) — the founder: a Karnata commander who, amid the decline of the Pala-era order, established himself at Simraungadh; the state at its height controlled theMithila plain and exercised influence deep into the hills up to the Valley (its armies periodically extracting tribute from Nepal-Mandala).2. Gangadeva, Narsinghadeva and successors — consolidation; the dynasty's golden culture (Maithili learning, temple-building; the era of the great Vidyapati at the court of the later kings — Maithili's greatest poet).3. Harisinghadeva (early 14th century) — the last king: the chronicles relate the destructionof Simraungadh in the 1320s (c. 1324–25) by the forces of the Delhi SultanGhiyasuddin Tughlaq's era; Harisinghadeva fled to the hills with his court — his queenDevaladevi's line re-entered Valley politics and, through Rajalladevi's marriage,produced the Jayasthiti settlement (3.1) — one of Nepali history's great ironies: the fallen dynasty of the tarai re-founding the Valley's order.