The Chola Golden Age

The Chola Golden Age, roughly 850 to 1279, was the height of the Chola Empire's power in South India, when rulers including Rajaraja I and his son Rajendra I built the most powerful navy in the medieval Indian Ocean and extended Chola influence overseas to Sri Lanka, the Maldives and the Srivijaya kingdom of Southeast Asia. The dynasty is remembered for its monumental Dravidian temple architecture, above all the Brihadisvara Temple at Thanjavur, for sophisticated local self-government through village assemblies, and for patronage of Tamil literature and bronze sculpture that set standards still admired today. Chola power declined gradually from the twelfth century under pressure from the rising Pandya and Hoysala kingdoms, and the empire finally ended in 1279.