"The term Kapu," Mr. H. A. Stuart writes, [105] "means a watchman, and Reddi means a king. The Kapus or Reddis (Ratti) appear to have been a powerful Dravidian tribe in the early centuries of the Christian era, for they have left traces of their presence at various places in almost every part of India. Though their power has been put down from time to time by the Chalukyas, the Pallavas, and the Bellalas, several families of zamindars came into existence after the captivity of Pratapa Rudra of Warrangal in A.D. 1323 by the Muhammadan emperor Ghiyas-ud-din Toghluk." Writing in the Manual of the Salem district concerning the Kongu kingdom, the Rev. T. Foulkes states that "the Kongu kingdom claims to have existed from about the commencement of the Christian era, and to have continued under its own independent kings down to nearly the end of the ninth century A.D., when it was conquered by the Chola kings of Tanjore, and annexed to their dominions. The earliest portion of the Kongu Chronicle (one of the manuscripts of the Mackenzie collection) gives a series of short notices of the reigns of twenty-eight kings who ruled the country previous to its conquest by the Cholas. These kings belonged to two distinct dynasties: the earlier line was of the solar race, and the later line of the Ganga race. The earlier dynasty had a succession of seven kings of the Ratti tribe, a tribe very extensively distributed, which has at various periods left its mark throughout almost every part of India. This is probably the earliest reference to them as a ruling power, and it is the most southern situation in which they ever held dominion. They disappear in these parts about the end of the second century A.D.; and, in the next historical references to them, we find them high up in the Northern Dakkan, amongst the kingdoms conquered by the Chalukyas about the fourth century A.D. soon after they first crossed the Nerbudda. In the Kongu Chronicle they are stated to be of the solar race: and the genealogies of this tribe accordingly trace them up to Kusha, the second son of Rama, the hero of the great solar epic of the Hindus; but their claim to this descent is not undisputed. They are, however, sometimes said to be of the lunar race, and of the Yadava tribe, though this latter statement is sometimes confined to the later Rathors." According to the Rev. T. Foulkes, the name Ratti is found under various forms, e.g., Irattu, Iretti, Radda, Rahtor, Rathaur, Rashtra-kuta, Ratta, Reddi, etc.