to the Indian independence movement came from Madras. With the advent of Indian independence on 15 August 1947, the Presidency became the Madras Province. Madras was later admitted as Madras State, a state of the Indian Union at the inauguration of the Republic of India on 26 January 1950. Origins Before the arrival of the English The discovery of dolmens from this portion of the subcontinent shows inhabitation as early as the Stone Age. The first prominent rulers of the northern part of the future Presidency were the Tamil Pandya dynasty (230 BCAD 102). Following the decline of the Pandyas and the Cholas, the country was conquered by a little known race of people called the Kalabhras. The country recovered under the subsequent Pallava dynasty and its civilisation attained a peak when the later Telugu kings started acquiring vast places in Tamil Nadu. Following the conquest of Madurai by Malik Kafur in 1311, there was a brief lull when both culture and civilisation began to deteriorate. The Tamil and Telugu territories recovered under the Vijayanagar Empire, founded in 1336. Following the empire's demise, the country was split amongst numerous sultans, polygars and European trading companies. Between 1685 and 1947, a number of kings ruled the areas that became part of the Madras Presidency. The southwestern portions of the Presidency, which together constitute Tulu Nadu and Kerala, has a distinct history, language, and culture from its eastern counterparts. Early English trading posts (1600–1643) On 31 December 1600, Queen Elizabeth I of England (1533–1603) granted a group of English merchants a charter to establish a joint-stock company which became known as the East India Company. Subsequently, during the reign of King James I (1567–1625), Sir William Hawkins and Sir Thomas Roe were sent to negotiate with the Mughal Emperor Jahangir (1569–1627) to permit the establishment of trading factories in India on behalf of the company. The first of these were built at Surat on the west coast and at Masulipatam on the country's eastern seaboard. Masulipatam is thus the oldest English trading post on India's east coast, dating back to 1611. In 1625, another factory was established at Armagon, a few miles to the south, whereupon both the factories came under the supervision of an agency based at Machilipatnam. The English authorities decided to relocate these factories further south, due to a shortage of cotton cloth, the main trade item of the