The Wadiyar dynasty (formerly spelt Wodeyer or Odeyer, also referred to as the Wadiyars of Mysore), is a late-medieval/early-modern South Indian Hindu royal family of former kings of Mysore from the Urs clan originally based in Mysore city. As Maharajas of Mysore, the Wadiyars ruled the Kingdom of Mysore from the late 1300s until 1950. Members of the Wadiyar dynasty and the Urs clan have also been royal advisers as Diwans to their reigning siblings, cousins, nephews, or distant relatives. Some members have also commanded army divisions as dalvoys (commander-in-chief) for their reigning monarch. During the late 14th century, the family was originally poleygars (Kannada for garrison) defending the regions in and around Mysore town for the Vijayanagara Empire, their feudal overlords. With the fall and decline of the empire in the 17th century, the Wadiyars declared independence when Raja Wadiyar seized the nearby town of Srirangapattana, the seat of Tirumala, Sriranga II's viceroy, in 1610. Between 1766 and 1799, when Hyder Ali and Tipu dictated the kingdom, the Wadiyar rulers as maharajas were largely nominal without any actual powers. After Tipu's execution in 1799, the British Crown which was ruling India at that time restored the kingdom back to the Wadiyars under a subsidiary alliance. After India's independence from the Crown, the ruling Maharaja Jayachamaraja Wadiyar ceded the kingdom into the newly formed Dominion of India. Name In Kannada, the common noun odeyaru (ಒಡೆಯರು; anglicised wodeyar or wadiyar) is the plural form of the singular odeya (ಒಡೆಯ) which means lord or lordship. The first poleygar and raja of Mysore, Yaduraya, assumed the term as his titular proper noun. In Kannada, the common noun arasa (ಅರಸ; anglicised urs or ursu; anglicised plural ursus) means ruler or king. Members of the Wadiyar dynasty hail from the Urs clan; upon incarnation or by heredity, they assume the title Wadiyar and their immediate family therewith, the latest instance of its happening with the present head of the Wadiyar family Yaduveer Wadiyar upon coronation in 2015. History The Wadiyars trace their ancestry to Lord Krishna. Legend has it that they arrived from Dvārakā. However, historians like P. V. Nanjaraj Urs, Shyam Prasad, Nobuhiro Ota, David Leeming, and Aya Ikegame instead suggest that the Wadiyars were local feudal lords who adopted puranic legend to claim themselves as direct descendants of the legendary Lunar Dynasty. Vassal fiefdom The Wadiyar dynasty started when Yaduraya, a garrison leader