Every year, as the monsoon retreats from Telangana's parched plains, women wake before sunrise to gather wildflowers that bloom nowhere else in quite the same way, stacking them into towers shaped like temple gopurams. 

The ritual is called Bathukamma, and while it now draws crowds from Los Angeles to London, its earliest echoes lead back roughly 800 years, to the fort city of Warangal and a queen who governed disguised as a king.

A queen's devotion becomes a kingdom's memory

The Kakatiya dynasty ruled large parts of present-day Telangana through the 12th and 13th centuries, with their capital at Orugallu, known today as Warangal. Their reign left behind some of the Deccan's finest architecture, including the Thousand Pillar Temple, built in 1163 under King Rudradeva, and the Ramappa Temple, completed in 1213 and now a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

It was Rudradeva's descendant, Rani Rudramadevi, who became part of one of the enduring stories associated with Bathukamma. Ganapatideva, her father, had no son, so he formally designated her as his male heir through the putrika ceremony and gave her the name Rudradeva. 

She took the throne around 1262, ruled in male attire, put down rebellions from nobles who resisted a woman's authority, and strengthened the Warangal Fort her father had begun. 

Historical tradition credits her with promoting the worship of Kakatamma, a regional mother goddess, particularly around Mogilicharla, where grand processions were held on Durga Ashtami, complete with music, dance, and the ceremonial immersion of the deity in nearby water. 

That closing ritual has often been cited as one thread in the long history of Bathukamma: flowers offered to water and a prayer for their return the following year echo the symbolism of what is now Saddula Bathukamma, the grand finale of the nine-day festival.

But Rudramadevi's story is not an uncontested........

© The Better India