Tel: కర్నూలు karnūlu
‘City of Grease’ [Kandenavolu] City/District, Andhra Pradesh
From Tel: kandena, ‘grease’; and prolu→v(r)olu, ‘(tax) district’, ‘town’, ‘city’ [Tam/Dra: por̤il, ‘park’, ‘(sand)bank’, ‘district’].
Local sources say that, at the time the Alampur temple was being built, stone carts stopped here before crossing the Tungabhadra river and took the opportunity for vehicle maintenance and wheel lubrication.
Kurnool was always an important crossing point on the ungabhadra River. The region was first ruled by the Cholas in 12thC and then by the Kakatiyas, a Telugu dynasty, from the 13thC. But it was in the 16thC that Kurnool emerged as a town in its own right following the construction of Kurnool Fort in the 16thC under the Vijayanagar Empire.
Kurnool was briefly the capital of an independent Andhra state (1953-1956). It then joined the Telugu-speaking regions of Hyderabad State to form Andhra Pradesh. It is now part of the Andhra Pradesh which split from Telangana.
For related place names see Indian Place names and Andhra Pradesh place names.
