Nedumkotta Fort

Nedumkotta or currently known as Travancore lines was a wall built as a security against constant attacks and threats from northern kingdoms mainly Zamorins of Kozhikode. It was built by the Dharma Raja Karthika Thirunal, King of Travancore with the support and permission of the Kingdom of Kochi. This historic defense line was comparable to the Great Wall of China except that the latter was more ancient and greater in length.

Nedumkotta was under the protective cover of this Nedumkotta that a small army of Travancoreans under the command of Raja Keshavadas defeated and frustrated near Alwaye which was a formidable army of Islamic fanatics led by Tipu Sultan. The fort was built to resist the invasion under Hyder Ali Khan against Travancore State.

Now only the ruins of this majestic fortification is there.The fort walls were raised using with clay and mud, and reinforced with stones, laterite and granite at strategic places.It started from the Krishan Kotta on the west coast, above Kodungallur, and stretched up to the Annamalai Hills on the Western Ghats. It was about 48 km long, twenty feet wide and twelve feet high. Its alignment was along the Periyar river on the west coast up to Chalakudy from where it went along the Chalakudy river up to the Annamalai Hills in the east.The most of the ruins whatever left have also been lost due ignorance about the historical structure among the locals.