When royalty needed a biographer six centuries later, Vikram Sampath rose gallantly to the occasion. Vikram Sampath, for those who don’t know, is not your average historian droning on about “subaltern agency” in a beige lecture hall. No—he is a historian with flair, drama, and the distinct sense that he may have missed his calling as a royal archivist in a parallel 18th-century Mysore. With a background in engineering, finance, and Carnatic music (because why not?), Sampath took it upon himself to exhume the largely neglected Wodeyar dynasty and give them the full ceremonial welcome history denied them. He does not merely write history; he resurrects it, applies sandalwood paste,…