Our Pasts - II

This chapter introduces the thousand-year period of Indian history from roughly 700 to 1750 CE, examining how historians use maps, manuscripts, and textual sources to trace changes in society, religion, language, and political rule.

• 1Two maps of the subcontinent are compared: Al-Idrisi's 1154 CE Arabic map (with south India at the top) and a 1720s French map from Guillaume de l'Isle's Atlas Nouveau that was used by European sailors and merchants.
• 2The meaning of 'Hindustan' changed across centuries — in the 13th century it referred to Punjab, Haryana, and the Ganga-Yamuna region; by the early 16th century Babur used it for the entire subcontinent's geography, fauna, and culture.
• 3In medieval India, a 'foreigner' meant any stranger not belonging to a particular village community — a city-dweller could regard a forest-dweller as a foreigner even if both lived in the same land.
• 4As paper became cheaper and more widely available, textual records multiplied — people wrote holy texts, chronicles, letters, judicial records, and tax registers, stored in libraries and archives.
• 5Scribes copying manuscripts by hand introduced small changes over centuries; historians must compare multiple versions of the same text to reconstruct what the author originally wrote.

Chapter 2 of Our Pasts II traces how new ruling dynasties rose across the Indian subcontinent between the seventh and twelfth centuries — covering how they gained power, collected taxes, fought wars over cities like Kanauj, and organised administration, with a detailed case study of the Chola empire in Tamil Nadu.

• 1New dynasties — Rashtrakutas, Gurjara-Pratiharas, Palas, Cholas, and Chahamanas — emerged after the seventh century when subordinate landlords and warrior chiefs declared independence from their overlords.
• 2The Rashtrakuta chief Dantidurga overthrew his Chalukya overlord in the mid-eighth century and performed the hiranyagarbha (golden womb) ritual with Brahmanas to acquire Kshatriya status, even though he was not born as one.
• 3The Gurjara-Pratiharas, Rashtrakutas, and Palas fought for centuries over control of Kanauj in the Ganga valley — historians call this the tripartite struggle.
• 4Mahmud of Ghazni raided the subcontinent 17 times between 1000 and 1025, targeting wealthy temples including Somnath in Gujarat, and used the wealth to build a splendid capital at Ghazni, Afghanistan.
• 5Prithviraja III (1168–1192), the Chahamana ruler of Delhi and Ajmer, defeated Sultan Muhammad Ghori in 1191 but lost to him in 1192.

The Delhi Sultans ruled from Delhi through the 12th to 15th centuries, with six dynasties — from early Turkish rulers to the Lodis — governing through military commanders and Persian-language administration. Key themes include the circle of justice, Sultan Raziyya's reign (1236–1240), Alauddin Khalji's tax reforms, and Mongol invasions.

• 1Delhi became an important city only in the twelfth century — first under the Tomara Rajputs, then the Chauhans (Chahamanas) of Ajmer who ruled from 1165 to 1192
• 2Six dynasties ruled from Delhi: early Turkish rulers (Qutbuddin Aybak, 1206–1210), Khalji, Tughluq, Sayyid (Khizr Khan from 1414), and Lodi
• 3Persian was the language of administration; histories of the Sultanate were written by court scholars, administrators, poets, and courtiers who also advised rulers on governance
• 4The circle of justice (Fakhr-i Mudabbir, 13th century) held that kings need soldiers, soldiers need salaries, salaries come from revenue, and revenue requires prosperous, fairly governed peasants
• 5Raziyya, daughter of Sultan Iltutmish, became Sultan in 1236 but was removed from the throne in 1240; chronicler Minhaj-us-Siraj opposed women ruling independently

Chapter 4 of Our Pasts II covers the Mughal Empire from the 16th to 17th century, explaining how the Mughals expanded from Agra and Delhi to control nearly the entire Indian subcontinent, and how they governed through mansabdars, jagirdars, the zabt revenue system, and Akbar's policy of sulh-i kul (universal peace).

• 1The Mughals descended from Genghis Khan (died 1227) on their mother's side and Timur (died 1404) on their father's side; they preferred their Timurid identity and disliked the Mongol label because of its association with massacre and the rival Uzbegs
• 2From the latter half of the 16th century the Mughals expanded from Agra and Delhi to control nearly the entire subcontinent by the 17th century, leaving administrative and governance structures that outlasted their rule
• 3The Mughals followed coparcenary inheritance — dividing the estate among all sons — rather than primogeniture (eldest son inherits all)
• 4Many Rajput rulers allied with the Mughals through marriage: Jahangir's mother was a Kachhwaha princess from Amber (modern-day Jaipur) and Shah Jahan's mother was a Rathor princess from Marwar (Jodhpur)
• 5Mansabdars held ranked positions (mansab/zat); in Akbar's reign there were 29 mansabdars with a zat of 5,000, rising to 79 by Aurangzeb's reign; they had to maintain a specified number of sawars (cavalrymen)

Chapter 5 explains how tribal and nomadic communities — including the Gonds, Ahoms, Bhils, and Banjaras — lived independently of caste-based society in medieval India, yet gradually interacted with and were transformed by it. It details the rise and fall of the Gond kingdom of Garha Katanga and the Ahom state in the Brahmaputra valley.

• 1Tribal societies were not governed by Brahmanical social rules; members were united by kinship bonds and jointly controlled land and pastures.
• 2Tribes followed varied livelihoods — some were hunter-gatherers, others herders or agriculturists; many combined these activities. Some were nomadic.
• 3The Banjaras were the most important trader-nomads; their ox-caravans were called tandas. Sultan Alauddin Khalji used them to transport grain to city markets, and Emperor Jahangir noted their role in supplying Mughal armies.
• 4Peter Mundy, an English trader in the early seventeenth century, described meeting a Banjara tanda of 14,000 oxen loaded with wheat and rice.
• 5The Gonds lived in Gondwana and practised shifting cultivation. Their kingdom of Garha Katanga had 70,000 villages according to the Akbarnama, and was divided into garhs, chaurasis (84 villages), and barhots (12 villages).

This chapter traces the devotional paths to God that developed in India from the eighth century, including the Bhakti movement in South India, Maharashtra, and North India, Basavanna's Virashaiva movement, Sufism, and the teachings of saints like Kabir and Baba Guru Nanak.

• 1Bhakti means personal devotion to a chosen deity; the idea is present in the Bhagavad Gita and was open to all people regardless of caste, gender, or social status.
• 2In South India (7th–9th centuries), 63 Nayanars devoted to Shiva (songs compiled in Tevaram and Tiruvacakam) and 12 Alvars devoted to Vishnu (songs compiled in Divya Prabandham) spread devotional religion across caste boundaries.
• 3Shankara (born in Kerala in the eighth century) taught Advaita — the oneness of the individual soul and the formless Brahman — and preached the path of knowledge for salvation; Ramanuja (born in Tamil Nadu in the eleventh century) taught intense devotion to Vishnu.
• 4Basavanna and companions Allama Prabhu and Akkamahadevi initiated the Virashaiva movement in Karnataka in the mid-twelfth century, arguing for equality of all humans and opposing caste, ritual worship, and idol worship.
• 5Maharashtra's saint-poets (13th–17th centuries) — including Dnyaneshwar, Namdev, Eknath, Tukaram, Sakhubai, and Chokhamela of the Mahar caste — focused on the Vitthala temple at Pandharpur and rejected social differences based on birth.

Regional cultures in medieval India were not ancient or fixed — they formed through complex blending of local traditions with ideas from other parts of the subcontinent, as seen in the development of Malayalam, the Jagannatha cult, Kathak dance, Rajput heroic traditions, miniature painting, and Bengali language and literature.

• 1The Chera kingdom of Mahodayapuram was established in the 9th century in south-western India (present-day Kerala); its rulers introduced Malayalam language and script in their inscriptions.
• 2Manipravalam — literally 'diamonds and corals' referring to Sanskrit and the regional language — was used in a 14th-century text on grammar and poetics.
• 3Anantavarman of the Ganga dynasty built the Jagannatha temple at Puri; in 1230 king Anangabhima III declared his kingdom dedicated to the deity and called himself its 'deputy.'
• 4The Mughals, Marathas, and the English East India Company all attempted to control the Jagannatha temple at Puri, believing it would make their rule acceptable to local people.
• 5Rajput rulers governed most of present-day Rajasthan from about the 8th century; they fostered a culture of heroism preserved by trained minstrels in poems and songs.

Chapter 8 of Our Pasts II traces how the Mughal Empire fragmented after Aurangzeb's death in 1707, giving rise to powerful regional kingdoms under the Rajputs, Sikhs, Marathas, and Jats up to the third battle of Panipat in 1761.

• 1The Mughal Empire declined after Aurangzeb's death in 1707; subadars seized control of diwani (revenue) and faujdari (military) administration, reducing remittances to the capital.
• 2Nadir Shah sacked Delhi in 1739, looting the Peacock Throne and enormous wealth; Ahmad Shah Abdali invaded north India five times between 1748 and 1761.
• 3Two Mughal emperors — Farrukh Siyar (1713–1719) and Alamgir II (1754–1759) — were assassinated, and two others — Ahmad Shah (1748–1754) and Shah Alam II (1759–1816) — were blinded by their own nobles.
• 4Rajput rulers of Amber and Jodhpur expanded into Malwa, Gujarat, and Agra; Sawai Raja Jai Singh founded Jaipur, received the subadari of Agra in 1722, and built five Jantar Mantar observatories in Delhi, Jaipur, Ujjain, Mathura, and Varanasi.
• 5Sikhs organised into jathas and misls; their combined dal khalsa met at Amritsar on Baisakhi and Diwali to pass gurmatas. After Banda Bahadur's capture (1715) and execution (1716), they declared sovereign rule by striking coins in 1765; Maharaja Ranjit Singh established his capital at Lahore in 1799.