Chapter 1 — Tracing Changes Through a Thousand Years

The chapter covers approximately a thousand years of Indian history, from roughly 700 CE to 1750 CE.

Al-Idrisi was an Arab geographer who made a world map in 1154 CE. The section reproduced in the chapter shows the Indian subcontinent with south India placed where we would expect to find the north — the opposite of modern maps.

In the 13th century, 'Hindustan' referred specifically to Punjab, Haryana, and the lands between the Ganga and Yamuna — a political term that never included south India. By the early 16th century, Babur used it to describe the geography, fauna, and culture of the entire subcontinent. Today we understand it as 'India', the modern nation-state.

In the medieval period, a 'foreigner' was any stranger who appeared in a given village — someone not part of that society or culture. A city-dweller could regard a forest-dweller as a foreigner, but two peasants of different religious or caste backgrounds living in the same village were not foreigners to each other.

As paper became more widely available — by the 14th century even shopkeepers wrapped food in it — people used it to write holy texts, chronicles of rulers, letters, teachings of saints, petitions, judicial records, and tax registers. This dramatically increased the number and variety of textual sources available to historians for the period 700–1750.

Since there was no printing press, scribes copied manuscripts by hand and introduced small changes over time. Over centuries these differences grew until versions of the same text became substantially different from one another. Historians must read multiple manuscript versions to guess what the author had originally written.

Rajput is derived from 'Rajaputra', meaning son of a ruler. Between the 8th and 14th centuries the term was applied more generally to a group of warriors who claimed Kshatriya caste status — including not just rulers and chieftains but also soldiers and commanders serving in the armies of different monarchs across the subcontinent.

New technologies introduced during this period included the Persian wheel (used in irrigation) and the spinning wheel (used in weaving). New crops introduced into the subcontinent included potatoes, corn, chillies, tea, and coffee.

A jati panchayat was an assembly of elders that enforced the rules and regulations framed by jatis (sub-castes) to manage the conduct of their members. Jatis were also required to follow the rules of their villages as they were one small unit of a larger state.

In 1318, Amir Khusrau noted different languages in every region: Sindhi, Lahori, Kashmiri, Dvarsamudri (southern Karnataka), Telangani (Andhra Pradesh), Gujari (Gujarat), Ma'bari (Tamil Nadu), Gauri (Bengal), Awadhi (eastern Uttar Pradesh), and Hindawi (around Delhi). He added that Sanskrit, unlike these languages, did not belong to any region and that 'common people do not know it, only the Brahmanas do'.

Major developments included the worship of new deities, the construction of temples by royalty, and the growing importance of Brahmanas as dominant groups supported by rulers seeking prestige. The bhakti tradition emerged — the idea of a loving, personal deity that devotees could reach without priests or elaborate rituals. Islam also arrived in the subcontinent in the seventh century, brought by merchants, and was interpreted in a variety of ways by its followers.

In the mid-19th century, British historians divided Indian history into three periods: 'Hindu', 'Muslim', and 'British'. This was based on the idea that the religion of rulers was the only important historical change. Few historians follow this periodisation today — most look to economic and social factors to characterise historical periods, arguing that the earlier division ignored the rich diversity of the subcontinent.

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