History of Ancient and Early Medeival India: From the Stone Age to the 12th Century

1561 Pages·2016·33.29 MB·English

by  Upinder Singh

A HISTORY OF ANCIENT AND EARLY
MEDIEVAL INDIA
FROM THE STONE AGE TO THE 12TH CENTURY

Upinder Singh

Delhi • Chennai • Chandigarh
Upper Saddle River • Boston • London
Sydney • Singapore • Hong Kong • Toronto • Tokyo
Brief Contents
Photographs, Maps, and Figures
About the Author
Preface
Acknowledgements
A Reader’s Guide
Introduction: Ideas of the Early Indian Past
1. Understanding Literary and Archaeological Sources
2. Hunter-Gatherers of the Palaeolithic and Mesolithic Ages
3. The Transition to Food Production: Neolithic, Neolithic–Chalcolithic, and Chalcolithic Villages, c .
7000–2000 BCE
4. The Harappan Civilization, c. 2600–1900 BCE
5. Cultural Transitions: Images from Texts and Archaeology, c. 2000–600 BCE
6. Cities, Kings, and Renunciants: North India, c. 600–300 BCE
7. Power and Piety: The Maurya Empire, c . 324–187 BCE
8. Interaction and Innovation, c. 200 BCE –300 CE
9. Aesthetics and Empire, c. 300–600 CE
10. Emerging Regional Configurations, c. 600–1200 CE
A Note on Diacritics
Glossary
Further Readings
References
Credits
Contents
Photographs, Maps, and Figures
About the Author
Preface
Acknowledgements
A Reader’s Guide
Introduction: Ideas of the Early Indian Past
THE MAIN PHYSIOGRAPHIC ZONES OF THE SUBCONTINENT
WAYS OF DIVIDING THE INDIAN PAST
CHANGING INTERPRETATIONS OF EARLY INDIAN HISTORY
NEW HISTORIES, UNWRITTEN HISTORIES
1 Understanding Literary and Archaeological Sources
READING ANCIENT TEXTS FROM A HISTORICAL POINT OF VIEW
Ancient palm leaf manuscripts
THE CLASSIFICATION OF LITERARY SOURCES: LANGUAGE, GENRE, AND CONTENT
THE VEDAS
THE TWO SANSKRIT EPICS: THE RAMAYANA AND MAHABHARATA
Archaeology and the Mahabharata
The chronological layers in the Ramayana
THE PURANAS
THE DHARMASHASTRA
Theory and practice in the Dharmashastra
BUDDHIST LITERATURE
Songs of Buddhist nuns
JAINA LITERATURE
SANGAM LITERATURE AND LATER TAMIL WORKS
The stories of the two Tamil epics
EARLY KANNADA AND TELUGU LITERATURE
OTHER ANCIENT TEXTS, BIOGRAPHIES, AND HISTORIES
Banabhatta and his royal biography
THE NATURE OF ANCIENT INDIAN HISTORICAL TRADITIONS
THE ACCOUNTS OF FOREIGN WRITERS
Al-Biruni on the writing of the Hindus
ARCHAEOLOGY AND THE EARLY INDIAN PAST
SCIENTIFIC TECHNIQUES IN ARCHAEOLOGY
Radiocarbon dating
INTERPRETING ARCHAEOLOGICAL EVIDENCE
ETHNO-ARCHAEOLOGY
The social and cultural aspects of technology
PROTECTING SITES
EPIGRAPHY: THE STUDY OF INSCRIPTIONS
ANCIENT AND EARLY MEDIEVAL SCRIPTS
LANGUAGES OF ANCIENT AND EARLY MEDIEVAL INSCRIPTIONS
Deciphered and undeciphered scripts
DATING THE INSCRIPTIONS
How to convert ancient era dates into modern ones
THE CLASSIFICATION OF INSCRIPTIONS
Memorializing death in stone
INSCRIPTIONS AS A SOURCE OF HISTORY
NUMISMATICS: THE STUDY OF COINS
A BRIEF HISTORY OF INDIAN COINAGE
COINS AS A SOURCE OF HISTORY
Counter-struck coins of the Kshatrapas and Satavahanas
CONCLUSIONS
2 Hunter-Gatherers of the Palaeolithic and Mesolithic Ages
THE GEOLOGICAL AGES AND HOMINID EVOLUTION
What does it mean to be human?
HOMINID REMAINS IN THE INDIAN SUBCONTINENT
PALAEO-ENVIRONMENTS
CLASSIFYING THE INDIAN STONE AGE
THE PALAEOLITHIC AGE
LOWER PALAEOLITHIC SITES
Typical lower palaeolithic tools
Isampur: a centre of stone tool manufacture
MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC SITES
The Levallois technique
UPPER PALAEOLITHIC SITES
Upper palaeolithic tools
PALAEOLITHIC ART AND CULTS
Ostrich eggshell beads
THE LIFE-WAYS OF PALAEOLITHIC HUNTER-GATHERERS
Food resources—now and then
THE MESOLITHIC AGE
MESOLITHIC SITES
Microliths
Animal bones at mesolithic sites
Graves, subsistence, and settlement patterns
The journey to get chalcedony
THE MAGNIFICENCE OF MESOLITHIC ART
CONCLUSIONS
3 The Transition to Food Production: Neolithic, Neolithic–Chalcolithic, and Chalcolithic Villages, c .
7000–2000 BCE
THE NEOLITHIC AGE AND THE BEGINNINGS OF FOOD PRODUCTION
WHY DOMESTICATION?
THE IDENTIFICATION OF DOMESTICATION AND FOOD PRODUCTION IN THE
ARCHAEOLOGICAL RECORD
The analysis of ancient plant remains
THE TRANSITION TO FOOD PRODUCTION IN THE INDIAN SUBCONTINENT
THE EARLIEST VILLAGE SETTLEMENTS IN THE INDIAN SUBCONTINENT, C. 7000–
3000 BCE
The north-west
The Vindhyan fringes and other areas
NEOLITHIC, NEOLITHIC–CHALCOLITHIC, AND CHALCOLITHIC COMMUNITIES, C.
3000–2000 BCE
The north and north-west
Did people actually live in the Burzahom pits?
Rajasthan
The Malwa region
The western Deccan
The middle Ganga plain and eastern India
South India
The mystery of the ash mounds
Community feasting at neolithic Budihal
THE LIFE OF EARLY FARMERS
CHANGES IN CULTIC AND BELIEF SYSTEMS
Female figurines—ordinary women or goddesses?
CONCLUSIONS
4 The Harappan Civilization, c . 2600–1900 BCE
CIVILIZATION AND URBANIZATION: DEFINITIONS AND IMPLICATIONS
The 10 characteristics of cities, according to Childe
RECENT DISCOVERIES AND CHANGING PERSPECTIVES
HARAPPAN, INDUS, OR SINDHU–SARASVATI CIVILIZATION?
ORIGIN: THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE EARLY HARAPPAN PHASE
The problems with diffusionist theories
THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE EARLY AND MATURE HARAPPAN PHASES
THE GENERAL FEATURES OF MATURE HARAPPAN SETTLEMENTS
PROFILES OF SOME HARAPPAN CITIES, TOWNS, AND VILLAGES
THE DIVERSITY OF THE HARAPPAN SUBSISTENCE BASE
Animal bones at Shikarpur
HARAPPAN CRAFTS AND TECHNIQUES
Sculpture in stone and metal
The making of long carnelian beads
NETWORKS OF TRADE
Shortughai—a Harappan trading post in Afghanistan
THE NATURE AND USES OF WRITING
RELIGIOUS AND FUNERARY PRACTICES
The ‘fire altars’
THE HARAPPAN PEOPLE
How healthy were the Harappans?
THE RULING ELITE
Defining a state
THE DECLINE OF URBAN LIFE
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE LATE HARAPPAN PHASE
CONCLUSIONS
5 Cultural Transitions: Images from Texts and Archaeology, c . 2000–600 BCE
PERSPECTIVES FROM TEXTS
USING THE VEDAS AS A HISTORICAL SOURCE
The date of the Rig Veda
WHO WERE THE INDO-ARYANS?
THE CULTURE REFLECTED IN THE FAMILY BOOKS OF THE RIG VEDA SAMHITA
Tribes and wars
Hymn to arms ( Rig Veda Samhita 6.75)
Lineage, clan, tribe
Pastoralism, agriculture, and other occupations
Varna in the Rig Veda
Women, men, and the household
The family and the household
Religion: sacrifices to the gods
Hymn to Indra ( Rig Veda 2.12)
The soma plant and its juice
THE HISTORICAL MILIEU OF LATER VEDIC AGE TEXTS
Aspects of everyday life
The emergence of monarchy
The ceremony of the jewel offering