History of Early India (FROM THE ORIGINS TO AD 1300) - Romila Thapar

 History of Early India (FROM THE ORIGINS TO AD 1300) by Romila Thapar

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Book Details 

Book Name : History of Early India (FROM THE ORIGINS TO AD 1300) 

Author : Romila Thapar 

Language : English

Pages : 597

ISBN : 9780143029892

Preface

It has been almost four decades since the first version of this book was written and in that time there have been substantial changes in the readings of Indian history. These have come about as a result of some new data,

together with many fresh interpretations of the known data. My attempt here has been to incorporate the essentials of the new data and interpretations while retaining some of the older arguments where they are still relevant.

A major amendment to this book lies in its chronological span. It now closes at c. AD I 300 instead of AD 1526 as in the earlier version. After many years, I have finally persuaded Penguin that the history of India should be covered in three volumes and not be restricted to two. The earlier division of two volumes did not do justice to the important period from c. AD 1300

to 1800 and this is now being corrected. The final volume will bring the narrative up to contemporary times. This change also provides more space for each volume. An introduction already exists to the pre-history and proto-history of India in the volume by F. R. and B. Allchin, The Birth of Indian Civilisation, revised in 1993, also published by Penguin, as well as

The Origins of a Civilization by the same authors and published by Viking in 1997 (Penguin, 1998). I have therefore given only a brief overview of

prehistory and protohistory.

In the course of writing this book I have drawn on many friends for comments on various chapters of an earlier draft. Among them I would like to thank R. Champakalakshmi, Madhav Gadgil, Dennis Hudson, Xinru Liu, Michael Meister, Vivek Nanda and K. N. Panikkar. My special thanks go to Susan Reynolds, not only for observations on specific chapters but also for many conversations about the book. I was delighted when Rav iDayal suggested that he might like to read the penultimate draft and

ploughed his way through it, with helpful remarks on what he had read.

Naina's postings of 'not clear' have hopefully made the narrative morelucid. Lucy Peck gallantly agreed to do rough drafts of all the maps, thus allowing me to include maps relating to every chapter. I would also like to  thank the Homi Bhabha Fellowships Council for the award of a Senior Fellowship. The research carried out during this period contributed to the  shaping of the earlier half of this book. And I would also like to thank David Ludden for arranging a series of lectures at the University of Pennsylvania 

which broadly covered the same themes. 

Gene Smith was fantastically generous with time and effort when he painstakingly scanned the earlier version onto disk and this made the 

mechanics of rewriting much easier. Shirish and Gautam Patel and Chris Gomes have been unruffled by my frequent cries for help when the computer behaved unpredictably, and have patiently set me right, a patience also shown by Vivek Sharma. Rajani was the one person who over the years kept insisting that I revise the earlier book, and finally her insistence has had effect. 

Romila Thapar 

New Delhi 

2001

 

Contents on the Book

 

1. Perceptions of the Past 1

2. Landscapes and Peoples 37

3. Antecedents 69

4. Towards Chiefdoms and Kingdoms: c. 1200-600 BC 98

5. States and Cities of the Indo-Gangetic Plain: c. 600-300 BC 137

6. The Emergence of Empire: Mauryan India; c. 321-185 BC 174

7. Of Politics and Trade: c. 200 BC-AD 300 209

8. The Rise of the Mercantile Community: c. 200 BC-A D 300 245

9. Threshold Times: c. AD 300-700 2.80

10. The Peninsula: Emerging Regional Kingdoms; C. AD 500-900 32.6

11. The Peninsula: Establishing Authorities and Structures;

c. AD 900-1300 363

12 The Politics of Northern India: c. AD 700-1200 405

13 Northern India: Distributive Political Economies and

Regional Cultures; c. AD 800-1300 442

Maps 491

Glossary 510

Select Bibliographies 516

General Bibliography 542

Index

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