The History of India covers the birth of humanity as long as 700,000 years ago, to the birth of human civilization 5,000 years ago, The Indus Valley civilization, one of the oldest in the world, dates back at least 5,000 years. Aryan tribes from the northwest invaded about 1500 B.C.; their merger with the earlier Dravidian inhabitants created the classical Indian culture. Arab incursions starting in the 8th century and Turkish in the 12th were followed by those of European traders, beginning in the late 15th century. By the 19th century, Britain had assumed political control of virtually all Indian lands. Indian armed forces in the British army played a vital role in both World Wars. Nonviolent resistance to British colonialism led by Mohandas GANDHI and Jawaharlal NEHRU brought independence in 1947. The subcontinent was divided into the secular state of India and the smaller Muslim state of Pakistan. A third war between the two countries in 1971 resulted in East Pakistan becoming the separate nation of Bangladesh. Despite impressive gains in economic investment and output, Now in the 21st century,India stands as the world's largest democracy with a population exceeding 1 billion and a self sufficient in terms of food, fast growing economically strong country.
Human civilization in India was one of the earliest ever and as glorious and significant as counterpart civilizations in ancient Mesopotamia and Egypt, and its period of history extends essentially to all of the Indian subcontinent, including the new nations of Pakistan founded in 1947 after the Partition of Indiaand Bangladesh in 1971,. It is also inalienably linked with the history and heritage of close nations like Sri Lankaand Nepaland India's culture, economy and politics have in turn influenced the history of the nations of South East Asia and Central Asia, as well as Tibet, Afghanistan, Iran and China over thousands of years. India has also strongly infuenced the life and times in medieval Europe, especially with landing of Vasco Da Gama and the incorporation of India into the British Empire, from the 1700s to 1947.
The Paleolithic era
Hominid remains in Hathnora in the Narmada Valley in Central India indicate that India has been inhabited since the Palaeolithic era. The precise date of these remains is unclear, and archaeologists put it anywhere between 200,000 to 700,000 years. The fossils are the earliest human remains found in South Asia. Recent finds include a quarry in the Kaladgi Basin, in southern India. Modern humans seem to have settled the subcontinent towards the end of the last ice age, 12,000 years ago. The first confirmed permanent settlements appeared 9,000 years ago in Bhimbetka in what is now Madhya Pradesh.
The Neolithic era
The early Neolithic culture in South Asia is represented by the Mehrgarh culture which began in 7000 BCE, now in Baluchistan, Pakistan. The Mehrgarh community were mostly pastoral, lived in mud houses, wove baskets and tended to goats and their farms. By 5500 BCE, pottery began to appear and later chalcolithic implements began to appear. By 2000 BCE, the settlement was abandoned.
The Bronze age
Indus Valley Civilization
The transition of settlements from agricultural to complex urban communities occurred sometime between the early settlements at Mehrgarh, and 3000 BCE. This period marked the beginning of the earliest urban society in India, known as the Indus Valley Civilization, also called the Harappan civilization, which thrived between 2800 BCE and 1800 BCE. It was centred along the Saraswati and Indus Rivers and their tributaries, and extended into the Ganges-Yamuna Doab, Gujarat, and northern Afghanistan.
The civilization is noted for its cities built of brick, road-side drainage system and multi-storey houses. The earliest historic references to India may be those to the Meluhha in Sumerian records, possibly referring to the Indus Valley civilization. When compared to the contemporary civilizations of Egypt and Sumeria, the Indus Civilization possessed unique urban planning techniques, covered the largest geographical area, and may have been a single state, as suggested by the amazing uniformity of its measurement systems.
The Mohenjo-daro ruins were once the centre of this ancient society. Indus Civilization settlements spread as far south as Bombay, as far east as Delhi, as far west as the Iranian border, and as far north as the Himalayas. Among the settlements were the major urban centres of Harappa and Mohenjo-daro, as well as Dholavira, Ganweriwala, Lothal, Kalibanga and Rakhigarhi. At its peak, some archaeologists opine that the Indus Civilization may have had a population of well over five million. To date, over 2,500 cities and settlements have been found, mainly in the general region to the east of the Indus River in Pakistan along what is said by many to be the Saraswati River of the Vedas, currently known as the seasonally active Ghaggar-Hakra River. It is thought by some that geological disturbances and climate change may have been responsible for the drying up of the Saraswati River, leading to a gradual aridization of the region, ultimately leading to the civilization's downfall.
Archaeological resources suggest that the diverse geography of ancient India was increasing in the amount and specialization of faunal remains around the era of 2400 and 1000 BCE. This specialization suggests that the Indus valley civilizations were dependent upon the alluvial soils of the Rivers, which produced high yields of cereal grains, and cultivated plant materials. By the time of 2700 BCE, the presence of a state level society is evident, complete with hierarchical rule and large scale public works. These include amazing accomplishments such as irrigation, warehouses for grain, public streets, brick-lined drainage systems for sanitation, and irrigation. Around the mid 2nd millennium BCE, the region of the River Basin in which approximately two-thirds of known sites were located dried, and the sites were abandoned.
Vedic civilization
The Vedic civilization is the Indo-Aryan culture associated with the Vedas, which are the oldest extant Indo-European texts, composed in Vedic Sanskrit. The exact connection of the genesis of this civilization with the Indus Valley civilization on one hand, and a possible Indo-Aryan migration on the other hand, is the subject of disputes. Early Vedic society was largely pastoral. Later on, the society became agricultural, and was organized around four Varnas, or classes. Several small kingdoms and tribes merged to form a few large ones which were often at war with each other.
In addition to the principle texts of Hinduism, (the Vedas), the great Indian epics, the Ramayana and Mahabharata, the latter of which constitutes the longest poem in the world, are said to have been first written during this period, perhaps from a longer spoken tradition of unwritten recitation. The Bhagavad Gita, another primary text of Hinduism, is contained within the Mahabharata.
Early Indo-Aryan presence probably corresponds to Ochre Coloured Pottery, archaeologically. The kingdom of the Kurus marks flowering of the Vedic civilization, corresponding to the Black and Red Ware and the beginning of the Iron Age in Northern India begins, around 1100 BCE, likely also contemporary with the composition of the Atharvaveda. Painted Grey Ware spread over all of Northern India marks the late Vedic period, corresponding to a wave of urbanization occurred across the Indian sub-continent, spreading from Afghanistan to Bengal, in the 7th century BCE. A number of kingdoms and republics emerged across the Indo-Gangetic plain and southern India during this period. 16 Mahajanapadas (great kingdoms) are referred to in ancient literature of the period.
The Mahajanapadas
By 600 BCE, sixteen hereditary monarchies known as the Mahajanapadas stretched across the Indo-Gangetic plains from modern-day Afghanistan to Bangladesh. The largest of these nations were Magadha, Kosala, Kuru and Gandhara. The right of a king to his throne, no matter how it was gained, was usually legitimized through religious right and genealogies concocted by priests who ascribed to the king divine origins.
Hindu rituals at that time were complicated and conducted by the priestly class. It is thought that the Upanishads, the secondary texts of ancient Hinduism, dealing mainly with philosophy, were first composed early in this period. The court language at that time was Sanskrit, while the dialects of the general population of northern India were referred to as Prakrits. In 537 BCE, Gautama Buddha gained enlightenment and thus founded Buddhism, which was initially intended as a supplement to the existing Hindu Vedic dharma. Around the same time period, in mid-6th century BCE, Mahavira founded Jainism. Both religions had a simple doctrine and were preached in Prakrit which helped it gain acceptance by the masses. While the geographic impact of Jainism was limited, Buddhist nuns and monks spread their teachings of Buddha to Tibet, Sri Lanka and South East Asia.
In around 500 BCE, the Indus Valley region was invaded by the Persian ruler Darius I making the far northwest of India a satrapy of the Achaemenid Empire. Though the Persians made Taxila the capital, their influence was marginal and governed the region for around 150 years. The Persians were defeated by Alexander the Great in the 4th century BCE. In 326 BCE Alexander the Great crossed the Hindu Kush mountains and invaded what is now Pakistan. However, costly campaigns against the forces of Magadha, and the will of his troops forced him to retreat to his empire after reaching the Beas River in Punjab. He appointed Greek governors to rule the newly acquired province to keep open trade routes between India and Greece. The kingdom occupied the southern portion of the Indian peninsula and became a great maritime nation with trading links with Egypt and South East Asia.
The Magadha empire
Amongst the 16 Mahajanapadas, the kingdom of Magadha rose to prominence under a number of dynasties that peaked in power under the reign of Asoka Maurya, one of India's most legendary and famous emperors. The kingdom of Magadha had emerged as a major power following the subjugation of two neighbouring kingdoms, and possessed an unparalleled military.
Shishunaga dynasty
The Shishunaga dynasty founded the Magadha Empire in 684 BCE, whose capital was Pataliputra, near the present day Patna. This dynasty lasted till 424 BCE, when it was overthrown by the Nanda dynasty. This period saw the development of two of India's major religions. Gautama Buddha in the 6th or 5th century BCE was the founder of Buddhism, which later spread to East and Southeast Asia. Mahavira developed Jainism.
Nanda dynasty
The Nanda dynasty was established by an illegitimate son of the king Mahanandin of the previous Shishunaga dynasty. Mahapadma Nanda died at the age of 88, ruling the bulk of this 100-year dynasty. The Nandas were followed by the Maurya dynasty.
Maurya dynasty
In 321 BCE, exiled general Chandragupta Maurya overthrew reigning king Dhana Nanda to establish the Mauryan Empire. Chandragupta was succeeded by his son Bindusara, who expanded the kingdom over most of present day India, barring the extreme south and east. During this time, most of the subcontinent was united under a single government for the first time.
The kingdom was inherited by his son Ashoka who initially sought to expand his kingdom. In the aftermath of the carnage caused in the invasion of Kalinga, he renounced bloodshed and pursued a policy of non violence or ahimsa after converting to Buddhism. The Edicts of Ashoka are the oldest preserved historical documents of India, and from Ashoka's time, approximate dating of dynasties becomes possible. The Mauryan dynasty under Asoka was responsible for the proliferation of Buddhist ideals across the entire of east asia, fundamentally altering the history and development of Asia. Asoka has been described as one of the greatest rulers the world has seen.
Shunga dynasty
The Sunga dynasty was established in 185 BCE, about 50 years after Ashoka's death, when the king Brihadratha, the last of the Mauryan rulers, was brutally murdered by the then commander-in-chief of the Mauryan armed forces, Pusyamitra Sunga, while he was taking the Guard of Honour of his forces. Pusyamitra Sunga then ascended the throne.
Early Middle Kingdoms - the golden age
The middle period, especially that associated with the Gupta dynasty, is known as India's Golden Age, a time of unparalleled cultural development. The Kushanas invaded northwestern India about the middle of the 1st century CE, from Central Asia, and founded an empire that eventually stretched from Peshawar to the middle Ganges and, perhaps, as far as the Bay of Bengal. It also included ancient Bactria (in the north of modern Afghanistan) and southern Tajikistan. Their power also extended into Turkestan and helped spread Buddhism to China. In South India, several kingdoms emerged. The earliest of these is the Pandya kingdom in southern Tamil Nadu, with its capital at Madurai. The Indo-Greek Kingdoms following the conquests of Alexander the Great ruled much of Gandhara from 180 BCE to 10 CE. Around the same time in southern India, the Dravidian Pandyan kingdom began to take shape. An important source for the geography and history of that period is the Greek historian Arrian.
Satavahana empire
The Satavahanas, also known as the Andhras, were a dynasty which ruled in Southern and Central India starting from around 230 BCE. Although there is some controversy about when the dynasty came to an end, the most liberal estimates are of about 450 years. Long before that their kingdom had disintegrated into successor states. Conflict with the Sakas and the rising ambitions of their feudatories, led to their decline. Several dynasties divided the lands of the kingdom among themselves.
Kushan empire
The Kushan Empire (c. 1st–3rd centuries) was a state that at its height, about 105–250, stretched from Tajikistan to the Caspian Sea to Afghanistan and down into the Ganges river valley. The empire was created by Tocharians from modern East Turkestan, China, but was culturally dominated by north India. They had diplomatic contacts with Rome, Sassanian Persia and China, and for several centuries were at the centre of exchange between the East and the West, spreading Buddhism through trade with China.
Gupta dynasty
In the 4th and 5th centuries, the Gupta Dynasty unified northern India. During this period, known as India's Golden Age, Hindu culture, science and political administration reached new heights. After the collapse of the Gupta empire in the 6th century, India was again ruled by numerous regional kingdoms. The Gupta 'golden age' marked a period of significant cultural development.
Their origins are largly unknown, however the Chinese traveller I-tsing provides the first evidence of the Gupta kingdom in Magadha. The Vedic Puranas are also thought to have been written around this period. The empire came to an end with the attack of the Huns from central Asia. A minor line of the Gupta clan continued to rule Magadha after the disintegration of the empire. These Guptas were ultimately ousted by the Vardhana king Harsha, who established an empire in the first half of the seventh century that, for a brief time, rivalled that of the Guptas in extent.
Late Middle Kingdoms - the classical age
Later, the Chola kingdom emerged in northern Tamil Nadu, and the Chera kingdom in Kerala. The ports of southern India were involved in the Indian Ocean trade, chiefly involving spices, with the Roman Empire to the west and Southeast Asia to the east. In the north, the first of the Rajputs, a series of kingdoms which managed to survive in some form for almost a millennium until Indian independence from the British.
Harsha's empire
King Harsha of Kannauj succeeded in reuniting northern India during his reign in the 7th century. His kingdom collapsed after his death. From the 7th to the 9th century, three dynasties contested for control of northern India: the Pratiharas of Malwa and later Kannauj; the Palas of Bengal, and the Rashtrakutas of the Deccan.
The Chalukyas and Pallavas
The Chalukya Empire ruled parts of southern India from 550 to 750 and again from 970 to 1190. The Pallavas were their contemporaries to the south. Over a period of roughly a century, the two kingdoms fought a series of low-intensity wars, each conquering the other's capitals at various points. The kings of Sri Lanka and the Keralan Cheras rendered support to the Pallavas, while the Pandyas rendered support to the Chalukyas. Whilst the northern concept of a pan-Indian empire had collapsed at the end of Harsha's empire, the ideal instead shifted to the south. The two dynasties were responsible for some of the greatest examples of both rock-cut and free-standing temples.
Chola empire
The Cholas emerged as the most powerful empire in the south in the 9th century and retained their pre-eminent position until the 13th century when the Vijayanagar empire was founded. The Cholas, like the Chalukyas and Pallavas before them, and the Vijaynagar after them, were responsible for some of India's finest monuments, and being located on the south tip of the peninsula, ruled Sri Lanka, and culturally dominated most of South East Asia, where the Hindu Srivijaya and Khmer empires of Indonesia and Cambodia used south Indian temple design. The Chola Navy was the most powerful for its time having conquered the neighbouring island of Lanka and other areas across the Bay of Bengal.
The Pratiharas, Palas and Rashtrakutas
The Pratiharas, also called the Gurjara-Pratiharas were an Indian dynasty who ruled kingdoms in Rajasthan and northern India from the sixth to the eleventh centuries. The Pala Empire controlled Bihar and Bengal, from the 8th to the 12th century. The Rashtrakutas were a dynasty which ruled the Deccan during the 8th-10th centuries after the end of Chalukya rule. Each three kingdoms vied for north Indian domination around the same time that the Cholas were flourishing in the south.
The Rajputs
The first recorded Rajput kingdoms emerged in Rajasthan in the 6th century, and Rajput dynasties later ruled much of northern India, including Gujarat (Solankis), Malwa (Paramaras), Bundelkhand (Chandelas), and Haryana (Tomaras). The Pallava dynasty of Kanchipuram ruled southeastern India from from 4th century to the 9th century. The Pratihar ruled northern India before the Rajputs. Various other dynasties such as the Yadav, Chera, Hoysala, Sena and Pala controlled various empires of their own.
The Islamic Sultanates
After the Arab-Turkic invasion of India's ancient northern neighbour Persia, various short lived Islamic empires invaded and spread across the subcontinent over a period of 1000 years. Prior to Turkish invasions, Muslim trading communities flourished throughout coastal South India, particularly in Kerala. In the 10th and 11th centuries, Turks and Afghans invaded India and established the Sultanate of Delhi at the beginning of the 13th century. The Slave dynasty and Khilji empire managed to conquer large areas of northern India approximate to the ancient extent of the Guptas, but were ultimately unsuccessful in conquering the subcontinent, until the onset of the Mughals.
Vijayanagar empire
The brothers Harihara and Bukka founded the Karnataka Empire, also known as the Vijayanagara Empire, in 1336. The Vijayanagara empire prospered during the reign of Krishnadevaraya. It suffered a major defeat in 1565 but continued for another century or so in an attenuated form. Southern Indian kingdoms of the time expanded their influence as far as Indonesia, controlling vast overseas empires in south east Asia. The Hindu dynasty came into conflict with Islamic rule and the clashing of the two systems, the prevailing indigenous Hindu\Muslim]] religion, which caused a mingling of the indigenous and foreign culture that left lasting cultural influences on each other. The later Mughal rule also saw such influences of Gujarati and Rajasthani culture contributing towards this.
The Mughal era
In the early 16th century, descendants of Genghis Khan swept across the Khyber Pass and established the Mughal (Mogul) Dynasty, which lasted for 200 years. The Mughal Empire ruled most of the northern Indian subcontinent from 1526; it went into a slow decline after 1707 and was finally defeated during the War of Independence of 1857. This period marked vast social change in the subcontinent as the Hindu majority were ruled over by the Mughal emperors, some of whom liberally patronized Hindu culture, some of whom destroyed historical temples and imposed taxes on non-Muslims. During the decline of Mughal rule, which at its peak occupied an area equivalent to that of the ancient Mauryan dynasty, several smaller empires rose to fill the power vacuum or themselves were contributing factors to the decline.
The Maratha confederacy
The Maratha Kingdom was founded by Shivaji in 1674 when he annexed a portion of the Bijapur Sultanate. Shivaji had declared war upon the oppressive Mughal dynasty in order for the Hindu majority of the subcontinent to once again be free of the various Islamic dynasties that had appeared over the last 600 years. By the 18th century, it had transformed itself into the Maratha Confederacy under the rule of the Peshwa. By 1760, the Empire had stretched across practically the entire subcontinent. This expansion was brought to an end by the Maratha's defeat by an Afghan army at the Third Battle of Panipat in 1761. The last Peshwa, Baji Rao II, was defeated by the British in the Third Anglo-Maratha War.
The Kingdom of Mysore
The Kingdom of Mysore was a kingdom of southern India, which was founded around 1400 CE by the Wodeyar dynasty. The rule of the Wodeyars was interrupted by Hyder Ali and his son Tippu Sultan. Under their rule Mysore fought a series of wars sometimes against the combined forces of the British and Marathas, but mostly against the British with some aid or promise of aid from the French. After the death of Tippu Sultan in the Fourth War of Mysore in 1799, the Wodeyar dynasty regained limited power as a Princely State under the British. The Kingdom of Mysore became part of the modern day, Indian state of Karnataka.
The Punjab
The Punjabi kingdom, ruled by members of the Sikh religious movement was a political entity that ruled the region of modern day Punjab. Founded by the ten Gurus of the Sikh faith, it expanded its borders during the reign of Maharaja Ranjit Singh at the height of the Sikh Empire to include surrounding areas like Kashmir and Peshawar, and was among the last areas of the subcontinent that was conquered by the British. The Anglo-Sikh wars marked the downfall of the Sikh Empire. |
