Mughal History

documented architectural remains, models, and artistic panels preserved in settlements in addition to reviewing studies on early "prehistoric" settlements, and utilizing the researcher's field observations. The study reached the following conclusions: • The Column: As a structural element, the column was among the oldest features to appear in early settlements, dating back to at least the 4th millennium BCE. It remained present throughout all historical stages of Ancient Yemeni architecture, with its materials and forms diversifying over time. • Arch (Vault): Arches were employed as both structural components and design solutions to overcome certain challenges encountered at construction sites, as demonstrated by the Sabaean Gate at the historic Thula Fortress. • Connecting Bridges (Sībat): The review of some rock drawings revealed the existence of connecting bridges between buildings a technique later known as the Sībat (corridor) in Islamic architecture. The drawing of Jurf al-Yahudi documented this remarkable technology. • Decorative Motifs: Decorative motifs were characterized by repetition and modification, incorporating human, animal, and plant forms, primarily depicting elements from the local Yemeni environment.

Idris Bitlisi was an historian and statesman of Kurdish and Iranian descent in the Ottoman Empire. This article introduces the influence of Bitlisi work on the historiography in the territory of the Ottoman Empire. Bitlisi was commissioned to write the history of the Ottoman family from the reign of Osman (1310 AD) to Bayazid II (1502 AD) which was entitled Hasht Bihisht (Eight Heavens) and was written in Persian. This era is considered the Golden Period in Ottoman historiography. By creating this work, Bitlisi transferred the methods of Iranian writing of history to the Anatolian regions. In all his works, the Persian language and literature and the crystallization of Iranian culture and civilization can be seen. Bitlisi's writings, especially Hasht Bihisht, can be seen as a more explicit statement of the political and cultural situation of the Ottoman sultans and their interest in history.

​"This research paper presents a detailed genealogical and historical analysis of the royal Sadozai-Durrani lineage settled in Peshawar. Utilising multi-archival sources—including colonial-era master charts from British boundary commissions and secret intelligence genealogies from 1884—the study traces the descendants of Ahmad Shah Abdali inscribed '(In Peshawar)'. It highlights how these sovereign princes transitioned into key administrative, judicial, and law enforcement figures within the colonial infrastructure of the frontier region, establishing a lasting dynastic legacy."

Abstract
This paper explores the socio-cultural and religious dynamics of Baluchistan through three primary lenses. First, it examines the region's structural and organizational social frameworks. Second, it analyzes how cultural and religious practices practically adapt to support the production and reproduction of material life. Finally, the study illustrates how the processes of sedentarisation, de-tribalisation, and the erosion of local self-sufficiency coincide with the institutionalization of religion and the rise of orthodox religious schools. Ultimately, the paper demonstrates that despite a shared adherence to orthodox Islam, global religious ties are unable to fully dismantle Baluchistan’s deeply ingrained tribal and segmentary relationships.

The paper deals with the role and status of female slaves in the Mughal period in medieval India, particularly in the imperial harem. The research explores and highlights the dominating and dignified role of the concubines and other female slaves of foreign origin, in the imperial harem in contrast to those of local female slaves having less attractive physical attributes and were assigned household and domestic tasks. It also categorizes the female slaves according to their positions and duties assigned to them, which they were bound to perform. The paper highlights the nature, organization of harem, femininity, social and cultural role of female slaves. It also discusses the methods of enslavement, legalization of slave trade, traditions of imperial harem and the social status of female slaves who were the important and most significant part of the Mughal household. The present research includes primary as well as secondary sources to show the novel portrait of the female slaves during this particular period.

The Hindu decolonial right is no different than the Anglo restorationist right, sharing striking sociological and intellectual characteristics. Both movements draw much of their energy from segments of the lower-middle class and are marked by a form of partial education that is often accompanied by a striking absence of history or curiosity. Their rhetoric tends to be intensely ideological, frequently dismissive of moderation, and often indifferent to democratic restraint. Both camps rely on a simplified and racialized narrative in which a small group of Englishmen are portrayed as having merely conquered and exploited India, a framing that conveniently sustains their respective political fantasies. For the British side, this narrative channels a sense of impotence amid perceived national decline, while for the Indian side it sustains a posture of historical grievance that diverts attention from contemporary shortcomings such as corruption, institutional weakness, and limited achievement. In both contexts, the discourse is animated by a resentful social class seeking redress through historical reinterpretation.

Kristof Szitar (Ph.D., Université de Lausanne), an early career researcher specializing in Persianate and South Asian studies. He currently serves as co-editor of the Ghaznavid Poetry Anthology and examines Persian and Urdu literary cultures. *** Years ago, I hiked through Switzerland's Francophone countryside. When I passed through Chesalles-sur-Moudon, the village coat of arms caught my eye. At first, it looked like just another flourish in Europe's heraldic landscape. But then I noticed the symbol at its center: a golden lion brandishing a scimitar beneath a blazing sun. This unmistakably Persianate cameo conjured the tiled palaces of Safavid Isfahan, the squares of Samarqand, and the imperial courts of Mughal Delhi. The lion's share of the story behind it, I would learn, belonged to a globe-trotting local of these pastoral slopes. Bird's-eye view of Chesalles today. (Photo: Commune de Lucens) Chesalles harbors an improbable link to the Persianate world: in 1927 the commune adopted a new blazon, the lion and sun, to honor an eighteenth-century native whose journey carried him from these verdant slopes to the Mughal court. His life-and the emblem that later memorialized itoffers a vivid window onto early modern mobility and the travels of symbols across continents.

होना तो यह चाहिए था कि संविधान निर्माताओं, खासकर डॉक्टर अंबेडकर, जो शिक्षा के अधिकार को संविधान के खंड 3 में मौलिक अधिकारों के साथ रखना चाहते थे, और जिन्होंने उसे संविधान के खंड 4 में राज्य के नीति-निर्देशक तत्वों के साथ इस संकल्प के साथ रखा कि दस वर्षों में शिक्षा के अधिकार का लक्ष्य हासिल कर लिया जाना चाहिए; और सर्वोच्च न्यायालय के फैसले का सम्मान करते हुए साठ साल बाद ही सही, देश के सभी नौनिहालों को समान गुणवत्ता वाली शिक्षा देने का उद्यम किया जाता। लेकिन हुआ यह कि भाजपा और कांग्रेस की मिलीभगत और अन्य राजनैतिक दलों के उनके साथ सहयोग से बच्चों को मिला मौलिक अधिकार इस कानून के जरिए छीन लिया गया।

This chapter offers a selective overview of interactions between migration and experimental poetry in English over the last half-century. Such writing departs from the traditions, forms, and conventions associated with English as a language of literary expression. These departures are the result of existential pressures bearing down upon authors and the historicity of the modes they use. The uneasy movement of peoples across borders-from homes abandoned to homes not yet in place-leads to the wrenching of expression and the fracturing of expectations regarding coherence and cohesion. Breaks from tradition capture the sense of rupture entailed in severing roots that are both familial and communal, as well as historical and literary. Writing is forced into being through disjunctions between persons and places, such that it articulates and sometimes ameliorates those disjunctions. Poetic experiment, literary estrangement, and geographic displacement present themselves to readers as one among the many unsettling outcomes of modern diasporas.

This essay examines the accession of Shāh ʿAbbās I’s grandson, the adolescent Sām Mīrzā, as the new Safavid ruler in early 1629, and his subsequent rise to real power as Shāh Ṣafī. His ascent was accompanied by an extraordinarily bloody purge among prominent courtiers and retainers, resulting in the killing and blinding of dozens of the shah’s family members and high-level officials. The purge was clearly designed to forestall any claims to legitimate successorship by potential rivals, but reveals more direct motives as well, ranging from sharp divisions in court circles, tribal rivalries, and a merciless reaction to a presumed conspiracy designed to topple the shah. Using all available sources, Persian-language chronicles as well as European eyewitness accounts, this article offers a detailed, more comprehensive narrative of Shāh Ṣafī’s path to power than has previously been attempted, probing the motives behind the purge, identifying the “winners” and the “losers” in the attendant power struggle, and assessing its significance for Ṣafī’s subsequent reign and, indeed, for the fate of the Safavid dynasty in the second half of the seventeenth century.

Among the ornamental features that distinguish Mughal architecture, the craft of parchīn kārī (stone inlaying) stands out for its technical prowess and its affordance to convey prestige. Over time, this skill-demanding and time-consuming technique evolved from large bichrome geometries under Akbar to minute polychrome figurative patterns under Shah Jahan. At the turn of the 19th century, these architectural decorations drew the attention of the Jats and the Britishers, who looted and repurposed fragments of them. From the 1840s onwards, British consumers gave a new impetus to this craft in Agra by commissioning marble inlaid commodities whose design was predominantly borrowed from the Taj Mahal. Besides, local patrons as diverse as Ranjit Singh, the Paigah of Hyderabad, the maharaja of Gwalior or the Jain community in Ahmedabad commissioned stone inlays deriving more or less explicitly from Mughal parchīn kārī. My doctoral research attempted for the first time to retrace the understudied history of this craft in South Asia from the Mughal period to nowadays. In this presentation, I would discuss how parchīn kārī – as an artisanal innovation introduced by Mughal emperors – has later been appropriated by different kinds of consumers across the subcontinent, therefore demonstrating the socio-political relevance of this craft.

Bu çalışmada, Bâbür İmparatorluğu'nda nezr geleneği ve bu geleneğin yol açtığı rüşvet eylemleri incelenmiştir. Hindistan'da varlık göstermiş diğer Türk hanedanlarında olduğu gibi Bâbürlülerde de nezr geleneği yaygın bir uygulamaydı. Hindistan dışında varlık göstermiş Türk devletlerinde ise bu terim pişkeş kelimesi ile ifade edilmekteydi. Ancak Bâbürlülerde özellikle Ekber Şah döneminden itibaren daha sık uygulanmaya başlanan bu gelenek, zaman içerisinde imparatorluğun en tepedeki soylu kadrolarından en düşük dereceli memurlarına kadar bir hediye alışverişinden çok, bir rüşvet ve yolsuzluk eylemine dönüşmeye başladı. Nitekim erken modern dünyanın en sofistike siyasi sistemlerinden birine sahip olan Bâbür İmparatorluğu, kişisel ilişkiler, tören yükümlülükleri ve maddi alışverişlerden oluşan karmaşık bir ağa dayanıyordu. Bu bakımdan, Bâbürlü yönetimini tanımlayan birçok kültürel ve idari uygulamadan biri olan nezr geleneği, yani imparatora veya yüksek rütbeli soylulara resmi hediye sunma geleneği, önemli bir yer tutuyordu. Nezr başlangıçta sadakat ve saygının sembolik bir göstergesi olsa da modern tarihçilerin rüşvet, kayırmacılık ve yasa dışı ödemeler olarak tanımladıkları uygulamalarla giderek örtüşmeye başladı. Zira, Ekber Şah döneminden itibaren törensel hediye sunumu ile yozlaşmış alışverişi ayıran çizgi genellikle ince, belirsiz veya stratejik olarak manipüle edilmeye başlandı. Dolayısıyla bu araştırma, nezrin imparatorluk ritüeli olarak ortaya çıkışından rüşvet ve nüfuz satın alma ile iç içe geçmesine kadar geçirdiği evrimi inceleyerek, ekonomik gereklilik, idari genişleme ve siyasi rekabetin Bâbür İmparatorluğu içinde bu sistemi nasıl şekillendirdiğine dair detaylı bir bakış sunmayı ve bundan sonra benzer konularda yapılacak bilimsel araştırmalara katkı sağlamayı amaçlamaktadır.

This  research,  which  revolves  around  (the  status  of  doctors  and  medical  sciences during the reign of Shah Abbas I, 1587 -1629), is an attempt to identify the status of doctors and medical sciences during the reign of Shah Abbas I, which is of particular importance in view of the important role that doctors of this period played in Many areas, even in political decisions.This  study  emphasizes  the  status  of  doctors  and  how  patients  were  treated,  while learning  about  the  state  of  hospitals  in  this  period  (1587 -1629).  Although  medical sciences were based on classical logic and tradition before the reign of Shah Abbas I, they developed somewhat during his reign. Medicalsciences in Iran, like other fields such  as  architecture  and  art,  have  not  achieved  great  achievements  but  have stagnated due  to  religious  fanaticism,  the  spread  of superstitions,  the personal  and financial  insecurity  of  doctors,  and  the  increase  in  the  number  of  inexperienced doctors.The  research  consists  of  five  sections.  The  first  section  focuses  on  a  general overview of medical sciences in Iran during the years (1501-1587), while the second section focuses on doctors and medical institutions during the reign of Shah Abbas I (1587-1629

Bu makale, 29 Mısır Çerkes ve Safevi saray nizamından Hindistan alt kıtasına uzanan transkültürel akrabalık ağlarının merkezindeki iki tarihî figürün -Ordu Komutanı Muqarrab Khan (Rüstem Han) ve Prenses Zebunnisa'nın (Makhfi)-siyasî, askerî ve edebî faaliyetlerini incelemektedir. Dönemin askerî teknolojilerinden demir kasalı roketlerin taktiksel kullanımı, saray içindeki klik çatışmaları, ideolojik ayrışmalar ve sömürge dönemindeki kentsel dönüşümler sırasında tahrip edilen mimari miras, birincil tarihî kaynaklar ve çağdaş literatür ışığında nesnel bir perspektifle analiz edilmektedir.

Ḥusayn b. Jamāl al-Dīn Muḥammad b. al-Ḥusayn Khwānsārī, better known as Āqā Ḥusayn Khwānsārī, was born in Dhū l-Qaʿda 1016/February 1608 in Khwānsār, a city north of Isfahan, which by the early seventeenth century had become an important site for its scientific, literary, and intellectual activity.1 As the capital of the Safavid dynasty, Isfahan was the main centre of socio-political and intellectual activity in Persia during Khwānsārī's lifetime. Having relocated there at a young age, Khwānsārī availed himself of its rich intellectual resources and took up residence in the esteemed madrasa of Khwāja Malik Mustawfī.2 There, he immersed himself in the study of philosophy under the renowned philosopher Mīr Findiriskī (d. 1050/1640).3 He also pursued further studies in Islamic jurisprudence ( fiqh) under the renowned scholar Muḥammad Taqī On Āqā Ḥusayn Khwānsārī's life and career, see the following biographical sources: Mīrzā ʿAbdullāh Afandī Iṣfahānī, Riyāḍ al-ʿulamāʾ wa-ḥiyāḍ al-fuḍalāʾ, ed. Sayyid Aḥmad al-Ḥusaynī, 6 vols.

Every year on May 19, Hazaras (self-designation Āzrah) across Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan, Europe, Australia, and North America celebrate their culture with passionate music, traditional food, and vibrant gatherings. This day is not merely a festival-it is a declaration of identity, a link to a past that stretches back more than three thousand years. But beneath the surface of these celebrations lie deeper, often forgotten layers: ancient Nowruz rituals in old Balkh, fire festivities, winter solstice ceremonies, girls' traditions, and the epic recitation of the Shahnameh. This expanded article brings those hidden layers to light.

Akbar's religious policies marked a significant shift from earlier Mughal and Sultanate approaches, emphasizing sulh-i kull (universal peace/toleration). While often framed as syncretism or tolerance for governance, his reign coincided with, and actively supported, a revival in Hindu temple construction, pilgrimage, and cultural expression, particularly in Braj (Vrindavan-Mathura) and other sacred sites. This was achieved through direct patronage, land grants, tax exemptions, administrative integration of Hindus, and state-sponsored cultural exchanges. It was pragmatic (empire-building) but also reflected genuine curiosity, leading to a flourishing of Hindu institutions under Mughal oversight.

he tribal orga ni za tion of the Sayyids is con fus ing," wrote Brit ish colo nial offi cer and eth nol o gist William Crooke in 1896, "because some of the divi sions take their name from an epon y mous ances tor and some are merely ter ri to rial." 1 Underlying Crooke's frus tra tion at being unable to iden tify a sin gle prin ci ple for describ ing the social posi tion that say yids occu pied in India was the pre sump tion that there ought to have been one. He went on to rea son that the far ther say yids trav eled away from Arabia, the more their sayyidness-marked by lin eal descent from the Prophet of Islam-must have dimin ished, betraying what some his to ri ans have called a the ory of racial mis ce ge na tion. 2 In the same entry on say yids, Crooke quoted an unat trib uted adage about inau then tic say yids that was widely repeated by colo nial offi cers: "Last year, I was a butcher, this year I am a Shaikh, next year if prices rise, I shall become a Sayyid." Anthropological and socio log i cal schol ar ship through out the twen ti eth cen tury con tin ued to refer to dif er ent ver sions of this adage, indi cat ing that the colo nial search for say yid authen tic ity had a last ing influ ence on debates about social strat i fi ca tion among Mus lims in the sub con ti nent. 3 In these debates, sayyidness was shaped by the pur ported encoun ter between for eign say yid migrants and native Indic com mu ni ties in medi e val and early mod ern India. Much of this dis cus sion dwelled on the notion that, in gen eral, Mus lims in India had tended to adopt vary ing degrees of local castelike prac tices, such as strict endog amy and hered i tary occu pa tions. 4 It was thought that under such con di tions, authen tic elite sta tus was held by Mus lims who had found ways to side step the influ ence of their Indian envi ron ment. 5 They consisted of four sha rif (noble) groups: say yids, shaykhs, Mughals, and Pash tuns. 6 By con trast, Mus lims who were the descen dants of con verts to Islam in India were con ceived of as low born or ajlaf. 7 In this way, say yids fig ured into nineteenth and twen ti ethcen tury epistemologies as the most elite and least Indian of the four sha rif Mus lim sta tus groups, far removed from the ajlaf. More recently, the claim that the neb u lous for eignerindi gene inter face outlined above laid the ground work for social strat i fi ca tion among Mus lims has been called into ques tion. By con trast, it is argued that a more "con struc tiv ist" his tor i cal inquiry into Mus lim hier ar chies is warranted, one that does not take her i ta ble elite sta tus as an objec tive, unchang ing, and mea sur able qual ity. 8 Drawing upon the case of the Wasiti say yids of Bilgram, a his tor i cal qasba located in the pres entday Hardoi dis trict of Uttar Pradesh in India, this arti cle is pred i cated on the notion that say yids con tin u ally nego ti ated their priv i lege under dif er ent local and impe rial his tor i cal con di tions. 9 It pro poses that dur ing the years of impe rial cri ses that wracked the Mughal empire in the eigh teenth cen tury, the say yids of Bilgram, despite being claim ants to descent from elite Mus lim migrants, did not rep re sent them selves as for eign, and they dou bled down on the local social priv i le ges that they had cul ti vated. Indeed, at cho sen moments, their sayyidness was con veyed entirely in the cus tom ary lex i con of their qasba. To begin to under stand why they did this, it is nec es sary to con sider how they became local elites.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the intricacies of the Mughal Empire. The Mughal Empire is studied due to it’s sophisticated legal, political and administrative policies, and legendary architecture. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the court structure and legal philosophy of the Mughal Empire. The Emperors Courts the highest authority of the Mughal Empire is famous for the Chain of Justice established by the Mughal Emperor Jahangir. The Chief Justice Court, the highest court with appellate jurisdiction, The Chief Revenue Court, Governors Court, District Qazi court and [1] Local and Village Levels Qazi of the Pargana (Township): Handled routine civil cases, inheritances, and marriages, Kotwali Trials: Handled by the Kotwal (city police chief) who tried petty criminal and public morality offenses, Panchayats: Village assemblies of local elders that retained author, Amalguzari Kachehrithe and the Faujdari Adalat. The emperors of the Mughal Court are revered as upholders of justice, with strong and sophisticated political administration existing for many centuries.

प्रेमचंद के साहित्य में भी प्रादेशिकता और वैश्विकता का संघर्ष मिलता है। हालाँकि, उनकी प्रादेशिकता की धारणा अतीतोन्मुखी साहित्यकारों जैसी नहीं है। वह सीधे युगीन यथार्थ से जुड़ी है। प्रेमचंद के साहित्य में प्रादेशिकता की खूबियाँ और कमजोरियाँ दोनों मिलती है। वे प्रादेशिकता पर वैश्विकता के वर्चस्व स्थापन में खुद भारतीयों की भूमिका को भी सामने लाते हैं। खासकर सामंतों, बुद्धिजीवियों और पूँजीपति व्यवसायियों की भूमिका प्रादेशिकता-विरोधी है। प्रेमचंद की वैश्विकता की धारणा भी कई अन्य साहित्यकारों से अलग है। उनके साहित्य में वैश्विकता के दमनकारी और मनुष्य-विरोधी चरित्र की पहचान के साथ उसके वैसा होने के मूलभूत कारण की पहचान की गयी है। अन्य ज्यादातर साहित्यकारों की तरह वे अपने साहित्य में प्रादेशिक अध्यात्मिकता के बरक्स वैश्विकता के भौतिकतावादी होने का इकहरा तर्क नहीं देते। हालाँकि, रचनात्मक के अलावा प्रेमचंद के विचारात्मक लेखन से पता चलता है कि वे दार्शनिक अर्थ में भौतिकवादी नहीं है। उनकी वैश्विकता के साथ असहमति का मूल कारण उसका धर्म-रहित होना है। यानी वैश्विकता के दमनकारी और मनुष्य-विरोधी होने का मूल कारण वे उसका धर्म-रहित होना मानते हैं।

This essay considers the institution of mehmandarl, the practice of having foreigners visiting in an official capacity welcomed, accompanied, and provided for by the host country. It discusses its diplomacy; hosting
historical roots and engages In a comparative analysis, to find that mebmandari was most prominently practised In early modern Iran. It examines the responsibilities of the officer in charge, the mehmandar, and his supervisor, the mehmandar-bashi, arguing that, aside from
serving as court-appointed hosts, these officials functioned above all as minders, tasked with monitoring the movements of envoys and to find out the real reasons for their visit. This study also discusses protocol, the practice of accommodating the visitor and his entourage and of
providing them with victuals, the per diem official visitors were entitled to, and the burden this put on the local population, with all the corruption and exploitation it involved. It finally traces the institution until Its very end In the early twentieth century, leaving undecided the question of whether it just faded or was officially abolished under Reza Shah.

Focusing on regional history, this chapter turns to Bengal to consider temple construction during the reign of Shah Jahan. Temple construction in Bengal during Shah Jahan’s reign was prolific. As appreciated through architectural designs and inscriptions, temple construction in Bengal was not only a political and devotion act, it also influenced and was influenced by conceptions of Mughal imperial power.

A chapter examining Shāh Walī Allāh's Hawāmiʿ, a little-known treatise on the science of "angelic invocation". The chapter makes two arguments. First, it shows that despite generations of scholars asserting that Walī Allāh lost interest in "magic" or "superstition" as he matured into "orthodoxy", this sophisticated occultist text is the product of his mature period. Second, I argue that despite its content this was a reformist text, seeking to articulate a scripturally rooted occult science directed towards the malāʾika that could replace superseded forms of occultism oriented towards the celestial bodies/planets.

This paper examines the representation of divinely sanctioned kingship in eighteenth-century Rajput portraiture through a comparative study of the courts of Kota and Kishangarh. Focusing on portraits of Maharao Ram Singh, Maharao Bhim Singh, and Maharaja Sawant Singh, the study explores how rulers employed visual culture to negotiate proximity to the divine figure of Krishna within the devotional framework of the Vallabha Sampradaya. Challenging the assumption that Rajput portraiture merely emerged under Mughal influence, the paper argues that the schools of Kota and Kishangarh developed distinct visual and ideological vocabularies rooted in regional devotional practices, political legitimacy, and local artistic traditions.

Through close visual analysis, the essay investigates how royal portraiture blurred the distinction between devotee and deity, transforming rulers into manifestations, attendants, or reflections of Krishna himself. The study pays particular attention to iconographic elements such as halos, bodily gestures, courtly attire, and stylized eyes, demonstrating how these visual strategies articulated authority, devotion, and spiritual elevation. Furthermore, the paper situates these works within broader discussions of bhakti traditions, darshan, materiality, and the political function of images in early modern Rajasthan. By examining the intertwined relationship between portraiture, kingship, and religious devotion, this essay contributes to ongoing scholarship on Rajput visual culture and proposes a more nuanced understanding of divine representation in South Asian art history.

Paper ID This work examines Bana's Kadambari as a crucial historical source for understanding the social structure and human relationships of early medieval India. Traditionally celebrated for its literary richness and exquisite prose, Kadambari has primarily been studied within the realm of Sanskrit aesthetics. However, this study presents the text as a valuable lens through which to examine themes such as kingship, religion, caste, gender roles, asceticism, and emotional expression. Through a thematic analysis of selected episodes and characters, particularly Chandrapida, Kadambari, Mahasveta, and Pundarika, this article demonstrates how the narrative reflects contemporary moral concerns, social hierarchies, and the tension between individual desire and public duty. Utilizing an interdisciplinary methodology grounded in cultural history, gender studies, and classical historiography, this research engages with prominent historians and theorists such as D.D. Kosambi, Romila Thapar, Kumkum Roy, and Sheldon Pollock. Ultimately, this article argues that Kadambari is not merely a product of elite courtly imagination but also a cultural repository that preserves the emotional and ethical dimensions of its time, offering historians a nuanced understanding of early medieval Indian society.

This essay examines the modern controversy surrounding Aurangzeb, historical memory, and the interpretive frameworks associated with scholars such as Audrey Truschke and Wendy Doniger. It argues that contemporary debates about Mughal history are frequently distorted by two opposing tendencies: communal simplification on one side and excessive revisionist defensiveness on the other. While acknowledging the extraordinary cultural, artistic, and political achievements of Indo-Islamic civilization, the essay contends that some modern academic approaches risk displaying asymmetrical empathy by extending substantial contextualization toward imperial actors while treating enduring civilizational memory among Hindus, Sikhs, and others with greater suspicion.

The essay does not reject nuance, nor does it endorse sectarian readings of history. Instead, it explores how inherited historical memory operates emotionally and symbolically across generations, particularly in a civilization as historically continuous as India’s. It further argues that criticism of Aurangzeb cannot automatically be reduced to modern political extremism, since resistance to aspects of his rule existed during his own lifetime and remains embedded in cultural memory. Ultimately, the essay calls for a more balanced historical discourse capable of holding complexity, pain, achievement, and disagreement together without moral delegitimization or communal hostility.

Along with the Safavids in Persia and the Mughals of India, the Ottomans will be one of three great Muslim powers of the fifteenth to nineteenth centuries. These three dominions all made contributions to the history of philosophy and science.

The study of devotional theology or the study of Bhakti religious cultures has been a major theme in Western scholarship on Hindu religious traditions. It has long been held that the growth of Shaiva and Vaishnava Bhakti traditions are part of the religious evolution of the older Brahmanical theological tradition, and that the former two represent a distinctive characteristic of Hinduism in early medieval and medieval religious traditions. However, in a very interesting work on the devotional culture within Jainism (Cort 2002a: 59-86; 2002b: 719-42; 2005: 93-115) As you rightly note, the study of bhakti has been a central element in the study of Indian religious traditions for many decades. For a long time, scholars assumed bhakti to be a

This essay attempts to examine the nature of Mughal state formation in the region of Bengal from the late sixteenth century onwards. To comprehend the nature of Mughal state formation, this essay focuses on the expansion of the Mughal political frontier across Bengal. The expanding Mughal political frontier was a product of the interactions between the Mughals and the various local ruling houses of the region. This essay will examine the relation between Mughals and three prominent local ruling groups of medieval Bengal to demonstrate the complex nature of these interactions. This essay also argues that the resilience of the Mughal political frontier in peripheral regions like Bengal depended on their ability to win the support of local social groups and not just the local rulers. Failure to win over the local society not only made it difficult for the Mughals to retain their political hold over such regions but also eroded their claims of absolute sovereignty.

Within the framework of Persianate self-hood, this article explores the intersection between translation, Indian dress, and portraiture in India and Britain, 1760-1800. It examines the translator's lived experience and cultural output as a published scholar and Persian secretary in the East India Company. First, it considers the self-constructed through clothing; second, it examines how the role of the EIC translator is discretely performed. The third is the role of art and the artist in visualizing a record of professional life and its relationship with material culture, and finally, how it evoked a multifarious kinship on a network of ideas unrelated to ethnicity or place. Engaging with the concept of transculturalism, it considers the global 'family' as a flexible and dynamic unit that empowers the movement of visual and material culture within generations. The investigation of dress and grooming reframes the imperial 'self ', seeing dress as the primary navigator of cultural space.

Sayyid Nāṣiruddīn Muḥammad Abūlmanṣūr Dilhavī, born into a Muslim family in 1823, was the son of Sayyid Muḥammad ʿAlī, a head clerk at the Nagpur residency (Imdād Ṣābrī, Firangiyoṇ kā jāl, p. 520). Tutored by his father and grandfather, he later worked in the home of Nawāb Jahāngīr Muḥammad Khān (1816-44), the ruler of the princely state of Bhopal. He learned English and in time became a prolific apologist for Islam, earning the sobriquet Imām-e fan-e munāẓarah ahl-e kitāb (‘the leader of the art of polemics with the people of the book’, Rāhī, ‘Sayyid Nāṣir-ul-Dīn Muḥammad', p. 9). This was a period marked by literary exchanges between Muslims and Christians, both missionaries and indigenous Christians. His writings contain Muslim responses to works such as Karl Gottlieb Pfander’s (1803–65; CMR 24, 188-236) Mīzān ul- ḥaqq (‘The balance of truth’) as well as the writings of ʿAbdullāh Ātham (1828-96; CMR 24, 392-6), Ṣafdar ʿAlī (1828-99; CMR 24, 765-80), ʿImāduddīn Lāhiz (1830-1900; CMR 24, 506-41), Rajab ʿAlī and Ṭhākur Dās (1852-1910). His major writings include Taṣḥiḥ al- taʾwīl  fī  radd -i ʿ alā Tafsīr al-mukāshfa (‘Correction of the explanation, in refutation of “Interpretation of the [biblical] Book of Revelation”’), Namūna-i taḥrīf (‘Patterns of textual alteration’), Navīd-i jāved (‘Eternally good news’), Mīzān ul-mīzān fī radd -i  ʿ alā Mīzān ul- ḥaqq lī Pfander (‘Balance of the balance, in refutation of “The balance of truth” by Pfander’), and Inʿām-i ʿ āmm fī radd -i ʿalā Aʾina-i Islām lī Rajab (‘A general reward, in refutation of “The mirror of Islam” by Rajab’).

This essay concerns the objects not originally made by (or for) the Great Mughals but collected by them between 1526 and 1707. Studied categories concern precious stones, jades and mirabilia ('ajā'ib), Chinese wares, and non-Mughal manuscripts and paintings, including European engravings. Some of these alien objects (such as the European engravings) had a strong impact on the arts of the period, while others, such as Chinese wares, did not generate local imitations but were showcased on the palaces' walls. Several objects, already laden with their own history, represented symbols for the legitimation of the dynasty. Among the latter, Timurid souvenirs proved especially significant. The functioning and dynamics of these collections, stored in different treasuries (khazāna), and reworked out in the imperial workshops (kārkhāna), are studied through the surviving artifacts and with the help of the primary sources, when possible. The collected objects and the cultural inflections they carry somehow illustrate how the Mughal emperors "seized the world." Keywords: Collections, Mughal art, treasury (khazāna), workshops (kārkhāna), precious stones, diamonds, jade, mirabilia ('ajā'ib), Chinese wares, Persian manuscripts and paintings, European engravings. * Art history relies, among other reflections, on the ways different forms of art have emerged. This notion of a progression-but not necessarily of a Darwinian evolution-gives rise to the idea of History. One of the ways to acknowledge how a specific land and period understands its own history is through the study of its (art) collections. 2 Of course, to do so, it is first

The essay elaborates on the manuscript tradition of transmission, commentary, and glossing of fiqh or "Islamic jurisprudence" texts in medieval and early-modern juridical culture from the Indian sub-continent. Premodern Muslim jurists composed doctrinal treatises primarily in Arabic, the shared theological language of the 'ulamā' or "learned scholars". However, in the Indian context, Persian too had acquired the status of a language of Islamic law. From the fourteenth century, fatāwā compilations were made in Persian. By seventeenth-century Mughal rule in northern India, sharḥ or "commentary" and ḥāshiya or "super-commentary" in Persian were deployed as a mechanism for pedagogical transmission. Analyzing two extant Persian manuscripts pertaining to the Ḥanafī madhhab or "school" of juridical thought, Fatāwā-i fīrūzshāhī (fourteenth century) and 'Abd al-Ḥaqq Sajādil Sirhindī's Sharḥ-i hidāya (seventeenth century), the essay appraises the nature of textual and manuscript practices involved in generating Islamic juridical norms and practices. Examining philological and textual features exhibited internal to these two texts, I argue that fiqh doctrinal writing in the age of post-classical Islamic sciences (twelfth to eighteenth Centuries) had become "hybrid" in style. Rather than indicating tendencies towards a phase of "decline" due to "orthodox" adherence to tradition, such texts of legal genre portray a complex culture of Islamic law-making in the premodern period.

Abstract - Early nisars, largess coinage for distribution on special occasions, of Jahangir have been described as posthumous issues in the name of Akbar, but it is suggested here that they are in fact early nisar issues of Jahangir, based on the weight standards and history of coinage in the early reign of Jahangir.

प्राचीन भारत की अवधारणा (धर्म, राजनीति, और पुरातत्त्व पर निबंध) एक विचारोत्तेजक और विद्वत्तापूर्ण निबंध-संग्रह है, जिसकी लेखिका प्रतिष्ठित इतिहासकार उपिंदर सिंह हैं। वे भारतीय इतिहास की गंभीर और संतुलित व्याख्या के लिए जानी जाती हैं। यह पुस्तक उनके द्वारा विभिन्न वर्षों में लिखे गए प्रमुख लेखों का संग्रह है, जिनका मुख्य विषय है– धर्म, राजनीति, और पुरातत्त्व। यह केवल एक शैक्षणिक ग्रंथ नहीं है, बल्कि यह वर्तमान समय में प्राचीन भारतीय अतीत की प्रस्तुति और उसकी व्याख्या को लेकर चल रहे विवादों और विचारधारात्मक प्रयोगों से एक गहन संवाद भी है।
इन निबंधों के माध्यम से लेखिका यह विश्लेषण करती हैं कि किस प्रकार प्राचीन ग्रंथों, अभिलेखों और पुरातात्त्विक साक्ष्यों का उपयोग और दुरुपयोग आधुनिक विचारधारात्मक उद्देश्यों को आगे बढ़ाने के लिए किया गया है। वे पाठकों से आग्रह करती हैं कि वे भारत के अतीत को लेकर बनाई गई सरल, आदर्शवादी या एकांगी धारणाओं पर प्रश्न उठाएँ। वे प्राचीन भारत को एक विविधतापूर्ण, गतिशील और विभिन्न दृष्टिकोणों से भरपूर क्षेत्र के रूप में प्रस्तुत करती हैं, जहाँ धर्म, राजनीति और समाज आपस में गहराई से जुड़े हुए थे और निरंतर विकसित हो रहे थे।

यह पुस्तक अनेक प्रमुख ऐतिहासिक पात्रों और विषयों से जुड़ी है जैसे- सम्राट अशोक और उनका धम्म, महाभारत, प्रारम्भिक बौद्ध और जैन परंपराएँ, और इतिहासलेखन में पुरातत्त्व की भूमिका। इसमें न केवल प्राचीन भारतीय इतिहास की बात की गई है, बल्कि इतिहासलेखन की भी चर्चा की गई है- अर्थात् यह इतिहास कैसे लिखा गया, समय के साथ कैसे बदला गया और आज इसे कैसे समझा जाता है। सिंह धर्म और सत्ता के बीच के संबंधों की पड़ताल करते हुए यह दर्शाती हैं कि किस प्रकार धार्मिक भाषा और प्रतीकों का उपयोग राज्य-व्यवस्था में किया गया। वे यह तर्क प्रस्तुत करती हैं कि हमें इतिहास को आधुनिक राजनीतिक उद्देश्यों की पूर्ति के लिए नहीं, बल्कि तथ्यों और प्रमाणों पर आधारित विवेकपूर्ण सोच के साथ पढ़ना चाहिए।

सारांशतः प्राचीन भारत की अवधारणा केवल निबंधों का संग्रह नहीं है, बल्कि यह एक जवाबदेह और विवेकपूर्ण इतिहासबोध का घोषणापत्र है। यह विद्यार्थियों, शोधार्थियों और आम पाठकों से यह आग्रह करता है कि वे इतिहास के साथ जटिलता, आलोचनात्मक दृष्टिकोण और संवाद के माध्यम से जुड़ें न कि उसे केवल राजनीतिक या सांस्कृतिक औजार के रूप में देखें।

The teaching of reputedly difficult Asian languages, such as Mandarin Chinese or Japanese, in the service of the spiritual ideal of conversion, substantially mobilised the resources of the European Missions in East Asia in the 16th and 17th centuries. Evidence of the linguistic efforts made in these missions can be seen in the knowledge of Chinese of prominent figures, such as Matteo Ricci (S.

This essay uncovers the largely invisible history of Hindu and Jain temples within the Mughal imperial capital. Drawing on Sayyid Ahmad Khan’s Asar-us-Sanadid and Zafar Hasan’s Monuments of Delhi, the authors trace Delhi’s temples from Shah Jahan’s reign through the twilight of Mughal sovereignty, when merchant patrons like Raja Harsukh Rai produced some of the city’s most refined sacred interiors.