Rethinking Early Medieval India

by Singh, Upinder

• ISBN13: 9780198070023
• ISBN10: 0198070020
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2011-04-18
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

Covering the period, c. 600-1300 CE, this volume presents a comprehensive account of early medieval India. Divided into four parts, Part I highlights the major explanatory models including their perspectives on the political processes of the period. It contains the latest and most mature reflections with regard to feudalism, segmentary state, and the integrative /processual models. Part II focuses on social and economic processes like the varna, jati, agrarian structure, urbanpatterns and trade as well as gender relations. Part III discusses religion and culture and how these were expressed within and beyond regional configurations. It raises important questions concerning the relationship between region, religion, community and identity. Part IV examines the important, buttill recently rather neglected, spheres of language and ideas of the subcontinent's pre-Sultanate and non-Sultanate history. The introduction analyses the early medieval in the context of larger questions related to periodization and focuses on general historiographical issues. It also gives the reader an entry-point into debates on various facets of the period, anchoring the discussion of major themes to the selected essays. The book gives an overview of the debates as well as opens the doorto fresh areas of inquiry which have so far been neglected.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations	p. vii
Preface	p. ix
Acknowledgements	p. xi
List of Abbreviations	p. xiii
Introduction	p. 1
Theoretical Models and Political Processes
How Feudal was Indian Feudalism?	p. 47
The Segmentary State: Interim Reflections	p. 70
The Early and the Imperial Kingdom: A Processual Model of Integrative State Formation in Early Medieval India	p. 91
Village, Town, and Society
Land Rights and Social Stratification	p. 121
Nagaram: Commerce and Towns AD 850-1350	p. 137
The Society of Kakatiya Andhra	p. 166
Women and Power in Early Medieval Kashmir	p. 189
Religion and Culture, Within and Across Regions
Domesticity and Difference/Women and Men: Religious Life in Medieval Tamil Nadu	p. 211
Cult Region: The Puranas and the Making of the Cultural Territory of Bengal	p. 233
The Flying Messenger	p. 252
Mapping Language, Ideas, and Attitudes
The Sanskrit Cosmopolis and the Vernacular Revolution	p. 269
Politics, Violence, and War in Kamandaka's Nitisara	p. 293
Images of Raiders and Rulers	p. 325
Notes on Contributors	p. 351
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