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Political Geography and the Region in Indian History : Daksina Kosala and Vidarbha, c. 400-1300 CE /
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This epigraphic study of the political geography of two historical regions, Dakṣiṇa Kośala and Vidarbha between fourth and thirteenth centuries, focuses on the interaction of physical and human geography as reflected in the changing nature of settlement patterns both rural and urban and their political organization through time - an important exercise, based primarily on Sanskrit inscriptions from the period and the region. The study contributes to further substantiation of the critical significance of the conception of early medieval in the study of Indian history. Since almost all the inscriptions are in the nature of land grants to Brahamans, shrines and monasteries, a related area of investigation is the extent of agrarian expansion in the context of political and administrative changes initiated by a series of dynasties across centuries. This also involved a gradual growth of a sense of affiliation with the region or conscious effort to appropriate its identity by the ruling dynasties. The book critically analyses the data meticulously presented in tabulated form - an established method in inscription-based studies of early medieval India. It thus adds to our knowledge and understanding of the region as it has gradually evolved over several centuries through the early medieval period.
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1 online resource (264 pages) : illustrations. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004753631
History of Indian Air Defence Artillery 1940-1945 /
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In 1921, the eighth Anti-Aircraft Battery of Royal Artillery was first stationed in India. However, it was only after two decades that the threat from the Japanese expansionism made India to finally realise how ill-prepared its anti-aircraft defences were. Starting from a Battery raised at Colaba, Indian Anti-Aircraft Artillery soon expanded to over thirty-four regiments for India to have the second largest concentration of Anti-Aircraft defences outside the Great Britain. At one time, India had more Anti-Aircraft Regiments than that of field artillery. Numbers aside, Indian Anti-Aircraft gunners served in varied battlefields with honour, both during defeat and victory. If they were at Singapore as the fortress fell, they kept the Japanese Air Force at bay when Allied forces retreated from Burma, and later formed part of the vanguard when the Allies returned to Burma in triumph. Indian Anti-Aircraft Regiments served in Singapore, Malaya, Burma, Maldives, Aden and Iraq. They were truly representative as all regiments comprised of varied races and castes. It had a separate training centre for women and was one of the first to enlist women when the WAC(I) manned its operation rooms and drove lorries. They defended key installations, protected cities, served with field formations, participated in amphibious operations, served at remote locations facing odds and administrative apathies.
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1 online resource (252 pages) : illustrations. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004753013
Buddha and Christ, Nativity Stories and Indian Traditions.
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The infancy narratives of the gospels of Matthew and Luke appear as a magnificent mosaic of allusions not only to the Hebrew Bible but also to Buddhist and Hindu religious traditions. Professor Thundy argues that many details of the infancy gospels as well as the rest of the gospels can be clarified by the Buddhist and Hindu scriptures. In this sense, the gospels are Eastern religious texts. Buddha and Christ covers the following topics in order: methodology of study, priority of Indian texts vis-à-vis Christian gospels, parallels of the birth narratives of Buddha and Jesus, uniqueness of Indian parallels, the Gnostic context of the Christian gospels, and contacts between India and the West in antiquity. Multicultural studies such as this encourage ecumenism and mutual understanding in East-West dialogues as well as reinforcing the view that the gospels should be taken seriously as Eastern religious texts.
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1 online resource. :
9789004378827
Christian Muslim relations. a bibliographical history /
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Christian-Muslim Relations, a Bibliographical History, Volume 11 (CMR 11) covering South and East Asia, Africa and the Americas in the period 1600-1700, is a continuing volume in a history of relations between the two faiths from the 7th to the early 20th century as this is reflected in written works. It comprises introductory essays and the main body of entries which treat all the works, surviving or lost, that are recorded. These entries provide biographical details of the authors, descriptions and assessments of their works, and complete accounts of publications and studies. The result of collaboration between numerous leading scholars, CMR 11 , along with the other volumes in this series, is intended as a basic tool for research in Christian-Muslim relations. Section Editors: Clinton Bennett, Luis F. Bernabe Pons, Jaco Beyers, Lejla Demiri, Martha Frederiks, David D. Grafton, Stanisław Grodź, Alan Guenther, Emma Gaze Loghin, Gordon Nickel, Claire Norton, Reza Pourjavady, Douglas Pratt, Radu Păun, Peter Riddell, Umar Ryad, Mehdi Sajid, Cornelia Soldat, Karel Steenbrink, Davide Tacchini, Ann Thomson, Serge Traore, Carsten Walbiner
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1 online resource (656 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004335585 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Classic ships of Islam : from Mesopotamia to the Indian Ocean /
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This book charts the development of Islamic ships and boats in the Western Indian Ocean from the seventh to the early sixteenth century with reference to earlier periods. It utilizes mainly Classical and Medieval Arabic sources with iconographical evidence and archaeological finds. Maritime activities in the region resulted in a cross fertilization, not only of goods but also of ideas and culture which gave an underlying cohesion to the Arabian, Persian and Indian maritime peoples. This study has led to a re-evaluation of that maritime culture, showing that it was predominantly Persian and Indian, with Chinese influence, throughout the Islamic period until the coming of the Portuguese, as reflected in nautical terminology and technology.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [427]-456) and index. :
9789047423829 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Islamic sufi networks in the western Indian Ocean (c. 1880-1940) : ripples of reform /
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In the period c. 1880-1940, organized Sufism spread rapidly in the western Indian Ocean. New communities turned to Islam, and Muslim communities turned to new texts, practices and religious leaders. On the East African coast, the orders were both a vehicle for conversion to Islam and for reform of Islamic practice. The impact of Sufism on local communities is here traced geographically as a ripple reaching beyond the Swahili cultural zone southwards to Mozambique, Madagascar and Cape Town. Through an investigation of the texts, ritual practices and scholarly networks that went alongside Sufi expansion, this book places religious change in the western Indian Ocean within the wider framework of Islamic reform.
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1 online resource (pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004276543 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Traditions and Customs of the Indian Armed Forces : Revised and Enlarged Edition /
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The cohesion and the spirit-de-corps in the Indian Armed Forces (Army, Navy and the Air Force) is fostered by various customs and traditions, which are reflected in the daily lives of their officers and men. They are not always legally binding but they are nonetheless followed willingly without coercion. There are traditions handed down from the past - Valour, Honour and Never to Surrender - that are intrinsic and resonate the lives of servicemen and image of their regiments and formations. On the other hand there are customs and traditions that regulate the lives of soldiers, sailors and airmen on a daily basis; military courtesies, dress and mess customs, regimental traditions, ceremonial drills and parades and the like. The various facets of customs and traditions of the armed forces were originally compiled by late Maj Gen Chand N. Das. The present volume has been inspired by the original and contains edited updated and enlarged facets that have been arranged in seven parts containing 33 chapters. Each chapter deals with different aspects of customs and traditions, viz., flags, colours and emblem, military uniform and dress customs, commemorative days, state and military funerals, battle honours, war memorials, medals and ribbons and so on.
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1 online resource (664 pages) : illustrations. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004752474
ROME AND THE INDIAN OCEAN TRADE FROM AUGUSTUS TO THE EARLY THIRD CENTURY CE.
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In Rome and the Indian Ocean Trade from Augustus to the Early Third Century CE Matthew Adam Cobb examines the development of commercial exchange between the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean worlds from the Roman annexation of Egypt (30 BCE) up to the early third century CE. Among the issues considered are the identities of those involved, how they organised and financed themselves, the challenges they faced (scheduling, logistics, security, sailing conditions), and the types of goods they traded. Drawing upon an expanding corpus of new evidence, Cobb aims to reassess a number of long-standing scholarly assumptions about the nature of Roman participation in this trade. These range from its chronological development to its economic and social impact.
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1 online resource (x, 355 pages) :
9789004376571 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
The Zoroastrian myth of migration from Iran and settlement in the Indian diaspora : text...
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The Qesse-ye Sanjān is the sole surviving account of the emigration of Zoroastrians from Iran to India to form the Parsi ('Persian') community. Written in Persian couplets in India in 1599 by a Zoroastrian priest, it is a work many know of, but few have actually read, let alone studied in depth. This book provides a romanised transcription from the oldest manuscripts, an elegant metrical translation, detailed commentary and, most importantly, a radical new theory of how such a text should be "read", id est not as a historical chronical but as a charter of Zoroastrian identity, foundation myth and justification of the Parsi presence in India. The book fills a lacuna that has been acutely felt for a long time.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [239]-242) and indexes. :
9789047430421 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Christian Muslim relations. a bibliographical history /
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Christian-Muslim Relations. A Bibliographical History, volume 6 (CMR 6), covering the years 1500-1600, is a continuing volume in a history of relations between followers of the two faiths as it is recorded in their written works. Together with introductory essays, it comprises detailed entries on all the works known from this century. This volume traces the attitudes of Western Europeans to Islam, particularly in light of continuing Ottoman expansion, and early despatches sent from Portuguese colonies around the Indian Ocean. The result of collaboration between numerous leading scholars, CMR 6, along with the other volumes in this series, is intended as a fundamental tool for research in Christian-Muslim relations. Section editors: John Azumah, Clinton Bennett, Luis Bernabé Pons, Lejla Demiri, Martha Frederiks, John-Paul Ghobrial, David Grafton Stanisław Grodź, Alan Guenther, Abdulkadir Hashim, Şevket Küçükhüseyin, Andrew Newman, Gordon Nickel Claire Norton, Douglas Pratt, Peter Riddell, Umar Ryad, Davide Tacchini, Serge Traore, Carsten Walbiner
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1 online resource (xii, 892 pages) :
9789004281110 :
1570-7350 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Kaṭṭaikūttu : The Flexibility of a South Indian Theatre Tradition /
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This book gives an insight into Kaṭṭaikkūttu, a living Tamil theatre tradition. Taking the perspective of performers as a starting point, it analyses how this theatre tradition has been able to adjust itself to changing conditions and challenges because of its inherent flexibility. The phenomenon of flexibility pervades both the formation and internal arrangements of theatre companies and the actual performances themselves. The first part of the book focuses on Kaṭṭaikkūttu in its historical and social context. It traces the theatre's disengagement from its organic embedding in the social and ritual village organization and its transition towards a more autonomous and more professional regional theatre form during the last fifty to hundred years. This transformation was accompanied by processes of professionalization and commercialization, which had their impact on the practitioners and the performances. The second part of the book provides a detailed analysis of the working of oral Kaṭṭaikkūttu texts in performance. Through a flexible handling of the oral - verbal and musical - material within the boundaries of a relatively fixed framework underlying these texts, Kaṭṭaikkūttu performers try to fulfill to the best of their abilities the demands of sponsors, audiences and occasions.
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Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004644922
The Bakhshālī Manuscript : An Ancient Indian Mathematical Treatise /
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The Bakhshālī Manuscript is an old birch-bark manuscript which treats mathematics in Sanskrit. It was unearthed by a farmer in AD 1881 at the small village of Bakhshālī, about eighty kilometers north-east of Peshawar, one of the important trading centers of the ancient Gandhāra district (now Pakistan). It was studied by eminent Indologists and historians of mathematics of the time, yet a number of mathematical rules and examples in it were either left undeciphered or misunderstood due to the fragmentary nature of the manuscript, the irregularities of the language, and the fact that the study of the history of Indian mathematics was in an early stage. The dating of the manuscript as well as of the work in it has also been long a matter of controversy. The dates estimated range from the early centuries of the Christian era to the twelfth century. The situation has been much improved, however, by quite a few studies on Indian mathematics that appeared after those pioneering works, and by the publication of two Sanskrit works, Bhāskara's commentary on the Aryabhaṭīya and Srīdhara's Paṭīgaṇita with an old commentary, which have greatly enhanced our knowledge of Indian mathematics of the seventh and eighth centuries. This book offers a fresh translation of the manuscript, the first English translation of the whole text based on a systematic study of linguistic peculiarities, and a mathematical commentary based on a comparative study of the Bakhshālī work and other Sanskrit mathematical texts, including the two mentioned above. The Introduction attempts to locate the Bakhshālī work properly within the history of Indian mathematics.
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Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004646643
The frontier mission and social transformation in western Honduras : the Order of Our Lady of Mercy, 1525-1773 /
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The Frontier Mission and Social Transformation in Western Honduras deals with the interaction between Mercedarian missionaries and the indigenous Lenca Indian population of western Honduras during the early sixteenth to mid-eighteenth centuries. Using an anthropological perspective, it relies heavily on previously neglected ecclesiastical archival material in conjunction with preliminary archaeological evidence as an integral source of data. A fine-grained description of the local processes of missionization in a frontier region examines the organization, operation and goals of the Mercedarian mission province located in the colonial Audiencia of Guatemala. Summary data concerning aspects of Lenca society and physical environment relevant to investigation of mission activities are provided. The importance of this study lies in its ability to explain mission development in frontier settings as well as to trace transformations within a mission order over almost a 250-year period.
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1 online resource (xii, 194 pages) : maps. :
Includes bibliographical references (p. 168-189) and index. :
9789004319950 :
0924-9389 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Police and Politics in India : Colonial Concepts, Democratic Compulsions: Indian Police 1947-2002 /
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Essentially a sequel to the author's earlier work, Defenders of the Establishment: Ruler-supportive Police Forces of South Asia , a history of the Indian police from ancient times to 1947, this book deals with police history, covering some 55 years since Indian independence. Writing about contemporary institutions and events is a risky proposition and more so in this country as the very nature of its polity is forever in a state of flux, not always for the better. Law enforcement and politics are essential, irrevocable and interdependent features of state power and are prone to feed on each other for sustenance. However, unwarranted political manipulation of state institutions, especially the police and the magistracy, a marked feature of Indian law enforcement mechanisms in recent times, is bound to impair democratic freedoms and human rights of the people. Also, all social and political institutions are the product of a nation's historical and philosophical experience through the ages. Indian police is no exception. In some ways, this is like saying that every society gets the police it deserves. Does it follow, therefore, that the Indian people are doomed to live for ever with a callous, overbearing, communalized, often corrupt and unaccountable police force? Not really. Only if the Indian state were to set in motion a calibrated process of substantial reforms in the outdated system of law enforcement, rooted in the mid-nineteerth century, most forms of distortions in police functioning would vanish.
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1 online resource (620 pages) : illustrations. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004752528
History in the Public Domain /
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History is a hot topic in popular politics of the public domain. Pressures from different kinds of ideological positions and politics of identities of various kinds put serious constraints on the practice and writing of history. Despite the challenges, scholarship has continued to grow. Current historiographical thrusts illustrate how a whole range of themes and issues are dealt with by professional historians from a variety of perspectives with reference to sources and evidence. For instance, issues relating to the complex interactions between religion and political culture are no longer being swept under the carpet. This collection of short essays and extended discussions on current research aims to intervene in public debates on what exactly happened in history. Given the situation, attempts of this kind can possibly help in somewhat bridging the wide gap between serious academic research and misplaced assumptions of popular histories. Much as historians are accused of merely speaking to themselves (and boring others), they need to be taken seriously when intervening in public debates using specialized historical methods and practices. Historical research conducted in universities can inform popular debates in newspapers, television channels, social media, and roadside dhabas for that matter, to lift the discussion to an informed intellectual plank and to bring about historical literacy and civility in the public domain.
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1 online resource (260 pages) : illustrations. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004751538
Bose and his Movement : From Nazi Germany to French Indochina /
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The work is based on original sources in the archives and libraries of France, England, India and Vietnam. It recounts the activities of Subhas Chandra Bose and his freedom movement in Germany and brings out certain hidden features of his life as found in the records, with adequate supporting evidence. The study also elaborates on Bose's activities in Southeast Asia, with a special focus on French Indochina. Incidentally it was from Saigon that he disappears from the face of the world. After rejecting the air crash theory in which Bose was supposed to have died as well as the Russian escape theory as untenable for want of factual evidence, the study concludes that Bose never left Saigon or Indochina after 17 August 1945, where he died in mysterious circumstances, before the arrival of the Cabinet Mission to India. The war treasures of Bose were confiscated by the Allied troops in Saigon during a search operation.
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1 online resource (236 pages) : illustrations. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004753457
The birth of indology as an Islamic science : Al-Biruni's treatise on yoga psychology /
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In The Birth of Indology as an Islamic Science Mario Kozah closely examines the pioneering contribution by Bīrūnī (d. circa 1048) to the study of comparative religion in his major work on India. Kozah concludes that a process of Islamisation is employed through a meticulous systematization of Hindu beliefs into one "Indian religion", preceding by almost a millennium the earliest definitions of Hinduism by nineteenth-century European Orientalists. This formulation of Hinduism draws on Bīrūnī's interpretation of Yoga psychology articulated in the Kitāb Bātanjal , his Arabic translation of the Yoga-Sūtra of Patañjali. Bīrūnī's Islamic reading of Hinduism relies on certain common denominators that he identifies as being of fundamental importance. In the case of Hinduism he identifies metempsychosis as its unifying banner.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004305540 :
0169-8729 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.