General History Thread

[Azaad]

 

[pankaj nema]

 

[Azaad]

 

[Azaad]

 

[ezsasa]

No you are talking about a different period , I'm talking about what happened before Moha was even born, ancient India, what I'm trying to say is , our curiosity to know what is happening outside of our lands led to our downfall because we became contented with what we have , therefore fall apart in innovation , tech etc , and later when the onslaught happened down the years we didn't have the mechanism to prevent it and fell apart

this is not a settled debate, if anything we have learnt over past nine years, there is every reason to doubt every theory about ancient India that originated from western Indologists and leftist historians.

cultures and societies don't die of their own, if there is a major shift in trend it is usually because of disruptions within or from outside. when there are troubles, people move to a new place and try to rebuild their lives, we have seen sindhis and punjabis who have rebuilt their lives after partition migration. in the case of trade, even fall of empires at the receiving end can cause disruptions here, just like troubles in countries thousands of km away have business impacts here. and whether that particular society in that particular time was able manage the disruption also matters.

fall of roman empire, buddhism, islamic expansion, droughts, floods etc. reasons could be anything.

on how hard is it to rebuild timelines related to ancient history, have a look at dr. meenakshi jain's reconstruction of Krishna Janmabhoomi history

 

[Azaad]

 

[Azaad]

 

[GaudaNaresh]

this is not a settled debate, if anything we have learnt over past nine years, there is every reason to doubt every theory about ancient India that originated from western Indologists and leftist historians.

cultures and societies don't die of their own, if there is a major shift in trend it is usually because of disruptions within or from outside. when there are troubles, people move to a new place and try to rebuild their lives, we have seen sindhis and punjabis who have rebuilt their lives after partition migration. in the case of trade, even fall of empires at the receiving end can cause disruptions here, just like troubles in countries thousands of km away have business impacts here. and whether that particular society in that particular time was able manage the disruption also matters.

fall of roman empire, buddhism, islamic expansion, droughts, floods etc. reasons could be anything.

on how hard is it to rebuild timelines related to ancient history, have a look at dr. meenakshi jain's reconstruction of Krishna Janmabhoomi history

Fall of civilisations is very rarely a 'chinggis khan has arrived' moment, its mostly a complex web of multiple reasons.

Take for example, the fall of the roman empire. The 'pop history' version taught in schools and even undergrad universities is 'Hurr the big stronk blonde blue eyed germanics showed up and romans got exhausted fighting them and ultimately won'.
But reality is, its the crisis of the 2nd century, which destroyed the Roman trade network system and forced a regionalisation of the roman economy: without a huge inter-dependent rural-urban network spanning the mediterranean, the problems of one end became irrelevant to people at the other end, regionalism started to flourish and coupled with Roman excesses in lifestyle, where they experienced a population decline ( sounds familiar ?), the western half simply ran out of logistics, trained personnel and resources to keep fighting the german barbarians, with the eastern half having no fucks to give (due to regionalisation).


Looking at Indian history, the 'fall' of Indian civilisation happened at the hands of the Islamist turks - the Ghori-Ghaznavi period, but its seeds are sown in the fall of the Gupta Empire.
Why ?
because the Hunnic invasions marked the break with classical India - the kannauj triangle period that follows, is where Indians start showing no memory of Arthashastra, Pingala, Panini etc. and emperors such as Ashoka, Chandragupta Maurya, Kharavela, etc start becoming forgotten.

This is the period we see an explosion of universities in India ( Vikramshila, Paharpura, Mahastangarh, Odantipuri, Jagaddala etc were all founded in post gupta period) but hardly any progress in mathematics, astronomy or medicine, with a lot of theological/ideological output : eerily similar to the declining scientific innovation of western education system & expansion of ideological 'research' (wokeness, anti-wokeness, gender theory, queer theory, etc) in the past 25 years.

This is also the period we see the concept of 'mlechcha desh' proliferate in Indian consciousness, deeming Indian land as some sort of 'holy pure land' and everything outside of it as unclean & therefore unworthy of going to: a stunning reversal of the past millenia, where Indians travelled to China & Greece to spread dharma while mass migrating to SE Asia to found the indianised kingdoms of SE Asia ( which also shows that our colonial methods are far less violent and benevolent than the western colonial method).
In doing so, we gave up the Arabian Sea & Bay of Bengal trade routes ( the latter was dominated by Odiyas and Magadhi-Bengalis, became a near monopoly of the Tamils, the last significant Indian culture to not fall prey to the 'wokeness' of this period). In doing so, we lost our eyes and ears to these lands, our ability to absorb technological developments in the greater Eurasia & having intelligence from these lands were severely restricted.
Consider this absurdity : While Magadh Empire & Gupta empire had diplomatic ties with the Ptolemaics, Seleucids & the Sassanians, ie, Indian diplomatic missions spanned up to Egypt & Greece, by the time the Kannauj triangle period ends, major Indian powers like the Chahamanas, Gahadvalas, etc. have ZERO knowledge of whats going on at the other side of the Khyber pass, being continuously caught by surprise and reacting to the incursions.

Warfare of this period also became a sanitised 'shuddh dharmic war' more for ego tussles on who is the greater yoddha, rather than the cold & calculated expansion of empires to control resources & access for one's people.


All this culminates at the time of Ghazni-Ghori, where if you read the accounts, you'd see how far Indians had regressed in their ability for war : gone was the technological supremacy of the Indian metallurgists who'd crafted the Meharauli pillars - The Kabul Shahi & Prithviraj didn't even have iron stirrups, they used wooden ones ( many of which broke in the case of Kabul shah's mad dash up the mountain to corner Mehmoud of Ghazni).
Gone were the elaborate tactics of warfare you see in arthashastra and instead you have the retarded full frontal charges of Prithviraj or Rana Sanga. Gone were the 'we fight to win at any cost' mentality and instead copes like 'we fought honourably but they attacked at night !' .

 

[GaudaNaresh]

The mitanni. IIRC they had kings named Bharataratna, Tushratta, Kirti, etc. They dominated the fertile cresant from 1600-1400 BCE IIRC, with their capital being named Vasukhani ( mine of the vasus). I don't find it a coincidence at all that the mitanni show up from the east, find a home in the fertile crescant just west of Assyria ( they were situated in what is northern syria/southern turkey today), barely 200 years after the end of the Indus Valley Civilisation's high phase.

 

[Pythonlover]

Warfare of this period also became a sanitised 'shuddh dharmic war' more for ego tussles on who is the greater yoddha, rather than the cold & calculated expansion of empires to control resources & access for one's people.


All this culminates at the time of Ghazni-Ghori, where if you read the accounts, you'd see how far Indians had regressed in their ability for war : gone was the technological supremacy of the Indian metallurgists who'd crafted the Meharauli pillars - The Kabul Shahi & Prithviraj didn't even have iron stirrups, they used wooden ones ( many of which broke in the case of Kabul shah's mad dash up the mountain to corner Mehmoud of Ghazni).
Gone were the elaborate tactics of warfare you see in arthashastra and instead you have the retarded full frontal charges of Prithviraj or Rana Sanga. Gone were the 'we fight to win at any cost' mentality and instead copes like 'we fought honourably but they attacked at night !' .

I cannot describe how much this part hurts to read. Really, 'we fought honourably' is useless. The winner takes all the spoils and glory. You lie dead with honour if you are defeated. Ghori won, changed the history of subcontinent and Dharmic religions. As is @Vinash 's tag: "Might is above right. Right is in the hands of the strong. Everything is pure that comes from the strong ---- Mahabharata". Heck, lack of political foresight of Indian rulers is so frustrating to read. After the 1st battle of Tarain, while Ghori rebuilt and improved his army, Prithviraj did not even try to expel the Afghans beyond Khyber pass. Punjab was still in Afghan control, from where the second attack was launched.

But I have two queries from you. One is we had concept of honour in warfare since Mahabharata and Ramayana period. Why were earlier ancient and classical empires not affected by it and why did that "wokeness" come to us in early medieval period?

Second query is that I want to learn history. I have an aim of completing all of RC Majumdar's volumes. If you have any recommendation in this regard, please tell me.

 

[GaudaNaresh]

I cannot describe how much this part hurts to read. Really, 'we fought honourably' is useless. The winner takes all the spoils and glory. You lie dead with honour if you are defeated. Ghori won, changed the history of subcontinent and Dharmic religions. As is @Vinash 's tag: "Might is above right. Right is in the hands of the strong. Everything is pure that comes from the strong ---- Mahabharata". Heck, lack of political foresight of Indian rulers is so frustrating to read. After the 1st battle of Tarain, while Ghori rebuilt and improved his army, Prithviraj did not even try to expel the Afghans beyond Khyber pass. Punjab was still in Afghan control, from where the second attack was launched.

But I have two queries from you. One is we had concept of honour in warfare since Mahabharata and Ramayana period. Why were earlier ancient and classical empires not affected by it and why did that "wokeness" come to us in early medieval period?

Second query is that I want to learn history. I have an aim of completing all of RC Majumdar's volumes. If you have any recommendation in this regard, please tell me.

Societies often get into purity spirals, that often puts practicality second to ideology. Golden age India ( 600s BCE-600s CE) was a period where orthodoxy competed with innovation ( in ideology as well as technology), yeilding stunning developments in metallurgy, architecture, linguistics, mathematics, astronomy, etc.
Post Gupta period India became a land of competing orthodoxy - how to be nicer, purer, etc and spawned one million different versions of orthodoxy in buddhism & hinduism.
My take, is that just like postmodernism is infecting western academia and destroying its objectivity & scientific basis to fit into the new doctrine of relativistic postmodernism, Indian intelligensia also underwent this phenomena in the guise of tantra (tantric buddhism, aka vajrayana and tantric hinduism for eg), where objective empiricism was put aside for ideological semantics.

There could've been societal reactions to the Hunnic invasions, which were the first of its kind in Indian history - up to that point, any and all invasions of India- such as by the Sakhamani Parthavas ( known as the Achaemenid Persians), to Shakas, Tukharas ( Kushans), etc. were interested in controlling the vastly rich Indian lands and its cities.
Huns on the other hand, razed everything to the ground, burning & looting everything in sight. Perhaps that had an impact in changing mentalities and Indian civilisation taking a deeply seclusionary & introverted take - much like what happened to Japan after the Mongol invasions.

As for your question- RC Majumdar isnt the worst of Indian historians like Ramachandra Guha, but he is an aryanist, with a very westernised take on Indian history.
How to study history- this i cannot tell you, but what i can tell you, is that standard study of history is very topical and often misses the forest for the trees. It focuses too much on dynasties and wars, far less on the societal impacts, sociological changes and the interconnectivity of cultures.
I started my history quest as an 18 year old engineering student with a deep interest in numismatics - that is the study of coins.
Through it, i learned of things that i didn't via standard history books ( for eg, Charlesmagne's coins had their gold mined in Russia for eg. Romans often made their gladius from iron mined in India, etc).

I would recommend the axiom of not seeing history as 'isolated' into 'indian history, european history,chinese history' etc. but realising that history is connected.
For eg, why did the great migrations of the Huns, Shakas, Tukharas, etc suddenly start around 200 BCE ? Why didnt these streaming central asian nomads show up around the time of buddha ?
Its because around 225 BCE, China was united by Shih Huang Di, their first real emperor. Who amongst other things, finally connected the major fortifications of northern Chinese cities into a continuous structure, aka the great wall. This meant that nomadic bands of raiders who for a millenia did raids on northern chinese villages could no longer just get together 50 guys on a horse, ride for a day and loot a village. Now, you had to organise into bigger polities, bigger groups-thus arose the Chanyus, followed by the Khagans ( Khans). And when China was strong, they'd prey on each other and the losing group got pushed out- thus began the great migrations, which ultimately ended up in India or rome.

 

[Swesh]

Armenia in talks to join Chabahar Port for India access

chabahar port: Armenia in talks to join Chabahar port for India access - The Economic Times

"The Armenian delegation recently participated in a high-level meeting in Mumbai on Chabahar Port utilisation," Safaryan said. "We are in talks to join the port and hope that the connectivity between the Chabahar Port and INSTC is completed soon. There are indications that this link will be...

m.economictimes.com

 

[Concard]

Societies often get into purity spirals, that often puts practicality second to ideology. Golden age India ( 600s BCE-600s CE) was a period where orthodoxy competed with innovation ( in ideology as well as technology), yeilding stunning developments in metallurgy, architecture, linguistics, mathematics, astronomy, etc.
Post Gupta period India became a land of competing orthodoxy - how to be nicer, purer, etc and spawned one million different versions of orthodoxy in buddhism & hinduism.
My take, is that just like postmodernism is infecting western academia and destroying its objectivity & scientific basis to fit into the new doctrine of relativistic postmodernism, Indian intelligensia also underwent this phenomena in the guise of tantra (tantric buddhism, aka vajrayana and tantric hinduism for eg), where objective empiricism was put aside for ideological semantics.

There could've been societal reactions to the Hunnic invasions, which were the first of its kind in Indian history - up to that point, any and all invasions of India- such as by the Sakhamani Parthavas ( known as the Achaemenid Persians), to Shakas, Tukharas ( Kushans), etc. were interested in controlling the vastly rich Indian lands and its cities.
Huns on the other hand, razed everything to the ground, burning & looting everything in sight. Perhaps that had an impact in changing mentalities and Indian civilisation taking a deeply seclusionary & introverted take - much like what happened to Japan after the Mongol invasions.

As for your question- RC Majumdar isnt the worst of Indian historians like Ramachandra Guha, but he is an aryanist, with a very westernised take on Indian history.
How to study history- this i cannot tell you, but what i can tell you, is that standard study of history is very topical and often misses the forest for the trees. It focuses too much on dynasties and wars, far less on the societal impacts, sociological changes and the interconnectivity of cultures.
I started my history quest as an 18 year old engineering student with a deep interest in numismatics - that is the study of coins.
Through it, i learned of things that i didn't via standard history books ( for eg, Charlesmagne's coins had their gold mined in Russia for eg. Romans often made their gladius from iron mined in India, etc).

I would recommend the axiom of not seeing history as 'isolated' into 'indian history, european history,chinese history' etc. but realising that history is connected.
For eg, why did the great migrations of the Huns, Shakas, Tukharas, etc suddenly start around 200 BCE ? Why didnt these streaming central asian nomads show up around the time of buddha ?
Its because around 225 BCE, China was united by Shih Huang Di, their first real emperor. Who amongst other things, finally connected the major fortifications of northern Chinese cities into a continuous structure, aka the great wall. This meant that nomadic bands of raiders who for a millenia did raids on northern chinese villages could no longer just get together 50 guys on a horse, ride for a day and loot a village. Now, you had to organise into bigger polities, bigger groups-thus arose the Chanyus, followed by the Khagans ( Khans). And when China was strong, they'd prey on each other and the losing group got pushed out- thus began the great migrations, which ultimately ended up in India or rome.

Fascinating read, this and the previous comment too. Never thought of historical events this way. I hope you write more about history here. Lot to learn.

 

[Azaad]

The History of Zoroastrians after Arab Invasion; Alien in Their Homeland

This is only a fraction of what actually happened to the Zoroastrians after the Arab invasion. The purpose of the presentation is not to generate hard feeling toward any people. Because no generation is responsible for the actions of past generations, although almost always they are unfairly...

www.cais-soas.com

 

[dfcool]

Facts from post independence 1947-2014

Thread.

 

[Azaad]

 

[Azaad]

 

[Azaad]

 

[Roshan]

Societies often get into purity spirals, that often puts practicality second to ideology. Golden age India ( 600s BCE-600s CE) was a period where orthodoxy competed with innovation ( in ideology as well as technology), yeilding stunning developments in metallurgy, architecture, linguistics, mathematics, astronomy, etc.
Post Gupta period India became a land of competing orthodoxy - how to be nicer, purer, etc and spawned one million different versions of orthodoxy in buddhism & hinduism.
My take, is that just like postmodernism is infecting western academia and destroying its objectivity & scientific basis to fit into the new doctrine of relativistic postmodernism, Indian intelligensia also underwent this phenomena in the guise of tantra (tantric buddhism, aka vajrayana and tantric hinduism for eg), where objective empiricism was put aside for ideological semantics.

There could've been societal reactions to the Hunnic invasions, which were the first of its kind in Indian history - up to that point, any and all invasions of India- such as by the Sakhamani Parthavas ( known as the Achaemenid Persians), to Shakas, Tukharas ( Kushans), etc. were interested in controlling the vastly rich Indian lands and its cities.
Huns on the other hand, razed everything to the ground, burning & looting everything in sight. Perhaps that had an impact in changing mentalities and Indian civilisation taking a deeply seclusionary & introverted take - much like what happened to Japan after the Mongol invasions.

As for your question- RC Majumdar isnt the worst of Indian historians like Ramachandra Guha, but he is an aryanist, with a very westernised take on Indian history.
How to study history- this i cannot tell you, but what i can tell you, is that standard study of history is very topical and often misses the forest for the trees. It focuses too much on dynasties and wars, far less on the societal impacts, sociological changes and the interconnectivity of cultures.
I started my history quest as an 18 year old engineering student with a deep interest in numismatics - that is the study of coins.
Through it, i learned of things that i didn't via standard history books ( for eg, Charlesmagne's coins had their gold mined in Russia for eg. Romans often made their gladius from iron mined in India, etc).

I would recommend the axiom of not seeing history as 'isolated' into 'indian history, european history,chinese history' etc. but realising that history is connected.
For eg, why did the great migrations of the Huns, Shakas, Tukharas, etc suddenly start around 200 BCE ? Why didnt these streaming central asian nomads show up around the time of buddha ?
Its because around 225 BCE, China was united by Shih Huang Di, their first real emperor. Who amongst other things, finally connected the major fortifications of northern Chinese cities into a continuous structure, aka the great wall. This meant that nomadic bands of raiders who for a millenia did raids on northern chinese villages could no longer just get together 50 guys on a horse, ride for a day and loot a village. Now, you had to organise into bigger polities, bigger groups-thus arose the Chanyus, followed by the Khagans ( Khans). And when China was strong, they'd prey on each other and the losing group got pushed out- thus began the great migrations, which ultimately ended up in India or rome.

What language did Indians use to communicate among themselves before Hindi and vernacular languages in their modern form were properly developed? That Mukesh Khanna episode with Chandraprakash Dwivedi of Chanakya fame got me thinking where they had a long discussion about Sanskrit and Hindi.

 

[shade]

What language did Indians use to communicate among themselves before Hindi and vernacular languages in their modern form were properly developed? That Mukesh Khanna episode with Chandraprakash Dwivedi of Chanakya fame got me thinking where they had a long discussion about Sanskrit and Hindi.

Elites probably used Sanskrit ofc? like say for diplomatic or religious communications between different kingdoms.

Don't think back in the day there was "migrate to different city for job" like there is today so pleb-to-pleb communications were non-existent beyond some traders who picked up the local language