The Penguin History Of Early: From The O

This is a useful and important overview of India's ancient past. Thapar takes us through some 4000 years of Indian history, from the founding of the Indus Valley civilization to the era prior to the Delhi Sultanate.She presents a more nuanced periodization of Indian history than the usual Hindu-Islamic-British version that most Indians are familiar with. She writes from what I suppose is a "Marxist" perspective, spending considerable time on social and economic processes, class stratification, and agrarian relations (admittedly, I found my eyes glazing over these portions). Her discussions on the symbiotic relationship between the priestly and ruling classes in India are enlightening, though I can see why it might make those of a Hindu nationalist bent uneasy. I was particularly pleased to see South India receive its just share in her narrative.Romila Thapar seems especially anxious to counter the Hindu nationalist vision that is currently prevalent in the country. She takes great pains to portray Indian society as a mixture of both native and foreign cultural streams and to explain how the Islamic attacks were only part of a long series of mutual aggressions by political actors in the region. She makes a well-intentioned attempt to downplay the religious aspect of the Islamic invasions of India toward the beginning of the second millennium AD, but it would behoove us to approach this part of the book with some skepticism.I don't want to comment on what seems to be her political project, but I will note that while Hindu nationalism falls short of being a rational narrative for what our country is, as a pragmatic matter, we do need such a national narrative in order to act coherently as a people. I will be scouting her other books to see whether she has addressed this aspect elsewhere. She clearly has the right credentials for the job and, might I add, the right taste as well.

Very good book for a person who want to know about early India without and color glass on eyes. Facts are logical and based on well researched accepted opinions of historians.

If Harappan times interests you then this one's for you.The book is painstakingly well documented and researched.Packed with info. every page is loaded with facts;sometimes some really amazing ones.Life as it was then is indeed a fascinating read.But be warned the narrative isn't conversational so it takes long to move.The language however is quite simple so absorbing the treasure trove of data isn't difficult.Enthsiasts of ancient history,especially students,would perhaps consider the book a must have.

An amazing mind boggling read

Very well researched work. Thorough and easily comprehensible.

The font of the book is too small and the quality of the paper is not as expected.

A must read book for history enthusiasts

Its is not like printed copied book . It is seems like original although pages are little yellow (even when a book i purchased online line that have same paper quality )but you can read it easily ..go for it you can buy .

Great book from an amazing author and academic, a bit of a long read, however I would suggest it to anyone interested in South Asian history.

Romila Thapar is a prolific historian of Ancient India, and this sprawling book is her attempt to re-write Indian history through the lens of a modified Marxist perspective, drawing from archaeology and historical sources to shape her narrative.My interest stems mostly from the archaeological perspective. It is disappointing to see Thapar use and misuse archaeological data to fit her narrative. One of her claims is that the identity/location of the vanished Sarasvati River of Rig Veda fame is 'controversial'. Actually it's not controversial at all. Even at the time of writing it had already been identified (for decades) as the present day Ghaggar-Hakra River. Equally dubious is her claim that horses and chariots were mostly unknown during Harrapan times. She states that the clearly identifiable bones of a horse dating from that period are somehow problematic. Clearly identified is not problematic(!) Yet only a few years ago an entire chariot was discovered which blew away the myth that horses and chariots were unknown in Ancient India.I had no firm opinion of Thapar going into this book, though she is highly controversial and negatively regarded by many in India; and there are no shortage of rebuttals to her leftist narrative in general, and specific points of archaeology in particular. Conversely, she is often held in higher esteem abroad. I sense her opponents are not just being 'political' when they highlight her obvious lapses in judgement and blinkered conclusions.This is only a three star ranking from me. Quite apart from her own self-made controversies, her lapidary prose (though packed with information) is lifeless, and often repetitive. For a better authority on Indian archaeology and history, I can recommend the doubly qualified historian & archaeologist NAYANJOT LAHIRI, whose books are totally grounded in the evidence and data, and who is not prone to wilful omissions or making political points. At the very least, Lahiri is an engaging and livelier writer who will not bore you with leaden and repetitive prose.

this is best history book I have read about ancient India. It is written with facts and can be believed.

1950s McCarthy-ism in India?I am not Indian and I have no political agenda. I am a student of Sanskrit and the Sanskrit texts. Even though I am well aware of India's sufferings and very sympathetic to her, I do recommend that you read Romila Thapar for a balance in perspective. In many ways India will always remain an enigma, but as a veritable treasury of superb metaphysics, literature, music, and art, India is in my view unparalleled. The creativity of the Indian people, their sheer capacity for endurance and wisdom is awesome.In my endless search to understand India I came across the lady historian, Romila Thapar. Thapar is highly respected by some and vilified by others. I want to share what I found with those who - like me - might not be aware. Frankly, when I first began reading her `Early India, From the Origins to AD 1300' my feeling was that she was a bit dry, western oriented, and tedious. Where was all the magic and mysticism I had loved in Alain Danielou's `A Brief History of India'? Then thanks to the Internet, I realized that Romila Thapar had made some serious enemies. This led me to further investigate and to learn why such a respected historian would elicit such vehemence.Romila Thapar [born 1931], Professor Emeritus in History at the Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, does not believe that history should be used as a political weapon and is against what she terms a 'communal interpretation' of Indian history that chooses facts through an extremely selective partisan filter. Again, I am not Indian and have no cultural bias, no political agenda, and no vested interest in Indian politics.Thapar has a way of describing history that is very broad, encompassing many perspectives, more cleanly an overview abstraction, and perhaps beyond many. She accepts that history will never be fact because what has been written is always from a multiplicity of writers who are saying different things. She compares this to the 1950 Japanese film 'Rashoman' that tells the story of a murder from the four witnesses, including the dead. The film reveals how life is experienced so completely and amazingly from our totally different perceptions. We all live in our own holograms. For Thapar there is no linkage between 'belief' and history; and history will never arrive at any absolute truth, but is an attempt to analyze evidence to find what may have occurred.McCarthyism in IndiaAfter a bit of research I found an illuminating article entitled 'Hating Romila Thapar' from the magazine HIMAL, June 2003. Thapar is described as: "...an historian who is indefatigable in the pursuit of knowledge and prolific in its publication, and who is above all a devoted partisan of the truth..." - Oxford University to Romila Thapar while conferring on her an honorary Doctorate of Letters, 2002.Excerpted from HIMAL: "Thapar's academic work is controversial with the Hindutva lobby because it is grounded in professional methods of historical investigation, rather than in the pet historical theories of Hindu extremists relying on extrapolation from Sanskrit texts. The disagreement may appear academic in nature but the controversy around her appointment speaks to a larger cultural project being advanced under the guise of anti-communism. While it is true that Thapar makes use of some Marxist categories of historiography, unremarkable in itself given the strong Marxist tradition in professional Indian history writing, her opponents' objections are essentially political rather than academic. Thapar's documentation of early Indian life is at odds with Hindutva preference, grounded in a regressive Hindu orthodoxy, of seeing India as a purely Hindu civilisation, the political implications of which for contemporary India being obvious."Excerpt: "The campaign [against Romila Thapar] represents the rebirth of McCarthism... [the] reference to McCarthyism is fitting - the Wisconsin conservative denigrated his political and ideological opponents by drawing on a deep-seated religious suspicion of left-wing ideologies, and advanced a powerful, dangerous cocktail of American nationalism grounded in so-called Christian values and unquestioning support for the nation and its political institutions."Excerpt: "The matrix of political conditions in 1950s America and present-day India (and the outlook of many in the Indian diaspora) is similar. Hindu nationalists, both in India and abroad, are sensitive to India's position in the world and see themselves as fierce defenders of the Indian nation against `dangerous' elements, typically constructed as Muslim and also at times as communist/Marxist. McCarthyism and the anti-Thapar campaign are both built on a populist politics of denunciation, of collecting a supposedly monolithic people against a hostile force."In 1954, in a move strikingly similar to the history book shenanigans in India today, the US Congress inserted two words into the `Pledge of Allegiance' recited every morning by American schoolchildren - '...one nation, under God, with liberty and justice for all', so that the pledge would differ from similar statements of loyalty in the Soviet Union that express no divine connection. The insertion in the US pledge is mild in comparison to the broader ideological project of Hindutva, but it rests on a similar assumption, that religion can be used to buttress state-inspired formation of identity. Unlike many of McCarthy's targets, Thapar will not fall victim to the ongoing assault. Tragically, though, the ambitious designs of the Hindutva brigade are already being realised in part throughout India."The mechanics of propaganda in the west are better understood by many of us these days - and revealed in the book, "Taking the Risk out of Democracy: Corporate Propaganda versus Freedom and Liberty" by Alex Carey (1996). [available on amazon]. There are some very interesting points of evidence on proganda in Romila Thapar's books. It hasn't only been the Jesuits and their Inquisition, and more recently the manipulative monopoly media, which managed to disempower and bewilder people. Considering propaganda as the tool of political agendas, we may see more clearly what Romila Thapar describes as the place of language and literature in India in the 11th century:"The more extensive use of Sanskrit coincided with educated brahmans seeking employment and migrating to various parts of the subcontinent. Where they were successful they were given employment and a grant of land. ... The Sanskrit section of the grant therefore had a political agenda, publicizing royal authority and legitimizing the titles and status of the king, along with his connections to ancient heroes and earlier rulers. The capturing of history became significant. By appropriating the compositions of the suta or bard - the traditional keepers of history - and editing these in a new format, the authors of the texts could control the use of the past and thereby the status of the rulers. The PURANAS, claiming to record the past, were now authored by brahmans and written in Sanskrit, although there was often a pretense that they were still being recited by the bard who was placed formally in the role of the original composer. The audience for this political agenda was the world of kings and courts."The meaning is clear that these educated brahmans were given employment and land grants in exchange for skewing the written word to support the right of rule and power, which in our time is called propaganda. Thapar is worth reading - while we are still free to do so. Also do watch the BBC Hardtalk India interview with Romila Thapar available on YouTube.

A very exceptional, thoughtful, insight into the history of human settlement in mother India. A concise work that puts to shame the Indian history written by colonists and some modern western historians. A beautiful piece of work.