1. They celebrated navaratnas like Kalidasa, Amarasimha, Visakadatta and Dhanvantri.
2. Kalidasa's famous dramas are Sakunthalam, Malavikagnimitram and Vikramaurvashiyam.
3. The works of Sudraka (Mrichchhakatika), Visakhadatta (Mudraraksasa and Devichandraguptam).

Perhaps the most detailed account of the administration is to be found in the Arthasastra (though the work itself is now dated to a few centuries later). However, it must be remembered that the Arthasastra was a prescriptive text, which laid down the guidelines for good administration. If we add to this the information from Ashoka's edicts and the work of Megasthenes, we get a more comprehensive picture of the Mauryan state as it was.

• Surat continued to suffer due to the uncertain political conditions, and by 1750, the local merchants had begun to declare themselves to be "under the protection" of the Dutch or the English in order to feel more secure.
• Bombay therefore became a viable alternative as a trade centre, attracting merchants from Surat and other parts of Gujarat

• The Mysore king Chamaraj IX died in 1796. Tipu resolved not to observe the formality of appointing a king.
• Synchronizing with this resolve came the announcement of the French colonial governor of Mauritius General Malartic that, after obtaining French help, he would declare war on the English.
• In July 1798 Tipu's correspondence with the French Directory and later with Napoleon and his evasiveness in his correspondence with Wellesley led to his declaration of war against Tipu

The Vijayanagar kingdom was successively ruled by four dynasties over a period of more than three hundred years:
1. The Sangama dynasty (1336-1485),
2. The Saluva dynasty (1485-1505),
3. The Tuluva dynasty (1505-1570) and
4. The Aravidu dynasty (1570-1650).

(a) Physical features and Nature of the People
The region of the Marathas consisted of a narrow strip of land called Konkan. Its precipitous mountains, inaccessible valleys and impregnable hill-forts were most favourable for military defence.
(b) Bhakti Movement and its Impact
The spread of the Bhakti movement inculcated the spirit of oneness among the Marathas. Tukaram, Ramdas, and Eknath were the leading lights of the movement.
(c) External causes
The degeneration of Bijapur and Golkonda prompted the Marathas to unite and fight together.
The Deccan wars against the Sultans of Bijapur, Golkonda and Ahmednagar had exhausted the Mughal treasury

Pindaris:
1. Pindaris were freebooters composed of both Muslim and Hindu bands.
2. The Subsidiary Alliance of the Company had led to the disbandment of thousands of soldiers and most of them joined them and swelled their numbers in central India.
3. The British proclaimed Pindari War.
Thuggees:
1. The Thugs were robbers operating between Delhi and Agra from the fourteenth century.
2. They were bound together by oaths and ritual and murdered unsuspecting travellers in the name of the goddess Kali.
3. Bentinck placed William Sleeman in charge of the operation to eliminate the Thuggee menace.
4. Between 1831 and 1837 more than three thousand Thugs were convicted.

• The most famous among his disciples was a young graduate of the Calcutta University named Narendranath Dutta, afterward famously called Swami Vivekananda( 1863-1902).
• Emphasising practical work over philosophizing he established the modem institution of the Ramakrishna Mission.
• He carried Ramakrishna's message allover India and the world.
• His learning, eloquence, spiritual fervour and personality gathered round him a band of followers across the country, many of whom also joined the national movement.

1. Jainism was patronised by later rulers such as Amoghavarsha I, Indra IV, Krishna II and Indra III.
2. Buddhism had declined and its only important centre was at Kanheri. The Rashtrakuta rulers were great patrons of learning.
3. Kannada and Sanskrit literature made great progress during their reign. Amoghavarsha I was the author of Prasnottaramalika, a Sanskrit work, and Kavirajarnarga, a Kannada work.
4. Jinasena wrote the Adipurana of the Jains.
5. Krishna II's spiritual guide, Gunabhadra, wrote the Mahapurana of the Jains.
6. The three gems of ancient Kannada literature - Kavichakravarthi Ponna, Adikavi Panpa and Kavichakravarti Ranna - were patronised by Rashtrkuta king Krishna III, as well as by Tailapa and Satyashraya of Western Chalukyas.

1. The Rig Veda refers to Arya varna and Dasa varna. The Dasas and Dasyus were conquered and treated as slaves
2. Social classes were classified as warriors, priests and common people. Sudras as a category of people appeared at the end of the Rig Vedic period.

1. Land grants recorded mainly on copperplates provide detailed information on land revenues and taxation.
2. Revenue came almost exclusively from rural sources, mercantile and urban institutions being largel unplanned.
3. Two categories of taxes were levied on the village.
4. The land revenue paid by the cultivator to the state varied from 1/6th to 1/10th of the produce, and was collected by the village and paid to the state collector.
5. In the second category were local taxes, also collected in the village but utilized for services in the village itself.
6. The tax money was spent for repairing irrigation works, illuminating the temple, etc.
7. When the state land tax was inadequate, the revenue was supplemented by additional taxes on draught cattle, toddy-drawers, marriage- parties, potters, goldsmiths, washer men, textile-manufacturers, weavers, brokers, letter-carriers, and the makers of ghee.

First Mysore War (1767-69)
• In the third Carnatic War Colonel Forde while conducting the forces from Bengal captured Masulipatnamm in 1759.
• This led to a treaty with Salabad Jung, who ceded the Northern Sarkars to the British (districts of Ganjam, Vizagapatnam, Godavari, Krishna and Guntur).
• English acquisition of the Northern Sarkars was legalized by a Mughal emperor in 1765 by the treaty of Allahabad. In 1766, trouble arose when the English occupied those districts.
• Yet a treaty was signed with Nizam Ali who acquiesced in the session. In return the English promised to help out in case of any danger from the enemies.
• This promise meant English help to the Nizam against Haider Ali. Here lay the genesis of the later Subsidiary System.
• Despite the treaty, Nizam came to an understanding with Haider in 1767 and the British therefore declared a war against Haider.
• This is called First Anglo- Mysore War or First Mysore War.

Naoroji argued that a great deal of wealth was drained to England in the form of Home Charges. The following constituted the Home Charges:
1. Incentive to the shareholders of the Company
2. Savings and the salaries of European officials, European traders and Planters remitted to England.
3. Pensions to those who retired from civil and military services.
4. The salaries of the staff and the Secretary to Home Government, India Office at London
5. Expenses on wars fought in India and interests for the loans obtained from the banks for the conduct of wars and for the building of railroads.

The Amatya or finance minister checked and countersigned all public accounts of the kingdom
The Walkia-Nawis or Mantrimaintained the records of the king's activities and the proceedings in the court.
Summant or Dabir or foreign secretary was to advise king on all matters of war and peace and to receive ambassadors and envoys from other countries.
Sachiv or Shuru Nawis or home secretary was to look after the correspondence of the king with the power to revise the drafts. He also checked the accounts of the Parganas.
Pandit Rao or Danadhyaksha or Sadar and Muhtasib or ecclesiastical head was in charge of religion, ceremonies and charities. He was the judge of canon law and censor of public morals.
Nyayadhish or chief justice was responsible for civil and military justice
Sari Naubat or commander-in-chief was in charge of recruitment, organization and discipline of the Army.

1. Sur Das lived at the court of Akbar and was popularly known as the blind bard of Agra.
2. Sur Das is believed to have been a disciple of Vallabacharya who was a Vaishnava preacher in the Sultanate period.
3. Vallabhacharya was the founder of Pushtimarga (way of grace). Sur Daspreached religion of love and devotion to a personal God.
4. He wrote inspiring and moving poems, Hindi poems about Lord Krishna. Krishna's bal lila constitutes the first great theme of Sur Das poetry.
5. According to him, love is a sublimated theme representing the irresistible attraction of the gopis of Brindavan towards Krishna.
6. The intensity of passion displayed by the gopis is an expression of the natural attraction of the human spirit towards the divine soul. His popular works are Sur Sagar, Sur Saravali and Sahitya Lehari.
7. His monumental work Sur Sagar or Sur's Ocean is a story of Lord Krishna from the birth to the departure for Mathura.

The Social Reform Movement in Tamilnadu
The reform movements of the north India had its own impact on Tamilnadu. Brahmo Samaj and Arya Samaj had their branches. Keshab Chandra Sen visited Madras and lectured here. But Tamilnadu also saw its own reform movements.
The Sri Vaikunda Swamigal:
• The Sri Vaikunda Swamigal's cult, which survives to this day, was organized in the 1830s. Born in a poor family (1809) at Sastankoil Vilai (now known as Swamithoppu), a village then in south Travancore (the present day Kanyakumari district), Muthukutti, spent his childhood in the village pial school, learning religious and moral texts.
• He also learnt the Bible and became well-versed in Christian theology.
Ramalinga Swamigal :
• Ramalinga Swamigal was born in a modest family near Chidambaram and spent his early life in Madras.
• He never had formal schooling, but exhibited great scholarship.
• Inspired by the Saiva Thevaram and Thiruvasagam hymns, he began to compose moving poems on his own.
• In his time, Saiva religion was in the grip of Saiva monasteries such as those at Thiruvaduthurai, Dharumapuram and Thiruppanandal.
Buddhist Revivalism and Iyotheethoss Pandithar
• Buddhismhad been practically wiped out in the Tamil country by the beginning of the second millennium. Towards the end of the nineteenth century, there was a revival of Buddhism. The publication of the complete edition of Jeevaka Chintamani (1887) and Manimekalai (1898) were landmarks in the recovery of heterodox traditions.
• But the most important figure was Iyotheethoss Pandithar (1845-1914). A native doctor by profession, he was an erudite scholar. He also came under the influence of Colonel Olcott of the Theosophical Society.
• In the 1890s he began a movement among the Adi Dravidars arguing that they were the original Buddhists who had been consigned to 'untouchability' due to their opposition to Vedic Brahminism.
• He re-read classical Tamil and other texts to make his case. He also encouraged the conversion to Buddhism. He found the greatest following in north Tamilnadu and among the working classes of the Kolar Gold Fields.
• In this movement, M. Singavelu and Prof P. Lakshmi Narasu also played an important role. Pandithar ran a weekly journal called Oru Paisa Tamilan (later Tamilan) from 1908 until his death.

Economy:
1. The Mughal economy was a forest-based agricultural economy.
2. The forests provided the raw materials for the craftsmen.
3. Timber went to carpenters, wood carvers and shipwrights, lacquerware makers; wild silk to reelers and weavers; charcoal to iron miners and metal smiths. .
4. Hence the relationship between manufacturing and the forest was very close.
Trade and commerce:
1. The political integration of the country with efficient maintenance of law and order ensured brisk trade and commerce.
2. The surplus was carried to different parts of the country through rivers, and through the roads on ox and camel drawn carts. Banjaras were specialised traders who carried goods in a large bulk over long distances.
3. Bengal was the chief exporting centre of rice, sugar, muslin, silk and food grains.
4. The Coromandel coast was reputed for its textile production. Kashmiri shawls and carpets were distributed from Lahore which was an important centre of handicraft production.
5. The movement of goods was facilitated by letters of credit called hundi.
6. The network of sarais enabled the traders and merchants to travel to various places.
7. The traders came from all religious communities: Hindus, Muslims and Jains. The Bohra Muslims of Gujarat, Marwaris of Rajasthan, Chettiars on Coromandel coast, and Muslims of Malabar were prominent trading communities.

1. Chola temples became the arena of social celebrations and functioned as social institutions. They became the hub of societal space in organising social, political, economic and cultural activities.
2. The prime temple officials were koyirramar, koyilkanakku (temple accountant), deva- kanmi (agent of god), srivaisnavar, cantesar (temple manager) and others.
3. They promoted the development of learning, dance, music, painting and drama. A play called Rajarajanatakam, based on the life of Rajaraja I, was performed in the Thanjavur temple.
4. The festivals of ChithiraiTiruvizha, Kartigai and Aippasivizha were celebrated. It is said that singing hymns in temple premises promoted oral literacy.
5. Traditional dance items like kudak-kuthu and sakkaik-kuthu were portrayed in the form of sculptures and paintings in the temples in Kilapalivur, Tiruvorriyur.
6. Nirutya and kama poses are shown in sculptural forms in the Thanjavur big temple. Traditional Tamil musical instruments also were portrayed in this way.
7. Temples functioned as banks by advancing loans and by purchasing and receiving endowments and donations.
8. They also became educational centres as training was imparted in Vedas, music and the arts. Sculpture and metal work too were promoted. Temple accounts were audited and the auditor was called koyilkanakku.

1. The geographical location of Arabia facilitated trade contact between India and Arabia. As sea-faring traders the pre-Islamic Arabs had maritime contacts with the western and eastern coasts of India.
2. While there were south Indian settlements in the Persian Gulf, Arabs too settled in Malabar and the Coromandel Coast.
3. Arabs who married Malabar women and settled down on the West Coast were called Mappillais (sons-in-law).
4. Arab military expedition in 712 and subsequent Ghaznavid and the Ghori military raids, intended to loot and use the resources seized to strengthen their power in Central Asia, created a relationship of the conqueror and the conquered .
5. Following the invasion of Afghanistan by Khurasan (Eastern Iran) Shah and later by Chengiz Khan severed the ties of North India Sultanate with Afghanistan.
6. Mongol invasions destroyed the Ghurid Sulatanate and Ghazni, and cut into the resources of Sultan Nasir-ud-din Qubacha (1206-1228), the ruler of Uchch and Multan.
7. Thus the Sultan Iltutmish had the opportunity of expanding his influence in northern India that enabled Muslim rulers to rule Indian provinces with Delhi as capital for about four centuries.
8. The Sultanate (1206-1526) itself was not homogenous. Its rulers belonged to five distinct categories: (a) Slave Dynasty (1206-1290) (b) Khalji Dynasty (1290-1320) (c) Tughlaq Dynasty (l320-1414) (d) Sayyid Dynasty (1414-1451) and (e) LodiDynasty (1451-1526).

1. The Palas were great patrons of Mahayana Buddhism.
2. The Buddhist philosopher Haribhadra was the spiritual preceptor of Dharmapala, the founder of the Pala kingdom.
3. Bengal remained one of the few places where Buddhist monasteries continued to exist.
4. The kingdom as well as Buddhism soon suffered decline because of large-scale conversion of merchants and artisans to Islam.

1. This regular interchange of ambassadors and correspondence, as well as the extension of the Mauryan Empire till Afghanistan, facilitated regular trade from India to the West as far as Egypt
2. Trade was carried on by the overland route via north-west Afghanistan (Bactria) and also partly by the coastal route along the Persian Gulf and Red Sea.
3. A variety of luxury goods, including ivory, tortoise shell, pearls, indigo and other dyes.
4. aromatic substances like spikenard or nard (a fragrant oil from the Gangetic region) and malabathrum (leaf of cinnamon, used as an aromatic) and rare woods were exported from India.
5. Thus, The rise of Indo-Greek kings in Western India strengthened trade and cultural contacts.

Foreign Notices
The following Greek and Latin sources inform us about the long distance cultural and commercial connections.
1. The Periplus of Erythrean Sea, an ancient Greek text of the first century CE.
2. Pliny the Elder's Natural History, first century CE
3. Ptolemy's Geography, second century CE
4. Vienna Papyrus G 40822, aGreek document datable to the second century CE.
5. A Roman Map called Peutingerian Table

Kacchayana believed that the world was made of seven substances that were unmade, irreducible, uncreated, barren, stable as a mountain peak, standing firm like a pillar that do not alter, do not change, do not interfere with one another, are incapable of causing one another pleasure, pain or both pleasure and pain.The Ajivikas had rich lay disciples such as potters and bankers. The Ajivika sect spread across the length and breadth of the country, though their influence was much less compared to that of Buddhism and Jainism.

The burial system followed by the people of Neolithic period continued into the Megalithic period. A circular tomb using big stone slabs built upon the place of burial is known as a megalith. Such megaliths have been found in many parts of Tamilnadu .
i) The urn burial system was another type of practice and is evidenced in Adichanallur (present Thoothukudi district
ii) Brahmi writing akin to Ashokan Brahmi has been discovered in Kodumanal (Erode District).
iii) Tamil Brahmi inscriptions, datable to third to second centuries BCE found in the upper part of the Vaigai valley.
iv) Paiyampalli is a village in Tirupathur taluk, Vellore district. Kodumanal, 40 km from Erode, is located on the northern bank of Noyyal river, a tributary of the Cauvery.

The other less prominent regions, the territories of chiefs such as the Irukkuvels, Ilangovels or Mazhavas or Banas were made part of the Chola state and their chiefs were inducted into the state system as its functionaries

The notable Pala texts on philosophy include Agama Shastra by Gaudapada, and Nyaya Kundali by Sridhar Bhatta. Many texts on medicine were compiled by Chakrapani Datta, Sureshwar Gadadhara Vaidya and Jimutavahana.

The major areas of concern for the Mauryan state were the collection of taxes as revenue to the state and the administration of justice, in addition to the maintenance of internal security and defence against external aggression

Neolithic age is the age in which animal and plant domestication developed, leading to food production.

• The Europeans were quite aware of the wealth and power of the Mughals, and English poets even wrote about the fabulous "wealth of India".
• Travellers from all parts of Europe visited India regularly during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
• The journals of their travels present a detailed contemporary account of the empire and society in India.

Three of his battles are important: the 1801 battle on Cauvery banks, the 1802 battle in Odanilai and the 1804 battle in Arachalur. The last and the final one was in 1805. During the final battle, Chinnamalai was betrayed by his cook Chinnamalai and was hanged in Sivagiri fort

1. Hurnayun was deeply engrossed in the affairs of Bahadur Shah.
2. the rebellions of the Gujarati people, Askari decided to proceed to Agra.
3. Sher Khan had strengthened himself by defeating the ruler of Bengal.
4. Sher Khan captured the fort of Rohtas and Bengal.

Keshab Chandra Sen said, 'Our position is not that truths are to be in all religions, but that all established religions of the World are true'

1. The Aihole inscriptions of the Chalukya king Pulakisin II provide details of Pallava Chalukya conflict.
2. The sculptures in the temples in Aihole, Badami, Pattadakal reflect the culture of the times.

1. The origin of Huns is not definitely known. According to Roman historian Tacitus, they were a barbarian tribe living near Caspian Sea and contributed to the fall of Roman Empire.
2. They organised under Attila and were known for their savagery and bestiality in Europe.
3. One branch of Huns, know as white Huns, moved towards India from Central Asia and their invasion began about a hundred years after the Kushanas.