Uncovering the Culture of Ancient India


Book Description

Step back in time to ancient India, where the people’s contributions to art, architecture, religion, and more shaped a unique culture that can still be seen today. This text presents the region’s archaeological finds chronologically, allowing readers to trace the civilization’s development. Readers learn about life in the early Indus Valley through ancient India’s Golden Age of the Gupta period, up until the Muslim Invasion. Detailed photographs of fascinating art, objects, and architecture bring this culture to life, while fact boxes, a timeline, and a simple map encourage readers to visualize the breadth of ancient India’s civilization.




Uncovering the Culture of Ancient India


Book Description

Step back in time to ancient India, where the people’s contributions to art, architecture, religion, and more shaped a unique culture that can still be seen today. This text presents the region’s archaeological finds chronologically, allowing readers to trace the civilization’s development. Readers learn about life in the early Indus Valley through ancient India’s Golden Age of the Gupta period, up until the Muslim Invasion. Detailed photographs of fascinating art, objects, and architecture bring this culture to life, while fact boxes, a timeline, and a simple map encourage readers to visualize the breadth of ancient India’s civilization.




Ancient India


Book Description

The legacy of past civilizations is still with us today. In Ancient India, readers discover the history and impressive accomplishments of the people of ancient India, including their enduring religions and rich literary traditions. Engaging text provides details on the civilization's history, development, daily life, culture, art, technology, warfare, social organization, and more. Well-chosen maps and images of artifacts bring the past to life. Aligned to Common Core Standards and correlated to state standards. Essential Library is an imprint of Abdo Publishing, a division of ABDO.




The Culture and Civilisation of Ancient India in HIstorical Outline


Book Description

First published in 1965, The Culture and Civilisation of Ancient India in Historical Outline is a strikingly original work, the first real cultural history of India. The main features of the Indian character are traced back into remote antiquity as the natural outgrowth of historical process. Did the change from food gathering and the pastoral life to agriculture make new religions necessary? Why did the Indian cities vanish with hardly a trace and leave no memory? Who were the Aryans – if any? Why should Buddhism, Jainism, and so many other sects of the same type come into being at one time and in the same region? How could Buddhism spread over so large a part of Asia while dying out completely in the land of its origin? What caused the rise and collapse of the Magadhan empire; was the Gupta empire fundamentally different from its great predecessor, or just one more ‘oriental despotism’? These are some of the many questions handled with great insight, yet in the simplest terms, in this stimulating work. This book will be of interest to students of history, sociology, archaeology, anthropology, cultural studies, South Asian studies and ethnic studies.




The Culture of Ancient India


Book Description

India has a long history rich in culture. The ancient civilizations of India—the Indus Valley Civilization, the Maurya Empire, and the Gupta Empire—were made up of sophisticated people whose art and lives contributed greatly to future generations. In addition to learning about the culture of ancient India, readers will learn how political and social changes of any region affect its art and culture. Boasting engaging text, rich and colorful illustrations, and an enhanced e-book option, this title is a valuable resource for report research.




The Ancient Indus Valley


Book Description

"Researchers have tentatively reconstructed a model of Indus life from the limited material that remains. Based on important findings from recent surveys and excavations in South Asia and neighboring regions, The Ancient Indus Valley explains what is now known about the Indus civilization's roots in the farming cultures of prehistoric South Asia, as well as the hallmarks of its extraordinary development. It is an eye-opening introduction to a vanished world - and a stirring testament to archaeology's power to recover the past."--BOOK JACKET.




The Past Before Us


Book Description

The claim that India--uniquely among civilizations--lacks historical writing distracts us from a more pertinent question: how to recognize the historical sense of societies whose past is recorded in ways very different from European conventions. Romila Thapar, a distinguished scholar of ancient India, guides us through a panoramic survey of the historical traditions of North India, revealing a deep and sophisticated consciousness of history embedded in the diverse body of classical Indian literature. The history recorded in such texts as the Ramayana and the Mahabharata is less concerned with authenticating persons and events than with presenting a picture of traditions striving to retain legitimacy amid social change. Spanning an epoch from 1000 BCE to 1400 CE, Thapar delineates three strains of historical writing: an Itihasa-Purana tradition of Brahman authors; a tradition composed mainly by Buddhist and Jaina monks and scholars; and a popular bardic tradition. The Vedic corpus, the epics, the Buddhist canon and monastic chronicles, inscriptional evidence, regional accounts, and literary forms such as royal biographies and drama are all scrutinized afresh--not as sources to be mined for factual data but as genres that disclose how Indians of ancient times represented their own past to themselves.




A History of Ancient and Early Medieval India


Book Description

A History of Ancient and Early Medieval India is the most comprehensive textbook yet for undergraduate and postgraduate students. It introduces students to original sources such as ancient texts, artefacts, inscriptions and coins, illustrating how historians construct history on their basis. Its clear and balanced explanation of concepts and historical debates enables students to independently evaluate evidence, arguments and theories. This remarkable textbook allows the reader to visualize and understand the rich and varied remains of India s ancient past, transforming the process of discovering that past into an exciting experience.




Indians


Book Description

What do we really know about the Aryan migration theory and why is that debate so hot? Why did the people of Khajuraho carve erotic scenes on their temple walls? What did the monks at Nalanda eat for dinner? Did our ideals of beauty ever prefer dark skin? Indian civilization is an idea, a reality, an enigma. In this riveting book, Namit Arora takes us on an unforgettable journey through 5000 years of history, reimagining in rich detail the social and cultural moorings of Indians through the ages. Drawing on credible sources, he discovers what inspired and shaped them: their political upheavals and rivalries, customs and vocations, and a variety of unusual festivals. Arora makes a stop at six iconic places -- the Harappan city of Dholavira, the Ikshvaku capital at Nagarjunakonda, the Buddhist centre of learning at Nalanda, enigmatic Khajuraho, Vijayanagar at Hampi, and historic Varanasi -- enlivening the narrative with vivid descriptions, local stories and evocative photographs. Punctuating this are chronicles of famous travellers who visited India -- including Megasthenes, Xuanzang, Alberuni and Marco Polo -- whose dramatic and idiosyncratic tales conceal surprising insights about our land. In lucid, elegant prose, Arora explores the exciting churn of ideas, beliefs and values of our ancestors through millennia -- some continue to shape modern India, while others have been lost forever. An original, deeply engaging and extensively researched work, Indians illuminates a range of histories coursing through our veins.




Uncovering the Culture of Ancient India


Book Description

Describes and depicts antiquities from ancient India up to approximately 1200, including the cave at Bhimbekta, artifacts at Dholavira, and buildings at Vikramashila University.




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