u/Cautious_Act_2549 — reddlx

Chand Bibi (1550 CE- 1600 CE)

A Marathi Princess whose favorite hobbies included playing the sitar, painting flowers and giving nightmares to the Mughals.

She successfully defended her capital of Ahmednagar against a Mughal invasion sent by Akbar in 1595. She also rallied other local Marathi chiefs and Sultans against the Mughals.

She would be assassinated by her own troops in 1600 due to false rumors, paving the way for the Mughal conquest of Ahmednagar.

u/Cautious_Act_2549 — 16 hours ago

▲ 10 r/IndianHistory

What are your thoughts on him? Was he a reckless prince or a master strategist? I have read different views about his actions. Some historians say that his defection to the Mughal side was genuine and that he hated the control his father (Shivaji Maharaj) had over him. Others say that his defection was actually a plot by the Marathas to spy on the Mughals. Considering that at one point even Shivaji Maharaj tried to work under the Mughal vassal system like the Rajput Rajas, how do we go about determing the true intentions behind the actions of Sambhaji?

u/Cautious_Act_2549 — 8 days ago

▲ 41 r/IndianHistory

Anizham Thirunal Bala-Marthanda Varma, more popularly known as the "maker of modern Travancore" was one of the few Indian monarchs to defeat a much more stronger European enemy. In 1741, his forces defeated the superior Dutch navy at Colachel. His "navy" during this time consisted of a few fishing boats. By 1753, Varma had forced the Dutch East India Company into signing the Treaty of Mavelikkara, which effectively ended their commercial interest in the subcontinent.

While today he is known outside of Kerala solely for this achievement, his 30 year reign and life of 53 years is very interesting. From hiding inside the trunks of trees to escape enemies as a child, to throwing his own cousin out a window to death, he built a modern nation state that endured for 200 years, becoming one of British India's model princely states.

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Marthanda Varma was born in 1706 in Attingal, to the sister of the King of Venad.

Venad was a small principality in the southernmost end of Kerala, which was troubled by neighbouring chieftains as well as rebellious feudal landlords from within. His two uncles, Aditya and Rama Varma, ruled the principality in succession for about 2 decades, during which they were repeatedly forced to flee as they tried reforming the political system. Without any power or prestige, Marthanda Varma and his siblings (an elder brother and two sisters) grew up away in Karunagapally, a neighbouring chiefdom where his family had relatives. Legends speak of how Marthanda Varma, as he grew into a teenager, was particularly targeted by the opponents of his uncle the King, for his assertive character. He spent much of his youth on foot, running from one place to another in incognito. He narrowly escaped death several times, once by hiding in the trunk of a jackfruit tree and the other time by swapping clothes with a Brahmin priest. In the second instance, the enemies of Marthanda Varma killed the priest who created a diversion for Varma to escape.

In February 1729, Marthanda Varma's uncle passed away, followed by the untimely death of two elder princes. This put Varma in the spotlight, and he took power by August of that year. His enemies, most prominent of them being the "Ettuveetil Pillamar" or Barons of Eight noble houses, were caught and executed. These same nobles had carried out an assault on Marthanda Varma's sister in the previous year, killing her husband in front of her (and her minor son). The Dutch records speak of how Marthanda Varma wiped the principality of refractory nobles in the short span of 2 years.

Marthanda Varma then had the mansions of the nobles destroyed, and large holes dug up in the places where they once stood. These holes were later enlarged and filled with water, creating artificial ponds. This act was to wipe out the memory of the nobles, and the immense power and wealth that they once had. He went a step ahead in punishing the nobles by selling the women and children of their family into slavery, to the local fishermen of his kingdom. This decision, which may have arose partly due to personal vendetta, was to ensure that not even a distant descendant of the nobles would be able to rise back to their high status in the future.

In the process of crushing the feudal nobility of his Kingdom, Varma had also come into conflict with his paternal cousins, the sons of his late uncle. These sons were never destined to take the throne as succession was matrilineal, through the sister of the King. Marthanda Varma would go on to kill his cousins. According to one sanitised account, he physically picked up one of the cousins and throw him out of a large window. When the other cousin rushed in to question Varma, he had him killed by the sword.

Next, Marthanda Varma set out to conquer neighbouring chiefdoms, all of whom had large amounts of pepper as well as other precious resources. These chiefdoms were ruled by his own cousins as well as maternal relatives. In one instance, he captured a 17 year old cousin of his who ruled the chiefdom of Kottarakara. The captured prince, technically like a younger brother of Varma (if we looked at the relationship through the matrilineal joint family system), languished in a prison till his untimely death.

By 1740, he had conquered a large number of states to the north of his chiefdom, alerting the Dutch. The Dutch campaign into Travancore, and their subsequent defeat is what most people outside of Kerala read about him.

After the defeat of the Dutch in 1741, Marthanda Varma detained several Dutch officers, some of whom voluntarily switching to his side. These officers brought with him European military tactics and strategy, which Varma employed on a large scale. He also modernised Travancore's army by importing European weapons and Tamil mercenary troops. Interestingly, Marthanda Varma made sure to always keep the Dutch commanders in his army isolated from each other, so that they could never band together against him. They were sprinkled throughout his realm, surrounded by local soldiers. This ensured that they could be effectively used to strengthen his position, without the risk of them becoming a threat.

His closest friends were a Tamil Brahmin war commander and a Dutch naval officer named De Lannoy, and he employed a large variety of people in his administration, largely on merit. His bond with De Lannoy was particularly strong. According to one story, Varma was furious at an Anglo-Indian merchant for not marrying his daughter to De Lenoy. He then escalated the issue by forcing the English company into making the merchant give his daughter to Varma's Dutch friend.

Marthanda Varma understood that he lacked legitimacy in newly conquered regions, where the people saw him as a foreign invader. So, he dedicated his entire Kingdom to his family deity, Lord Padmanabhaswamy in 1750. He then assumed the title of "Padmanabha Dasa" or servant of Lord Padmanabha. He proclaimed that he would only rule as the regent of the deity. This was a political masterstroke, as criticising the King now became equivalent to insulting God. It also created a divine aura around the King and his family, whereby at least a small portion of the devotion that went to the deity, now also reflected on the King. Essentially, people began worshipping him in a way.

Despite all the questionable things he did, along with the mass destruction he brought upon his enemies, Marthanda Varma had created a modern nation state in Kerala for the first time. He broke the old feudal world and put in its place a strong centralised political system. The dominance of certain caste groups was abolished, and a bureaucratic system was developed. Immigration was encouraged and pepper trade was made a state monopoly, thereby preventing European companies from trading at whatever price they decided. When he died in 1758, his Kingdom of Travancore stretched from Kanyakumari to Cochin, and had a European style army of 50,000 soldiers.

Today however, not a single statue exists to him in Trivandrum, the capital of Kerala. The plot of land he was cremated in now belongs to a multinational real estate group.

Ask away any questions you have about him.

u/Cautious_Act_2549 — 10 days ago

▲ 19 r/IndianHistory

Recently I have seen a lot of content on social media which presented a rather puritanical view of Indian culinary history, with repeated emphasis on vegetarianism and the refrain from discussing non-veg items. There is a common misconception that people who belonged to the "upper" castes of Indian society historically did not eat meat, or that meat was consumed in moderation by certain upper caste groups such as Kshatriyas only to meet specific dietary needs for their caste roles. This post intents to inform the reader that meat was always eaten by Indians of almost all castes (especially upper castes), without contempt , at different time periods, right from the Iron age to the present day. While certain upper caste groups developed puritanical views and embraced strict vegetarianism in the past 2000 years for various reasons, a rich pre-Mughal and pre-Islamic tradition of meat eating among Ancient Indians have been recorded by our own texts and inscriptions. This post will discuss the role of non-veg foods in three time periods and historical settings in India.

1) The Imperial Kitchens of Mauryan India.

While it is true that later in his reign Emperor Ashoka implemented a wide range of laws prohibiting the slaughter of animals throughout his realm, it is well known that him and his court enjoyed various non-vegetarian delicacies fit for royalty.

Ashoka's first major rock edict states that his kitchens used to slaughter hundreds of thousands of animals every day. While the inscription does not explicitly say for whom other than Ashoka these animals were slaughtered, we can make an educated guess that the entire Mauryan palace establishment, with its thousands of guards, officials, servants and court aristocracy were fed daily using the meat from these animals. The edict goes on to promote Ashoka's ahimsa policy, and states that this practice of animal slaughter had been drastically cut down by him. It states that during the time this edict was created, only 3 animals were slaughtered in the palace kitchen. Two of these animals were Deers. It is well known that wild game such as deer were hunted down by the royalty and nobility of India since ancient times. The Mauryan urban centers such as Varanasi and Pataliputra contained various parks and hunting grounds dedicated to the deer. The Buddhist Bhallatiya Jataka, which talks about a pre-Ashokan King of Varanasi, mentions that the King enjoyed eating Venison which was charcoal-broiled. Anyways, it is clear that by Ashoka's time, the status of Venison as a royal delicacy was made permanent in Indian society.

However, the star of the Mauryan royal feast was an animal that would land you in jail if you were to cook it today. The inscriptions of Ashoka talk about how even after meat was drastically cut down, the emperor still needed 2 peacocks to be killed and cooked daily. We do not know how the peacock was cooked in Mauryan times, but later Ayurvedic texts mention that the meat of peacock had various medicinal benefits and.

https://preview.redd.it/z5on40xt35zg1.png?width=850&format=png&auto=webp&s=a65413bcecc7589c14900062aae0b38512056f6b

2) The various delicacies of 12th century Deccan

In 1129 CE, the Kalyani Chalukya Emperor Someshvara Deva III compiled a vast encyclopedia named "Manasollasa". It contained a detailed section about the food items consumed by his subjects as well as his court.

Someshvara ruled nearly all of modern day Karnataka and vast portions of Maharashtra from 1127 CE to 1138 CE. He notes river rats and tortoise as being popular foods among his subjects in the 12th century. While several veg items that we recognize today like Dosaka (Dosa), Idli and Vada are mentioned in the treatise, it also contains a wide variety of non vegetarian items, with special focus on fish. It seems that Someshvara was himself a fish enthusiast, and he wrote extensively about the 35 types of marine and freshwater fishes available in his realm. In fact, by the 12th century fishing/angling had become a major royal recreation along with hunting and elephant fighting. Various recreational fisheries existed in the Chalukyan Empire to satisfy the needs of the elite. Fish was cooked in various methods such as grilling, frying and cooking in a curry.

Someshvara details the recipe of a tamarind fish curry in his work, which may have been a favorite dish of his possibly. The recipe required curry cut pieces of fish to be cooked with salt, pepper, cardamom powder, wheat flour and most importantly tamarind juice. Rice and fish cooked with ghee (an ingredient used extensively by royalty) was also a popular option.

Talking about rice dishes, Someshvara's court also experimented with an early form of Biryani known as Mamsadauna. This dish required meat to be cooked with aromatic spices and ghee, after which it would be mixed with rice. While Chicken was eaten during this time period, it was venison and mutton which were more popular in elite circles.

It is to be noted that Someshvara Deva was a devout Shaivite, and during his reign his empire became a center of Vedic revival. It is also to be said that up until then his realm had been a center of Jainism (which was popular among the nobility and commoners alike) for centuries. Despite their long standing Jain affiliation, local people never abandoned their non-veg cuisine.

https://preview.redd.it/wt0hl4qg35zg1.png?width=800&format=png&auto=webp&s=78593d76012e21f7c203e9acce65155528337d97

3) Rajput Shikaar

The Rajputs are a diverse group of peoples who originated around the 6th to 7th centuries in Northern India. Their military culture synthesized and developed in the post-Imperial Pratihara period as well as the Islamic period (as a response to the disruption brought about by the invasions). Rajput cuisine had always put great emphasis on rich and exotic non-vegetarian cuisine. Hunting was a common sport among the Rajputs, and various recipes were handed down from one generation to the other until recent times, when hunting ceased to occur. Some of these recipes still exist and are actively prepared. Due to the geography of Rajasthan, fish was not preferred, and while Chicken was always an option- it was largely confined to the ordinary sections of society.

In the royal family of Jodhpur, wild boar was a traditional delicacy that was popular across generations. With the decline in hunting however, the boar was replaced by pork from local piggeries. Lamb was the most popular type of meat in Rajput cuisine, for its exceptional quality. Meat was often cooked with lots of spices and ghee. Mutton hara Korma and Laal Maas were popular options. In addition, birds such as guinea fowl, partridge, and sand grouse were also consumed.

https://preview.redd.it/ii9zns7d35zg1.png?width=1200&format=png&auto=webp&s=92db63455577a4e0fccf0e9e6e403baf4b8ef052

In Bikaner, both Lamb and chicken were enjoyed equally. The state was founded in the 15th century by Rao Bika, a Rathore prince of Marwar who took a liking to hunting (as well as conquering new regions which later became Bikaner State).

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u/Cautious_Act_2549 — 11 days ago