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What are the different historical sources?

    Historians use different types of sources to learn about the past depending upon the period of their study and the nature of their investigation. Most common sources consist of coins, inscriptions, sculptures, architecture and textual records. Early textual records were manuscripts. The number of textual records increased dramatically during this period and they slowly displaced other sources of information.
 What does time mean for historians? How does it help them?

     Time, for historians, doesn't mean just passing of hours, days or years. Instead it reflects changes in social and economic organization, in the persistence and transformation of ideas and believes. In order to study historical developments historians divide the past into large segments. It makes the study convenient. The historians study different aspects of the specific period and then assess the comparative developments their impact on society and their contribution to future generation.
What are Manuscripts and how are they useful to historians?


    A manuscript or handwritten is a recording of information that has been manually created by someone. These manuscripts were collected by wealthy people, rulers, monasteries and temples. They were placed in libraries and archives. These manuscripts and documents provide a lot of detailed information to historians but they are also difficult to use.
What are the difficulties that historians face in using manuscripts?

     There was no printing press in ancient days. So scribes copied manuscripts by hand. Sometimes they cannot read the handwriting and are forced to guess what is written in it. Thus the copied manuscripts may have some difference. These small differences grew over centuries of copying until manuscripts of the same text became substantially different from one another. Sometimes authors revised their chronicles at different times. This is a serious problem because we rarely find the original manuscript of the author today. We are totally dependent upon the copies made by later scribes. As a result historians have to read different manuscript versions of the same text to guess what the author had originally written.
What was the process of copying manuscripts? What were its drawbacks?

     As there was no printing presses before 1750, scribes used to copy down the manuscripts which were hand-written, Sometimes it was difficult to recognize the original script. So the scribes used their own way of interpreting the facts. Consequently, there were differences in the copies written by different scribes. As all the copies were handwritten, it was difficult to recognize which was the original one, which was a major drawback.
What is Jati Panchayat?

    Jati Panchayat was the assembly of elders which controlled the conduct of the members of their jati. They had their own rules and regulations.
How did the British historians divide the history of India?

    In the middle of the nineteenth century British historians divided the history of India into three periods: “Hindu”, “Muslim” and “British”. This division was based on the idea that the religion of rulers was the only important historical change, and that there were no other significant developments – in the economy, society or culture. Such a division also ignored the rich diversity of the subcontinent.
 How do historians divide the past into periods? Do they face any problems in doing so?

    Most of the historians look to the economic and social factors to characterize the major elements of different moments of the past. They have divided the past into ancient history, medieval history and modern history. Describing the entire period as one historical unit has its own problems. The ancient period is often contrasted with the medieval period and also the medieval period is often contrasted with the modern period.
 In what ways has the meaning of the term 'Hindustan' changed over the centuries?

    It has been observed that language and its interpretation change with the change of time. The term 'Hindustan' was used for the first time by Minhaj-i-Siraj, a thirteenth century Persian chronicler. He, with this term meant the areas of Punjab, Haryana and the lands between the Ganga and Yamuna. It was used in a political sense for lands constituting a part of the dominions of the Delhi Sultan. Though the term shifted with the extent of the Sultanate it never included south India. Later in the sixteenth century, Babur, while using this term, meant the geography, the fauna and the culture of the inhabitants of the subcontinent. A fourteenth-century poet Amir Khusrau also used the term 'Hind' almost in the same sense. The remarkable point is that while the idea of geographical and cultural entity like 'India' did exist, the term 'Hindustan' did not carry the political and national meanings that we associate with it today.
 Which were the new groups of people who became prominent in the years between 700 and 1750?

     At different periods of this age new technologies made their appearance. It was also a period of mobility. Groups of people travelled across miles in search of opportunities. Rajputs, Marathas, Sikhs, Jats, Ahoms and Kayasthas were the groups which came to prominence in this age. They availed most of the opportunities of the society.
What was the stretch of Delhi Sultan Ghiyasuddin Balban's Empire?

      Delhi Sultan Ghiyasuddin Balban's empire stretched from Bengal (Gauda) in the east to Ghazni (Gajjana) in Afghanistan in the west. It also included all of south India (Dravida).
What were the religious developments of this period? Trace out major developments?

      The period between 700 and 1750 witnessed major changes in religion. It was seen prominently in Hinduism. The worship of new deities, the construction of temples by royalty and the growing importance of Brahmans, the priests, as dominant groups in society were some of the major developments. The idea of bhakti emerged. Merchants and migrants brought the new teachings of 'Quran' the holy book of the Muslims. A class of patrons emerged. They were the rulers who provided shelter and protection to the ulamas - the learned theologians and jurists. Muslims were interpreted in various ways namely, Shia and Sunni. Shia Muslims believed in Prophet Muhammad's son in law, Ali’s authority while the Sunnis accepted the authority of the early leaders- Khalifas.
What do you mean by pan-regional rule? What was its impact?    

       Pan- regional rule applies to the trend of extending the empire to the region beyond one's own state. With the decline of the Mughal Empire in the eighteenth century many regional states emerged. Consequently a chance of sharing different traditions in the realms of governance, economy, elite culture and languages was brightened. People knew a lot of new thing, manners, etc, without losing their own culture and identity.
 Who were the patrons?      

       Patrons were a group of rulers and rich class of people who provided protection and livelihood to the Brahmans, artists and poets.

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