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Mughal Empire

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The Mughal Empire, also known historically as Hindustan[9][10] was an early modern Islamic empire that ruled most of the Indian subcontinent.[11] It existed from 1526 to 1858.[12] Between 1526 and 1707, it contributed to 24% of the world's GDP.[13] It was the world's largest economy and was known for its architecture.[14][15]

Mughal Empire
मुगल साम्राज्य
امپراتوری مغول
1526–1858
Mughal
The empire at its greatest extent in c. 1700 (with subahs) under Aurangzeb
Capital
Official languages

Chagatai (elite army and court language)

Religion
Sunni Islam (Official)
GovernmentMonarchy
Emperor[a] 
• 1526–1530 (first)
Babur
• 1837–1857 (last)
Bahadur Shah II
Vakil-i-Mutlaq 
• 1526–1540 (first)
Mir Khalifa
• 1795–1818 (last)
Daulat Rao Sindhia
Grand Vizier 
• 1526–1540 (first)
Mir Khalifa
• 1775–1797 (last)
Asaf-ud-Daula
Establishment
• Founding
1526
• Fall
1858
Area
1690[5][6]4,000,000 km2 (1,500,000 sq mi)
Population
• 1595
125,000,000[7]
• 1700
158,000,000[8]
Preceded by		 Succeeded by
Delhi Sultanate
Sur Empire
Maratha Empire
Nizam of Hyderabad
Carnatic Sultanate
British Raj
Today part ofIndia
Pakistan
Bangladesh
Afghanistan

The Mughal emperors were Turkic-Mongols in origin.[16] Though they later settled in India and became Indianized.[12][17][18] Babur of the Timurid dynasty founded the Mughal Empire in 1526 and ruled until 1530. He was followed by Humayun (1530–1540) and (1555–1556), Akbar (1556–1605), Jahangir (1605–1627), Shah Jahan (1628–1658), and Aurangzeb (1658–1707) and several other minor rulers until Bahadur Shah Zafar II (1837–1857). After the death of Aurangzeb, the Mughal Empire became weak. It continued until 1858. By that time, the Indian subcontinent had become under the British Raj.

The Mughal Empire was established by Muslim rulers who came from the present-day Uzbekistan after defeating the Delhi sultanate. The Mughal rule in India saw the region into a united Indian state.[19] which was administered under a single ruler. This hadn't happened since the Delhi Sultanate, Guptas and Mauryans. During the Mughal period, art and architecture became important.[20] The Taj Mahal was built during the Mughal period.

Empire expansion

Mughal India was one of the three Islamic gunpowder empires, along with the Ottoman Empire and Safavid Persia.[21] The founder of Mughal empire in India, Babur was invited by Daulat khan Lodi, governor of Lahore to support his rebellion against Sultan Ibrahim Khan, Babur was familiar with gunpowder firearms and field artillery, and a method for deploying them. Later, the Mughals under Akbar in the sixteenth century, initiated the use of metal cylinder rockets known as bans, particularly against war elephants. By the death of Akbar, the empire extended from Afghanistan to the Bay of Bengal, and southward into Gujarat and the northern Deccan region.[22][23]

The Mughals found support among the local groups of North India. In the Punjab, and parts of Rajasthan, the Jats were integrated through marriage and grants, leading to the formation of Durbari or Darbari, Akbari and Jahangiri Jat families, who allegedly descended from the leading families who had given their daughters in marriage to the imperial Mughal family.[24] These families considered themselves above the other Jats, and practiced rigid hierarchies and hypergamy. The Aurangzebi jats, Shahjahauni jats, and other such Jats were admitted into these ranks during the rule of Aurangzeb and later by the British respectively.[25] During Akbar's reign, Jat Khaps (clan-councils) in western Uttar Pradesh were given increased autonomy in exchange for local support for taxation reform.[26] In Rajasthan, few elite local Rajput rulers were also integrated through court promotions and marriages like the Jats. As a result of having Rajput officers in the Mughal army, and such intermarriages, there was a cultural-fusion seen in the later Mughal art and architecture.[27][28]

The Mughal Empire reached its zenith during the rule of Emperor Aurangzeb. The empire ruled over most of the Subcontinent. He is often criticized for his actions against non-Muslims, including his ordering of the demolition of non-Muslim schools and temples and the reimposition of the jizya, a tax on non-Muslims, which had been suspended for the previous 100 years by his great-grandfather Akbar.[29]

Empire decline

Due to Aurangzeb's stricter interpretation of the Sharia, the empire faced revolts from several groups, including the Rajputs, Sikhs and Jaats.[30][31][32][33] After the death of Aurangzeb, the empire declined quickly due to a variety of reasons, including the succession of weak rulers, continued resistance from Hindu and Sikh groups, the Iranian and Afghan invasions, and the rise of the British Raj.[34][35][36][37]

The empire officially ended with Bahadur Shah II as the last emperor. He was deposed by the British following the failed Indian Rebellion of 1857.

Mughal Empire Media

  • The remnants of the empire in 1751

  • Portrait of Bahadur Shah Zafar

  • India in 1605 and the end of emperor Akbar's reign; the map shows the different subahs, or provinces, of his administration.

  • Ain-i-Akbari Subah, by Wilkinson, 1815

  • Police Chuprassee by Emily Eden

  • Coin of Aurangzeb, minted in Kabul, dated 1691/2.

  • Muslim Lady Reclining or An Indian Girl with a Hookah, painted in Dacca, 18th century.

Notes

  1. ↑ The title (Mirza) descends to all the sons of the family, without exception. In the royal family it is placed after the name instead of before it, thus, Abbas Mirza and Hosfiein Mirza. Mirza is a civil title, and Khan is a military one. The title of Khan is creative, but not hereditary.[4]

References

  1. ↑ Sinopoli, Carla M.. Monumentality and Mobility in Mughal Capitals. Asian Perspectives 33 (2) (1994). p. 294. Retrieved 11 June 2021.
  2. ↑ Conan 2007, p. 235.
  3. ↑ Islam: Mughal Empire (1500s, 1600s). BBC (7 September 2009). Retrieved 13 June 2019.
  4. ↑ Morier 1812, p. 601.
  5. ↑ Turchin, Peter. East–West Orientation of Historical Empires and Modern States. Journal of World-Systems Research 12 (2) (2006). p. 219–229. doi:10.5195/JWSR.2006.369.
  6. ↑ Rein Taagepera. Expansion and Contraction Patterns of Large Polities: Context for Russia. International Studies Quarterly 41 (3) (September 1997). p. 475–504. doi:10.1111/0020-8833.00053. Retrieved 6 July 2019.
  7. ↑ Dyson, Tim. A Population History of India: From the First Modern People to the Present Day (2018)Oxford University Press. p. 70–71. ISBN 978-0-19-256430-6.
  8. ↑ József Böröcz. The European Union and Global Social Change (2009)Routledge. p. 21. ISBN 978-1-135-25580-0. Retrieved 26 June 2017.
  9. ↑ Vanina, Eugenia. Medieval Indian Mindscapes: Space, Time, Society, Man (2012)Primus Books. p. 47. ISBN 978-93-80607-19-1. Retrieved 19 October 2015.
  10. ↑ Hardy, P.. Conversion to Islam (1979)Holmes & Meier. p. 69. ISBN 978-0-8419-0343-2. Retrieved 19 March 2023.
  11. ↑ Stein, Burton. A History of India (2010)John Wiley & Sons. p. 159–. ISBN 978-1-4443-2351-1. Retrieved 15 July 2019. Quote: "The realm so defined and governed was a vast territory of some 750,000 square miles [1,900,000 km2], ranging from the frontier with Central Asia in northern Afghanistan to the northern uplands of the Deccan plateau, and from the Indus basin on the west to the Assamese highlands in the east."
  12. ↑ 12.0 12.1 Richards, John F.. The Mughal Empire (1995)Cambridge University Press. p. 2. ISBN 978-0-521-56603-2. Retrieved 9 August 2017. Quote: "Although the first two Timurid emperors and many of their noblemen were recent migrants to the subcontinent, the dynasty and the empire itself became indisputably Indian. The interests and futures of all concerned were in India, not in ancestral homelands in the Middle East or Central Asia. Furthermore, the Mughal Empire emerged from the Indian historical experience. It was the end product of a millennium of Muslim conquest, colonization, and state-building in the Indian subcontinent."
  13. ↑ Jeffrey G. Williamson & David Clingingsmith, India's Deindustrialization in the 18th and 19th Centuries Archived 29 March 2017 at the Wayback Machine, Global Economic History Network, London School of Economics
  14. ↑ Maddison, Angus. Development Centre Studies The World Economy Historical Statistics: Historical Statistics (2003)OECD Publishing. p. 256–. ISBN 978-92-64-10414-3. Retrieved 9 August 2017.
  15. ↑ Roy, Tirthankar. The Ashgate Companion to the History of Textile Workers, 1650–2000 (2010)Ashgate Publishing. p. 255. ISBN 978-0-7546-6428-4. Retrieved 15 August 2017.
  16. ↑ Richards, John F.. The Mughal Empire (1995)Cambridge University Press. p. 6. ISBN 978-0-521-56603-2.
  17. ↑ Vanina, Eugenia. Medieval Indian Mindscapes: Space, Time, Society, Man (2012)Primus Books. p. 47. ISBN 978-93-80607-19-1.
  18. ↑ Chandra, Satish. Parties And Politics At The Mughal Court (1959).
  19. ↑ Britanica, Encyclopaedia. The Mughal Empire (2022)Encyclopaedia of britanica. p. 2. ISBN 978-0-521-56603-2. Retrieved 9 August 2017. Quote: "A further distinction was the attempt of the Mughals, who were Muslims, to integrate Hindus and Muslims into a united Indian state."
  20. ↑ Asher, Catherine B.. India Before Europe (2006)Cambridge University Press. p. 186–. ISBN 978-0-521-80904-7. Retrieved 15 July 2019. Quote: "All these factors resulted in greater patronage of the arts, including textiles, paintings, architecture, jewelry, and weapons to meet the ceremonial requirements of kings and princes."
  21. ↑ Hodgson, Marshall G. S.. The Gunpowder Empires and Modern Times (in en) (2009-05-15)University of Chicago Press. ISBN 978-0-226-34688-5.
  22. ↑ Thackeray, Frank W.. Events that formed the modern world : from the European Renaissance through the War on Terror (2012). Santa Barbara, Calif.: ABC-CLIO. p. 248. ISBN 9781598849011.
  23. ↑ J. R. Partington. A history of Greek fire and gunpowder (1999)Johns Hopkins University Press. ISBN 978-0-8018-5954-0.
  24. ↑ Ibbetson, Sir Denzil. Glossary of the Tribes and Castes of the Punjab and North West Frontier Province (in en) (1990)Asian Educational Services. ISBN 978-81-206-0505-3.
  25. ↑
  26. ↑ Richards, John F.. The Mughal Empire - Part 1 Volume 5 (1993)Cambridge University Press. p. 90. ISBN 9780521566032.
  27. ↑ The Oxford Handbook of Global Religions (2006)OUP. p. 475. ISBN 978-0-19-976764-9.
  28. ↑ Richard M. Eaton. India in the Persianate Age 1000- 1765 (2019)University of California Press. p. 257. ISBN 978-0520325128.
  29. ↑ Smith, Vincent Arthur. The Oxford history of India, from the earliest times to the end of 1911 (1919)Oxford, Clarendon Press.
  30. ↑ Metcalf, Barbara D.. A Concise History of Modern India (in en) (2006-09-28)Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-139-45887-0.
  31. ↑ Sarkar, Jadunath. Fall of the Mughal Empire: 1789-1803 (1934). Calcutta: Sarkar & Sons.
  32. ↑ Pashaura Singh. The Oxford Handbook of Sikh Studies (2014)Oxford University Press. p. 236–238. ISBN 978-0-19-969930-8. Retrieved 12 June 2017.
  33. ↑ Seiple, Chris. The Routledge handbook of religion and security (2013). New York: Routledge. p. 96. ISBN 978-0-415-66744-9.
  34. ↑ Dalrymple, William. Koh-i-Noor: The History of the World's Most Infamous Diamond (2017)Bloomsbury Publishing. p. 52–60. ISBN 978-1408888827.
  35. ↑ Axworthy, Michael. The Sword of Persia: Nader Shah, from Tribal Warrior to Conquering Tyrant (2009)I.B. Tauris. p. 8.
  36. ↑ Gommans, Jos. Indian Warfare and Afghan Innovation During the Eighteenth Century (in EN). Studies in History 11 (2) (1995-08-01). p. 261. doi:10.1177/025764309501100204.
  37. ↑ Vincent A. Smith. The Oxford History of India, Edited by Percival Spear (1981)Oxford University Press. p. 492.
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