TUTORIAL: [M21431 Archaeology of Early South Asia] Review: Mudit Trivedi, Hemanth Kadambi, and Supriya Varma, eds, 2021, Archaeologies of the Medieval in South Asia, The Medieval History Journal, Volume 24, Issues 1-2, Special Double Issue.

COURSE NAME: M21431 Archaeology of Early South Asia 

M. A. SEMESTER 1

TUTORIAL 2                         

TUTORIAL TOPIC: Write a review of the edited volume titled, Archaeologies of the Medieval in South Asia, listed below.

Mudit Trivedi, Hemanth Kadambi, and Supriya Varma, eds, 2021, Archaeologies of the Medieval in South Asia, The Medieval History Journal, Volume 24, Issues 1-2, Special Double Issue.

SUBMITTED BY: Pranav Kushwaha

[DISCLAIMER: The following tutorial is being shared so students of CHS, JNU can get some idea regarding how a tutorial is to be written. This tutorial is by no means of high quality, and you might find some factual, spelling, and grammatical errors.]

                       

 

 

Review:

Mudit Trivedi, Hemanth Kadambi, and Supriya Varma, eds, 2021, Archaeologies of the Medieval in South Asia, The Medieval History Journal, Volume 24, Issues 1-2, Special Double Issue.

One of the several misconceptions associated with the discipline of archaeology in India is that its sole purpose is to find sources for writing the ancient history of the subcontinent. Treating archaeology as subservient to history produces two ill effects: (i) it disregards the existence of the former as separate and distinct from the latter, and (ii) the accomplishment of archaeology when applied to other time periods – such as the medieval and the modern – are not given an equal degree of importance. 

The present volume of the Medieval History Journal successfully addresses these issues. The volume is divided into nine articles that deal with different aspects of medieval South Asian history. These aspects include, but are not limited to, “the concept of the rural and settlement…sources and contextualization, about problems of core and periphery, memory and historicity [,] and distinctions between elite and non-elite experiences” (p. 11). Interdisciplinarity is maintained across the articles, as each article has been reviewed by a historian as well as an archaeologist (p. 13). 

The first article, “Archaeological Context and Archival Content: Historical Archaeology and Medieval Period Donative Practices on the Raichur Doab, Southern India”, by Andrew M Bauer (pp. 17-55) looks at the relationship between the changing landscape of the Raichur Doab in the medieval period and the corresponding donative inscriptional records that are available to us. The archaeological context of this study owes its existence to the Maski Archaeological Research Project (MARP) which began in 2010 (p. 30). The donative records show us that more than half the donations around Maski (57%) during the eleventh and twelfth centuries were financed by the Chalukyan royal family (p. 43). These grants show us that fields that were characterised by black soil, and had better access to water, were granted to temples and administrators. This prevented the farmers from accessing these fertile lands. Instead, farmers cultivated primarily on the red sandy soils that had little access to irrigation. Archaeological data has revealed that although agriculture expanded during the eleventh-fourteenth centuries, the expansion occurred on the aforementioned red soil, which limited the quantity of actual crop production (p. 47). Thus, the data reveals that agricultural expansion on its own is not a sign of an increase in status or prosperity. 

The second article, “Climatic Variation and Society in Medieval South Asia: Unexplored Threads of History and Archaeology of Mandu”, by Anne Casile (pp. 56-91) elaborates upon the environmental factors and the effects of climate on settlements over a long period of time. The factors and effects have been disregarded – or at least not given their due importance – when writing the history of medieval settlements. The MANDU project seeks to rectify this mistake. The project focuses upon Mandu, the capital of the Malwa Sultanate, for its historical significance, the abundance of archaeological evidence, ecological variety, the continued presence of the Bhil tribal community, and the relative lack of urbanization which has more or less preserved the site. (p. 74). The project also takes into account the patterns of use of “ancient water infrastructure and bodies, [and] the social significance of water associated with ancient water bodies” (p. 78). Importance is also laid upon interdisciplinary approaches in order to establish a better understanding of how the biotic and the abiotic components influenced the life of the people, and how the people influenced the environment around them.

The third article, “Politics Beyond Imperial Cores: Spatial Production in the Peripheries of Medieval South India”, by Eduard Fanthome (pp. 92-129) argues that although textual sources tell us about the establishment of political claims and new dynasties, they do not tell us how these political claims actually came into existence from the grassroots level. Overlordship in theory did not always translate into practicality, that is, local chiefs could refuse to obey their overlords. However, the interaction between different levels of power did result in social changes at various levels of the power structure. One example of these social changes is the way space was appropriated in order to instil political order, often with religious undertones. For example, in the case of Vijayanagar, the Virupaksha Temple established the rulers as devotees of the respective god, while at the same time, Deva Raya’s construction of the Ramchandra Temple repositioned them as followers of Lord Rama. Coming to MARP-30 – a site at Maski – the author observes that the entranceway to the settlement might show signs of cosmopolitanism as present in Maski as a whole, but the meanings associated with the structure were imparted to it via social processes and decisions that were taken at the specific site itself. This speaks to the political negotiations that must have taken place between the ruling elite at the upper echelons of power and the local political intermediaries.

The fourth article, “Ever the Handmaid? A Consideration of What a Medieval Archaeology in South Asia Might Be”, by Jason D. Hawkes (pp. 130-170) focuses on the Vidarbha region in present-day Maharashtra during the Vakataka period. Several ‘zones’ are considered, including Pauni, Adam, Mandhal and Wag. The conclusion that is reached is as follows: although the land and revenue rights granted by the Vakatakas came from the crown land, the region was settled in a non-uniform manner, both before and during their reign. This is to say that the socio-economic developments that took place during the period were not driven by the decisions being taken by the rulers at the centre, and that certain local factors must have been at play (pp. 153-154). And although most land grants were limited to the donation of one village at most, the author argues that the real value of the land would have been realized by the recipients via the capital derived due to being the owner of the land and their association with the temple institutions. For the Vakatakas, who were the new rulers of the region, these donations afforded them legitimacy and solidified their right to rule (p 158). The archaeological evidence also points to the existence of crafts industries and markets at Pauni; Adam and Nagardhan acting as administrative centres; and an increase in activities at Wag and Mandal (pp. 155-156). The author concludes with a discussion on how archaeology should be practiced in the context of medieval South Asia, arguing that although we may take inspiration from archaeological methods being applied and questions being asked in the context of medieval Europe, we must modify those questions and apply them accordingly in the medieval South Asian context.

The fifth article, “Matter of Time: Ceramics and Historicity in Medieval South India”, by Mannat Johal (pp. 171-206) brings us back to Maski, this time at site MARP-23. Ceramic vessels made up of clay are the “most ubiquitous form of medieval material culture at Maski” and were used for cooking and serving food, collecting water, storing things, etc., each vessel having its own lifetime (pp. 192-193). These vessels – whether the vessels were repaired when they got broken or were disposed of instead, the frequency of repair or disposal (and subsequent replacement) – tell us about the quality of and value of the craft that was being produced on a regular basis. In this way, we get a closer look at what the everyday life of the twelfth-fourteenth century CE must have looked like. On the one hand, the material and appearance of these ceramics help us in establishing a continuity between the ceramic production techniques of the early historic and medieval periods. For example, ceramic remains have indicated that red, black, and red and black ceramics of the “slipped” and “polished” varieties – that were “inherited” from the earlier periods – continued to be produced in the medieval era. On the other hand, we see that newer methods of ceramic production had also been developed, resulting in ceramics that were in shades of grey and brown (pp. 194-195).

The sixth article, “Agro-Pastoralism, Archaeology and Religious Landscapes in Early Medieval South India”, by Hemanth Kadambi (pp. 207-243) shifts our focus to Aihole during the Early Chalukya period. Use of terms such as gosasiga (gifting cows to gain religious merit) and turigol (cattle raid) speak to the importance of cattle, and hence pastoralism, while the use of the prefix Golla is used to denote cattle pastoralists (pp. 225-226). The concept of turigol is also connected to the construction of memorial stones or “hero stones” (p. 237) to honour those who died as part of the cattle raids. Religion also played an important role in the region. Early Chalukya rulers projected themselves as under the blessings of the Saptamatrikas, while several legends were ascribed to the deity known as Yellama who was associated with fertility. Moreover, the author states with caution that the Early Chalukya rulers also promoted the worship of Lajja Gauri, as indicated by the sculptures of the concerned period.

The seventh article, “Between Archaeography and Historiography: Unsettling the Medieval?”, by Mudit Trivedi (pp. 244-280) deals heavily with the effects of historiography on the discipline of archaeology. On the one hand, we have R N Mehta, who recognized how difficult it was to convince both historians and archaeologists to take medieval archaeology as a serious prospect. However, his view of the medieval world is focused on courts and dynasties (p. 251), away from the lives of the common people. On the other hand, Mate wondered about the lack of Islamic archaeology and concluded that there existed a need of arriving at new and different approaches as well as different people who would take to these different approaches naturally (p. 253). The author then presents several viewpoints through which one can look at the history of Mewat, a region he himself has worked at. One could begin to look at the region as part of Mughal administration, or as an area divided into castes and gotras, or through oral traditions such as the bāt. Matters become much more complicated, however, when one considers the fact that people holding a better position in the socio-economic hierarchy could simply buy their way into genealogical and land records, and these records – once passed down to us in the present day – will influence our perspective of past societies.

The eighth article, “Ephemeral Traces: Archaeology of a Medieval Rural Settlement”, by Supriya Varma, Jaya Menon and Deepak Nair (pp. 281-319) looks into the ways archaeology can improve our understanding of the rural medieval societies, providing perhaps the only source of information when there exist no inscriptional records. Although the size of a settlement cannot be the only factor in designating a settlement as rural or urban, we know that urban settlements are more durable as compared to rural settlements. Professor Varma has identified three types of rural settlements, based on the density of architectural remains, habitation deposits, and the artefacts left behind by the people (p. 287). The structure of the ceramic remains excavated at Rohana Khurd has been used to determine the uses of these vessels as well as in the contexts in which they were produced. So, for example, the large number of unslipped red bowls suggests that these bowls must have been used for community feasts and were meant for single-use, after which they were discarded (p. 307). Moreover, the fact that large numbers of standardised bowls and small numbers of non-standardised bowls are both found at a rural settlement such as Rohana Khurd suggests that (i) large scale production activities were not limited to urban centres, and (ii) non-standardised bowls must have been produced in individual households (pp. 311-312). The authors argue that historical time periods cannot be blindly applied to all temporal contexts. For example, Painted Grey Ware in the context of India belongs to the Iron Age in north India, dateable to between 1200-500 BCE. However, at Rohana Khurd, the PGW is dateable to the fourth century BCE (p. 313).

The ninth article, “The City as Façade in Velha Goa: Recognising Enduring Forms of Urbanism in the Early Modern Konkan”, by Brian C. Wilson (pp. 320-352) concludes our journey with a final stop at the capital of the Portuguese Eastern Empire. The textual sources point to the spatial as well as the socio-religious organization of Velha Goa as similar to the Portuguese capital of Lisbon (p. 328, 330). However, since the settlements at Velha Goa continuously occupied the landscape, the city did not fit the idea of the “classic Iberian vision of colonial space…[of]…discrete village settlements” (p. 341). Archaeological evidence has revealed that behind the façade of whitewashed houses – that were built on both sides of the road – existed large agricultural fields. Moreover, despite the decline of the Portuguese Empire, the material evidence points to the fact that Velha Goa never underwent complete depopulation. Instead, the city experienced several phases of growth and decline. Both archaeological findings and traveller’s records confirm that the city was continuously occupied across centuries by Indians living in semi-urban landscapes and working in the fields. These findings challenge the narrative of an urban landscape detached from its immediate semi-urban, or even rural,) surroundings.

The present volume of the Medieval History Journal thus leaves us with the understanding that the discipline of archaeology is not limited to the study of ancient history only. Through careful study of material remains, archaeology can and does transform our understanding of other time periods as well. The present volume also demonstrates the disconnect between the historian’s definition of time periods and the material evidence that transcends these definitions. Ultimately, the best way forward in understanding the societies and settlements of the past is using a stable and equitable combination of archaeological findings and textual evidence. 

Pranav Kushwaha

Enrolment Number: 21/61/HH/063

Semester 1

M. A. Ancient History (ANCM), CHS, JNU