Title Somanatha : the many voices of a history / Romila Thapar

Published London ; New York : Verso, 2005

Copies

Location	Call no.	Vol.	Availability
MELB	954.0223 Tha/Stm		AVAILABLE

Description xxi, 265 pages : maps ; 23 cm Contents 1. The context -- 2. The setting -- 3. The Turko - Persian narratives -- 4. Sanskrit inscriptions from Somanatha and its vicinity -- 5. Biographies, chronicles and epics -- 6. The perceptions of yet others -- 7. Colonial interpretations and nationalist reactions -- 8. Constructing memory, writing histories Summary "In 1029, Sultan Mahmud of Ghazni raided the Hindu temple of Somanatha (Somnath in textbooks of the colonial period). The story of the raid finds little mention except in the Turko-Persian sources but becomes a major event of Indian history during the raj. It was first depicted as a trauma for the Hindu population not in India, but in the House of Commons. The triumphalist accounts of the event in Turco-Persian sources became the main source for most 19th-century historians. It suited some and also helped the British to divide and rule a multi-millioned subcontinent." "In her new book, Romila Thapar reconstructs what took place by studying other sources, including local Sanskrit inscriptions, biographies of kings and merchants of the period, court epics and popular narratives that have survived. The result undermines the traditional version of what took place. These findings also contest the current Hindu religious nationalism that constantly utilises the conventional version of this history."--BOOK JACKET Notes Originally published: New Delhi : Penguin Books India, 2004 Bibliography Includes bibliographical references (pages [229]-240) and index Subject Mahmud, Sultan of Ghazni, 971-1030. Somanatha Temple (Somnāth, India) -- History -- Sources. SUBJECT India -- History -- 1000-1526 http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85064911 -- Sources. http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh2002012010 India -- History -- 1000-1526 http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85064911 -- Historiography. http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh00006046 LC no. 2004020254 ISBN 1844670201 hardcover alkaline paper

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