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A Letter for
Young HistoriansDear Young Historians,
Recently I received a very thoughtful letter in the mail from one of our readers asking why women aren’t usually mentioned in history. I thought this was such a great question!
You see, the thing about history is that it is always changing, yet it also remains the same. It’s the same in the sense that historians may know how an event took place, but they may not know about all of the different people who played an important role in that event.
But it’s also changing because, as we gather more information, new people come into the picture, which sometimes changes the way we see an event.
Oftentimes women and people of color were excluded from the historical record, but as historians make new discoveries, they find more and more that women played an important role in history (just like the women in the Sealed Knot in Issue 6).
History is fun to study because our knowledge of past events is always changing based on new discoveries. By continuing your study of history, you are shaping history in this very moment by changing your views on how certain events took place. So keep it up, young historians! Together, we can change the world!
Cheers,Editor-In-Chief FEATURED YOUNG HISTORIANDo you have any pets? If so, what are they and what are their names?
I have three dogs. The biggest dog is Princess Poppy, the medium dog is Romeo, and the tiniest dog is Lilly-Bell.
Do you have any siblings? How many? Are you the oldest, middle, or youngest?
I have one brother, and he’s older. I’m the youngest.
What do you want to be when you grow up?
I’m not sure. I’m good at a lot of things so I’m keeping my options open. That’s my answer.
What do you like to do for fun?
I like to play with my brother and practice tennis with my coaches.
If you had to eat the same thing for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, what would it be?
Cookies and cream ice cream!
If you were stuck on a deserted island, what three things would you bring with you?
I would bring one weapon to defend myself, food, and lots of supplies!
What has been your favorite
Honest History topic?
Issue Three | Spring 2019 | War of the Currents was my favorite because it’s so cool seeing all the things people can come up with.
Is there a topic or subject you think Honest History should cover? If so, what?
I would like to learn more about Pocahontas!
Would you rather live in space or underwater? Why?
I would like to live underwater. But how would I live underwater? Would I be a mermaid or a fish? A mermaid. I’d definitely be a mermaid.
What is one fun thing you’ve learned from reading Honest History?
If you train really hard, you could be a spy. YOU PROBABLY DIDN'T KNOWHumans have been living in the Indian subcontinent for over 250,000 years.There are over 1.3 billion people living in the Republic of India.The currency used in India is called a rupee.A rupee may look like it is printed onpaper, but it is actually made of cotton and cotton rag.Words like “shampoo” and “pajamas” came from languages spoken in India.Cricket is one of the most popular sports in India.The oldest European church and ocated in Isynagogue are
lndia.Martale first created in arts wer pread to India and later sa by BuddhistAsi
missionaries.There are over 300,000 active mosques in India.
The Taj Mahal is considered one of India’s most admired works of art.Modern-day India is the largest country in the Indian subcontinent and has a shared history with Pakistan and Bangladesh.The national symbol of India is the Bengal Tiger. INDIANS WORTH REMEMBERINGSavitribai Phule
(1831-1897)Meet India’s first feminist, Savitribai Phule. While Phule courageously fought against many injustices, including child marriage, she’s best known for her trailblazing work in the field of education. In 1847, Phule became the first woman teacher in India. Soon after, she made education more accessible to girls by opening up a school for them. She didn’t stop at just one school. Over time, Phule and her husband established a total of 18 schools in India. She welcomed all girls to her schools, including those from lower castes. Phule truly paved the way for generations of Indian women to get an education.
Rani Lakshmi Bai
(1827 or 1828-1858)Rani Lakshmi Bai is popularly known as Jhansi ki Rani (Queen of Jhansi). She grew up learning archery, shooting, martial arts, and other traditionally male activities. In 1857, when the British tried to take over the Jhansi province, Lakshmi Bai joined a revolt against them. She took charge and assembled an army of over 14,000 warriors, some of whom were women, to fight the British military. Rani Lakshmi Bai sadly died in battle, but she is remembered for her bravery and leadership.Rabindranath Tagore
(1861-1941)“Jana Gana Mana Adhinayaka jaya hai …” The melodic words of India’s national anthem were written and composed by Rabindranath Tagore. Tagore was a Bengali poet, playwright, painter, and composer. Many considered Tagore the most outstanding creative artist of early 20th-century India. He helped introduce Indian culture to the West and vice versa. Tagore even started an experimental school where he tried to blend the best of Indian and Western traditions. His ideas about developing a child’s imagination are still used in teaching today. In 1913, Tagore’s English translations of his Bengali poems earned him the Nobel Prize in Literature—making him the first non-European to receive the award. Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar (1891-1956)Dr. Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar fought against all odds to achieve success. Growing up, Ambedkar was made fun of and bullied because he was from a poor family—they were considered Dalits, or Untouchables. However, he was a bright student and earned scholarships to attend Columbia University and the London School of Economics. In 1947, Ambedkar became the first law minister of an independent India. He used his power and influence to fight against the discrimination of people from lower castes. Ambedkar also took a leading role in writing the Indian Constitution.
Like many countries, there is an “official language,” but there are regional languages spoken as well, depending on where you live in a country. India is no different!
Here are just a few of the many
languages spoken throughout India.
TeluguKannadaEnglishTamilBengalHindiHOW TO SAY ____________ IN HINDI Bollywood is India’s Hindi-language film industry. It began in the city of Bombay, today known as Mumbai. While there are many film industries in India, Bollywood is one of the largest, releasing hundreds of movies every year. These popular movies are loved by many for their musical numbers, colorful sets, and dramatic storylines.
In 1896, the first motion picture arrived in India. It was brought to Bombay by a Frenchman named Marius Sestier and inspired Indian photographers to try out this new art form. They began to make short films, showing them in tents, playgrounds, and public halls. Around this time, a Hindu portrait photographer named Dhundiraj Govind Phalke became interested in filmmaking. He went to see the film The Life of Christ and was inspired to make a movie based on his own people’s gods, goddesses, and legends. In 1913, he released what is known as India's first silent film, Raja Harishchandra (translated to King Harischandra).
As the popularity of movies grew, sound was added to films. This new way of watching movies changed Bollywood forever. In 1931, the first Hindi film with sound, Alarm Ara (translated to Beauty of the World), was released. This movie was directed by Ardeshir Irani and began the tradition of music and dance for which Bollywood is so well known. It not only had dialogue, but it also featured music, songs, and dance numbers.
Early movies in India were not only for entertainment, however. During British rule, some films contained secret political messages amid their lighthearted and fun stories. At the time, many of the country's citizens could not read or write. Movies became a way for some filmmakers to communicate with people in a way they could understand. To limit this, the British put censorship laws in place, requiring Indian films to get British approval before audiences could watch them. For filmmakers who disagreed with British rule in India, these laws meant harder work to conceal their messages.
Desai often worked with the biggest actors of his time, including Shatrughan Sinha, Shammi Kapoor, Shashi Kapoor, and Randhir Kapoor. If you’re a fan of Bollywood movies, you will know a thing or two about the Kapoor family! They have been in the Bollywood world since 1935, Raj Kapoor being the first and founding member.
Today, Bollywood produces more films per year than Hollywood, its American counterpart, and is loved worldwide! partitiona country or state being divided into different partsimperialismextending one country's power or authority over anotherzananathe part of the house or palace where the women livehowdaha canopied seat for riding atop a camel or elephantpalanquina litter or box carried on poles by four people as a means of transportationbiodiversitya variety of plants and animals in a habitat or ecosystemecosystema community of living organisms interacting with one anotherghatsa flight of steps leading down to waterbritish rajthe rule of the british crown over the subcontinent of India India is a large country with over a billion people! India’s transportation options make it possible for all of these people to get to their jobs, visit friends and family, buy food, see the sights, and join the hustle and bustle of life.
RICKSHAW
A three-wheeled taxi service, called a rickshaw or tuk-tuk, is an excellent way for people to travel quickly in cities. Rickshaws are fairly small and only have one seat at the front for the driver and enough room for two adult-sized passengers in the back. Due to their size, they can quickly weave through the city traffic. They have a front window, but no doors so passengers can quickly jump on and off!
TRAINS
The railway in India is one of the largest in the world, with over 40,000 miles of track around the country. You can travel from one side of India to the other side in three days! Citizens and tourists use trains to travel long distances. Locals and business people also use commuter trains, called local trains, every day. If you’re in a city and want to get somewhere quickly, you might catch a ride on one of the city trains, also called metro trains.
People travel around India and to other countries by plane. Some areas in the country are remote and are challenging to get to by car or train, so small planes make travel to these places possible. India is now the third-largest growing aviation market in the world! It all started in 1932 when the first airline, Tata Air Services, was created by J. R. D. Tata to carry mail and people around the country. In 1946, the airline name was changed to Air India and started flying passengers around the world.
Some people use animals like camels, elephants, horses, yaks, and mules to get around and transport products. Bicycles and motorcycles are also very popular. And of course, walking! An age-old Indian custom called shatapawali states that walking 100 steps after a meal can help you stay healthy.
CARS & BUSESBOATSIn some parts of the country, India’s rivers and canals offer another way to travel. People use ferries to cross rivers, and in Southern India, there are coracles, small boats made from bamboo. Coracles have curved sides and are lined with animal hides or plastic to make them waterproof. This boat style has been around for centuries, and today, they are used to navigate rivers for fishing, traveling, and tourism.
In Delhi, private vehicles with odd-numbered license plates can only drive on odd-numbered dates, while even-numbered plates can drive on even-numbered dates. If you don’t have a car, a cheap and popular way to get around is by bus. People take them to travel in the city or to take overnight trips to other towns. Buses even travel on rough mountain roads, connecting small villages to the big cities.
IMPERIALISM IN
INDIA
For over a hundred years, the British Empire ruled as an imperial power in India. While India was not the nation’s only colony, it was its most important. Some even called India the “Jewel in the Crown” of the British monarchy because of its trade routes and natural resources. During the Age of Exploration, Europeans pushed their way toward the East.In order to become more involved in the spice trade in India
and Southeast Asia, a group of English merchants formed the East India Company (EIC). They received a royal charter from the English monarchy that gave them control over British trade in India. As the Mughal Empire lost power, the EIC became involved in politics and raised its own armies. The company’s political power grew over time, and by the mid-1800s, the British ruled the majority of the Indian subcontinent through the EIC. Many Indian people did not like the company’s rule, and the business faced mutinies and resistance. These rebellions showed the British government that its indirect rule over India through the EIC wasn’t working. In 1858, the British Parliament passed the Government of India Act, transferring rule over India to the British monarchy. The period of direct rule was known as the British Raj.During the time of the British Raj, India changed, not always for the better. Culturally, many of the British who came to serve the British Empire in the colony believed that it was their duty to make the Indian people more like Europeans. Governmentally, Indians had their own practices and knowledge, but the new imperial power didn’t allow them to take jobs that were high up in the military or government.This meant that Indians had little say in how the
British ruled their land. Instead, the British developed the country in ways that benefited them and made India more like England. They brought the English legal system and the English language. They built railroads, canals, and roads that allowed many goods, like sugar, coffee, and wheat, to be moved across the country. With the railroads came telegraph lines and new dams and bridges. In the cities, education and public health improved as new colleges were built, and some people had better access to doctors trained in Western medicine. These changes also brought struggles for many Indian people as the British didn’t allow Indian small businesses to trade in the ways that they once had, causing many to lose their ability to survive on their work and crops. CHECKMATEYou have probably encountered the game of chess in your home or maybe seen it played in a movie. Perhaps you have even tried it yourself. This ancient game has two players. Each player moves 16 pieces on a checkerboard, trying to maneuver to capture a piece called the king. Once the king is captured, the game ends.Believe it or not, chess has been played for hundreds of years! Historians can find records of the game being played in the north of India in the 6th and 7th centuries. Since it is so old, it’s hard to find out exactly how chess began, but there are two main legends. The first legend tells the story of an Indian king named Shihram who loved games. In his kingdom, there was a mathematician named Sissa Ben Dahir. One day, the king ordered Dahir to invent a new game. The game that Dahir presented to the king was called Chaturanga, and it is the earliest version of what we now call chess. It took Dahir months to create this game, and when he finally presented it to the king, Shihram was so impressed that he insisted Dahir choose a reward. Dahir requested that the king put one grain of wheat on the first square of the game’s board, two on the second, four on the third, eight on the fourth, and continue doubling the amount of grain per square until each square was filled. The amount of grain on the last square is what Dahir wanted as his reward. When the king realized that all the wheat in the kingdom would not be enough to fill the board, he proclaimed that requesting such a prize was even more clever than inventing the game. The second legend describes two half-brothers, Gav and Talhand, who were fighting for a kingdom’s throne when Talhand was killed in a battle. Gav knew that their mother would be heartbroken by Talhand’s death. He wanted her to know that he did not kill his brother, so he told her the story of the battle through a game played on a board. This board had multiple pieces that Gav moved around to show how Talhand, who was exhausted from fighting, eventually became trapped. The Persian word he used to describe Talhand’s situation was shah mat, which means a position of no escape. Shah mat eventually turned into the phrase checkmate, which players say today when they have beaten their opponent in chess. Although we may never know how chess was created, the game soon spread throughout the entire world. It moved from India to Persia (modern-day Iran), where it grew in popularity. By the 10th century, Muslims from Persia brought the game to North Africa, and from there, it spread all over Europe. It became known as a military strategy game, and its popularity among rulers around the world gave it the nickname, “The Royal Game.” Chess changed rules and forms often, which made it difficult for players from different cultures to compete. But in 1835, an Englishman named Nathaniel Cook designed the Staunton-pattern set, named after Howard Staunton, the world’s best chess player at the time. And in 1851, Staunton used his position as unofficial world champion to promote a uniform set of rules. This design and these rules are still in use today.
Thanks to this Indian invention, people worldwide can play one of the world’s oldest board games. ECOSYSTEMS
FOUND
THROUGHOUT
INDIA
Diverse. Mysterious. Two adjectives that perfectly describe the ecosystems of India. Iconic creatures like Indian elephants, sloth bears, and Asiatic lions are native to India’s Gir Forest. Yet there is more to this amazing country than rich forests and dense jungles. From snow-covered mountains to deserts and wetlands, India’s amazingly diverse ecosystems have captured the imaginations of writers, explorers, and artists for centuries.India’s biodiversity has been a source of interest for
centuries. In the 17th century, an artist named Ustād
Mansūr traveled with the Mughal emperor, Jahāngīr,
and painted scientifically accurate portraits of
India’s plants and animals. During his travels, Ustād
painted the best surviving portrait of a dodo, a
flightless bird that went extinct in 1681. This painting
is on display at the Hermitage Museum in Saint
Petersburg, Russia.In northern India, a mountain range called the Himalayas makes up one of the region’s most important ecosystems. Among the pinnacles, well-hidden due to their spotted, white-gray fur, shy snow leopards lurk among the snowy rocks. Musk deer, mouse-like pikas, bearded vultures, and blue sheep live in this ecosystem too. In the surrounding forests and plains, one can find clouded leopards, Himalayan brown bears, and herds of wild yak. Red pandas even live up in the trees, foraging and munching on bamboo.
During the 19th century, the British Empire hired Indian explorers, like Nain Singh Rawat
(1830–1882), to survey the Himalayas on foot. Rawat measured distance by counting every step he took. Every 2,000 paces equaled one mile, and Rawat walked thousands of miles on his many journeys. On one trek through Tibet, which borders India to the north, Rawat located gold mines way up in the mountains. Perhaps he saw snow leopards too!
The Thar Desert in India and Pakistan gets very little rain, but there is tremendous biodiversity in this extreme ecosystem. Indian gazelles called chinkara, blackbuck, desert foxes, and caracals all call this region home. Tawny eagles and great Indian bustards fly high in the sky, while spiny-tailed lizards and monitors crawl in the desert sand.
The Sundarbans, a forest spanning across both India and Bangladesh, is home to the largest mangrove area in the world. Mangrove forests are wetland ecosystems that form along coasts, and mangrove tree roots create a unique habitat for many different animals. Saltwater crocodiles, fishing cats, sea turtles, and even river dolphins live in the Sundarbans of India. This ecosystem’s apex predator, an animal which is hunted or eaten by no other, is the Bengal tiger.
The country’s national animal, it symbolizes power and grace. Humans and tigers coexist in this region, usually without problems, but attacks do occur. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, one legendary tiger called the Man-Eater of Champawat killed more than 400 people.
Animals like tigers, rhinos, and elephants have been an important part of this region’s identity since ancient times. Artifacts from the ancient Indus Valley Civilization, for instance, often depict the same animals that live in India today, thousands of years later! India’s ecosystems have greatly changed over the centuries, making it harder for species like Bengal tigers, greater one-horned rhinos, and Indian elephants to survive where they once thrived. However, modern-day India is still one of the most awe-inspiring, biologically diverse places on the planet.
The Indian subcontinent is a vast area in Asia. Today, it is divided into three countries: India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. When the British arrived in the 17th century, however, the subcontinent had several empires and states. Each one had leaders, languages, cultures, and religions. At first, the British came to trade. They followed other Europeans like the Portuguese, the Dutch, and the French who came to India before them in search of popular spices like cinnamon, pepper, and turmeric. From their initial trading posts in a region called Bengal, the British slowly conquered the whole Indian subcontinent and brought its diverse people and cultures under the rule of a single government. The colony of India became the largest colony in the British Empire.By the 1940s, after nearly 200 years of foreign rule, many people in India were unhappy with the British and wanted to govern themselves. They felt that British policies were unfair, exploited Indians, and created many economic and social problems. The Quit India Movement, led by an Indian lawyer named Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, started organizing protests for Indian independence. Although Gandhi wanted the protests to be peaceful, violence erupted all over the country. The British government cracked down on protestors, and British pilots even bombed parts of the country.Meanwhile, World War II was raging around the world. The British Indian Army fought in the war on behalf of the Allied forces. The Allies won the war in 1945, but Britain had suffered many losses and needed to be rebuilt. The British government decided it would be better for the British to leave India, where anti-British protests were rising. The big question was how to transfer governance. British India was vast and home to nearly 400 million people, mostly divided into two big religious groups, Hindus and Muslims. Tensions rose between them as Indian independence inched closer to reality. There were concerns that Muslims would be at a disadvantage in a new country with a Hindu majority. The conflict between these two groups led to clashes across the country. After much discussion, it was decided that the British would divide British India into two independent countries with their own governments. India would
be formed out of the Hindu-majority regions while Pakistan would be formed from primarily Muslim areas. However, two big provinces—Bengal in the east and Punjab in the west—had nearly equal numbers of Muslim and Hindu residents.
A British lawyer named Cyril Radcliffe was tasked with carving up the colony to form the two new countries of India and Pakistan. This difficult task had to be completed in just five weeks. When the division was announced, millions of people had to leave the homes that their families had lived in for hundreds of years and move across the subcontinent. Their new home country was determined by the lines that a single man had drawn. This is known as the Partition of India.
Partition became the largest movement of people
in history not caused by war or famine. Nearly 12 million people lost their homes and became refugees in their new countries. Many families were torn apart as some members moved and others remained, never to meet again. People perished on the journey or in riots and clashes. In August of 1947, British rule in India finally came to an end. As the British departed, two new countries, India and Pakistan, were born. Later, after a war in 1971, Pakistan’s eastern wing became independent, forming the third country on the subcontinent, Bangladesh.
Partition continues to influence the lives of people in all three countries. Tensions between India and Pakistan remain high, and there have been multiple armed conflicts since 1947. In particular, India and Pakistan dispute over another province, Kashmir. Travel and trade between these two countries can be difficult. Even cricket matches between India and Pakistan can lead to protests. More than 70 years later, the ghost of Partition continues to haunt India and its neighbors. THE HISTORY OF SANSKRITSome languages in the world share an alphabet with English. This means that their letters look just like ours! Some, however, have alphabets that look very different. Sanskrit, an Indian language, is one of them. To see a good example of this, look at the Vedas, the ancient sacred texts of Hinduism. They were probably written 1500–500 BC and are the oldest example of Sanskrit writing. Although the Vedas may look undecipherable to someone who only speaks English, Sanskrit is a very complex language that has an important role in history.
Around the year 400 BC, a man named Pānini had an idea. Although Sanskrit had existed for centuries by this time, no one had ever written out its grammatical rules. Pānini did just that. In eight chapters, he explained how to use the language and the set of rules that governed it. This was the first detailed grammar system in the whole world. In Pānini’s time, the type of Sanskrit he spoke was very different from the outdated Sanskrit of the Vedas. Pānini’s Sanskrit became known as Classical Sanskrit, while the Sanskrit used in the Vedas was called Vedic, or Ancient Sanskrit.
Sanskrit was an early member of the Indo-European language family. In fact, it has influenced many other languages, like Greek and Latin, and through them, languages like English and Spanish. Some English words even take cues directly from Sanskrit. For instance, the words “avatar” and “juggernaut” are originally Sanskrit!
Sanskrit is incredible in other ways too, boasting an impressive vocabulary, with over 250 words about rain and over 65
words about the earth. Used for music, religion, and poetry, its many descriptive words allow people to express themselves
in amazing ways. It is the language of the Vedas and the Ramayana, another Indian story. It is important to many religions. Buddhism, Jainism, and Hinduism all use Sanskrit in their writings, and today, many ancient Hindu songs are still sung in Sanskrit.
Sanskrit, however, is more than a language for art. It is also a language well-suited for math, science, and logic. Many mathematicians and astronomers have recorded their work in Sanskrit. Aryabhata, an ancient Indian genius, studied algebra, estimated the value of pi, and mapped out the solar system so accurately, he was the first known person to calculate that a year is made of 365 days. His work? All written in Sanskrit.
Today, Sanskrit is not widely spoken, but it is one of India’s national languages. With its practical grammar and detailed vocabulary, it is no wonder that Sanskrit’s name means “perfectly done.”
THE IMPACT OF 2H OMake a list of all the ways you use clean water throughout the day.What do you think would be the biggest challenge to not have access to clean water?What do you think would be the biggest challenge to not have access to clean water?If you were only given one gallon (or 4.5 L) of clean water each day, how would you use it and what would you use it for?If you didn’t have access to clean water, how would your life look different? The hunting party had been stalking the tiger all day long. It was a man-eater who had been terrorizing the villages for months. From her howdah (canopied chair) atop an elephant, Nur Jahan could hear a slight rustle in the bushes. Her elephant’s ears flapped anxiously. It stepped backward. She knew it could smell danger. She glanced knowingly over at her husband, Emperor Jahangir. He had recently promised to give up hunting, so Nur Jahan knew it was all up to her.
The elephant was backing up in alarm now. The howdah lurched as if it would topple off. Nur Jahan grasped the side of her seat to steady herself. Just ahead, the tiger’s head emerged from the bushes. Nur Jahan lowered the rifle and steadied her sight just as it lunged out of the vegetation. In a split second, she pulled the trigger. The tiger crumpled. Mission accomplished. It wasn’t the first time she’d done this. Years before, she’d killed four tigers with only six shots. This earned her the nickname the Tiger Slayer.
It was also not the first time that this powerful seventeenth-century queen defied a convention of her time. Gifted with a brilliant mind, seemingly endless creativity, and bravery and generosity in equal measure, she was a force to be reckoned with. In the seventeen years that she held power in the Mughal Empire, she achieved what was thought impossible for a woman of her time.
The queen, who came to be known as Nur Jahan, was born with the name Mehrunnisa outside of what’s now Kandahar, Afghanistan, around 1577. Her parents had fled Persia (modern-day Iran) in search of better opportunities. This was during the time of the Mughal emperor, Akbar the Great, who welcomed immigrants to his realm. His kingdom spanned current-day Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and much of central India.
Mehrunnisa’s parents held high status at Emperor Akbar’s court. Although not much is known about life in the women’s quarters where she grew up, it’s clear that Mehrunnisa learned to read and write poetry. The talent she later developed for singing, painting, and doing intricate embroidery was probably nurtured at this time too. When she was a teen, her parents arranged her marriage to an adventurer of Persian heritage. Together they had a daughter named Ladli. When Mehrunnisa was 30 years old, her husband was killed, and she was taken in by the court of Emperor Jahangir in Agra to work as a lady-in-waiting. At court, everything changed.
As a lady-in-waiting, Mehrunnisa was assigned to help Jahangir’s step-mother. She lived in the zanana or the ladies’ quarters. Some historians suspect that there were around 300 women in Jahangir’s zanana: royal mothers, aunts, sisters, cousins, wives, princesses, dancing girls, and maids. The women’s quarters were separate from the palace, surrounded by a high wall with enclosed gardens. Only members of the royal court were allowed in and out. If the women had to travel outside the zanana, they did so in palanquins. These were a kind of wooden compartment carried by four or more bearers. Sometimes, they traveled in canopied boats.
In the zanana, Mehrunnisa quickly became known for her outgoing personality and her amazing artistic talent. She wrote poetry and held poetry competitions for the other women. As a child, she had learned Persian zari and kimkhab (translated as “woven flower”) embroidery, a kind of brocade embroidery that uses silver and gold thread to create rich patterns. She taught other women this craft, and soon they were producing highly sought-after textiles that caught the attention of court traders and fetched high prices. The women of the zanana appreciated Mehrunnisa’s leadership and energy. She eventually caught the attention of Emperor Jahangir, who is said to have met her at a festival. Her active mind and quick wit enchanted him. He soon declared he would marry her. At this time, it was customary for Mughal rulers to have more than one wife. Mehrunnisa became his twentieth wife in 1611, and Jahangir began to call her Nur Mahal, which means “Light of the Palace.”
From the start, this relationship was different from Jahangir’s other marriages. While Mehrunnisa was said to have been beautiful, her other qualities elevated her in a position far above his other wives. She was a brilliant conversationalist who could hold her own with the men of the court. While his father, Akbar, was known for his empire-building, Jahangir was more relaxed.
He was happy to let his new bride take control of decisions, and she was very capable of doing so. She issued decrees from the balcony of the palace and participated in military and diplomatic decisions. Their power-sharing relationship became so strong that diplomats and visitors to the court knew they would have to go through her if they wanted to get to the emperor. Although she was never crowned, she became known as the “lady emperor.”
Now called Nur Jahan—“Light of the World” —she was considered a co-emperor and was the only Mughal woman to have her image appear on a coin. She took part in battles and even rescued her husband when a rebellious nobleman kidnapped him.
The early seventeenth-century was a time of great commercial growth in India. Traders from all over the world came to the Mughal court to try to make deals with the emperor. The Mughal Empire exported textiles, spices like ginger and pepper, and dyes such as indigo. They imported wines, perfumes, brocade, dishes from China, gold, silver, ivory, pearls, and horses.
Much of what we know about the lady emperor comes from the reports of English, Dutch, Italian, and Portuguese traders who came to the court. One English trader named Thomas Roe stayed at the court for nearly four years. To try to win special trade considerations, he brought Nur Jahan and the emperor gifts from the English royal family, including a beautiful English-made carriage. It took months before Roe realized who he needed to impress. It wasn’t the emperor. He needed to impress Nur Jahan. The emperor's powerful wife took charge of approving trade agreements for foreign traders and negotiating customs fees. She was ambitious and savvy and managed to amass a fortune. Nur Jahan even had her own ships for exporting indigo and embroidered cloth.
Nur Jahan’s love of textiles extended into fashion design. She wanted women to be more comfortable in the notoriously hot temperatures of Agra. So, she designed dresses, veils, and scarves in lightweight fabrics adorned with floral patterns. She wore her clothes sewn instead of wrapped around the body as women had done in the past. Other women followed her lead, and her style is still worn in India. Nur Jahan even made the imperial elephants stylish with embroidered “caparisons” (a kind of saddle) made from recycled mail bags!
Nur Jahan was known as a great entertainer. She served rainbow-colored yogurt, and other delights on plates decorated with candied fruit peels and rice-powder glazes painted on in intricate patterns. For festivals, she helped
prepare beautiful displays of meat and fruit and create new recipes. Some say she even invented the famous Indian dish biryani, a kind of fried rice dish flavored with fragrant spices, although others believe her niece Mumhaz Mahal may have been the true inventor of this dish.
She transformed the Mughal palace,
commissioning richly-carved walls, jewel-studded curtains, and carpets she designed herself. Her artistic vision wasn’t limited to inside the palace, though. She oversaw the design and construction of palaces and gardens around the empire. One of the most famous was the “Light-Scattering Garden” in Agra, known today as Ram Bagh.
Under her direction, beautiful walkways were placed along the river, and pavilions were built with painted birds decorating the ceilings. You can still visit the garden today and breathe in the beautiful scents of jasmine and lemon trees.
When Nur Jahan’s parents died, she designed a tomb for them in Agra. It is said to be the inspiration for the most famous monument later built in the city, the Taj Mahal, a memorial to Mumtaz Mahal, the wife of her stepson, Shah Jahan.
Not everyone was comfortable with Nur Jahan’s power. Her stepson, Shah Jahan, was Jahangir’s oldest son. The two were close for many years, but when it came time for her daughter Ladli to marry, she chose Shah Jahan’s younger brother, Sharhiyar. From that point on, Shah Jahan was against his stepmother. When he came to power, he had Nur Jahan and Ladli sent to Lahore, a distant part of the empire, so that she couldn’t be a threat to his power. The mother and daughter lived in relative comfort and spent their time aiding the poor. But in her absence, Shah Jahan had many of the coins minted with her image destroyed, and he tried to ruin her legacy.
Today, Nur Jahan is known as the most powerful of the Mughal queens. Most of what we know about her comes from the accounts of others and not from her own words. But the monuments and gardens she designed still stand and have influenced generations of architects and artisans. Her smarts, style, and bravery left an impact on India that’s still felt today.
According to Hinduism, water is sacred. It is the foundation of all life, purifies all things, and destroys evil. One city has sat on the banks of the Ganges River, the most sacred river in India, for over 3,000 years.
Hindu legend says that Lord Shiva walked on Earth with his wife Parvati at the beginning of time. On the river, they founded the city Varanasi. This city is one of the oldest places that people have lived in continuously in all of India. Varanasi has grown a lot over the centuries. Once it was made up of only a few rural villages scattered across the landscape. Small pieces of pottery from these early towns have been found in Rajghat, the north side of the city that dates back to 1000 BC. Even earlier settlements have been found in the countryside around Varanasi.This tells historians that people have lived in the area since at least 1800 BC. These first villages had many crafts and trades. For example, one town made ivory sculptures, another produced textiles, and another mixed perfumes. Villagers sold their goods at the market. Over time, the area grew into a busy port city filled with merchants and traders. In the 6th century BC, this city became the capital of the Kingdom of Kashi, one of India’s 16 Great Kingdoms. The city grew wealthy through trade. Politics, art, culture, religion, philosophy, and medicine became important parts of life in Varanasi.
Varanasi is a winding maze of buildings that stretches four miles along the Ganges River’s left bank. Its many temples, religious shrines, and ancient palaces are laid out according to Hindu and astronomical significance. At the heart of this riverside city are its ghats. Ghats are stone steps that lead down to the Ganges and are used for religious bathing and cremation burials.
There are 84 ghats in Varanasi, each with its own legends and histories. Hindus sometimes visit this ancient and sacred city on pilgrimages. They pay respect to their gods and get purified by the water of the Ganges. Hindus believe that if you die in Varanasi, you will be freed from the reincarnation cycle and will become one with Lord Shiva.
Varanasi is a city filled with art, culture, education, and religion. It grew from simple beginnings into one of the seven sacred cities of Hinduism. Today, Varanasi is a multicultural city with thousands of different religious sites for Hindu, Muslim, Sikh, Christian, Buddhist, and Jain worshipers. A TIMELINE OF THE EASTC. 2500–1700 BC:
Some of the earliest cities develop near the Indus RiverC. 1500 BC:
The oldest sacred books of Hinduism are written in Sanskrit600–500 BC:
The game of chess appears in the North of India528 BC:
Buddha gives his first sermon in Sarnath326 BC:
Alexander the Great invades India and nearly faces defeatC. 320 AD:
The Gupta Empire in northern India begins629:
The first mosque in India is built 1526:
Bābur creates the Mughal EmpireC. 1548:
Guru Nanak begins teaching Sikhism1600:
The East India Company receives a Royal Charter to trade in India1611:
Nur Jahan marries the Mughal emperor1653:
The Taj Mahal is completed1848:
Savitribai Phule opens the first school for girls1858:
The British Crown rules India1905:
The Swadeshi Movement begins1930:
C. V. Raman
receives the Nobel Prize in Physics1939-1945
Over 2 million Indian soldiers fight in WWII1947:
India and Pakistan gain independence1971: Bangladesh breaks from Pakistan to become its own nation2013:
India’s Space agency launches a Mars space probe Layers of Society:The Caste SystemThe Hindu caste system is the oldest and most well-known social hierarchy in the world. Complicated, with many rules, this system stretches back thousands of years. At the heart of the caste system is the belief that a person’s rank or status in society depends on their caste. It impacts many parts of life in India and determines what people eat, who they marry, and most importantly, what kinds of jobs they can obtain.
There are four main castes to which a person might belong: Brahman [brah-muhn], Kshatriya [ksha-tree-uh], Vaishya [vei-shai-uh], and Shudra [shoo-druh]. Brahmans hold high positions in society and are often priests, spiritual advisors, teachers, and scholars. Kshatriyas, the second-highest of the four castes, are traditionally known as warriors and take on roles in the military and government. Vaishyas are typically merchants, traders, and farmers. At the bottom are the Shudras. They work in jobs that are viewed as undesirable and are often craftsmen, blacksmiths, and laborers.There’s also a group of people who fall even below the Shudras; they don’t belong to any caste and are called Dalits [da-luhts], or Untouchables. Dalits perform tasks that deal with dirt, like handling dead bodies, cleaning toilets, and sweeping roads.
There are different theories about how the caste system got started in India. Some believe that the Aryans, or Indo-Iranian peoples, introduced the system to control the local population when they invaded India during the Vedic period (c. 1500–1000 BCE). Others believe it had Hindu origins. They claim the Rigveda, Hinduism’s oldest sacred text, included an explanation of how people were created from parts of the divine Purusha’s (god) body. Brahmans were made from Purusha’s mouth, Kshatriyas from his arms, Vaishyas from his thighs, and the Shudra from his feet.
Although experts still disagree about how or why people started following the caste system, it continues to have a hold over Indian society. The Constitution of India, which determines many laws in the country, made the caste system illegal in 1950. However, many in India still follow this well-known social hierarchy. The
Ramayana
Sometime around 300 BC, an ancient Indian poet called Valmiki was sitting in his hut. In front of him was a stack of pages covered in 24,000 lines of Sanskrit writing—his poem. His hand was probably cramping from writing so much, but even still, he started planning how he would teach it to the people who looked up to him. When he shared his poem, his audience listened eagerly and then told it to others. Slowly but surely, Valmiki’s poem became so popular that almost everybody in India today still knows of it. His poem is called the Ramayana.The Sanskrit language was said to have been revealed by the gods. The Ramayana, one of the most important Sanskrit poems, is no different. In the beginning of the poem, Valmiki tells how he got the idea to write it. Brahma, the Hindu god of creation, appeared to him and used the death of a bird to inspire him to tell the story of the gods in a new form of poetry called shloka. Valmiki used his poetic invention throughout all of the Ramayana. It worked so well that it became the most popular way to write poetry in India for hundreds of years.Valmiki’s Ramayana tells the story of Rama, the perfect man, the ideal warrior, and a physical incarnation of Vishnu, the Hindu god of protection. He wins the love of the beautiful and virtuous princess, Sita, but they are banished from their kingdom by his mother-in-law, who wants her own son to be king. They live in the forest until Sita is kidnapped by the evil king, Ravana, and Rama and his half-brother, Lakshmana, go on a quest to rescue her. However, they don’t know where to start. They have no idea where Ravana lives. That is where a fascinating character enters the story. His name is Lord Hanuman. He is a god (the wind god is his father), and he looks a little different from Rama and Lakshmana. He is a monkey and the leader of a monkey army.Once Rama, Lakshmana, and Hanuman become a team, Hanuman makes it possible for Rama to find Sita and defeat Ravana. Hanuman is the one who finds out that Ravana lives across the ocean on an island, and he brings an entire monkey army to help Rama fight. Hanuman fights alongside Rama and the army, but even the monkey god is thwarted by Ravana’s poisoned arrows. Eventually, Rama’s army lies around his feet, injured and unable to keep fighting. Rama cries that all hope is lost.
But all hope is not lost—not if some special medicinal herbs can be brought to the battlefield.
Who did Rama choose to search for the herbs? Hanuman, the
monkey who once searched for his wife and found her. As the
wind god’s son, Hanuman soars through the world and finds what
he is looking for: a hill covered with beautiful plants. Some of
these could heal his friends—but which ones? Was there time to
decide? Would he be too late?Hanuman cannot risk it. He does not know which plants to take, but he cannot wait any longer. There is one last thing he can try. It seems impossible, but he digs his fingers into the earth and uproots the entire hill of medical herbs, flying it back to heal his injured friends. Because of those herbs, Rama can overthrow Ravana and save his wife.
From here, the story of Rama and Sita continues, but this is just a glimpse into the many adventures and characters found in Valmiki’s poem.The Ramayana has been translated into many languages and is carved into temples outside of India. In fact, a whole ballet was formed to tell the story of Rama and Sita. The poem has even made it onto the silver screen. Two separate TV shows called Ramayan have been produced in India in the past 50 years. Valmiki had no idea that his epic story would inspire so many people. Today, the Ramayana is not only one of the most influential pieces of Indian literature, but one of the building blocks of Hindu culture. What are your thoughts on imperialism? What impact do you think imperialism has had on Indian culture?Do you think the British were right to partition the subcontinent of India?
What do you think would have happened had the British government just left India alone rather than dividing it up?What do you think it would be like to live in an ancient city like Varanasi? Do you think there are any perks to living in an ancient city?What has been the most interesting thing you have learned in this issue so far? The History Quiz:
IndiaGrab a pen and a piece of paper1. What animal is India's national symbol?2. There are over ___________ people living on the subcontinent of India.
a. 1.3 billion
b. 1.5 million
c. 2 million4. The British partitioned the Indian subcontinent into these three countries:
___________ , ___________ , and ___________
5. True or False? Sanskrit was spoken and sung for hundreds of years before it became a written language.
6. The ancient city of Varanasi sits on which river?
a. The Danube
b. The Nile
c. The Volga
d. The Ganges find these words in the word searchindia
hanuman
partition
hindi
caste
bollywood
rickshaw
varanasi
bengali
biodiversity ramayana
sanskrit
THE
ADVENTURE
MAGAZINE
FOR YOUNG
HISTORIANS