A Highlight · History
The Maratha Empire
Shivaji’s hill forts to a confederacy that broke Mughal power across the Deccan and north India. 5 entries.
Overview
- Maratha EmpireThe Maratha Empire was a Hindu warrior state that rose in the Deccan under Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj in the mid-17th century and, as a loose confederacy of allied houses, became the dominant power across most of the Indian subcontinent before its final defeat by the British in 1818.
- ShivajiShivaji Bhonsle (1630–1680) was the founder of the Maratha Empire, crowned Chhatrapati in 1674 after building an independent state in the Deccan through decades of warfare against the Bijapur Sultanate and the Mughal Empire.
- The PeshwasThe Peshwas were the hereditary chief ministers who ruled the Maratha empire from Pune for a century, expanding it across northern India and losing it to the British in 1818.
Against the Mughals
- Aurangzeb and the MarathasThe Mughal-Maratha wars were a 27-year series of campaigns (1681–1707) fought by Emperor Aurangzeb in the Deccan against the Maratha kingdom founded by Shivaji, ending in Mughal exhaustion and the later rise of Maratha power across much of India.
- Mughal-Maratha warsThe Mughal-Maratha wars were a prolonged series of conflicts between the Mughal Empire and the Maratha state founded by Chhatrapati Shivaji, fought mainly between 1657 and 1707 and continuing in altered form until Maratha power was broken by the British in 1818.