A Highlight · History
The Vijayanagara Empire
The last great Hindu empire of the south, built in the fourteenth century as a bulwark against the Sultanates — and sacked in 1565.
Overview
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- The Indian Independence MovementFrom the 1857 revolt to Partition — every satyagraha, revolutionary and Congress leader, in one place.
- European Colonial Rule in IndiaFrom Vasco da Gama's landfall to the last Viceroy — the Company's conquest and every Governor-General who ruled after it.
- The Maurya EmpireFrom Chandragupta to Ashoka — the first pan-Indian empire, and the emperor who renounced conquest after seeing what it cost.
- The Gupta Golden AgeClassical India at its height — the age of Aryabhata, Kalidasa, and a revival of Sanskrit literature and science.
- The Chola EmpireSouth India's great maritime power — temple-building, a navy that reached Southeast Asia, and the longest-lived dynasty in Indian history.
- The Islamic Conquest of North IndiaGhaznavid raids to the Delhi Sultanate, 1000–1526 — the temples destroyed, Nalanda burned, Delhi sacked twice, told without euphemism and without inventing what the sources don’t say.
- The Mughal EmpireFrom Babur to Aurangzeb — the empire that built the Taj Mahal, ran the Mansabdari system, and reached its widest extent just before it began to break apart.
- The Maratha EmpireShivaji’s hill forts to a confederacy that broke Mughal power across the Deccan and north India.
- The Bhakti MovementDevotion over ritual and caste — the poet-saints who reshaped Hindu religious life from the seventh century onward.