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Introduction by the Editor

Not the least historic of the ancient nations of the East is India, even when compared with Egypt and its monuments, China and its annals, or Assyria and Babylonia with their cuneiform tablets and their cylinders. India’s earliest records, written in its literature, have been inscribed in the hearts of the people for more than three thousand years; and from that remote age its history is recorded in an almost unbroken line to this very century, so that he who will may follow its development through the early centuries that preceded the Christian era, onward through the medieval period of Mohammedan rule, down to the days when the Europeans entered India and the country came under British dominion.

The aim of this series of volumes is to present a continuous narrative of the history of India from the dim ages of the past down to the present time, combining into an organic whole a succession of standard works by recognized authorities, each a master of the special period with which he deals, thus providing a

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complete picture of the development of the country whose teeming millions are now under the sceptre of Great Britain. In carrying out this design, the publishers and the editor have had the generous assistance of the scholars whose work is represented by these volumes. Special care has been taken to make such changes as were needed to meet the requirements of the series in a sympathetic manner and in such a way as to preserve all the essentials, thus giving the reader the results of the ripest scholarship in each field.

Ancient India and its civilization is discussed by the Honourable Romesh Chunder Dutt, of Baroda State, in a manner that will awaken interest in the life and history of our earliest kinsmen of Aryan blood. The second volume, written by Mr. Vincent Smith, recounts the history of the land of the Ganges from the time of Buddha to the first centuries after the Mohammedan conquest of Hindustan, when the history of Medieval India begins. A comprehensive picture of the fortunes of the country under the rule of Islam is given in the volumes by Mr. Stanley Lane-Poole, and this is supplemented by a collection of the most characteristic descriptions of the period by Mohammedan writers themselves, as translated from their Arabic and Persian originals by Sir Henry M. Elliot, thus covering the history of India down to the time when the land was brought into direct contact with Europe. The settlements by the Portuguese, Dutch, French, and English, and the struggle for supremacy which resulted in England’s

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triumph, are thoroughly treated in the volumes originally prepared by Sir William Hunter, and Sir Alfred Lyall relates the modern history of British dominion in India. A volume designed to give an objective view of the land and its people, as seen through the eyes of foreigners, presents a collection of the most striking descriptions of India by foreign travellers from ancient times to the eighteenth century, selected by the editor from Greek, Chinese, Persian, and Arabic sources, and from the accounts of the earliest European travellers and discoverers from the Western World.

Throughout the entire series the endeavour has been to eliminate the more technical matters and to omit detailed discussions of mooted points, while foot-notes have been almost universally avoided and diacritical marks omitted in the spelling of proper names. The illustrations of the various volumes have been chosen with great care, and many of them have been taken from photographs in my own collection, made during my travels in India. I am happy to have the opportunity to acknowledge my obligations to those scholars who have so kindly aided me by giving permission to make use of their works and to thank those who have allowed me to reproduce pictures which were their special property.

My thanks in particular are due to my friend and former pupil, Dr. Louis H. Gray, sometime Fellow in Indo-Iranian at Columbia University, for aid in the preparation of the text and for the indexing of the volumes. Mr. George C. O. Haas, formerly Scholar,

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now Fellow, in Indo-Iranian at Columbia, has also lent generous assistance in reading the proof-sheets and in various matters of detail.

A. V. Williams Jackson.

This collection transcribed by Chris Gage
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