India

Mughal emperor Jahangir holding a portrait of his father, Akbar the Great, 17th century.

Messy Beginnings

The uncertainty, contingency and precarity of England’s incipient commercial and imperial ambitions.

the Babri Masjid, Ayodhya, c.1867.

Treason of the Clerics

For 600 years Muslims held sway over the Indian subcontinent. Then democracy and a desultory leadership did them in.

The Ramayana is one of the two great ancient Sanskrit epics from India (the other being the Mahabharata) and is one of Hinduism’s foundational texts. Thought, in its earliest sections, to date from between the seventh and fourth centuries bc, it forms part of the cultural consciousness across the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia. The Ramayana covers the journey of prince Rama and his wife Sita, and is full of poignant stories and captivating characters through which the importance of virtue and duty e

The Nandi Bull

Two Hindu gods discover an abandoned child while following the wind’s path.

Tata Stamp

Zoroastrian Zeligs

Questioning the powerful Tata dynasty’s claims for a ‘different kind of capitalism’.

Maharani Jind Kaur, by George Richmond, 19th century © Christie’s/Bridgeman Images.

The Last Sikh Queen

The ambitious Sikh queen Jind Kaur faced division among her subjects and the might of the British Empire. 

Punkahwallahs.jpg

Keeping India Cool

Sweltering British imperialists relied on an army of fan bearers, whose stories are as invisible as the air they circulated.