Ever the Handmaid? A Consideration of What a Medieval Archaeology in South Asia Might Be

Bibliographic Data

ID10223305
AuthorsJason D Hawkes (0000-0003-1008-5848, Gonville and Caius College, University of Cambridge, England., corresponding author)
Year2021
Volume24
Issue1-2
Pages130-170
Publication date2021-05-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueThe Medieval History Journal (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0971-9458 • E-ISSN: 0973-0753
PublisherSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/09719458211054352
OpenAlexW4206355416
LanguageEN
Citations received1
References cited28

This article shifts discussion of the medieval in South Asia away from conversations about ‘what’ took place towards ‘how’ it is studied. Following a brief review of what defines the South Asian medieval, this article starts with the premise that the entire period has not been studied archaeologically and that there is a great deal of potential in doing so. This potential is explored with reference to recent work in Central India, which has investigated a particular set of developments in which socio-economic histories first located the transition from the ancient to the medieval in South Asia, namely, royal grants of land to Hindu temples in the fourth to seventh centuries ce. Considering these land grants as archaeological objects and situating them in the very landscapes they existed within reveal a great deal of new information about early medieval social formation and the transition to the early medieval in this region. In presenting this research, I demonstrate not only the potential value of an archaeological approach to the study of the period but also the necessity of it. Consideration then turns to the directions and form(s) that a ‘medieval archaeology’ might usefully take in the study of South Asia, which by no means shares the same empirical (text–object) and theoretical (historical–archaeological) relationships as the study of the medieval elsewhere in the world

Ancient history · Archaeology · Art · Geography · Linguistics · Middle Ages · Object (grammar · Period (music · Premise · Transition (genetics · Value (mathematics · Anthropological Studies and Insights · Classics · Eurasian Exchange Networks · History · Indian and Buddhist Studies