Previous Page [Digital South Asia Library] Next Page

Schwartzberg Atlas, v. , p. xxx.

Switch to image view

It should be clear from the foregoing paragraphs that this atlas provides no more than an outline of the territorial aspects of the political history of the ancient period; for social, cultural, and economic history it barely scratches the surface. On demo- graphic history it sheds virtually no light. That we have not gone further, however, does not reflect lack of will so much as a dearth of usable data. As epigraphists, numismatists, and other scholars bring new information to light, a more well- rounded picture of the distant past is bound to emerge.

But what of the period for which contemporary written histories are available? Can we not rely on the chronicles of Muslim historians in order to reconstruct re- liable political maps of the period since the advent of Arab and Turkish conquer- ors in northwest India? To begin to answer this question it will be helpful to con- sider "Nine Views of the Limits of the Mughal Empire in 1605," which appears on p. xxxv. The year 1605, when the Emperor Akbar died, follows by only three years the completion of the Ā'īn-i Akbarī (the Institutions of Akbar), part of which may be regarded as a gazetteer of the Mughal Empire (cf. plate VI.A.2 for a sample of the contents). On the basis of the Ā'īn and other contemporary works such as the Akbar-Nāma (a history of the Mughals from the days of Tīmūr to 1602), historians should be able to reconstruct reasonably reliable and, one would suppose, consistent representations of the extent of the Mughal domains. In fact, they have not done so. Measuring maps (a)–(h) against one another, one finds that the areas about the inclusion of which authorities disagree are slightly larger than those areas that all eight views place within the empire. Our own view (map (i)) is the most conservative of those presented. Yet, despite our disagreement with all the other maps, we can put forward rather clear reasons for every carto- graphic decision our map embodies, and in this case, more so than in the case in the Ku&stod;ā&ntod;as, we would be prepared to defend our choices in the face of counter- arguments from other scholars. If, then, there is disagreement among historians on the limits of the empire in 1605, the fault, in our judgment, lies more with the his- torians than with the data available to them.

Two noteworthy features of our map of the Mughal Empire and of several of the others presented are that they depict voids in the area of Mughal control—most notably in the area of recalcitrant Afghan tribes, astride what is today the North- West Frontier Province of Pakistan, and in the rugged terrain of the southern Aravallis where the Sisodiyā Rajputs resisted Mughal rule until 1658—and that they characterize certain frontier areas as not completely integrated. That we have rarely employed such cartographic refinements in mapping other states should not, of course, be taken to mean that such states differed from the Mughal Empire in not having poorly integrated areas on their peripheries or that they did not encom- pass other areas where they exercised little or no political control; rather, it simply reflects the relative richness of data in the one case and its paucity or poor quality in others.

Beginning with the year 1766 (plate VII.A.1), the political maps of this atlas regularly show generalized frontiers and more precise boundaries, as well as the areas involved in specific transfers of territory, most of which are traceable in Aitchison's treaty series, other government documents, or contemporary maps. In certain cases the boundaries shown may admittedly be somewhat anachronistic, in that a boundary agreed upon by the British and a particular Indian princely state may not have been actually demarcated on the ground until decades later than the treaty or other legal instrument by which it was determined. The degree of error such a circumstance might introduce into our maps, however, is never likely to be great.

For the period after 1857 (secs. VIII and IX), our depiction of boundaries is, for general purposes, more than adequate; but undelimited political frontiers that continue to exist in certain sectors beyond the physical limits of the Indian subcon- tinent are less objectively determinable and are subject to varying partisan inter- pretations. We claim no finally for any of the views of such frontiers depicted in this atlas. The ultimate determination of the proper boundary alignments through frontier zones now in dispute is a matter properly to be decided by binational diplomacy or international arbitration, not by editorial judgment.

The compilation of political maps and ancillary materials in sections III through VI of the atlas entailed close collaboration between a geographer (the atlas editor) and historians specializing in the periods covered. The criteria applied in selecting data to be presented included mappability, historicity, ability to promote geo- graphic or ethnographic knowledge, relevance to prominent historical events and movements, and value for eliciting patterns over the course of history. For many maps, especially of the earlier periods of South Asian history, the identification of places and even of regions named in the relevant sources is a difficult matter. Many are utterly impossible to trace; numerous others can be assigned to any of several possible localities, depending on how one interprets the available evidence. Au- thorities frequently differ in their views in this type of question, and where none of their arguments was persuasive it was necessary to come to an independent judgment. In such cases the editor listened to the principal map author's exposition of the arguments for and against a particular location, gave his opinion on their geographic merits, and left the final choice to the historian. Not infrequently, how- ever, two possible locations for a given place or region were mapped, the less cer- tain being followed with a question mark; in other highly doubtful cases a single name is given followed by a question mark.

In general, the initial choice of dynastic, state, regional, and ethnic names to be placed on the map and of cities, towns, and physical features to be plotted was the Maues, and probably Artemidorus on maps (d)–(f) do not refer to separate individuals, but are pseudonyms or titles for Mithradates II of Parthia. Furthermore, the coins issued under several other names do not necessarily imply independence, but could have been issued by vassals of several much larger states. historian's; but certain deletions were normally urged by the editor to avoid clut- tering in the most politically prominent regions. From the standpoint of aesthetics and communications theory, it will often appear that the editor was not firm enough, since a number of atlas plates are so laden with information in certain areas that they are difficult to read. In such cases the demand for content won out over the desire for clarity, and the atlas user has to work somewhat harder than usual to get at the facts. But, if the facts were not on the map in the first place no amount of effort by the reader would uncover them. Elsewhere, additional names have been called for by the editor so as not to convey the impression that certain regions less politically salient during the era being portrayed were devoid of significant settle- ment and viable polities.

The spacing, alignment, and size of the names of dynasties, states, regions, and peoples also involved a dialogue between historian and geographer. When bound- aries are missing from a map, the positioning and size of place names assumes additional significance in conveying an idea of the extent and importance of the features portrayed; but the degree of crowding of information in specific areas of the map necessarily has a bearing on what is finally plotted. Similar considerations guided our decisions on the number, length, and placement of explanatory histori- cal notes.

Accompanying most of the principal political maps in sections III.B through VII.A of the atlas are one or more inset maps showing political frontiers or bound- aries and a chart entitled "Dynastic Chronology." For the more important powers of the period under review, the chronologies provide time bars indicating their duration, independent or subordinate status and dates of change from one status to the other, relative extent at various times, duration of reigns of principal mon- archs or other ruling figures, and the religion or culture of the rulers. Preparing such charts while compiling the map plates to which they pertain helped us greatly in deciding on the relative importance of events and in determining how much in- formation had to be made explicit in map notes, in view of the large amount of information on the charts themselves.

The inset maps referred to in the preceding paragraph relate to a more select group of major powers than those treated on the dynastic chronologies, typically from two to five, and show their maximum territorial limits during the period of the main map and, in some instances, certain stages in their territorial growth. Where the maximum extent of the state is highly problematic, a special boundary symbol or a note to that effect is typically inserted. Also indicated are the capital (s) of each state shown and, where appropriate, the core area from which the state grew to become a major power. The routes of major military campaigns are shown for certain powers.

In delimiting the extent of particular powers within specified periods of history, we are guided not merely by the data of the various source materials discussed above, but also by considerations of terrain and strategy. For example, if an in- scription indicates that a certain Gangetic monarch conquered Ujjayinī (Ujjain), we would probably assume, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, that the limits of his kingdom extended somewhat farther south, to the defensible crest of the Vindhyan escarpment; we would make the same assumption if the inscription noted that he conquered Mālava (Malwa), with no further specification of what Mālava comprised. We take it as axiomatic that certain "perennial nuclear re- gions" (to use a term coined by Spate) tend to remain political units: to be con- solidated time and again as core regions of states, to shift hands as units, and to fall as units. Malwa is but one among many such units in South Asia. Particularly relevant to a consideration of regions over the course of South Asian history are the two synoptic maps of plate XIII.A.1.

Over much of South Asia we were guided in drawing political frontiers by the distribution of rugged and smooth terrain, indicated by the presence or absence of a light reddish background color on most of the political maps of this atlas through section VII and on many other plates scattered throughout the work. While high- land barriers are most commonly presumed to mark the customary frontiers of states, competing powers contesting for control over broad expanses of plains will typically be limited there by other types of barriers, especially by rivers that cut across the general trend of the plain, as do, for example, the Gandak and the Son Rivers in the central portion of the Gangetic Plain. When considering expansion into coastal plains, we would normally assume, in the absence of contrary evidence, that an interior power known to have seized a major city therein (e.g., the Cālukyas, with respect to Ve&ndot;gi in ancient Āndhra) would also have extended its power be- yond that city to the sea and we would draw the limits of that power accordingly.4

If we have said little above about the method of drawing the nonpolitical maps of sections III through VII of the atlas and about the wide diversity of maps to be found in other sections, it is not because they did not confront us with interesting and challenging cartographic problems; rather, it is partially because the problems were so numerous and so diverse that they defied attempts at generalization in de- scribing them; alternatively, certain maps may have been so straightforward and simple to prepare that they left little to the imagination. Where necessary, we have called attention to the problems in the text keyed to the specific map plates where they arose.

In marked contrast to the ever-changing political situation in South Asia is the relative stability of the physical geographic stage. That stage, however, should not 4 In plotting the limits of the Ku&stod;ā&ntod;a Empire (discussed on p. xxix and plotted in the maps on p. xxxiii) we use a similar line of reasoning in indicating Sind as "possibly included" (map (j)). We, in common with all other authorities, extend the Ku&stod;ā&ntod;a domains as far to the southwest as modern Sui Vihar, in West Punjab, the site of an important Ku&stod;ā&ntod;a inscription. But we reason, as do several other authorities, that a state as powerful as that of the Ku&stod;ā&ntod;as, with a keen interest in trade, would have had both the means and the will to extend its sway through Sind to the Arabian Sea. The correctness of this judgment awaits further evidence.

Previous Page To Table of Contents Next Page

Back to Schwartzberg Atlas | Back to the DSAL Page

This page was last generated on Friday 22 January 2021 at 19:29 by dsal@uchicago.edu
The URL of this page is: https://dsal.uchicago.edu/reference/schwartzberg/pager.html