Urban Settlements in Early Medieval India | History Optional for UPSC (Notes) PDF Download

Introduction

• Urban settlements in the post-Gupta period were closely linked to the agrarian economy, with land grants playing a crucial role in this relationship.
• The system of land grants led to the expansion of cultivation and the agrarian economy, which in turn fostered the growth of towns and cities between the eighth and twelfth centuries.
• While there was a general revival of urban centers across the Indian subcontinent,regional variations existed due to different economic forces, ecological and cultural factors, and the nature of political organization.
• Detailed regional studies of urban centers are available for Rajasthan, Central India, and South India, highlighting the diverse experiences of urbanization in these areas.

Form and Substance of Urban Centres 

Urban Centers in Early Medieval India:
Urban centers in early medieval India have been studied primarily through two lenses:

• Economic History: Focusing on trade, commerce, and craft production.
• Administrative or Political History: Examining urban centers as capitals, administrative hubs, and fort towns.

Types of urban centers have been categorized into various types such as market centers, trade ports, political centers, and religious hubs.

However, there has been a lack of exploration into the underlying causes for the emergence of these towns. While the forms of urban centers have been studied, their significance and substance have not been adequately addressed.

Phases of Urban Growth in India: Before the arrival of the Turks, the Indian subcontinent experienced three distinct phases of urban growth:

• Bronze Age Harappan Civilization (fourth-second millennium B.C.)
• Early Historic Urban Centers of the Iron Age (c. sixth century B.C. to the end of the third century A.D.)
• Early Medieval Towns and Cities (c. eighth/ninth to twelfth centuries A.D.)

Definition of an Urban Center: Gordon Childe introduced the concept of 'urban revolution' and identified key features of urban centers:

• Monumental Buildings
• Large Settlements with Dense Population
• Presence of Non-Food Producers(rulers, artisans, merchants)
• Cultivation of Art, Science, and Writing

Childe emphasized the importance of craft specialists and agricultural surplus in supporting non-food producers in cities. While agricultural surplus from rural areas is crucial for the existence of a town, merely a settlement of non-agriculturists does not qualify as an urban center.

Literary texts from the early medieval period describe towns surrounded by walls and moats, inhabited by people of various classes, and governed by the laws and customs of artisan and merchant guilds.

Recent Studies on Urban Centers: Excavations from 140 sites across the Indian subcontinent have shifted the focus to:

• Quality of Material Life and Nature of Occupations
• Urban Centers as Integral Parts of Rural Hinterland

Prominent traits of urban centers applicable to early medieval settlements include:

• Size of Settlement: Area and population size.
• Proximity to Water Resources: Such as river banks, tanks, and ring wells.
• Artefacts of Artisans: Evidence of artisan activities like axes, chisels, plough-shares, sickles, crucibles, ovens, and jewellery-making tools.
• Coin Moulds and Mint Towns: Presence of metallic money and evidence of artisans and merchants indicating urban character.
• Luxury Goods: Such as precious stones, glassware, and fine pottery, which could have become necessities for superior rural classes.
• Baked Brick Structures: Not just burnt bricks, especially in moist, rainy climates.
• Streets, Shops, Drains, and Fortifications: Providing insights into the nature of the urban settlement.
• Silos and Granaries: For storing surplus foodgrains found at historical sites.

Regional variations and types

Rural Centres Transformed into Urban Centres:

• The brahmadeyas and devadanas provided the nuclei of urban growth.
• The Brahmana and Temple settlements clustered together in certain key areas of agricultural production. These centers were initially rural, became points of convergence of trade of various goods from distant region.

Such centers are more commonly found in South India. examples:

• The Cola city of Kumbakonam(Kudamukku-Palaiyarai) developed out of agrarian clusters and became a multi-temple urban centre between the ninth and twelfth centuries. Additional factor of it’s growth was that it was residential capital of the Colas.
• Kanchipuram is a second major example of such an urban complex. It too had the additional importance of being the largest craft center (textile manufacturing) in South lndia.

Market Centres, Trade-Network and Itinerant Trade:

• These were urban centers of relatively modest dimensions, as market centres, trade centres (fairs, etc.) which were primarily points of the exchange network.
• The range of interaction of such centres varied from small agrarian hinterlands to regional commercial hinterlands.
• The nagaram of South India is the best example. It served as the market for the nadu or kurram, an agrarian or peasant region. The nakhara and nagaramu in Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh respectively, are also such center to some extent.
• Nagarams located on important trade routes and at the points of intersection developed into more important trade and commercial centres of the region. They were ultimately brought into a network of intra-regional and inter-regional trade as well as overseas trade through the itinerant merchant organisations and the royal ports.
• Markets in these centers were controlled by the nagaram assembly headed by a chief merchant called pattanasvami.
• A fairly large number of such centres were founded by ruling families or were established by royal sanction and were named after the rulers, such centres had the suffix pura or pattana.
• In Gujraat, Bhrigukachcha (Broach) continued to flourish as entrepots of trade in early medieval times. In Rajsthan, Bayana was another such center.
• Some of the craft and commercial centres of the early historic urban phase survived till the early medieval period and were brought into the processes of re-urbanisation which linked them with the new socio economic institutions like the temple.Kashi (Varanasi) in the north and Kanchipuram(near Madras) in the south are two very prominent examples of such processes.

Sacred/Pilgrimage Centres

Two Types of Pilgrimage Centres:

• During the early medieval period, the concept of pilgrimage to religious centres emerged, influenced by the spread of the Bhakti cult. This expansion involved a blend of Brahmanical or Sanskritic worship with folk or popular cults, transcending narrow sectarian boundaries. As a result, ancient local cult centres, along with those linked to Brahmanical and non-Brahmanical religions, evolved into pilgrimage sites.
• The pilgrimage network was sometimes limited to specific cultural regions where a cult centre gained sacred significance. However, these cult centres (tirthas) drew worshippers from diverse regions.
• Both types of pilgrimage centres exhibited urban characteristics due to a mobile pilgrim population, trade, and royal patronage. Historians have acknowledged the role of emerging markets in the growth of tirthas.

Examples:

• Pushkara near Ajmer in Rajasthan was a tirtha of regional importance with a dominant Vaishnava association.
• Kasi (Banaras) acquired a pan-Indian character due to its greater antiquity and significance as a Brahmanical sacred centre.

In South India:

• Srirangam(Vaishnava), Chidambaram(Shaiva), and Madurai(Shaiva) were regional pilgrimage centres.
• Kanchipuram became part of an all-India pilgrimage network.
• Melkote was a regional sacred centre in Karnataka.

Jain centres of pilgrimage emerged in Gujarat and Rajasthan, with merchant and royal patronage leading to the proliferation of Jain temples.

In South India, two types of urban growth occurred around temple structures:

• Organized around a single large temple, as seen in Srirangam, Madurai, Melkote, Simhachalam, etc.
• Around several temples of different religions such as Shaivism, Vaishnavism, and Shaktism.

Royal Centres or Capitals

A major category of urban centres in early medieval India.

• Royal families established their own ports, which served as key entry points into their territories and facilitated international trade.
• The commercial demands of these royal centres fostered new trade and communication routes, strengthening ties between the royal centre and its agricultural hinterlands or resource bases.
• In the regions south of the Vindhyas, there is strong evidence of such royal centres. For example:
  • Vatapi and Vengi: Royal centres of the Chalukyas in northern Karnataka and Andhra.
  • Kanchipuram: A royal centre of the Pallavas, who had a royal port at Mamallapuram (Mahabalipuram).
  • Madurai: A royal centre of the Pandyas, with Korkai as their port.
  • Kalyana: A royal centre of the Western Chalukyas.
  • Dvarasamudra: A royal centre of the Hoysalas.
  • Warangal: A royal centre of the Kakatiyas, with Motupalli as their port. Warangal was notable for being a fortified royal city in South India.
• Examples of royal centres in North India include:
  • Kanyakubja (Kanauj): The Gurjara Pratihara capital.
  • Khajuraho: A royal centre of the Candellas.
  • Dhara: A royal centre of the Paramaras.
  • Valabhi: A royal centre of the Solankis.
• A list of 131 places has been compiled for the Chauhan dominions, most of which appear to have been towns.
• Nearly two dozen towns are identified in Malwa under the Paramaras.
• Gujarat under the Chalukyas was dotted with port towns.
• In Eastern India, the number of towns does not seem to be large, although all nine victory camps (jayaskandavars) of the Palas, such as Pataliputra, Mudgagiri, Ramavati, Vata Parvataka, Vilaspura, Kapilavasaka, Sahasgand, Kanchanapura, and Kanaui, may have been towns.
• Sometimes, important trade and market centres were also granted to feudatory families, with examples found in Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, and Rajasthan.
• The changes brought about by the system of land grants in the post-Gupta centuries were not limited to a new agrarian economy. Urban settlements, which had been in decline after the arrival of the Guptas, experienced a resurgence.
• The revival of trade, emergence of new markets, dispersal of political authority, and consolidation of economic power by religious establishments contributed to the rise of numerous towns and cities across different regions of the Indian subcontinent, with only minor variations in the relative importance of these factors.