. Give long answers for the following questions.
1. What did Hindustan stand for in medieval times?
2. What were the major historical developments during the medieval period?
3. List some important chronicles available for the study of the medieval period.
4. How are travelogues an important literary source
please answer
Answers
1. Hindustan is a Persian word that means “land of the Indus” or “land beyond the Indus”. (In Old Persian, Hindu was the name for the Indus River, derived from the Sanskrit form Sindhu.) So, in the Middle Ages, Hindustan was the Persian name for South Asia, the region that now includes Pakistan, India, Nepal, Bhutan, and Bangladesh. Sri Lanka and the Maldives weren’t well known to Persian speakers, and it isn’t clear whether they would have been included in the vague idea of Hindustan.
Of course, the Mughals were Persian speakers, so this would have been their term for much of the region they ruled as emperors.
2. Medieval technology is the technology used in medieval Europe under Christian rule. After the Renaissance of the 12th century, medieval Europe saw a radical change in the rate of new inventions, innovations in the ways of managing traditional means of production, and economic growth. The period saw major technological advances, including the adoption of gunpowder, the invention of vertical windmills, spectacles, mechanical clocks, and greatly improved water mills, building techniques (Gothic architecture, medieval castles), and agriculture in general (three-field crop rotation).
The development of water mills from their ancient origins was impressive, and extended from agriculture to sawmills both for timber and stone. By the time of the Domesday Book, most large villages had turnable mills, around 6,500 in England alone. Water-power was also widely used in mining for raising ore from shafts, crushing ore, and even powering bellows.
3. A chronicle is a record of the rule of kings and life at the court. Some important chronicles of the medieval period are:
Rajatarangini by kalhana is a history of the kings of Kashmir.
Tarikh-I Firoz Shahi by Zia-ud-din Barani which describes the history of the Sultans of Delhi till the reign of Firoz Shah Tughlaq.
Khazainul-Futuh and Tughlaqnama by Amir Khusrau deal with the reign of Khaljis and Tughluqs.
4. Travelogues an important literary source because they give a detailed account about political trade ,events and commerce.They give us information about the condition of people that time.It also gives us information about their courts and their style.