The Mughal Empire 1526-1858 A.D.

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The Mughal Empire 1526-1858 A.D.

• By Lauren Sibille, Asia DaCosta Marilyn Sanabria
• 2nd Period

The white area on the map is where the Mughal
Empire was during most of its rule.
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Background Information

• The Mughal (or Mogul) Empire ruled most of India
  and Pakistan in the 16th and 17th centuries.
• It consolidated Islam in South Asia, and spread
  Muslim (and particularly Persian) arts and
  culture as well as the faith.
• The Mughals were Muslims who ruled a country with
  a large Hindu majority.
• However, for much of their empire they allowed
  Hindus to reach senior government or military
  positions.
• The foundation of the Mughal Empire was
  established around 1504 by Al-Din Muhammad. Also
  known as Babur (The Tiger).
• Muhammad was a Chagatai Turk who claimed descent
  from both Genghis Khan and Tamerlane. He took
  control of Kabul (the largest city in
  Afghanistan) and eastern regions of Khorasan,
  which included the fertile Sindh region and lower
  valley of Indus River.
• In 1526, the Muhammad defeated the last of the
  Turkic Delhi Sultans, Ibrahim Sha Lodi, at the
  First Battle of Panipat to put the newly founded
  Kingdom in motion.

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Why was the Mughal Empire important?

• The Mughals brought many changes to India
• Centralized government which brought together
  many smaller kingdoms
• Delegated government with respect for human
  rights
• Persian art and culture
• Persian language mixed with Arabic and Hindi to
  create Urdu
• Periods of great religious tolerance
• A style of architecture (e.g. the Taj Mahal)
• A system of education that took account of
  pupils' needs and culture

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Political Organization

• The Empire Babur founded was a sophisticated
  civilization based on religious toleration. It
  was a mixture of Persian, Mongol, and Indian
  culture.
• While Humayun, Baburs successor, was certainly
  disastrous as a ruler, his love of poetry and
  culture heavily influenced his son Akbar, and
  helped to make the Mughal Empire an artistic
  power as well as a military one.
• Akbar established a form of delegated government
  in which the provincial governors were personally
  responsible to him for the quality of government
  in their territory.

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This is a Delhi tomb in India.
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Emperors of the Mughal Empire

• Babur, the first Mughal emperor, was followed by
  his son Humayun who was a bad emperor, a better
  poet, and a drug addict.
• The third Emperor, Abu Akbar, is regarded as one
  of the great rulers of all time.
• Akbar was followed by Jahangir, and then his son
  Jahan. They both had major religious and cultural
  influences in the Mughal Empire.

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Emperors (cont.)

• Jahan's son, Aurangzeb, was to be the last great
  Mughal Emperor.
• He was a strong leader, whose conquests expanded
  the Mughal Empire to its greatest size.
• Under Aurangzeb, the Mughal Empire reached the
  peak of its military power, but the rule was
  unstable mostly because the empire got too big to
  handle.
• Aurangzeb's extremism caused Mughal territory to
  dry up and the Empire went into decline. The last
  Mughal Emperor was disposed of by the British in
  1858.

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You can see here that only under the emperors
Jahan and Aurangzeb did the Mughal Empire ever
reach most of India.
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Role of Religion

• Under Babur, Hinduism was tolerated and new Hindu
  temples were built with his permission.
• Baburs first act after conquering Delhi was to
  forbid the killing of cows because that was
  offensive to Hindus.
• He even wrote an autobiography, The Babur -
  Namah. The autobiography is candid, honest, and
  at times even poetic.
• Akbar proclaimed an entirely new state religion
  of 'God-ism', a jumble of Islamic, Hindu,
  Christian and Buddhist teaching with himself as
  deity. It never spread beyond his court and died
  when he did.

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Role of Religion (cont.)

• Fatehpur Sikri was the new capital built by
  Akbar.
• Akbar believed that that a ruler's duty was to
  treat all believers equally, all religions should
  be tolerated, and, whatever their belief.
• Akbar's son, Emperor Jahangir, readopted Islam as
  the state religion and continued the policy of
  religious toleration.
• His court included large numbers of Indian
  Hindus, Persian Shi'a and Sufis and members of
  local heterodox Islamic sects.

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This is the famous Fatehpur Sikri which was the
new capital built by Akbar, as a part of his
attempt to absorb other religions into Islam.
Fatehpur Sikri is a synthesis of Hindu and
Islamic architecture.
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Cultural Developments

• Jahangir began building the magnificent monuments
  and gardens by which the Mughals are chiefly
  remembered today.
• Jahangir's approach was typified by the
  development of Urdu as the official language of
  Empire.
• Urdu uses an Arabic script, but Persian
  vocabulary and Hindi grammatical structure.
• Jahan, Jahangirs successor, commissioned the Taj
  Mahal.

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This is the world famous Taj Mahal which was
built by Emperor Jahan as a symbol of the
empires stability, power, and confidence.
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Social Aspects

• Generally the Mughal Empire is thought of as a
  prosperous time period.
• Even though the Mughal Empire existed 300-500
  years ago, its influence still exists in current
  day India.
• The social aspects of the Mughal Empire and India
  today especially relate including family life,
  religion, art, music, literature, and education.
• During the Mughal Empire, women had a significant
  role in family life.
• Women received salaries, owned land, participated
  in business transactions, and literary
  activities.
• Aristocratic women painted, wrote poetry, and
  played music because they received a higher
  education.

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Social Aspects (cont.)

• The Mughal Empire was run by Muslim emperors,
  however India was and still is Hindu dominated.
• Hindus, specifically of the upper class, adopted
  the Muslim practice of isolating women, called
  purda.
• The Hindu practice of cremation of widows, called
  suttee, continued even though the Mughals tried
  to abolish it.
• The Mughal rulers sometimes forced Islam upon the
  Hindus, but many times the Hindus resisted.
• Hindu men would marry Islam women and convert
  them to Hinduism in order to keep their religion
  prominent.
• Families looked down upon Hindus if one converted
  to Islam.
• Child marriage also remained common.
• Depending on the emperor, there was religious
  acceptance and tolerance, but religious
  segregation still existed.

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Economic Developments

• Productive agricultural economy was the base and
  foundation to all of the Islamic empires.
• They relied heavily on crops of wheat and rice.
• The profit from agricultural trade and production
  went mostly to finance armies and bureaucracies.
• The Columbian exchange brought change (though not
  as dramatic as the change in Europe and Asia) by
  introducing American food crops such as maize,
  potatoes, and tomatoes.
• Maize was used as feed for animals because it was
  not popular for food use for the Islamic people.

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Economic Developments (cont.)

• Tobacco and coffee traded by European merchants
  became very popular in the 16th century.
• Plantations specialized in the production of
  these items in a similar way as sugar in America.
• The interest in coffee and tobacco sparked a new
  tradition of coffee and smoke houses where the
  people could indulge in both of the addictive
  substances.
• In the mid sixteenth century, both the drink and
  tobacco were outlawed because of their
  distraction on moral teachings.
• The rise in population in the Mughal empire was
  attributed mainly to their success in agriculture
  rather than trade. The people of the Mughal
  empire also participated actively.

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Bibliography

• "History of the Mughals." SSCNet. 31 Jan. 2008
  lthttp//www.sscnet.ucla.edu/southasia/History/    
   Mughals/mughals.htmlgt. "History of the Mughals."
  SSCNet. 31 Jan. 2008
• lthttp//www.BBC.co.uk/religion/religions/islam/his
  tory/mughal empire_1.shtmlgt. "Social Aspects of
  the Mughal Empire in India." Menloschool. 31 Jan.
  2008     
• lthttp//sun.menloschool.org/sportman/westernstudi
  es/first/1718/2000/cblock/mughal/social.htmlgt.