This thread will be the first amongst many that document the regularized violence in the feudal Gangetic plain from the late Middle Ages to early modern period. Zamindari power was virtually unchanged from 1595 to the annexation of Oudh by Johnny Company in 1858. The establishment and maintenance of it depended heavily upon armed power, as violence is the
ultimate denominator of power, especially in a place as unstable as the North Indian plain.

An archetypical example of the establishment of such fiefdoms. The Dom tribals of Gorakhpore and its
environs were subjugated by migratory Rajpoots, who then held the lands, until they too were similarly conquered by Rajputs of Kacchar.

An overview on Warrior Ascetics in Early Modern India…. Part 1 The Indian subcontinent has long been the home of many orders of ascetics, known as sadhus or Sannyasis. Among the most famous of these orders were the Dasnamis, and by the 17th century, its sadhus had become a militarized group, with various bands of armed monks, or Nagas (lit. naked) attached to these sects.

This occurred with many different sects of Sadhus in addition to the Dasnamis, and there are thus different kinds of Nagas as well.

The Dasnami Nagas were organized into 6 broad akharas or regiments, the date of foundation for these regiments is unknown save for a testament from a document by one monastery from the 19th century, though it cannot be corroborated. There were also numerous akharas that formed via fission of extant akharas under the leadership of former chelas, or acolytes, of Mahants (gosain leaders) who split away and formed their own regiments after the deaths of their mahants. These usually lasted as long as their founders.

Indian civilization has always been more decentralized comparatively than say Chinese civilization, which always had a stronger autocratic element and a philosophical inclination towards unification. The strong aristocratic culture of India, girded on by notions of Indo-European tripartite societal organization, led to a weakening of central authority even prior to the decentralization and parcellization of power in the Gupta and post Gupta age, when feudalism properly began in India. The endemic warfare and notions of freedom of this rural aristocracy

This Sattu vs Whey is a very interesting debate within the Indian community, primarily because it operates under a few interesting assumptions.

1) Assumption 1: “My grandfather ate/drank this and lived to 98, if I do it I’ll also live to 98.” Yet we have vastly different

https://twitter.com/biharigurl/status/1775393790746063124

lifestyles from our grandfathers. Even belonging to the leisure class at the time required considerable walking…so life was more physical in general. My grandfathers belonged to such a class. They would walk/ride everywhere and play Kabaddi for fun…most

🧵 on Hero cults in India.

In India, hero cults mainly focus on local heroes engaging in or repulsing a cattle raid. This is because cattle raiding in pre modern India was the most conspicuous way to become a hero on the local rural level. A cattle raid brought wealth to your community, but also, more importantly, humiliated your rivals. In India, the title of a “cow protector” was an important title with deep significance that did not just relate to protecting cattle from slaughter, but also from raids.

🧵on the Cattar or Cathiar. The Cathiar were Brahmin war bands found throughout Kerala and Tamil Nadu as well as the rest of Southern India, where they were referred to as ghatam/kalam. The Cathiar would take up arms for their respective kings. However upon defeat of their liege lord, they could be incorporated into the new kingdom. At times, they entered into political disputes, choosing the kings of the Cheras and Pallavas, or even founded kingdoms

There’s a new controversy on Twitter today about the physiques of Ancient Greek soldiers. My take is that they obviously weren’t unfit, but at the same time they wouldn’t have looked like bodybuilders. They probably had physiques similar to old school athletes. Most might have looked like these guys from the Harvard Wrestling team from 1938.

So this tweet got a lot of attention and I decided to continue with a series on various traditional Indian training methods for the upper body. This will not cover calisthenics, as most people know about them.

https://twitter.com/tpeshwa/status/1520627578402480128

1) Indian clubs. These are fairly famous, even Joe Rogans used one. They are essentially really heavy clubs that are swung. It’s done to make your shoulders stronger. This is similar to the workouts at the Iranian Zoorkhaneh.

youtube.com/shorts/1HMEXDB…

🧵on the Kamasutra and classical Indian sex practices.

There are two sides to the debate regarding sex in Indian history. One seeks to present the past as a sexless, prudish society where such actions were robotic. These people will often be shocked at Indian sculpture and poetry and seek to hide/burn it(example is Gandhi). The other side seems to portray the past as some sort of an orgy which only ended when the Muslims arrived. They point to sculptural evidence, but ofc cannot explain some of the more absurd sculptures.

Saw this chart making the rounds today and decided to give me two cents. The fact is women are selective about who they are with. Funnily enough, in a traditional society, men would be held to an even higher standard than women are holding men to right now. It sounds crazy, but could you imagine a father giving his daughter away to an impotent shithead with no markers of success or virility? So now that we have established that whatever society we live in, selection of some sort will be there, we can attempt to interpret the graph.

🧵on the Alha-khand. The Alha-khand is an epic from the Bundelkhand region of India, but is popular in other regions of Northern India influenced by Rajput culture. The epic is set in the 11th century on the eve of the Turkic conquest. It narrates the tale of 52 battles involving Alha, Udal, and their friends. It begins with the classic tale of Rajput bravado, the abduction of Sanyogita by Prithviraj Chauhan. For the uninitiated, Sanyogita is the daughter of the king Jaichand.