Indu Sundaresan's Blog

We’re on a long drive from. . .well, one place to another this past summer, and I’m bored and swiping on the map on my phone for somewhere to stop and stretch our legs. A name pops up. Appomattox. Appo-ma-ttox. Appo—

My kid, in the back seat (who’s obviously been paying attention in history class) pipes up, and fixes my memory into place.

We redirect the GPS, and we’re off. It’s a good thirty miles aslant of our intended route, but what matter, when there are such riches to be met at the end of it!

The village of Appomattox Court House:
Appomattox Court House, a miniscule village in Virginia, thrust itself into prominence on the 9th of April, 1865, by hosting two most famous generals—Grant of the Union Army and Lee of the Confederate Army—as they signed the official document that brought an end to a crushing, expensive, and devastating civil war in the United States. Continue reading here.

We just left the thriving Chola dynasty of ancient India extinguished at the end of the 4th Century CE. All of a sudden, and with no seeming explanation.

And then, for three centuries there was nothing out of southern India. It was as though entire existence had been wiped out. Because there’s nothing to tell us of which dynasties ruled, who they fought, who they married, what they built, or whom they patronized.

By the 6th Century, one of the other kingdoms of ancient India (who had ruled alongside the Early Cholas) emerged in power, along with another two.

And, still, no Cholas. Read the rest here.

We’re on our (somewhat leisurely, I know!) way to the Airavateshwar Temple in Kumbakonam in southern India, built by the Later Cholas who ruled from the ninth to the thirteenth century. Later, because yes, there were the Early Cholas in ancient India from the first to the fourth centuries, and a gap between these two during which the entire dynasty disappears from all historical story line.

In the first post, I introduced the Early Cholas, because their reign—even that far back—is surprisingly well documented in more than two thousand poems written on palm-leaf manuscripts. (This is the oldest known history of south India.)

We visited the Early Chola King Karikala’s capital city at Kaveripattinam in the modern-day state of Tamilnadu, flitted through his palace, wandered down streets, stood at the docks at mouth of the Kaveri River, and marveled at the brisk trade and the mammoth ships from other parts of India and from Egypt.

So much for their lifestyle—what of the king? What of his duties, his responsibilities and his moral character? The Sangam Age literature of ancient India obliges even with that. Read the rest here.

Kumbakonam is a city in southern India where God dwells. In plenty. There are some 200 temples, most dedicated to Shiva, some to Vishnu and one of the very few places of worship to Brahma.

That is not all. Drive outside the city limits, and you will invariably glimpse the gopurams—the entrance stupas—of hundreds more etched against the sky. That is because the city is itself of great antiquity, inhabited since pre-Vedic times in ancient India, although most of the existing temples are either of more recent construct or date back to the 7th Century or so. Read the rest here.

Siyaasat the tv adaptation of The Twentieth Wife is launching on a new history channel in India called Epic.

Launch date for the channel and Siyaasat is Thursday, November 19, 2014 at 9pm. From then on, the series will air every Thursday night at 9pm.

Here's a trailer:

http://youtu.be/QVXDxslV1Po

If you're in India and see the series, please do tell me what you think of it!

First look at THE TWENTIETH WIFE tv series in India (and then, hopefully, everywhere else in the world). It's called SIYAASAT. Set to launch about end of this year, on a new history channel in India, called Epic.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QVXDxs...

Tonight at 7pm from this book, THE MOUNTAIN OF LIGHT.

Lahore, the River Sutlej, Calcutta, Bombay, Suez, Alexandria, London, Paris, anyone?

In 1854, the young Maharajah of the Punjab, Dalip Singh, follows his Kohinoor diamond to England. Dalip is only sixteen years old.

He's greatly feted in London. Has many dinners at Buckingham Palace with Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. They give him gifts. They take him on vacation to the Isle of Wight. Prince Albert finds Dalip a German teacher, supervises his education, makes an English coat of arms for Dalip.

Victoria commissions a portrait of Dalip Singh as a gift for herself--painted by Franz Xaver Winterhalter.

You'll meet all of these people in the last chapter of THE MOUNTAIN OF LIGHT, titled 'Diary of a Maharajah.' And see what all this means to Dalip, what all of it means in the end...

The rue de la Tremoille in Paris in 1893. One of the main protagonists of LIGHT (I won't tell you who; I think it gives too much away) finds himself living here.

Cobbled streets; a flower seller with her basket of flowers; a violin player, his case at his feet for contributions; a bakery, spears of golden baguettes in window; a wine seller who fills the mouth of this narrow street with his wine casks every morning...and our protagonist, once a very rich man, hiding out in a garret. Who is he? And why is he here? You'll see why and who in THE MOUNTAIN OF LIGHT.The Mountain of Light