Studies on fortification in India

Publié par Institut français de Pondichéry, le 14 avril 2020

267 pages

Résumé

This book brings together essays on some prominent defensive works which have been constructed over many centuries across the Indian subcontinent, particularly South India. The first chapter, on the Harappan period and Early Historic Indian sites, is based mainly on archaeological reports; all the other chapters, covering South India from the 3rd to the 18th century A. D., draw on the available historical material, both documentary and epigraphic, as well as on intense field work and personal investigations carried out by the author over the past twenty years in numerous hill forts and fortified towns in India. Much of the information has been already published piecemeal in a range of articles written in French. Here, the findings of this body of work are freshly presented with an attempt at synthesis. For each period a selection has been made of outstanding examples of fortification in order to analyse the building techniques, considering the evolution of military technology, particularly the development of artillery, to establish the typology of the structures and to bring into focus a reliable method for identifying and dating defensive works in India. This analysis, which draws attention to the considerable skills and ingenuities of Indian fort builders, has something to engage the interest of all those concerned with India military monuments, be they engineers, archaeologists or historians.

Ancient Fortifications of The Tamil Country - As Recorded in Eighteenth-Century French Plans

Le vieux Pondichéry (1673-1824) revisité d'après les plans anciens

Contribution à l'histoire de la voiture en Inde

Origins of the Urban Development of Pondicherry according to Seventeenth Century Dutch Plans

Contribution to the History of the Wheeled Vehicle in India

Les aventures de Jean-Baptiste Chevalier dans l'Inde orientale (1752-1765) - Mémoire historique et Jornal de voyage à Assem

Studies on fortification in India

Senji (gingi): ville fortifiée du pays tamoul

Critiques