Water and historic settlements : the making of a cultural landscape / Yaaminey Mubayi.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Mubayi, Yaaminey, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Water and civilization--India--Marathwada.

Water--India--Marathwada--Religious aspects.

Cultural landscapes--India--Marathwada.

Cultural landscapes.

Historical geography.

Religion.

Water and civilization.

Water--Religious aspects.

Marathwada (India)--Historical geography.

Marathwada (India)--Religion.

India--Marathwada.

Physical Description:

xiii, 135 pages : illustrations, maps ; 25 cm

Place of Publication:

Abingdon, Oxon ; New York : Routledge, 2023.

Summary:

"This book explores the manner in which human societies understood and managed scarce water resources. Focusing on the arid, rain shadow region of Marathwada, it documents the panoramic history of this region's most important resource - water. It shows how water delineates the establishment of political authority, marks the intersection of networks of trade and pilgrimage and is the bearer of identity through community memories. The book foregrounds how, as a material as well as a ritual and symbolic element, water flows across the boundaries of caste, sect and religion, bringing communities together and linking the past with the present. It not only analyses textual and archaeological sources, but also focuses on oral narratives and their potential to provide consensual as well as alternative narratives of the historic and cultural landscape of Ellora-Daulatabad-Khuldabad. It also shows how water has been framed in a myriad forms in human history - as a ritual, allegorical element present in the myths and cosmology that order the sacred geography of pilgrimage centres, as a physical tangible presence manipulated through human technology to sustain the population and finally, as a subliminal driver for historic agency, its often hidden, underground presence underwriting the region's vitality over the past millennium. A nuanced history of water over millennia, this book will be of great interest to scholars and researchers of environmental history, historical geography, South Asian studies, heritage studies and environmental studies"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Introduction : Foregrounding water within the cultural landscape of Ellora-Khuldabad-Daulatabad, a methodological approach

Water and settlements-historical development of the region vis-à-vis the political economy of the Deccan ; networks of trade and patronage

Water and sacrality-Sacred geography and networks of pilgrimage

Water and memory-community identities as the past remembered ; memories as carriers of values, beliefs and practices

Conclusion : a unique cosmopolitanism.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Other Format:

Online version: Mubayi, Yaaminey. Water and historic settlements

ISBN:

9780367723682

0367723689

9781032324616

1032324619

OCLC:

1302575763

Publisher Number:

99993881998