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IGNOU HISTORY NOTES : India History From 8th to 15th Century - Urban Settlements

IGNOU HISTORY Study Notes for IAS, UPSC Exams

History India From 8th to 15th Century

Urban Settlements

Structure

2.0 Objectives
2.1 Introduction
2.2 Form and Substance of Urban Centres
2.3 The General Pattern
2.4 Regional Variations and Types
2.4.1 Rural Centres Transformed into Urban Centres
2.4.2 Market Centres. Trade-ndwork and Itinerant Trade
2.4.3 Sacred/ Pilgrimagr: Centres
2.4.4 Royal Centres or Capitals
2.5 Let Us Sum Up
2.6 Key Words
2.7 Answers to Check Your Progress Exercises.

2.0 OBJECTIVES

After reading this Unit you should be able to explain the:

factors responsible for the rise of urban centres,
various phases in the history of urbanism,
criteria for identifying settlements as urban,
general pattern of the post-Gupta urban growth,
regional variations in urban settlements, and
a types of towns.

2.1 INTRODUCTION

The study of urban settlements is an indispensable element in the understanding of
socio-economic history of the post-Gupta centuries. It should be taken as a
complementary component along with the agrarian economy. Recent writings have
particularly focussed on the place of urban settlements in the overall framework of
Indian feudalism. This and the two subsequent Units make an attempt to review the
problems associated with such developments.

2.2 FORM AND SUBSTANCE OF URBAN CENTRES

Study of urban czntres is an important aspect of socio~conomic history. Urbgn
centres in early medieval India have generally been studied in two ways :
i) As a part of economic history i.e. history of trade, commerce and craft production, etc., and
ii) as a part of administrative or political history, i.e. as capitals, administrative centres, centres of major and minor ruling families and fort towns.
Hence the focus of urban studies has so far been mainly on types of urban centres.
Accordingly towns or cities have been listed under various categories such as market,
trade or commercial centres, ports, political and administrative centres, religious
centres, etc. However, there has been no sufficient attempt to explain the causes
behind the emergence of towns. In other words the form of an urban centre is
studied but not its meaning or substance. In order to understand both' the form and