Why has India Been a Nation of Such Intrigue?

India has been a nation often invaded and commonly conquered. The most famous colonization of India would be by the British, starting in 1858 and lasting for almost a century later (National Geographic 321). Why has India been a nation of such intrigue? One of the reasons may be its surplus of natural resources. However, in the prehistoric subcontinent of India, the lack of unity throughout and constantly warring kings as well as their nations made India a simple country to colonize. Mark Twain once described India: “India is, the cradle of the human race, the birthplace of human speech, the mother of history, the grandmother of legend, and the great-grandmother of tradition. our most valuable and most instructive materials in the history of man are treasured up in India only.” India has been colonized by a variety of nations, including the Arabs, Persians, Ghaznavids, Scythians, Pallavas, Pahlavas, Portuguese, and French. By analyzing the trend of India’s colonization by three powerful nations, the Aryans, the Greeks, and the Mughals, an understanding of how India’s culture came to be can be developed.

One of the first foreign invaders in India, the Aryans, created the backbone of Indian culture and opened the path for other invaders into India. A controversy among many historians would be the entrance of the Aryans into the Indian subcontinent. There are four main theses, in regards to the Aryans coming to India: Aryan Invasion Thesis, Aryan Migration Thesis, Indigenous Aryan Thesis, and Out of India Thesis. The Aryan Invasion Thesis states that the Aryans invaded India, while the Aryan Migration Thesis claims there was a migration instead of an invasion. Indigenous Aryan Thesis and Out of India Thesis both claim that the Ary...

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... by the domination of the British. The three empires analyzed were ones of grand impacts on the Indian culture and lifestyle. The Aryans was the first empire of the Indian subcontinent, yet it shaped the Indian culture often identified today. The Greeks were a powerful force that sculpted the culture of India and strengthened the power of India. The final empire created the final and beautiful empire with the building of the Taj Mahal and many advancements in the society. India, in the words of Will Durant, “was the motherland of our race, and Sanskrit the mother of Europe's languages: she was the mother of our philosophy; mother, through the Arabs, of much of our mathematics; mother, through the Buddha, of the ideals embodied in Christianity; mother, through the village community, of self-government and democracy. Mother India is in many ways the mother of us all.”