92-529: Somadeva , also known as Somadeva Bhatta , was an 11th century writer from Kashmir . He is best known for his work Kathasaritsagara . Somadeva is believed to have lived in Kashmir, a region in the northwestern part of the Indian subcontinent, during the 11th century CE. He was a Shaivite Brahmin scholar and a court poet, serving in the court of King Ananta of Kashmir. Somadeva's most famous work, "Katha Sarit Sagara,"
184-636: A territorial dispute : Pakistan controls the northwest portion (Northern Areas and Kashmir), India controls the central and southern portion (Jammu and Kashmir) and Ladakh, and the People's Republic of China controls the northeastern portion (Aksai Chin and the Trans-Karakoram Tract). India controls the majority of the Siachen Glacier area, including the Saltoro Ridge passes, whilst Pakistan controls
276-409: A boundary dispute that began in the late 19th century and continues into the 21st. Although some boundary agreements were signed between Great Britain, Afghanistan and Russia over the northern borders of Kashmir, China never accepted these agreements, and China's official position has not changed following the communist revolution of 1949 that established the People's Republic of China. By the mid-1950s
368-473: A boy living on the island of Samos, to which he had fled with his family from the oppressions of Lygdamis, tyrant of Halicarnassus and grandson of Artemisia. Panyassis , the epic poet related to Herodotus, is reported to have taken part in a failed uprising. The Suda also states that Herodotus later returned home to lead the revolt that eventually overthrew the tyrant. Due to recent discoveries of inscriptions at Halicarnassus dated to about Herodotus's time, it
460-642: A course through the entire Ladakh and Gilgit-Baltistan. Almost all the rivers originating in these region are part of the Indus river system. After reaching the end of the Great Himalayan range, the Indus turns a corner and flows southwest into the Punjab plains. The Jhelum and Chenab rivers also follow a course roughly parallel to this, and join the Indus river in southern Punjab plains in Pakistan. The geographical features of
552-535: A guerrilla onslaught meant to frighten its ruler into submission. Instead the Maharaja appealed to Mountbatten for assistance, and the governor-general agreed on the condition that the ruler accede to India. Indian soldiers entered Kashmir and drove the Pakistani-sponsored irregulars from all but a small section of the state. The United Nations was then invited to mediate the quarrel. The UN mission insisted that
644-646: A historical topic more in keeping with the Greek world-view: focused on the context of the polis or city-state. The interplay of civilizations was more relevant to Greeks living in Anatolia, such as Herodotus himself, for whom life within a foreign civilization was a recent memory. Before the Persian crisis, history had been represented among the Greeks only by local or family traditions. The "Wars of Liberation" had given to Herodotus
736-404: A literary critic of Augustan Rome , listed seven predecessors of Herodotus, describing their works as simple unadorned accounts of their own and other cities and people, Greek or foreign, including popular legends, sometimes melodramatic and naïve, often charming – all traits that can be found in the work of Herodotus himself. Modern historians regard the chronology as uncertain, but according to
828-522: A native of Halicarnassus in Anatolia , and it is generally accepted that he was born there around 485 BC. The Suda says his family was influential, that he was the son of Lyxes and Dryo and the brother of Theodorus, and that he was also related to Panyassis – an epic poet of the time. Halicarnassus was then within the Persian Empire , making Herodotus a Persian subject, and it may be that
920-503: A part of its territory, while Pakistan claims the entire region excluding Aksai Chin and Trans-Karakoram Tract. The two countries have fought several declared wars over the territory. The Indo-Pakistani War of 1947 established the rough boundaries of today, with Pakistan holding roughly one-third of Kashmir, and India one-half, with a dividing line of control established by the United Nations. The Indo-Pakistani War of 1965 resulted in
1012-463: A princess of Jalandhara and wife of King Ananta of Kashmir. Kashmir 34°30′N 76°30′E / 34.5°N 76.5°E / 34.5; 76.5 Kashmir ( / ˈ k æ ʃ m ɪər / KASH -meer or / k æ ʃ ˈ m ɪər / kash- MEER ) is the northernmost geographical region of the Indian subcontinent . Until the mid-19th century, the term "Kashmir" denoted only
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#17328756524861104-519: A reference to the Sharada Peeth . The Ancient Greeks called the region Kasperia , which has been identified with Kaspapyros of Hecataeus of Miletus ( apud Stephanus of Byzantium ) and Kaspatyros of Herodotus (3.102, 4.44). Kashmir is also believed to be the country meant by Ptolemy 's Kaspeiria . The earliest text which directly mentions the name Kashmir is in Ashtadhyayi written by
1196-468: A stalemate and a UN-negotiated ceasefire. The Kashmir region lies between latitudes 32° and 36° N , and longitudes 74° and 80° E . It has an area of 68,000 sq mi (180,000 km ). It is bordered to the north and east by China (Xinjiang and Tibet), to the northwest by Afghanistan (Wakhan Corridor), to the west by Pakistan (Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Punjab) and to the south by India (Himachal Pradesh and Punjab). The topography of Kashmir
1288-680: A version of the Histories written by "Herodotus of Thurium", and some passages in the Histories have been interpreted as proof that he wrote about Magna Graecia from personal experience there (IV, 15,99; VI, 127). According to Ptolemaeus Chennus , a late source summarized in the Library of Photius , Plesirrhous the Thessalian, the hymnographer, was the eromenos of Herodotus and his heir. This account has also led some historians to assume Herodotus died childless. Intimate knowledge of some events in
1380-510: A young Thucydides happened to be in the assembly with his father, and burst into tears during the recital. Herodotus observed prophetically to the boy's father: "Your son's soul yearns for knowledge." Eventually, Thucydides and Herodotus became close enough for both to be interred in Thucydides's tomb in Athens. Such at least was the opinion of Marcellinus in his Life of Thucydides . According to
1472-528: Is 12,541,302; that of Pakistan-administered territory of Azad Kashmir is 4,045,366; and that of Gilgit-Baltistan is 1,492,924. Kashmir's economy is centred around agriculture . Traditionally the staple crop of the valley was rice, which formed the chief food of the people. In addition, Indian corn, wheat, barley and oats were also grown. Given its temperate climate , it is suited for crops like asparagus , artichoke, seakale, broad beans, scarletrunners, beetroot, cauliflower and cabbage. Fruit trees are common in
1564-404: Is a vast compilation of stories and folktales drawn from various sources, including earlier Indian texts, oral traditions, and the literary heritage of Kashmir. The work is divided into 18 books (or lambakas), each containing a series of interconnected stories within a larger narrative framework. Most of his work was composed by the help of patronage from Ananta and were composed for Queen Suryamati,
1656-801: Is an archaic spelling of modern Kashmir, and in some countries it is still spelled this way. Kashmir is called Cachemire in French, Cachemira in Spanish, Caxemira in Portuguese, Caixmir in Catalan, Casmiria in Latin, Cașmir in Romanian, and Cashmir in Occitan . In the Kashmiri language , Kashmir itself is known as Kasheer . The Government of India and Indian sources refer to
1748-618: Is consistent with a tyrant under pressure. His name is not mentioned later in the tribute list of the Athenian Delian League , indicating that there might well have been a successful uprising against him some time before 454 BC. Herodotus wrote his Histories in the Ionian dialect , in spite of being born in a Dorian settlement. According to the Suda , Herodotus learned the Ionian dialect as
1840-511: Is dominated by oaks ( Quercus spp.) and Rhododendron spp. The Blue Pine (Finns excelsa) Zone with Cedrus deodara , Abies pindrow and Picea smithiana occur at elevations between 2,800 and 3,500 m. The Birch (Betula utilis) Zone has Herbaceous genera of Anemone , Geranium , Iris , Lloydia , Potentilla and Primula interspersed with dry dwarf alpine scrubs of Berberis , Cotoneaster , Juniperus and Rhododendron are prevalent in alpine grasslands at 3,500 m and above. Kashmir
1932-486: Is generally assumed that he died not long afterwards, possibly before his sixtieth year. Herodotus would have made his researches known to the larger world through oral recitations to a public crowd. John Marincola writes in his introduction to the Penguin edition of the Histories that there are certain identifiable pieces in the early books of Herodotus's work which could be labeled as "performance pieces". These portions of
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#17328756524862024-602: Is home to rare species of animals, many of which are protected by sanctuaries and reserves. The Dachigam National Park in the Valley holds the last viable population of Kashmir stag (Hangul) and the largest population of black bear in Asia. In Gilgit-Baltistan the Deosai National Park is designated to protect the largest population of Himalayan brown bears in the western Himalayas. Snow leopards are found in high density In
2116-536: Is mostly mountainous. It is traversed mainly by the Western Himalayas . The Himalayas terminate in the western boundary of Kashmir at Nanga Parbat . Kashmir is traversed by three rivers namely Indus , Jhelum and Chenab . These river basins divide the region into three valleys separated by high mountain ranges. The Indus valley forms the north and north-eastern portion of the region which include bare and desolate areas of Baltistan and Ladakh. The upper portion of
2208-794: Is now known that the Ionic dialect was used in Halicarnassus in some official documents, so there is no need to assume (like the Suda ) that he must have learned the dialect elsewhere. The Suda is the only source placing Herodotus as the heroic liberator of his birthplace, casting doubt upon the veracity of that romantic account. As Herodotus himself reveals, Halicarnassus, though a Dorian city, had ended its close relations with its Dorian neighbours after an unseemly quarrel (I, 144), and it had helped pioneer Greek trade with Egypt (II, 178). It was, therefore, an outward-looking, international-minded port within
2300-602: Is on account of the many strange stories and the folk-tales he reported that his critics have branded him "The Father of Lies". Even his own contemporaries found reason to scoff at his achievement. In fact, one modern scholar has wondered whether Herodotus left his home in Greek Anatolia , migrating westwards to Athens and beyond, because his own countrymen had ridiculed his work, a circumstance possibly hinted at in an epitaph said to have been dedicated to Herodotus at one of his three supposed resting places, Thuria : Herodotus
2392-521: Is referred as a beauty spot of the medicinal and herbaceous flora in the Himalayas. There are hundreds of different species of wild flowers recorded in the alpine meadows of the region. The botanical garden and the tulip gardens of Srinagar built in the Zabarwans grow 300 breeds of flora and 60 varieties of tulips respectively. The later is considered as the largest Tulip Garden of Asia. Kashmir region
2484-524: The Alcmaeonids , a clan whose history is featured frequently in his writing. According to Plutarch , Herodotus was granted a financial reward by the Athenian assembly in recognition of his work. Plutarch, using Diyllus as a source, says this was 10 talents . In 443 BC or shortly afterwards, he migrated to Thurii , in modern Calabria , as part of an Athenian-sponsored colony . Aristotle refers to
2576-569: The Chinese army had entered the north-east portion of Ladakh. By 1956–57 they had completed a military road through the Aksai Chin area to provide better communication between Xinjiang and western Tibet . India's belated discovery of this road led to border clashes between the two countries that culminated in the Sino-Indian War of October 1962. The region is divided amongst three countries in
2668-486: The Euphrates to Babylon . For some reason, possibly associated with local politics, he subsequently found himself unpopular in Halicarnassus, and sometime around 447 BC, migrated to Periclean Athens – a city whose people and democratic institutions he openly admired (V, 78). Athens was also the place where he came to know the local topography (VI, 137; VIII, 52–55), as well as leading citizens such as
2760-522: The Hemis National Park in Ladakh. The region is home to musk deer , markhor , leopard cat , jungle cat , red fox , jackal , Himalayan wolf , serow , Himalayan yellow-throated marten , long-tailed marmot , Indian porcupine , Himalayan mouse-hare , langur and Himalayan weasel . At least 711 bird species are recorded in the valley alone with 31 classified as globally threatened species. In
2852-821: The Kashmir Valley between the Great Himalayas and the Pir Panjal Range . The term has since come to encompass a larger area that includes the India-administered territories of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh , the Pakistan-administered territories of Azad Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan , and the Chinese-administered territories of Aksai Chin and the Trans-Karakoram Tract . In 1820,
Somadeva - Misplaced Pages Continue
2944-606: The Kashmir Valley . He became a wealthy and influential noble in the Sikh court. In 1845, the First Anglo-Sikh War broke out. According to The Imperial Gazetteer of India : Gulab Singh contrived to hold himself aloof till the battle of Sobraon (1846), when he appeared as a useful mediator and the trusted advisor of Sir Henry Lawrence . Two treaties were concluded. By the first the State of Lahore (i.e. West Punjab) handed over to
3036-603: The Kunlun mountain range in the north and the main Great Himalayas to the south. Capital towns of the region are Leh and Kargil . It is under Indian administration and was part of the state of Jammu and Kashmir until 2019. It is one of the most sparsely populated regions in the area and is mainly inhabited by people of Indo-Aryan and Tibetan descent. Aksai Chin is a vast high-altitude desert of salt that reaches altitudes up to 5,000 metres (16,000 ft). Geographically part of
3128-664: The Northern Areas , is a group of territories in the extreme north, bordered by the Karakoram , the western Himalayas , the Pamir , and the Hindu Kush ranges. With its administrative centre in the town of Gilgit , the Northern Areas cover an area of 72,971 square kilometres (28,174 sq mi) and have an estimated population approaching 1 million (10 lakhs ). Ladakh is between
3220-759: The Peloponnesian War on the abduction of some prostitutes – a mocking reference to Herodotus, who reported the Persians' account of their wars with Greece , beginning with the rapes of the mythical heroines Io , Europa , Medea , and Helen . Similarly, the Athenian historian Thucydides dismissed Herodotus as a story-teller. Thucydides, who had been trained in rhetoric , became the model for subsequent prose-writers as an author who seeks to appear firmly in control of his material, whereas with his frequent digressions Herodotus appeared to minimize (or possibly disguise) his authorial control. Moreover, Thucydides developed
3312-559: The Persian Empire (now Bodrum , Turkey) and a later citizen of Thurii in modern Calabria , Italy. He wrote the Histories , a detailed account of the Greco-Persian Wars , and was the first writer to apply a scientific method to historical events. He has been described as " The Father of History ", a title conferred on him by the ancient Roman orator Cicero , and the " Father of Lies " by others. The Histories primarily cover
3404-509: The Persian Empire , and the historian's family could well have had contacts in other countries under Persian rule, facilitating his travels and his researches. Herodotus's eyewitness accounts indicate that he traveled in Egypt in association with Athenians, probably sometime after 454 BC or possibly earlier, after an Athenian fleet had assisted the uprising against Persian rule in 460–454 BC. He probably traveled to Tyre next and then down
3496-722: The Sikh Empire , under Ranjit Singh , annexed Kashmir. In 1846, after the Sikh defeat in the First Anglo-Sikh War , and upon the purchase of the region from the British under the Treaty of Amritsar , the Raja of Jammu, Gulab Singh , became the new ruler of Kashmir. The rule of his descendants, under the paramountcy (or tutelage ) of the British Crown , lasted until the Partition of India in 1947, when
3588-569: The Suda , he was buried in Macedonian Pella and in the agora in Thurii. Herodotus announced the purpose and scope of his work at the beginning of his Histories: Here are presented the results of the inquiry carried out by Herodotus of Halicarnassus. The purpose is to prevent the traces of human events from being erased by time, and to preserve the fame of the important and remarkable achievements produced by both Greeks and non-Greeks; among
3680-546: The Tibetan Plateau , Aksai Chin is referred to as the Soda Plain. The region is almost uninhabited, and has no permanent settlements. Though these regions are in practice administered by their respective claimants, neither India nor Pakistan has formally recognised the accession of the areas claimed by the other. India claims those areas, including the area "ceded" to China by Pakistan in the Trans-Karakoram Tract in 1963, are
3772-570: The brahmin Kashmiri Pandits . To the northeast, sparsely populated Baltistan had a population ethnically related to that of Ladakh, but which practised Shia Islam . To the north, also sparsely populated, Gilgit Agency was an area of diverse, mostly Shia groups, and, to the west, Punch was populated mostly by Muslims of a different ethnicity than that of the Kashmir valley. After the Indian Rebellion of 1857 , in which Kashmir sided with
Somadeva - Misplaced Pages Continue
3864-570: The 1901 Census of the British Indian Empire , the population of the princely state of Kashmir and Jammu was 2,905,578. Of these, 2,154,695 (74.16%) were Muslims, 689,073 (23.72%) Hindus, 25,828 (0.89%) Sikhs, and 35,047 (1.21%) Buddhists (implying 935 (0.032%) others). The Hindus were found mainly in Jammu, where they constituted a little less than 60% of the population. In the Kashmir Valley,
3956-813: The Afghan Durrani Empire . In 1819, the Kashmir Valley passed from the control of the Durrani Empire of Afghanistan to the conquering armies of the Sikhs under Ranjit Singh of the Punjab , thus ending four centuries of Muslim rule under the Mughals and the Afghan regime. As the Kashmiris had suffered under the Afghans, they initially welcomed the new Sikh rulers. However,
4048-451: The British after the first defeat of the Sikhs in 1846, as a reward to a former official who had sided with the British. The Himalayan kingdom was connected to India through a district of the Punjab, but its population was 77 per cent Muslim and it shared a boundary with Pakistan. Hence, it was anticipated that the maharaja would accede to Pakistan when the British paramountcy ended on 14–15 August. When he hesitated to do this, Pakistan launched
4140-451: The British, and the subsequent assumption of direct rule by Great Britain, the princely state of Kashmir came under the suzerainty of the British Crown . In the British census of India of 1941, Kashmir registered a Muslim majority population of 77%, a Hindu population of 20% and a sparse population of Buddhists and Sikhs comprising the remaining 3%. That same year, Prem Nath Bazaz , a Kashmiri Pandit journalist wrote: "The poverty of
4232-419: The British, as equivalent for one crore indemnity, the hill countries between the rivers Beas and Indus; by the second the British made over to Gulab Singh for 75 lakhs all the hilly or mountainous country situated to the east of the Indus and the west of the Ravi i.e. the Vale of Kashmir. Drafted by a treaty and a bill of sale, and constituted between 1820 and 1858, the Princely State of Kashmir and Jammu (as it
4324-440: The Hindu population of the princely state), the most important castes recorded in the census were " Brahmans (186,000), the Rajputs (167,000), the Khattris (48,000) and the Thakkars (93,000)." In the 1911 Census of the British Indian Empire, the total population of Kashmir and Jammu had increased to 3,158,126. Of these, 2,398,320 (75.94%) were Muslims, 696,830 (22.06%) Hindus, 31,658 (1%) Sikhs, and 36,512 (1.16%) Buddhists. In
4416-439: The Hindus represented "524 in every 10,000 of the population ( i.e. 5.24%), and in the frontier wazarats of Ladhakh and Gilgit only 94 out of every 10,000 persons (0.94%)." In the same Census of 1901, in the Kashmir Valley, the total population was recorded to be 1,157,394, of which the Muslim population was 1,083,766, or 93.6% and the Hindu population 60,641. Among the Hindus of Jammu province, who numbered 626,177 (or 90.87% of
4508-502: The Jammu province and Muzaffarabad falls within the reach of Indian monsoon. The Pir Panjal Range acts as an effective barrier and blocks these monsoon tracts from reaching the main Kashmir Valley and the Himalayan slopes. These areas of the region receive much of their precipitation from the wind currents of the Arabian Sea. The Himalayan slope and the Pir Panjal witness greatest snow melting from March until June. These variations in snow melt and rainfall have led to destructive inundations of
4600-469: The Jhelum valley forms the proper Vale of Kashmir surrounded by high mountain ranges. The Chenab valley forms the southern portion of the Kashmir region with its denuded hills towards the south. It includes almost all of the Jammu region . High altitude lakes are frequent at high elevations. Lower down in the Vale of Kashmir there are many freshwater lakes and large areas of swamplands which include Wular Lake , Dal Lake and Hokersar near Srinagar . To
4692-429: The Kashmir Valley to the Punjab of British India. For almost a century, until the census, a small Hindu elite had ruled over a vast and impoverished Muslim peasantry. Driven into docility by chronic indebtedness to landlords and moneylenders, having no education besides, nor awareness of rights, the Muslim peasants had no political representation until the 1930s. Ranbir Singh's grandson Hari Singh , who had ascended
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#17328756524864784-504: The Kashmir region differ considerably from one part to another. The lowest part of the region consists of the plains of Jammu at the southwestern corner, which continue into the plains of Punjab at an elevation of below 1000 feet. Mountains begin at 2000 feet, then raising to 3000–4000 feet in the "Outer Hills", a rugged country with ridges and long narrow valleys. Next within the tract lie the Middle Mountains which are 8000–10,000 feet in height with ramifying valleys. Adjacent to these hills are
4876-409: The Muslim masses is appalling. ... Most are landless laborers, working as serfs for absentee [Hindu] landlords ... Almost the whole brunt of official corruption is borne by the Muslim masses." Under Hindu rule, Muslims faced hefty taxation and discrimination in the legal system, and were forced into labor without any wages. Conditions in the princely state caused a significant migration of people from
4968-409: The Phulai ( Acacia modesta ) and Olive (Olea cuspid ata) Zone. There occur semi-deciduous species of Shorea robusta , Acacia catechu , Dalbergia sissoo , Albizia lebbeck , Garuga pinnata , Terminalia bellirica and T. tomentosa and Pinus roxburghii are found at higher elevations. The temperate zone between (1,500–3,500 m) is referred as the Chir Pine (Finns longifolia). This zone
5060-531: The Sanskrit grammarian Pāṇini during the 5th century BC. Pāṇini called the people of Kashmir Kashmirikas . Some other early references to Kashmir can also be found in Mahabharata in Sabha Parva and in puranas like Matsya Purana , Vayu Purana , Padma Purana and Vishnu Purana and Vishnudharmottara Purana . Huientsang , the Buddhist scholar and Chinese traveller, called Kashmir kia-shi-milo , while some other Chinese accounts referred to Kashmir as ki-pin (or Chipin or Jipin) and ache-pin . Cashmeer
5152-502: The Sikh governors turned out to be hard taskmasters, and Sikh rule was generally considered oppressive, protected perhaps by the remoteness of Kashmir from the capital of the Sikh Empire in Lahore. The Sikhs enacted a number of anti-Muslim laws, which included handing out death sentences for cow slaughter, closing down the Jamia Masjid in Srinagar, and banning the a dhan , the public Muslim call to prayer. Kashmir had also now begun to attract European visitors, several of whom wrote of
5244-400: The abject poverty of the vast Muslim peasantry and of the exorbitant taxes under the Sikhs. High taxes, according to some contemporary accounts, had depopulated large tracts of the countryside, allowing only one-sixteenth of the cultivable land to be cultivated. Many Kashmiri peasants migrated to the plains of the Punjab. However, after a famine in 1832, the Sikhs reduced the land tax to half
5336-407: The ancient account, these predecessors included Dionysius of Miletus , Charon of Lampsacus, Hellanicus of Lesbos , Xanthus of Lydia and, the best attested of them all, Hecataeus of Miletus . Of these, only fragments of Hecataeus's works survived, and the authenticity of these is debatable, but they provide a glimpse into the kind of tradition within which Herodotus wrote his own Histories . It
5428-412: The area of the former princely state of Jammu and Kashmir, which comprises Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh , while Pakistan controls a third of the region, divided into two provinces, Azad Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan . Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh are administered by India as union territories . They formed a single state until 5 August 2019, when the state was bifurcated and its limited autonomy
5520-472: The audience. It was conventional in Herodotus's day for authors to "publish" their works by reciting them at popular festivals. According to Lucian , Herodotus took his finished work straight from Anatolia to the Olympic Games and read the entire Histories to the assembled spectators in one sitting, receiving rapturous applause at the end of it. According to a very different account by an ancient grammarian, Herodotus refused to begin reading his work at
5612-408: The challenge is great: The data are so few – they rest upon such late and slight authority; they are so improbable or so contradictory, that to compile them into a biography is like building a house of cards, which the first breath of criticism will blow to the ground. Still, certain points may be approximately fixed ... Herodotus was, according to his own statement, at the beginning of his work,
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#17328756524865704-460: The climatic conditions and the altitude. Kashmir forests range from the tropical deciduous forests in the foothills of Jammu and Muzafarabad , to the temperate forests throughout the Vale of Kashmir and to the alpine grasslands and high altitude meadows in Gilgit-Baltistan and Ladakh. The Kashmir region has four well defined zones of vegetation in the tree growth, due to the difference in elevation. The tropical forests up to 1500 m, are known as
5796-450: The exodus, ranging from the entire population of over 150 thousand, to 190 thousand of a total Pandit population of 200 thousand (200,000), to a number as high as 300 thousand (300,000). People in Jammu speak Hindi, Punjabi and Dogri, the Kashmir Valley people speak Kashmiri, and people in the sparsely inhabited Ladakh speak Tibetan and Balti. The population of India-administered union territories of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh combined
5888-439: The festival of Olympia until some clouds offered him a bit of shade – by which time the assembly had dispersed. (Hence the proverbial expression "Herodotus and his shade" to describe someone who misses an opportunity through delay.) Herodotus's recitation at Olympia was a favourite theme among ancient writers, and there is another interesting variation on the story to be found in the Suda : that of Photius and Tzetzes , in which
5980-422: The first genuinely historical inspiration felt by a Greek. These wars showed him that there was a corporate life, higher than that of the city, of which the story might be told; and they offered to him as a subject the drama of the collision between East and West. With him, the spirit of history was born into Greece; and his work, called after the nine Muses, was indeed the first utterance of Clio . Though Herodotus
6072-441: The first half of the first millennium, the Kashmir region became an important centre of Hinduism and later of Buddhism . During the 7th-14th centuries, the region was ruled by a series of Hindu dynasties, and Kashmir Shaivism arose. In 1320, Rinchan Shah became the first Muslim ruler of Kashmir, inaugurating the Kashmir Sultanate . The region was part of the Mughal Empire from 1586 to 1751, and thereafter, until 1820, of
6164-449: The first years of the Peloponnesian War (VI, 91; VII, 133, 233; IX, 73) suggests that he returned to Athens, in which case it is possible that he died there during an outbreak of the plague. It is also possible he died in Macedonia instead, after obtaining the patronage of the court there; or else he died back in Thurii. There is nothing in the Histories that can be dated to later than 430 BC with any certainty, and it
6256-407: The former princely state of the British Indian Empire became a disputed territory , now administered by three countries: China , India , and Pakistan . The word Kashmir is thought to have been derived from Sanskrit and was referred to as káśmīra . A popular local etymology of Kashmira is that it is land desiccated from water. An alternative etymology derives the name from
6348-487: The intensity of the cold which keeps the perpetual snow on the mountains. Jammu Division, excluding the upper parts of the Chenab Valley, features a humid subtropical climate. The Vale of Kashmir has a moderate climate. The Astore Valley and some parts of Gilgit-Baltistan features a semi-Tibetan climate. While as the other parts of Gilgit-Baltistan and Ladakh have Tibetan climate which is considered as almost rainless climate. The southwestern Kashmir which includes much of
6440-430: The last census of British India in 1941, the total population of Kashmir and Jammu (which as a result of the Second World War, was estimated from the 1931 census) was 3,945,000. Of these, the total Muslim population was 2,997,000 (75.97%), the Hindu population was 808,000 (20.48%), and the Sikh 55,000 (1.39%). The Kashmiri Pandits , the only Hindus of the Kashmir valley, who had stably constituted approximately 4 to 5% of
6532-629: The lives of prominent kings and famous battles such as Marathon , Thermopylae , Artemisium , Salamis , Plataea , and Mycale . His work deviates from the main topics to provide a cultural, ethnographical , geographical, and historiographical background that forms an essential part of the narrative and provides readers with a wellspring of additional information. Herodotus was criticized in ancient times for his inclusion of "legends and fanciful accounts" in his work. The contemporaneous historian Thucydides accused him of making up stories for entertainment. He retorted that he reported what he could see and
6624-452: The lofty Great Himalayan ranges (14000–15000 feet) which divide the drainage of the Chenab and Jehlum from that of the Indus. Beyond this range lies a wide tract of mountainous country of 17000–22000 feet in Ladakh and Baltistan . Kashmir has a different climate for every region owing to the great variation in altitude. The temperatures ranges from the tropical heat of the Punjab summer to
6716-600: The lower territory just southwest of the Saltoro Ridge. India controls 101,338 km (39,127 sq mi) of the disputed territory, Pakistan controls 85,846 km (33,145 sq mi), and the People's Republic of China controls the remaining 37,555 km (14,500 sq mi). Jammu and Azad Kashmir lie south and west of the Pir Panjal range , and are under Indian and Pakistani control respectively. These are populous regions. Gilgit-Baltistan, formerly known as
6808-540: The main valley. One instance of such Kashmir flood of a larger proportion is recorded in the 12th-century book Rajatarangini . A single cloudburst in July 1935 caused the upper Jehlum river level to rise 11 feet. The 2014 Kashmir floods inundated the Kashmir city of Srinagar and submerged hundreds of other villages. Kashmir has a recorded forest area of 20,230 square kilometres (7,810 sq mi) along with some national parks and reserves . The forests vary according to
6900-424: The matters covered is, in particular, the cause of the hostilities between Greeks and non-Greeks. His record of the achievements of others was an achievement in itself, though the extent of it has been debated. Herodotus's place in history and his significance may be understood according to the traditions within which he worked. His work is the earliest Greek prose to have survived intact. Dionysius of Halicarnassus ,
6992-503: The name of the Vedic sage Kashyapa who is believed to have settled people in this land. Accordingly, Kashmir would be derived from either kashyapa-mir (Kashyapa's Lake) or kashyapa-meru (Kashyapa's Mountain). The word has been referenced to in a Hindu scripture mantra worshipping the Hindu goddess Sharada and is mentioned to have resided in the land of kashmira , or which might have been
7084-583: The north and northeast, beyond the Great Himalayas, the region is traversed by the Karakoram mountains. To the northwest lies the Hindu Kush mountain range. The upper Indus River separates the Himalayas from the Karakoram. The Karakoram is the most heavily glaciated part of the world outside the polar regions. The Siachen Glacier at 76 km (47 mi) and the Biafo Glacier at 63 km (39 mi) rank as
7176-493: The opinion of Kashmiris must be ascertained, while India insisted that no referendum could occur until all of the state had been cleared of irregulars. In the last days of 1948, a ceasefire was agreed under UN auspices. However, since the plebiscite demanded by the UN was never conducted, relations between India and Pakistan soured, and eventually led to two more wars over Kashmir in 1965 and 1999 . India has control of about half
7268-462: The population of the valley during Dogra rule (1846–1947), and 20% of whom had left the Kashmir valley to other parts of India in the 1950s, underwent a complete exodus in the 1990s due to the Kashmir insurgency . According to a number of authors, approximately 100,000 of the total Kashmiri Pandit population of 140,000 left the valley during that decade. Other authors have suggested a higher figure for
7360-621: The produce of the land and also began to offer interest-free loans to farmers; Kashmir became the second highest revenue earner for the Sikh Empire. During this time Kashmir shawls became known worldwide, attracting many buyers, especially in the West. The state of Jammu , which had been on the ascendant after the decline of the Mughal Empire, came under the sway of the Sikhs in 1770. Further in 1808, it
7452-468: The research seem independent and "almost detachable", so that they might have been set aside by the author for the purposes of an oral performance. The intellectual matrix of the 5th century, Marincola suggests, comprised many oral performances in which philosophers would dramatically recite such detachable pieces of their work. The idea was to criticize previous arguments on a topic and emphatically and enthusiastically insert their own in order to win over
7544-470: The son of Sphynx lies; in Ionic history without peer; a Dorian born, who fled from slander's brand and made in Thuria his new native land. Yet it was in Athens where his most formidable contemporary critics could be found. In 425 BC, which is about the time that Herodotus is thought by many scholars to have died, the Athenian comic dramatist Aristophanes created The Acharnians , in which he blames
7636-431: The territory under Pakistan control as "Pakistan-occupied Kashmir" ("POK"). The Government of Pakistan and Pakistani sources refer to the portion of Kashmir administered by India as "Indian-occupied Kashmir" ("IOK") or "Indian-held Kashmir" (IHK); The terms "Pakistan-administered Kashmir" and "India-administered Kashmir" are often used by neutral sources for the parts of the Kashmir region controlled by each country. In
7728-480: The throne of Kashmir in 1925, was the reigning monarch in 1947 at the conclusion of British rule of the subcontinent and the subsequent partition of the British Indian Empire into the newly independent Dominion of India and the Dominion of Pakistan . According to Burton Stein 's History of India , Kashmir was neither as large nor as old an independent state as Hyderabad ; it had been created rather off-handedly by
7820-485: The valley, and the cultivated orchards yield pears, apples, peaches , and cherries. The chief trees are deodar , firs and pines , chenar or plane, maple, birch and walnut , apple, cherry. Herodotus Herodotus ( Ancient Greek : Ἡρόδοτος , romanized : Hēródotos ; c. 484 – c. 425 BC) was a Greek historian and geographer from the Greek city of Halicarnassus , part of
7912-404: The world's second and third longest glaciers outside the polar regions. Karakoram has four eight-thousander mountain peaks with K2 , the second highest peak in the world at 8,611 m (28,251 ft). The Indus River system forms the drainage basin of the Kashmir region. The river enters the region in Ladakh at its southeastern corner from the Tibetan Plateau , and flows northwest to run
8004-404: The young Herodotus heard local eyewitness accounts of events within the empire and of Persian preparations for the invasion of Greece , including the movements of the local fleet under the command of Artemisia I of Caria . Inscriptions recently discovered at Halicarnassus indicate that Artemesia's grandson Lygdamis negotiated with a local assembly to settle disputes over seized property, which
8096-421: Was first called) combined disparate regions, religions, and ethnicities: to the east, Ladakh was ethnically and culturally Tibetan and its inhabitants practised Buddhism ; to the south, Jammu had a mixed population of Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs. In the heavily populated central Kashmir valley, the population was overwhelmingly Muslim —mostly Sunni , however, there was also a small but influential Hindu minority,
8188-522: Was fully conquered by Maharaja Ranjit Singh. Gulab Singh, then a youngster in the House of Jammu, enrolled in the Sikh troops and, by distinguishing himself in campaigns, gradually rose in power and influence. In 1822, he was anointed as the Raja of Jammu. Along with his able general Zorawar Singh Kahluria , he conquered and subdued Rajouri (1821), Kishtwar (1821), Suru valley and Kargil (1835), Ladakh (1834–1840), and Baltistan (1840), thereby surrounding
8280-571: Was revoked. According to Encyclopædia Britannica : Although there was a clear Muslim majority in Kashmir before the 1947 partition and its economic, cultural, and geographic contiguity with the Muslim-majority area of the Punjab (in Pakistan) could be convincingly demonstrated, the political developments during and after the partition resulted in a division of the region. Pakistan was left with territory that, although basically Muslim in character,
8372-447: Was sparsely populated, relatively inaccessible, and economically underdeveloped. The largest Muslim group, situated in the Valley of Kashmir and estimated to number more than half the population of the entire region, lay in India-administered territory, with its former outlets via the Jhelum valley route blocked. The eastern region of the former princely state of Kashmir is also involved in
8464-457: Was told. A sizable portion of the Histories has since been confirmed by modern historians and archaeologists . Modern scholars generally turn to Herodotus's own writing for reliable information about his life, supplemented with ancient yet much later sources, such as the Byzantine Suda , an 11th-century encyclopedia which possibly took its information from traditional accounts. Still,
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