This is the first book dealing with the foreign influence on ancient India. Discusses the foreign invasions of India by the Achaemenians, Greeks, Sakas, Kushans, Sassanians, Pahlavas and the Hunas, and also the peaceful impact of the Romans on India. The book advances a theory that ancient India never provided any casus belli to the foreigners to attack her. It was India's weakness and an implied confidence in future victories that kept the invaders coming to India one after another. But these foreigners have also influenced India in the field of administration, religion, philosophy, astronomy, language, script, trade and commerce, and above all the way of life of the people of India, which is the main subject of the book. This book suggests that after the partition of this sub-continent, the name `India' which continued to be used for this country is a misnomer when the river INDUS after which the country was so named, went to Pakistan. This book also finds is real nature the matrimonial alliance between Seleucus and Chandra Gupta Maurya and gives possible solutions to some riddles of Indian history. The origin of the name of KIDAR has also been discovered for the first time. The book tells us in a poetic language how ‘the golden age of the Guptas was converted into a molten age of destruction and confusion’ by the Hunas. What remained of our culture after so much turmoil and changes is before us.

The Theme Of This Book Is That From The Most Ancient Times India Has Drawn On Other Lands To The West Of Her For A Number Of Techniques, Institutions And Ideas, For From Being Isolated In The Past, She Has Assimilated Alien Influences Subsequently Endowing Them With The Stamp Of Her Own Native Genius.

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Description: In Indian history the decline of the Mauryan empire synchronised with large scale invasions leading to foreign occupation of northern India and parts of the Deccan. This also resulted in the infiltration of sizable foreign population. The political consequences of these invasions were indeed great and these have been adequately dealt with by scholars. The social consequences of foreign invasions have not, however, attracted the attention of scholars in the same measure. This book is an attempt to analyse and interpret these political upheavals in cultural terms. Food and drinks, dress ornaments and toilet, cults and cult objects, social organization and the caste system and social entertainments are primary to a society where the influence, if any, is most fundamental. These are, therefore, the aspects which have been taken up for studying the social impact of foreign invasions.