History

The most ancient civilization on the Indian territory  - that of Indians and Proto-Indians – existed in the 3^rd -2^nd millennia B.C. in the estuary of Indus and its tributaries. This civilization was a contemporary of the Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, and it equaled them in the development level. In the second half of the 2^nd millennium B.C. India was reinhabited by several successive waves of Indo-Aryans, which in a certain period of time opened up and cultivated the most part of the subcontinent. During several centuries the migrants mixed with the indigenous people of India - Munda, Dravids and others – thus forming up a new ethno cultural environment. The cultural and political centres of Indo-Aryas formed up in the Jumna-Ganges interfluves. Already in the 6^th century BC there existed here “Grand  kingdoms” – mahajanapadas.  In 334 BC Alexander the Great fighting against the Achaemenids conquered Punjab but facing the resistance of the local peoples, had to abandon India.  After Alexander of Macedon left Chandra Gupta – the founder of a new dynasty – continued to unite the lands of India and during the reign of his grandson Ashoka (269-232 BC) a major Mauryan empire finally took shape and united the largest part of the subcontinent. Later followed the Kushān empire, after the fall of which in the 4^th BC the Gupta Empire conquered and ruled practically the whole of India. A lengthy period of feudal strife, which followed the fall of the empire, ended in the Muslim invasion and the emergence of the Delhi Sultanate (XII-XYI cc AD) and of the Great Mogols Empire (XVI-XVIII cc AD), where the Muslim dynasties ruled. In the XVIII century India was conquered by the British Empire and was integrated into its colonial system. Beginning from the middle of the XIXth century the country was struggling against the British colonial rule and in 1947 it became independent.

A Festive Procession of an Indian Maharaja. “Underwood and Underwood” The Beginning of the XXth century.		The Ekka cart in front of Victoria Station in Bombay.  Underwood and Underwood) The beginning of the XXth century		In the Red Fort in 1947 the British flag was lowered and the flag of independent India was hoisted. India. New-Dehli.N.Dubyanskaya.2005
Entrance of Shakh Djakhan, the  Mughal Emperor, to new capital Shakhdkakhanabad. 1649. India.		Gate in Hyderabad the largest and richest princedom. By 1903.		Palace built for women of Maharaja family. The Palace has  953 windows to watch life in the streets. By 1903.
Ulvar Rajaship palace park. By 1903.		The Tower of Victim. By 1903.		Trichinopoly city, famous for its temples. By 1903.
Jagannatha temple in Puri. India. Puri. By 1903.		Professional photographer, owner of a studio. India. The Indians. Snatenkov V.		The British in India. Painting by Johann Zoffany "Claude Martin and his friends" (1787). The Victoria Memorial in Calcutta. India. Bengal.
In the Red Fort in 1947 the flag f of Britain was lowered and the national flag of indipendent India was run up. India. Delhi. Dubyanskaya V.		Seal from Mokhendjo-Daro. India. The Indians Civilisations anciennes du Pakistan. Bruxelles: Musees Royaux d'Art et d'Histoire. 1989		In drinking water shop. Nepal. Snatenkov V.
Interior of present-day office. India. Snatenkov V.		Aircraft park in Nepal. Nepal. Snatenkov V.