Shivaji The Grand Rebel

by Dennis Kincaid

It is not uncommon for a strong new power to rise on the frontier districts between two large but decrepit states. An obvious instance is the sudden emergence of the Ottomans on the border country between the Byzantine Empire and the Seljuk emirates. Nor is it uncommon for the large states to be ruined, less by any positive superiority of the new power rising between them than by their mutually destructive animosity. The success of the Arabs against both Persian and Roman Empires is a case in point. So it is necessary to emphasise the geographical situation of Shivaji’s family estates on the very borders of both Bijapur and the Mogul dominions – for this strip of land, given to Shivaji’s grandfather by a Muhammadan prince in a gesture reminiscent of the Arabian Nights, was in fact to prove the core of a new empire.