Indian Feudalism (book)

Indian Feudalism
Third edition cover
AuthorRam Sharan Sharma
LanguageEnglish
SubjectHistory of India, Ancient India
PublisherMacmillan Publishers India Ltd., 3rd Revised Edition, Delhi
Publication date
2005
Publication placeIndia
Preceded byIndia's Ancient Past 
Followed byEarly Medieval Indian Society: A Study in Feudalisation, Perspectives in Social and Economic History of Early India 

Indian Feudalism is a book by Indian professor Ram Sharan Sharma. The book analyses the practice of land grants, which became considerable in the Gupta period and widespread in the post-Gupta period. It shows how this led to the emergence of a class of landlords, endowed with fiscal and administrative rights superimposed upon a class of peasantry which was deprived of communal agrarian rights.

Professor Sharma studies in detail the basic relationships in early medieval society down to the eve of the Ghorian conquests. He argues in favour of a "feudalism largely realising the surplus from peasants mainly in kind through superior rights in their land and through forced labour, which is not found on any considerable scale... after the Turkish conquest of India."[1]

The third revised edition of the book was published by Macmillan Publishers in 2005.

  1. ^ Habib, Irfan (9 August 1997). "History and interpretation". Frontline. Archived from the original on 22 April 2009. Retrieved 5 April 2009.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)