Revision Notes for Class 8 Social Science

History Chapter 1 – Introduction: How when and Where

As discussed above, History tells us about how the world looked in the past and how it looks
now. So, there is a comparison between the past and the present. As soon as we establish any
kind of relationship between ‘now’ and ‘then,’ we have to skip the timelines and periods out
of the picture. For example, today you are 15 years old but how do you know that? It is because
you know the History of your birth. It is due to your knowledge that 15 years ago you took
birth so you know you are 15 years old today.

Precise Date vs A Period of Time

If you pick up any History book, you will find two ways of talking about a time in History.
First, you will see the precise dates on which certain incidents happened. Then there are the
timelines during which something began to happen.

Ask your mother exactly when you started speaking. Your mother will obviously say that it
was a long process. You did not just start speaking fluently one fine morning. You learn one
word, then two, three, and so on. Similarly, in Europe, industrialisation did not happen at
once. It was a process that spanned over the years. So, we say that the first industrial
revolution started in the 18th century and we have no exact date.

Traditional History uses exact dates. Traditional historical discourse takes big events like the
coronation of a king, the start or end of a war, the birth of somebody famous etc. as the standard
against which the events of these periods are told. Because a decisive battle was fought
between the Indian King Hemu and the Mughal forces.

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The Demerits of the Date-Based History

Traditional date-based History has a severe flaw in that it takes major incidents like wars, the
coronation of a king etc. as the focal points and then talks about the incidents surrounding
these focal points. But History is not made up of these big incidents alone. It is made up of the
actions of ordinary people like you and us. Traditional History has no place for these ordinary
laymen. Neither does this kind of History show things from different perspectives.

For example, when History talks about the Second Battle of Panipat, it tells the story of how
the Mughal forces won Delhi after defeating Hemu. But it does not tell us a thing about how
he had driven the Mughals out of Delhi to Lahore and how he had captured the entire Gangetic
Plains in less than a year. He also ruled Delhi and issued coins in his name, as Hemchandra
Vikramaditya.

Who Gets to Decide Which Dates are Important?

History is filled with dates and years. It is not feasible to talk about each one of them. So,
who decides which year is important and which year isn’t? If a country is ruled by
foreigners, they will try to tell its History from their point of view. It is only when the
countrymen take the responsibility of telling their own History that we get the real picture.

The History book talks about how the History of India written from a British perspective
tends to give importance to the years that mark the rule of various governor-generals of
British India. All the other dates were considered secondary.

Let us take another example. In the higher Classes, you will read about the Independence of
America - how it fought against the British. But did you know that the Americans were
mostly the British and European settlers? Before these settlers came to America, it was
inhabited by the Native Americans.

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A Vox article rightly says that if the foreign settlers had not forcibly marginalised the Native
Americans - depriving them of their own land, it is the Native Americans who would have
built the nation-state that we call America today. The History of North America has ignored
the existence of Native Americans.

Which Periods are Important?

As we said, we cannot use dates everywhere. So, we use periods. Here too, we have the same
problem of deciding what historical incidents we should use to mark the start and end of a
particular period.

James Mill, a historian who supported British rule in India, divided Indian History into Hindu,
Muslim, and British periods. The assumption was, that during the reign of the Hindu and
Muslim rulers, India was in the dark ages. It is the British rulers who pulled India out of the
darkness. The ancient Sanskrit language is deeply intertwined with Mathematics.

Then there is the question, why should we categorise periods based on religion? There are
many aspects of History apart from the religious angles.

To banish this bias, modern historians started dividing Indian History into ancient, medieval,
and modern. However, the Indian civilization did not advance chronologically. It was during
the so-called ‘ancient’ times that the Indians were at the prime of socio-political growth.

Only when the British came into the so-called modern age did India plunge into darkness. So,
this chronological way of periodicity is wrong.

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The Colonial Period

Because India plunged into darkness during British rule, modern historians refuse to term
that age as the modern age. The British came to India and sucked the very life force of the
country reducing it to a poor, socially divided nation.

During their 190 years of rule, they replaced the Indian customs, culture, language and even
the thought process with their own versions. To this date, we shake hands when we greet
people.

When a country subjects another country to forceful rule leading to an annihilation of the local
culture, traditions, language, customs, and the original thought process - we call that
colonialism. That is exactly what happened when the British came to India.

Where Do Historians Get the Info?

Historical incidents of the last 250 years had the fortune of being written down. So, what are
the sources of this historical info?

Official Documents

The British were of the opinion that every instruction, plan, execution of the plan, research
etc. should be written down so that these things could be studied and analysed in the future.

So, every government department in the British Raj - like the courts or the village Tahsildar’s
office made it a point to create documents stating their works and plans.

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Surveys

The surveys of the topography, number of people in a region, density of forests, number of
people belonging to a particular religion or gender etc. produced historically significant
records.

Then there were archaeological, Zoological, or Botanical surveys. However, official

Periodisation of Indian History into Ancient, Medieval, and Modern Periods

Apart from the Classification of History by the British, historians have divided Indian History
into three other subdivisions. These include the following.

1. Ancient

2. Medieval and

3. Modern

However, this division had a number of problems and drawbacks. This Classification of the
periods in Indian History has the idea borrowed from the West, where the modern period was
characterised by the growth and development of all the forces of modernity. These forces
include science, reason, liberty, democracy, equality, etc.

‘Ancient’ refers to a very old period of History that witnessed very negligible advancement.
The term ‘Mediaeval’ was used to describe a society which lacked the existence or prevalence
of the features of modern society. However, the features of the modern period of History were
non-existent in India during British rule. Indians at that time did not have equality, freedom,
or liberty. There was no growth or progress in trade or India's economy. Hence, many
historians refer to the British period as colonial.

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Class 8 History Chapter 1 Notes

In this chapter, students will learn that earlier people were using history as a synonym for the
dates. Also, students will get to know about the perspective of the old historians who used to
dive deep into the dates of the battles and who won them. But modern historians have
changed everything. Modern-day historians try to look for the change that has happened and
how it was initiated and what led to its initiation.

This chapter's writer breaks the history into two periods to make students understand the
characteristics of time and other central features as students read through the chapter pages.
Moving apart from the British classification of Indian history, which was generally divided
into Ancient, Medieval, and Morden. In ancient times and even now, Brirshters used to believe
in writing down the things which they feel are essential. Every instruction led out by the British
empire, every plan, policy, decision, and agreement used to be written up to be taken as
evidence if the time comes to present it to other people.

When, Where, and How Class 8 Summary

In 1817, a British writer named James Mill published a three-part book with the title A History
of British India. In his book, James Mill divided Indian History into three parts. The Hindu,
Muslim, and British. According to Mill, every Asian community has a lower level of
civilization than the people living in European countries. In his book, he described before
Britishers came to India, Hindu and Muslim disputes used to rule the country. You can see the
religious intolerance among the different communities. Also, there was an issue of caste taboo
and the practising of the superstitions which dominated the social life of the people living in
India.

In his writing, he said that during the British rule, the Indian community became more
civilised. His vision of Indian History with Britisher was meant to be progressive and
civilised.

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