ABSTRACT
Through military victories, bureaucratic innovation, and cultural synthesis, the Mughal dynasty (1526-1858) built a vast, fabulously wealthy and ethnically diverse empire that eventually encompassed almost the entire Indian subcontinent and then, even after its decline, significantly shaped subsequent British colonial rule.1 The dynasty’s founder, Emperor Babur, conquered much of north India. His grandson, Emperor Akbar, and Akbar’s three successors largely expanded their domain, despite repeated regional, as well as intra-dynastic, rebellions. At the peak in the late seventeenth century under Akbar’s great-grandson, Emperor Aurangzeb Alamgir, the empire included over 1,250,000 square miles and some 100-200 million people. Even after its centralised control collapsed, the Mughal Empire continued for centuries as a powerful symbol and a precursor for British colonialism.
