Piety and politics in the early Indian mosque

This volume focuses on a series of mosques constructed after north-west India came under the political control of the Ghurid sultanate of Afghanistan in the 1190s. The most famous of the group is the Qutb Mosque in Delhi. The book explores the complex relationship between pre-modern architecture, history, and modern historiography. It brings together divergent voices that have enriched nineteenth- and twentieth-century scholarship on some of the earliest surviving mosques in South Asia. Piety and Politics analyzes the different traditions that contributed to the development of the earliest mosques in South Asia. It examines the evidence that architecture offers for cultural exchange, identity formation, and political polemics in the Ghurid and early Delhi sultanates in order to understand the context of contemporary debates, memories, and perceptions related to the mosques that form the subject of the volume. Presenting a range of perspectives on the meaning of pre-modern monuments, it contributes to broader debates on the nature of modern historical writing.