James Tod - Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan

COLONEL JAMES TOD.
(From the bust by Vo. Livi, 1837. By permission of Lt.-Col. E. W.
Blunt-Mackenzie, R.A.).
Frontispiece.

Sire ,

The gracious permission accorded me, to lay at the foot of the Throne the fruit of my labours, allows me to propitiate Your Majestys consideration towards the object of this work, the prosecution of which I have made a paramount duty.

The Rajput princes, happily rescued, by the triumph of the British arms, from the yoke of lawless oppression, are now the most remote tributaries to Your Majestys extensive empire; and their admirer and annalist may, perhaps, be permitted to hope that the sighs of this ancient and interesting race for the restoration of their former independence, which it would suit our wisest policy to grant, may be deemed not undeserving Your Majestys regard.

Sire ,

Your Majesty has graciously sanctioned the presentation of the Second Volume of the Annals of Rajputana to the Public under the auspices of Your Majestys name.

In completing this work, it has been my endeavour to draw a faithful picture of States, the ruling principle of which is the paternity of the Sovereign. That this patriarchal form is the best suited to the genius of the people may be presumed from its durability, which war, famine, and anarchy have failed to destroy. The throne has always been the watchword and rallying-point of the Rajputs. My prayer is, that it may continue so, and that neither the love of conquest, nor false views of policy, may tempt us to subvert the independence of these States, some of which have braved the storms of more than ten centuries.

It will not, I trust, be deemed presumptuous in the Annalist of these gallant and long-oppressed races thus to solicit for them a full measure of Your Majestys gracious patronage; in return for which, the Rajputs, making Your Majestys enemies their own, would glory in assuming the saffron robe, emblematic of death or victory, under the banner of that chivalry of which Your Majesty is the head.

That Your Majestys throne may ever be surrounded by chiefs who will act up to the principles of fealty maintained at all hazards by the Rajput, is the heartfelt aspiration of,

No one can undertake with a light heart the preparation of a new edition of Colonel Tods great work, The Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan. But the leading part which the Rjputs have taken in the Great War, the summoning of one of their princes to a seat at the Imperial Conference, the certainty that as the result of the present cataclysm they will be entitled to a larger share in the administration of India, have contributed to the desire that this classical account of their history and sociology should be presented in a shape adapted to the use of the modern scholar and student of Indian history and antiquities.

In the Introduction which follows I have endeavoured to estimate the merits and defects of Colonel Tods work. Here it is necessary only to state that though the book has been several times reprinted in India and once in this country, the obvious difficulties of such an undertaking have hitherto prevented any writer better qualified than myself from attempting to prepare an annotated edition. Irrespectively of the fact that this work was published a century ago, when the study of the history, antiquities, sociology, and geography of India had only recently started, the Authors method led him to formulate theories on a wide range of subjects not directly connected with the Rjputs. In the light of our present knowledge some of these speculations have become obsolete, and it might have been possible, without impairing the value of the work as a Chronicle of the Rjputs, to have discarded from the text and notes much which no longer possesses value. But the work is a classic, and it deserves to be treated as such, and it was decided that any mutilation of the original text and notes would be inconsistent with the object of this series of reprints of classical works on Indian subjects. The only alternative course was to correct in notes, clearly distinguished from those of the Author, such facts and theories as are no longer accepted by scholars.