This is a bibliography of notable works about the historical Indian subcontinent as well as the modern-day Republic of India.
India history books Single volume works Primary sources Ancient India Diodorus Siculus, 1st century BC. "Book II: The East." Pp. 35–60 in Bibliotheca historica. Ashokavadana, 2nd century CE Medieval India ibn Mubarak, Abu'l-Fazl. 16th century. Ain-i-Akbari, Akbarnama Vol. 3. Full online set. Jahangir, Nur-ud-din Muhammad. 16th century. Tuzk-e-Jahangiri. Kashmiri, Muhammad Ali. 1642. Tohfatu'l-ahbab.Pandit. N. K., trans. 2009. A Muslim Missionary in Mediaeval Kashmir: Being the English translation of Tohfatu'l-ahbab. New Delhi: Voice of India. Qazvini, Muhammad Amin. 1646. Padshah Nama.
British Raj Nehru, Jawaharlal. 1946. The Discovery of India.
Mill, James. 1817, 1820, 1826. The History of British India, edited by Horace Hayman Wilson (1848, 1858).
Secondary sources
Balagangadhara, S. N. 2012. Reconceptualizing India Studies. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Bryant, Edwin. 2001. The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture. Oxford University Press Chakrabarti, Dilip K. 1997. Colonial Indology. New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal. Durant, W. 2011. The Case for India. Mumbai: Strand Book Stall. Inden, R. B. 2010. Imagining India. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press. Karkare, Neelesh Ishwarchandra. 2014. Shreenath Madhavji: Mahayoddha Mahadji Ki Shourya Gatha. Lal, B. B. 1997. The earliest civilization of South Asia: Rise, maturity, and decline. New Delhi: Aryan Books International. —— 1998. India 1947-1997: New light on the Indus civilization. New Delhi: Aryan Books International. Lal, K. S. 1980. History of the Khaljis: A.D. 1290-1320. New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal. Adluri, Vishwa, and Joydeep Bagchee. 2014. The Nay Science: A History of German Indology. New York: Oxford University Press.
Guha, Ramachandra. 2007. India after Gandhi. Dharampal. 1995. The beautiful tree: Indigenous Indian education in the eighteenth century. New Delhi: Biblia Impex Private Limited. —— 2000. Indian science and technology in the eighteenth century: Some contemporary European accounts. Goa: Other India Press. Panikkar, K. M. 1965. Asia and Western dominance. Millswood, AU: Braille Writing Association of South Australia. Priolkar, A. K. 1961. "The Goa Inquisition: Being a Quatercentenary Commemoration Study of the Inquisition in India." Bombay University. Majumdar, Ramesh C. 1962. History of the Freedom Movement in India, 3 vols. Calcutta: K. L. Mukhopadhyay. . —— 1970. Historiography in Modern India. London: Asia Publishing House. Majumdar, Ramesh C., Hem C. Raychaudhuri, and Kalikinkar Datta. 2007. An Advanced History of India. Delhi: Macmillan India. Trautmann, Thomas. 1997. Aryans and British India. Berkeley: University of California Press. Sen, Amartya. 2005. The Argumentative Indian. Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Elphinstone, Mountstuart. 1841. The History of India, 2 vols. London: John Murray. vol. 1, vol. 2. Sachau, Eduard C. 1910. Alberuni's India — An account of ... India about A.D. 1030, 2 vols. London: Kegan Paul, Trench Trubner & Co.Ltd. vol. 1, vol. 2.
Elliot, Henry M. 1867–1877. The History of India, as Told by Its Own Historians. The Muhammadan Period, 8 vols., edited by J. Dowson.
Multivolume works Firishta, Muhammad. 1794. Ferishta's History of Dekkan..., 2 vols., translated by J. Scott, Jonathan. London: John Stockdale. vol. 1, vol. 2. Tod, James. 1829, 1832. Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan, 2 vols. London: Smith, Elder.
Chattopadhyaya, Debbi P., ed. 2009. Project of History of Indian Science, Philosophy and culture, 20 vols. Centre for Studies in Civilizations.
Jackson, A. V. Williams, ed. 1906–1907. History of India, 10 vols. London: Grolier Society. Smith, Vincent Arthur. 1906. History of India, vol. 2: From Sixth century B.C to Mohammedan Conquest. Lane-Poole, Stanley. 1906. History of India, vol. 3: From Mohammedan Conquest to the Reign of Akbar the Great. —— 1906. History of India, vol. 4: From Reign of Akbar the Great to the Fall of Moghul Empire. Elliot, Henry M. 1907. History of India, vol. 5: The Muhammadan Period as Described by Its Own Historians. Hunter, William Wilson. 1906. History of India, vol. 6: From the first European settlements to the founding of the English East India Company. —— 1906. History of India, vol. 7: The European struggle for Indian supremacy in the seventeenth century. Lyall, A. C. 1907. History of India, vol. 8: From the close of the seventeenth century to the present time. Jackson, A. V. Williams. 1907. History of India, vol. 9: Historic accounts of India by foreign travellers, classic, oriental, and occidental. Majumdar, Ramesh C. 1951–1969. The History and Culture of the Indian People, 11 vols. Mumbai: Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan. Malhotra, Rajiv. 2012. Infinity Foundation series: Contributions to history of Indian science and technology, 20 vols. New Delhi: Pentagon Press.
Race, caste and tribe Primary sources Sherring, M. A. 1872–81. Hindoo Tribes and Castes, 3 vols.
Northern India Crooke, William. 1896. The tribes and castes of the North-western Provinces and Oudh, 4 vols. Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing. Volume I Volume II Volume III Volume IV Rose, Horace Arthur, and Edward Douglas MacLagan. 1911–1919. A Glossary of the Tribes and Castes of the Punjab and North-West Frontier Province, 3 vols. Lahore: Samuel T. Weston at the Civil and Military Gazette Press.
Central Provinces Enthoven, Reginald Edward. 1920–1922. The Tribes and Castes of Bombay, 3 vols. Bombay: Government Central Press. Russell, Robert Vane. 1916. Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India, 4 vols. Rai Bahadur Hira Lal. London: Macmillan & Co. Volume I Volume II Volume III Volume IV
Southern India Thurston, Edgar, and K. Rangachari. 1909. Castes and Tribes of Southern India, 7 vols. Madras: Government Press. Volume I (A to B) Volume II (C to J) Volume III (K) Volume IV (K to M) Volume V (M to P) Volume VI (P to S) Volume VII (T to Z)
Secondary sources
Malhotra, Rajiv. 2011. Breaking India: Western Interventions in Dravidian and Dalit Faultlines. Amaryllis. .
Biography Basu, Kanailal. 2010. Netaji: Rediscovered. Borthwick, Meredith. 1977. Keshub Chunder Sen: a search for cultural synthesis. Chakrabarty, D. 2016. The Calling of History: Sir Jadunath Sarkar and His Empire of Truth. Collet, Sophia Dobson, and Francis Herbert Stead. 1914. The Life and Letters of Raja Rammohun Roy, edited by Hem Chandra Sarkar. Fauja, S., and Gurbachan Singh Talib. 1996. Guru Tegh Bahadur: Martyr and Teacher. Patiala: Punjabi University. Geddes, Patrick. 1920. The Life and Work of Sir Jagadis C. Bose. Gordon, Leonard A. 1990. Brothers Against the Raj: A Biography of Indian Nationalist Leaders Sarat and Subhas Chandra Bose. Hatcher, Brian A. 2014. Vidyasagar: The Life and After-life of an Eminent Indian. Hunter, William Wilson. 1889. Rulers of India series, 28 vols. Kanigel, Robert. 1991. The Man Who Knew Infinity. Karkare, Neelesh Ishwarchandra. Biography on Great Warrior Shreenath Mahadji Shinde. Kaviraj, Krishnadas. 1582. Chaitanya Charitamrita. translated in Sarkar, Jadunath, trans. 1922. Chaitanya's Life and Teachings. Kling, Blair B. 1976. Partner in Empire: Dwarkanath Tagore and the Age of Enterprise in Eastern India. Lal, B. B. 2011. Piecing together: Memoirs of an archaeologist. New Delhi: Aryan Books International. Majumdar, R. C. 1967. Svami Vivekananda: A Historical Review. Calcutta: General Printers & Publishers. Max Müller, Friedrich. 1916. Ramakrishna: His Life and Sayings. Mitra, Subal Chandra. 1902. Isvar Chandra Vidyasagar, a story of his life and work. Nasrin, Taslima. 1999. Amar Meyebela - My Girlhood. Calcutta: People's Book House. Paul, Samiran Kumar, and Amar Nath Prasad. 2006. Recritiquing Rabindranath Tagore. Radhakrishnan, Sarvepalli. 1919. The Philosophy of Rabindranath Tagore. Rao, S. R. 2008. Reminiscences of an archaeologist. New Delhi: Aryan Books International. Rhys, Ernest P. 1916. Rabindranath Tagore: A Biographical Study. Robinson, W. Andrew. 1989. Satyajit Ray: The Inner Eye: The Biography of a Master Film-Maker. vol 1, vol. 2. Rolland, Romain. The Life of Ramakrishna. —— The Life of Vivekananada and the Universal Gospel. Roy, Basanta Koomar. 1915. Rabindranath Tagore – The man and his poetry. (1915: 1; 1916: 2) Roy, Samaren. 1986. The Twice-born Heretic, M. N. Roy and Comintern. —— 1988. India's First Communist. —— 1997. M. N. Roy: A Political Biography. Sarkar, Jadunath. 1981. History of Aurangzib. Orient Longman. —— 2012. Shivaji and His Times. Orient Longman. Sister Nivedita. 1910. The Master as I Saw Him Seely, Clinton B. 1990. A Poet Apart: A literary biography of the Bengali poet Jibanananda Das, (1899-1954). Sen, Amiya Prosad. 2008. Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay: An Intellectual Biography. Sengupta, Subodh Chandra. 1977. Bankimchandra Chatterjee. Toye, Hugh. 1959. The Springing Tiger. Yogananda, Paramahansa. 1946. Autobiography of a Yogi. The father of modern India: Commemoration volume of the Rammohun Roy centenary celebration, 1933. Rammohun Roy Centenary Committee. 1935.
Biographical dictionaries and encyclopedias Samsad Bangali Charitabhidhan, ed. Subodh Chandra Sengupta Dictionary of National Biography 4 vols ed. Sibapada Sen The Indian Biographical Dictionary (1915) by C. Hayavadana Rao Dictionary of Indian biography (1906) by Charles Edward Buckland Who's Who in India Supplement 1 (1912) Who's Who in India Supplement 2 (1914) The Golden Book of India, a genealogical and biographical dictionary of the ruling princes, chiefs, nobles, and other personages, titled or decorated, of the Indian empire (1893) by Roper Lethbridge The Oriental Biographical Dictionary (1881) by Thomas William Beale Reminiscences and Anecdotes of Great Men of India by Ram Gopal Sanyal Vol 1 (1894), Vol 2 (1895) Who's who of Indian Writers, 1999: A-M Encyclopaedia of Indian Literature, Volume 1 Encyclopaedia of Indian Literature, Volume 2 Encyclopaedia of Indian Literature, Volume 3 Encyclopaedia of Indian Literature, Volume 5 Encyclopaedia of Indian Literature: Supplementary entries and index Historical Dictionary of the Bengalis (2013) by Kunal Chakrabarti, Shubhra Chakrabarti
Manuals and gazetteers
Chaudhuri, S. B. 1964. History of the Gazetteers of India. New Delhi: Publication Division.
The Imperial Gazetteer of India
Travelogues Early period Indica by Megasthenes, c. 300 BCE , 414 CE
Great Tang Records on the Western Regions, by Xuanzang. 646 CE.
Majumdar, R. C. (1981). The Classical accounts of India: Being a compilation of the English translations of the accounts left by Herodotus, Megasthenes, Arrian, Strabo, Quintus, Diodorus, Siculus, Justin, Plutarch, Frontinus, Nearchus, Apollonius, Pliny, Ptolemy, Aelian, and others with maps. Calcutta: Firma KLM.
Early modern period
Meenakshi Jain, The India They Saw (co-edited with Sandhya Jain, 4 Volumes, Prabhat Prakashan), , , , .
Late modern Emily Eden. Up the Country
Begums Thugs and White Mughals. Fanny Parkes, ed. William Dalrymple. 2002 The Hill of Devi. E. M. Forster, 1953. A Walk Along the Ganges. Dennison Berwick. 1985. India: A Million Mutinies Now. V. S. Naipaul. 1990.
Provinces Holland, Thomas Henry, ed. Provincial Geographies of India.
Biodiversity and environment Karan, P. P. "Environmental movements in India." Geographical Review 84#1 (1994): 32-41. online Nayak, Arun Kumar. "Environmental movements in India." Journal of developing societies 31.2 (2015): 249-280. online Saravanan, Velayutham. Environmental History of Modern India: Land, Population, Technology and Development (Bloomsbury Publishing India, 2022) online review; also see excerpt at Amazon] Shiva, Vandana. "Ecology Movements in India", in Oomen, T. K. (Ed.), Social Movements: Issues of Identity (Oxford University Press, New Delhi, 2011)