Monsoon Ecologies : Irrigation Agriculture and Settlement Patterns in Rajasthan During the Pre-Colonial Period

Contents:  Preface.  Introduction. I. Monsoon landscape:  1. Intimate visions: environment, territory and society. 2. Monsoon: possibilities with constraints. II. The rain-catchers: 3. Fluid stability: variable waterscape and settlement patterns. 4. Waterscapes: rain water harvesting and agro-pastoral landscape. 5. Visibly invisible: ecological imprints. 6. Epilogue. Bibliography. Index.

The role of climate in general and the monsoon in particular, in the evolution and growth of human settlements in the area has been scarcely touched upon. Here is a case study which offers more nuanced readings of human-nature interactions. Integrating data from paleoecology, archaeology and history, this study has attempted to track the environmental social and political transformations in this region over the last one and a half millennia.