Christopher Tadgell’s Architecture in the Indian Subcontinent: From the Mauryas to the Mughals offers a rare and ambitious survey of Indian architecture spanning five millennia, across distinctive and overlapping regions, dynasties, and cultural affiliations. The book is a revised edition of Tadgell’s 1990 survey The History of Architecture in India: From the Dawn of Civilization to the End of the Raj, which the publisher rightly claimed to be “the first modern monograph to draw together in one volume all the strands of India’s architectural history.” After thirty-four years, Tadgell’s new book remains the sole single-volume survey of precolonial Indian architecture—a testament to the difficult and admirable feat of bringing together such a vast amount and range of materials in a cohesive narrative.

The sheer breadth of the book alone, encompassing buildings and sites beyond the major “greatest hits” and dynastic centers (such as the less-studied regional variations in Kerala...

You do not currently have access to this content.