ABSTRACT
The fortunes of civilization have risen and fallen for millennia in India. Empires have come and gone, and so too have invaders. Foreign invasion is as old as the story of history in the Indian subcontinent. But always, it seems, the would-be conquerors were themselves the conquered as the great ocean of Hindu culture ultimately swallowed up the invaders, assimilating them into the multifaceted world of Indian peoples. The Muslim conquest of India was a different story. This time the invaders came, not only to stay, but to remain a detached and unassimilated class of conquerors.
