ABSTRACT

All Aurangzib's arts and all his industry were insufficient to resist the increasing disorders of the state, which now pressed upon him from every quarter. The history of India during the second half of the seventeenth century was made momentous by the careers of two men of extraordinary force of character. One of these was Aurangzib himself, the other was Sivaji, the Mahratta " mountain rat." Sivaji's exploits, which included the sacking of Surat, came to an end with his death in 1680. Dr John Fryer clearly points out one of the chief causes of the political distractions of the later years of Aurangzib's reign. Akbar had perceived that a powerful Mogul Empire was only possible if it were propped up by Hindu and Mohammedan alike, and had acted on that belief. In 1674, when Fryer was at Bombay, Oxenden and others were sent from that town on an embassy to Sivaji.