Why do I love history?
Growing up in an academic environment that always looked down on anything which does not belong to STEM and after pursuing a career in technology, I find myself very secluded in my love for history. Battling countless prejudices against it, I never stopped enjoying its immensely immersive experiences. Be it countless stories, monuments and their tales, metamorphic events or archaeological breakthroughs, it has many folds and each one of them is equally fascinating.
For me, what started as an intrigue about textbook stories has now become an obsession. Obsession for knowing more and more about people, perception and progress of gone ages.
But the most beautiful and somewhat contradicting thing about history is that it does not only dwell in the past. It’s the past that makes sense of our present and builds our future and so does history. It runs parallel to everything in every timeline.
I consider myself fortunate enough to be born in a country that is so full of history that goes back more than thousands of years yet is somehow amazingly relevant. India’s history is bundled with joy, culture, tragedies, victories and treacheries and this makes my love for it even stronger. In India one can pitch deep into history just anywhere as this ancient land is whispering stories all around.
As a famous saying goes, Earth has music for those who listen, I believe history enchants those who concede to it.
Still, people keep wondering what’s there in history to love? For once and for all, join me in exploring some captivating reasons for “why do I love history?”
1. Ocean of stories
History is nothing but an ode to billions of stories that has shaped mankind. Stories of not only kings and kingdoms, battles and conquests, trades and wars but stories of food and jewelries, love and romance, devotion and betrayal, emperors and saints, clothes and traditions, language and culture i.e. stories of everything!
From the accounts of Sir Howard Carter, romance of Raziya Sultan, the fall of Kashmeri gate in the September of 1857, or the betrayal of Mir Jafar, to the alluring descriptions of Chandni Chowk in Shahjahanabad, from introducing Persian vegetables to cooking Mughal Niharis, from paintings of Raja Ravi Verma to the beauty of Didarganj Yakshini, from something as groundbreaking as Rakhigarhi to something as constant as Taj Mahal, stories behind all these never fail to fascinate us in every sense.
These little stories, accounts or anecdotes take you to a world which was still in making (for as we know it today) and lets you dive into its countless fascinations. It makes you look through the eyes of people who were there, witnessing when the tides were turning and when the world was a different place. You can feel what they felt, know what they knew and learn what they could never.
Once you get to know these stories, you feel personally attached to them as if something which happened hundreds of years ago still makes an imprint on you. It can haunt,fascinate or make you believe in the unbelievable. You start drawing similarities between your life and those who lived thousands of years ago and then you wonder how mankind has progressed so much and has built a very different world yet somehow the fundamentals of life, religion and blunders have remained similar.
When you walk into an ancient monument, you see things happening which happened many years ago like everything around you has suddenly come to life just because you know the little story behind it. As I mentioned above, it’s an immersive experience and that one can only perceive and hardly explain and this convinced the child inside me to love history.
2. Puts everything into perspective
I feel like we live in a troubled time where you are always forced a perspective to look into everything around you and hence you either fall back or adopt the mass mentality.
History gives you freedom to build your own narrative about everything like socio-political issues or international affairs. This liberty to view things from your own natural vision is very emancipating and helps you to make a meaningful stand on complex issues like ethnicity, religion, identity and most importantly- our leaders. In the times when it is very hard to trust the floating information, history comes out as a very reliable option to fall onto as it never lies.
Though distortions are a very common menace in documenting history, still you can find abundant reliable sources to settle essential questions and keep off propaganda as much as possible.
This ability to believe the truth and the power it gives to moot a stand is what convinced the rational self of mine to love history.
3. Who are we?
For those who dare to dig deep into the immutable question of “who are we?” either dealing with identity crisis or out of simple curiosity, only history can provide them answers acceptable to all faiths and beliefs.
History in its fundamental character deals with the very question of human existence and identity. Though, such complex questions may have many varying answers, history can provide sane justifications for it.
Be it anthropological evolution of mankind, formation of complex social bonds like monogamy or patriarchy, the growth of religions and eventual clashes or simple behaviors of our ancestors, history may not have all answers always but it still offers valid propositions that can be debated on grounds of authentic findings with some constraints.
In such polarized times when people love to yell about “history of their identity” and are fascinated about their origin, history only offers us the lesson that human identity is anything but static. It has changed with time and empires and will continue changing. The lines we draw or delete, the differences we inculcate or similarities we accept have to be dynamic.
It is this clarity offered on some very cluttered issues convinced the curious person inside me to love history.
So, next time you come across something like the Aryan invasion theory or wonder why IVC disappeared or simply walk into some Mughal architectural wonder, just remember to delve into its stories as it will never leave you unsatisfied and that is why I love History!