Anatomically modern humans are thought to have arrived in South Asia 73-55,000 years back,^[21] though the earliest authenticated human remains date to only about 30,000 years ago.^[22] Nearly contemporaneous Mesolithic rock art sites have been found in many parts of the Indian subcontinent, including at the Bhimbetka rock shelters in Madhya Pradesh.^[23]
Around 7000 BCE, the first known Neolithic settlements appeared on the subcontinent in Mehrgarh and other sites in western Pakistan.^[24] These gradually developed into the Indus Valley Civilisation,^[25] the first urban culture in South Asia;^[26] It flourished during 2500–1900 BCE in Pakistan and western India.^[27] Centred around cities such as Mohenjo-daro, Harappa, Dholavira, and Kalibangan, and relying on varied forms of subsistence, the civilisation engaged robustly in crafts production and wide-ranging trade.^[26]
During the period 2000–500 BCE, in terms of culture, many regions of the subcontinent transitioned from the Chalcolithic to the Iron Age.^[28] The Vedas, the oldest scriptures of Hinduism,^[29] were composed during this period,^[30] and historians have analysed these to posit a Vedic culture in the Punjab region and the upper Gangetic Plain.^[28] Most historians also consider this period to have encompassed several waves of Indo-Aryan migration into the subcontinent from the north-west.^[31][29][32] The caste system, which created a hierarchy of priests, warriors, and free peasants, but which excluded indigenous peoples by labelling their occupations impure, arose during this period,^[33] and small tribal units gradually coalesced into monarchical, state-level polities.^[34] On the Deccan Plateau, archaeological evidence from this period suggests the existence of a chiefdom stage of political organisation.^[28] In southern India, a progression to sedentary life is indicated by the large number of megalithic monuments dating from this period,^[35] as well as by nearby traces of agriculture, irrigation tanks, and craft traditions.^[35]
In the late Vedic period, around the 5th century BCE, the small states and chiefdoms of the Ganges Plain and the north-western regions had consolidated into 16 major oligarchies and monarchies that were known as the mahajanapadas.^[36][37] The emerging urbanisation and the orthodoxies of this age also created heterodox religious movements, two of which became independent religions. Buddhism, based on the teachings of Gautama Buddha attracted followers from all social classes excepting the middle class; chronicling the life of the Buddha was central to the beginnings of recorded history in India.^[38][39][40] Jainism came into prominence during the life of its exemplar, Mahavira.^[41] In an age of increasing urban wealth, both religions held up renunciation as an ideal,^[42] and both established long-lasting monastic traditions. Politically, by the 3rd century BCE, the kingdom of Magadha had annexed or reduced other states to emerge as the Mauryan Empire.^[36] The empire was once thought to have controlled most of the subcontinent excepting the far south, but its core regions are now thought to have been separated by large autonomous areas.^[43][44] The Mauryan kings are known as much for their empire-building and determined management of public life as for Ashoka's renunciation of militarism and far-flung advocacy of the Buddhist dhamma.^[45][46]
The Sangam literature of the Tamil language reveals that, between 200 BCE and 200 CE, the southern peninsula was being ruled by the Cheras, the Cholas, and the Pandyas, dynasties that traded extensively with the Roman Empire and with West and South-East Asia.^[47][48] In North India, Hinduism asserted patriarchal control within the family, leading to increased subordination of women.^[49][36] By the 4th and 5th centuries, the Gupta Empire had created in the greater Ganges Plain a complex system of administration and taxation that became a model for later Indian kingdoms.^[50][51] Under the Guptas, a renewed Hinduism based on devotion rather than the management of ritual began to assert itself.^[52] The renewal was reflected in a flowering of sculpture and architecture, which found patrons among an urban elite.^[51] Classical Sanskrit literature flowered as well, and Indian science, astronomy, medicine, and mathematics made significant advances.^[51]

Medieval India

The Indian early medieval age, 600 CE to 1200 CE, is defined by regional kingdoms and cultural diversity.^[53] When Harsha of Kannauj, who ruled much of the Indo-Gangetic Plain from 606 to 647 CE, attempted to expand southwards, he was defeated by the Chalukya ruler of the Deccan.^[54] When his successor attempted to expand eastwards, he was defeated by the Pala king of Bengal.^[54] When the Chalukyas attempted to expand southwards, they were defeated by the Pallavas from farther south, who in turn were opposed by the Pandyas and the Cholas from still farther south.^[54] No ruler of this period was able to create an empire and consistently control lands much beyond his core region.^[53] During this time, pastoral peoples whose land had been cleared to make way for the growing agricultural economy were accommodated within caste society, as were new non-traditional ruling classes.^[55] The caste system consequently began to show regional differences.^[55]
In the 6th and 7th centuries, the first devotional hymns were created in the Tamil language.^[56] They were imitated all over India and led to both the resurgence of Hinduism and the development of all modern languages of the subcontinent.^[56] Indian royalty, big and small, and the temples they patronised, drew citizens in great numbers to the capital cities, which became economic hubs as well.^[57] Temple towns of various sizes began to appear everywhere as India underwent another urbanisation.^[57] By the 8th and 9th centuries, the effects were felt in South-East Asia, as South Indian culture and political systems were exported to lands that became part of modern-day Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, Philippines, Malaysia, and Java.^[58] Indian merchants, scholars, and sometimes armies were involved in this transmission; South-East Asians took the initiative as well, with many sojourning in Indian seminaries and translating Buddhist and Hindu texts into their languages.^[58]
After the 10th century, Muslim Central Asian nomadic clans, using swift-horse cavalry and raising vast armies united by ethnicity and religion, repeatedly overran South Asia's north-western plains, leading eventually to the establishment of the Islamic Delhi Sultanate in 1206.^[59] The sultanate was to control much of North India, and to make many forays into South India. Although at first disruptive for the Indian elites, the sultanate largely left its vast non-Muslim subject population to its own laws and customs.^[60][61] By repeatedly repulsing Mongol raiders in the 13th century, the sultanate saved India from the devastation visited on West and Central Asia, setting the scene for centuries of migration of fleeing soldiers, learned men, mystics, traders, artists, and artisans from that region into the subcontinent, thereby creating a syncretic Indo-Islamic culture in the north.^[62][63] The sultanate's raiding and weakening of the regional kingdoms of South India paved the way for the indigenous Vijayanagara Empire.^[64] Embracing a strong Shaivite tradition and building upon the military technology of the sultanate, the empire came to control much of peninsular India,^[65] and was to influence South Indian society for long afterwards.^[64]