Page 62 - SST Class 07
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Pilgrimage Towns
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            A pilgrimage town is the one where is located a
            place of pilgrimage for the people of one or more        Indian traders sold spices and cotton textiles to
            religions, such as the towns located on the bank of      the parts of Red Sea, Persian Gulf, East Africa,
            the Ganga, such as Varanasi, Allahabad, or where         South-East Asia and China.
            some important place related with a deity is             Trade and Port Towns
            located, such as Ayodhya. When the pilgrims visit
            a place in large numbers, many people settle there      Trade and commerce expanded greatly during the
            in  order   to   give  them    facilities,  such  as    medieval period. There were a number of trading
            shopkeepers, hoteliers, priests etc. Gradually, this    towns like Agra, Surat, Patna, Ahmedabad, Delhi,
            settlement develops into a town.                        Calicut, Malwa etc. The major products produced
                                                                    here were textile, paper, opium, indigo etc. They
                                                                    became the meeting points of foreigners and
                 Info Bits                                          Indians, from where export and import of goods
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            Amritsar, in Punjab region of India has been the        were started.
            religious centre for Sikhs since the sixteenth          Sometimes the location of a town developed it
            century. The famous Golden Temple there, with its       into an important trade or port town. A trade town
            gold covered copper roof, sit on the edge of a          is a place where the traders often pass through or
            sacred lake. When the roof of the temple was            come    to  sell  and    buy   commodities,    such
            regilded in 1830, it took 100 kg of gold to cover       as—Kabul (now in Afghanistan) was famous for
            the copper plates.                                      horse trade, Ajmer for camel trade and Surat for

            The pilgrimage towns play an important place in         textile trade. The location of a town on the bank
            the social interaction of the people as these towns     of a river or on the coastline with favourable
            are visited by the people belonging to different        conditions could develop it into a port town, such
            regions or countries. This develops culture and         as Masulipatnam in southern India and Kolkata in
            civilisation. This results in synthesis and spread of   eastern India.
            knowledge.
            These towns have important temples or other
            places of worship. You
            have    read    that   in
            southern    India,    the
            temples     played     an
            important role in the
            lives of the people in all                                         Kabul                    Ajmer
            a s p e c t s — s o c i a l ,
            economic,       religious,                                     F ind Outind Out
            cultural  and   political.      Somnath Temple           Find out famous forts and monuments which were
            These    temples    were                                 built without using cement.
            rich, so they were the
            eyesores of the invaders                                These towns were the centres of bustling trade
            who wanted to plunder                                   and commercial activity. These towns came into
                                                                    prominence or got lost in oblivion due to several
            them for their wealth, as
            has    happened      with                               factors.  For    example,    the   importance     of
                                                                    Masulipatnam faded away because the British had
            many temples such as
                                                                    set up other port towns. Sometimes, favourable or
            the Somnath and Kashi
            Vishwanath.                  Kashi Vishwanath Temple    unfavourable taxation by the rulers can also result
                                                                    in the growth or decline of a trade town.
                     Contemporary Social Science-7
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