Gita Ramaswamy

2 months ago | theindiaforum.in | Sunil S. Amrith |Ramachandra Guha |Gita Ramaswamy

The first substantive chapter of Sunil Amrith’s magnificent new book starts in the China of the 13th century, ‘the largest, most populous, and wealthiest agrarian state the world had ever known’. China’s rise had been fostered over the past two centuries by more productive means of rice cultivation. Soon, by relying on better techniques of growing wheat instead, Europe also witnessed a surge in human prosperity and human numbers.