Ganesh Chaturthi: The modak’s history reflects its strong ties to the land; here is how

Subject: History

Section:

Context:

The sweet and some of the recipes used in making it are quite old; its ingredients include some of the Deccan’s famous crops like ambemohur rice
The artwork at Ellora (600-1000 CE) has the attribute of Ganesha as someone who is eating something that looks like a modak,
Ganesha worship really came into its own in the area that is now Maharashtra during the reign of the Yadavas of Devagiri (1187-1317).
During the Peshwa period, a collection of eight temples known as ashtavinayaka were established and became popular in the pilgrimage circuit.
Bal Gangadhar Tilak started Ganeshotsava as a public sort of celebration. During that time, the festival was also used as a cover for revolutionary activities against the British Raj.

Yadavas of Devagiri

The Seuna, Sevuna, Gavli Kings or Yadavas of was a Medieval Indian dynasty, which at its peak ruled a kingdom stretching from the Narmada river in the north to the Tungabhadra river in the south, in the western part of the Deccan region.
Its territory included present-day Maharashtra, north Karnataka and parts of Madhya Pradesh, from its capital at Devagiri (present-day Daulatabad in modern Aurangabad district, Maharashtra).
The Yadavas initially ruled as feudatories of the Western Chalukyas. Around the middle of the 12th century, as the Chalukya power waned, the Yadava king BhillamaV declared independence.
The Yadava kingdom reached its peak under Simhana II, and flourished until the early 14th century, when it was annexed by the Khalji dynasty of the Delhi Sultanate in 1308 CE.
When Alauddin Khilji, sultan of Delhi crossed the Narmada River, the northern frontier of Yadavas in 1294, the Yadava Ruler Raja Ramchandra (1291-1309 AD) was obliged to surrender and was ransomed his life by a large treasure

Literature and Language:

The Yadavaswere the first major dynasty to use Marathi as an official language. Earlier, both Sanskrit and Kannada had been used for official inscriptions in present-day Maharashtra; subsequently, at least partly due to the efforts of the Yadava rulers, Marathi became the dominant official language of the region
Mukundaraya wrote Vivekasindhu in Marathi.
Gnyaneshwar wrote Gnyaneshwari, a marthi language commentary on Bhagwad Gita.
Hemadri composed Chaturanga Chintamani. (Sanskrit)
Sarangapani composed sangeetaratnakara (considered to be first book on music).
Kannada was one of the court languages during early Yadava times, as is evident from a number of Kannada-language inscriptions.

Architecture

The Gondeshwar temple is an 11th-12th century Hindu temple located in Sinnar, a town in the Nashik district of Maharashtra, India.
It features a panchayatana plan; with a main shrine dedicated to Shiva; and four subsidiary shrines dedicated to Surya, Vishnu, Parvati, and Ganesha.
The Gondeshwar temple was built during the rule of the Seuna (Yadava) dynasty, and is variously dated to either the 11^th or the 12th century.