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A study of the emergence of the Rajputs has been done in order to outline the political and social structure of medieval Rajasthan. Apart from kinship ties, the inter-clan relationships have been studied as well as the process State formation which developed through distinct stages. Study of these developments aids in understanding the marriage network among the clans. Whereas during the early period of State formation, caste boundaries were quite blurred, by the 15th–16th centuries, caste distinctions acquired importance both for marriage purposes and systematisation of administration. It is apparent from the study of the caste structure of this region that it cannot be seen in terms of the fourfold varnas. For the Rajputs, it was the clan structure that was more significant and this governed the marriage rules.

The introduction outlines previous definitions of the modern state as well as historians’ current explanations of state formation in early modern Europe and England. It demonstrates that earlier scholars have focused almost entirely on the state’s ability to engage in active warfare and have thus neglected an important aspect of the monopoly of violence, the restriction of non-state or illegitimate violence. The introduction also explores the medieval background of the coroner system, the mechanism designed to regulate violence in England and explains why the system had failed to achieve its proposed ends prior to the sixteenth century.

The introduction provides an overview of the historiographies of the Civil War and Reconstruction in the South and Southern Appalachia specifically. It further establishes the author’s central argument and methodology for the book as well as the individual chapters. The author argues that reconstruction unfolded as a dialogue between national policy and local realities. Western North Carolina’s demographic makeup—namely its large white population majority—allowed a variety of issues to work in conjunction with emancipation during the region’s reconstruction. While the end of slavery and African Americans’ struggle for civil rights was a crucial issue in the region, the smaller black population prevented the fears of black domination that informed politics in the former plantation districts. In western North Carolina, wartime loyalty, governmental power, and economic development played major roles in the region’s reconstruction after the Civil War. The author suggests that western North Carolina reorients current interpretations of reconstruction away from a singular focus on emancipation’s consequences and brings additional issues into focus.

The conclusion reiterates the centrality of the coroner system and its oversight in the monopolization of violence, state formation, and the growth of state power by creating and delineating new definitions of legitimate and illegitimate violence. It also examines the resulting decline of extra-judicial violence—blood feud, vendetta etc.—and subsequent attempts by the English state to target and control non-lethal forms of non-state violence such as riot and assault. Finally, the conclusion offers some initial comparisons with continental Europe and suggests that the trends seen in England may have been mirrored by similar attempts to monopolize violence in the Holy Roman Empire.

Political changes impacted the marriage customs and practices. The caste structure and the emergence of Rajputs indicate deviations from the theoretical concept of caste and as the clan structure of the Rajputs remained significant throughout. For the ruling elite, marriage was a channel for diplomacy. The rituals of marriage were a mixture of local customs and the Sastras, a syncretic fusion of Brahmanism with several disparate vibrant cultural traditions. Sati was a complex phenomenon. The number of women committing Sati declined in the Mughal period, precisely the period of hardening of attitude towards women and widow remarriage. Widows of non-elite families were fully aware of their property rights and petitioned the state whenever their rights were violated. Infidelity was prevalent across all sections of society, and the state played an active role as a regulating body. For the state marriage was an edifice through which social order could be maintained.