The Maratha Empire (1674-1818)
The Maratha polity rose from Shivaji's hill-fort state in western India to become the dominant power in the subcontinent after Mughal decline, expanding under the hereditary Peshwas from the Deccan to Delhi and beyond before defeat in the Third Battle of Panipat and the Anglo-Maratha Wars brought it under British control. This is the story of the largest indigenous power to emerge in India between the Mughals and the British.
Events
Shivaji Defeats the Afzal Khan at Pratapgad
In the Battle of Pratapgad, Shivaji's forces defeated the army of Afzal Khan, a general of the Bijapur Sultanate, ambushing the numerically larger force in the hills below the fort. The victory established Shivaji as a serious military power in the western Deccan and secured his base in the Konkan. It also set the pattern of his state: hill forts, quick mobility, and revenue administration that bypassed the decaying Bijapur order.
Location: Pratapgad, Maharashtra, India
The Treaty of Purandar and the Agra Escape
After the 1665 Treaty of Purandar forced Shivaji to cede most of his forts to Mughal emperor Aurangzeb, Shivaji traveled to the Mughal court at Agra in 1666, was placed under house arrest after a protocol dispute, and escaped in August 1666 — traditionally in sweet baskets. The episode made him a legend across India and presaged the three-decade guerrilla war his state would wage against the empire. He recovered his lost territories during the subsequent Mughal-Maratha conflicts.
Location: Agra, Mughal Empire
Shivaji's Coronation at Raigad
Shivaji was crowned Chhatrapati (sovereign king) at Raigad in an elaborate Vedic ceremony, formally founding an independent Hindu kingship in the Deccan. The coronation asserted a legitimacy independent of the Mughal and Bijapur courts and established the administrative framework — the Ashta Pradhan council of eight ministers — for the new state. It marks the conventional founding date of the Maratha Empire.
Location: Raigad, Maharashtra, India
The War of 27 Years Exhausts the Mughal Empire
Aurangzeb's death on 3 March 1707 ended the War of 27 Years (1681-1707), his all-out campaign to destroy the Marathas, which had drained Mughal treasury and manpower without breaking Maratha resistance. The war militarized the Maratha state, spread its raids across the Deccan, and left the Mughal Empire overextended and increasingly fragile. Within a decade, Maratha influence began pushing into North India proper.
Location: Deccan, India
The Peshwa Takes Delhi — Maratha Ascendancy
Under Peshwa Balaji Vishwanath, Maratha forces entered Delhi, installed a puppet Mughal emperor (Farrukhsiyar's successors), and extracted formal Mughal sanction (a 1719 agreement) for Maratha collection of taxes (chauth and sardeshmukhi) across the Deccan and beyond. The Peshwa's hereditary office, held by the Bhat family, became the effective executive of the expanding polity. The Mughal emperor now ruled at the pleasure of the Marathas.
Bajirao I's Victory at Bhopal
Peshwa Bajirao I routed the Mughal army at Bhopal, the final defeat of Mughal field armies by Maratha cavalry, followed by the January 1738 Treaty of Bhopal in which the Mughals ceded Malwa. Bajirao's two decades of campaigns (1720-1740) took Maratha power from the Deccan to the gates of Delhi and into Bundelkhand, Gujarat, and the Punjab. A contemporary saying held that the Maratha lance was the true ruler from Attock to Cuttack.
Location: Bhopal, India
The Third Battle of Panipat
The Maratha army under Sadashivrao Bhau was destroyed by Ahmad Shah Durrani's Afghan forces, supported by Indian allies including the Rohillas and Najib-ud-Daula, at Panipat, roughly 97 kilometres (60 miles) north of Delhi. The battle killed a generation of Maratha commanders and ended Maratha ambitions in North India for a decade. Maratha military power revived in the 1770s under the confederacy houses, but the defeat opened North India to later British expansion and became the empire's defining catastrophe.
Location: Panipat, Haryana, India
The Maratha Confederacy at Its Height
After the post-Panipat recovery under Madhavrao I, the polity stabilized as a confederacy: the Peshwa at Pune as nominal head, with the great houses — Scindia of Gwalior, Holkar of Indore, Gaekwad of Baroda, and Bhonsle of Nagpur — each running armies, treasuries, and foreign policy. This period was the Marathas' last sustained dominance over Indian affairs, restoring their protectorate over the Mughal court and dominating North Indian politics. The confederacy's decentralized structure, however, also prevented unified action against the rising British.
The Treaty of Bassein
Peshwa Baji Rao II, fleeing the confederacy's civil strife after his defeat by Holkar, signed the Treaty of Bassein accepting subsidiary alliance with the British East India Company — stationing Company troops in his territory and ceding revenue districts to pay for them. The treaty split the confederacy: Scindia and Bhonsle fought to overturn it, Gaekwad and the Peshwa's court accepted it. It set the stage for the final British-Maratha confrontation.
Location: Bassein (Vasai), India
The Empire Ends — Baji Rao II Surrenders
After defeat in the Third Anglo-Maratha War (1817-1818), Peshwa Baji Rao II surrendered to the British East India Company and was pensioned off to Bithur, abolishing the Peshwa's office and ending Maratha sovereignty. The Company annexed the Peshwa's territories (the Bombay Presidency's core), while the confederacy houses survived as princely states under British paramountcy. The last major indigenous power in the subcontinent was now under Company rule.
Location: Khadki / Pune, India