Kuru kingdom

The Kuru Kingdom (Sanskrit: कुरु राज्य, romanized: Kuru Rājya) was an ancient Indo-Aryan kingdom that appeared in the Middle Vedic period (c. 1200 – c. 900 BCE) during the Iron age of India, encompassing parts of the modern-day states of Haryana, Delhi, and some North parts of Western Uttar Pradesh. The Kuru Kingdom was the first recorded state-level society in the Indian subcontinent. It emerged through the political consolidation of the Bharatas and Pūrus and was ruled by the Kuru dynasty, a branch of the Pūru-Bharata dynasty. The kingdom declined during the later Vedic period with the rise of neighbouring powers, particularly the Pañcāla kingdom, and was later defeated by the non-Vedic Salva (or Salvi) tribe.

The Kuru kingdom became a dominant political and cultural force in the middle Vedic Period during the reigns of Parikshit and Janamejaya, but declined in importance during the late Vedic period (c. 900 – c. 500 BCE) and had become "something of a backwater" by the Mahajanapada period in the 5th century BCE. However, traditions and legends about the Kurus continued into the post-Vedic period, providing the basis for the Mahabharata epic.

The Kuru kingdom corresponds with the archaeological Painted Grey Ware culture. The Kuru kingdom collected and standardized the Vedas, reorganizing the scattered, secret ancestral hymns of different clans into systematic collections, forming the bulk of the Rigveda, as well as compiling the Samaveda, Yajurveda, and Atharvavedathe religious heritage of the early Vedic period, arranging their ritual hymns into collections called the Vedas, and developing new rituals, that gained their position in Indian culture as the Srauta rituals. They transformed the historical Vedic religion into Brahmanism, which eventually contributed to the Hindu synthesis.