India has been an often invaded and often conquered nation. The most famous colonization of India would be that by the English, which began in 1858 and lasted almost a century after (National Geographic 321). Why has India been such an intriguing nation? One reason could be the surplus of natural resources. However, in the prehistoric subcontinent of India, the lack of unity anywhere and the constantly warring kings and their nations made India an easy country to colonize. Mark Twain once described India: “India is the cradle of the human race, the birthplace of human language, the mother of history, the grandmother of legend, and the great-grandmother of tradition. our most precious and most instructive materials in the history of man are held only in India.” India was colonized by a variety of nations, including Arabs, Persians, Ghaznavids, Scythians, Pallavas, Pahlavas, Portuguese, and French. By analyzing the trend of colonization of India by three powerful nations, the Aryans, the Greeks and the Mughals, it is possible to develop an understanding of how Indian culture was formed. One of the first foreign invaders in India, the Aryans, created the backbone of Indian culture and paved the way for other invaders to India. A controversy among many historians would be the entry of the Aryans into the Indian subcontinent. There are four main theses regarding Aryans coming to India: Aryan invasion theses, Aryan migration theses, indigenous Aryans theses, and India exit theses. The Aryan invasion thesis states that the Aryans invaded India, while the Aryan migration thesis states that there was a migration instead of an invasion. The Indigenous Aryan Thesis and the Out of India Thesis both argue that the Aryan...... middle of paper...... from the domination of the English. The three empires analyzed had a great impact on Indian culture and lifestyle. The Aryans were the first empire of the Indian subcontinent, but they shaped the Indian culture often identified today. The Greeks were a powerful force that sculpted India's culture and strengthened India's power. The final empire created the final and beautiful empire with the construction of Taj Mahal and many advancements in society. India, in the words of Will Durant, “has been the motherland of our race, and Sanskrit the mother of European languages: it has been the mother of our philosophy; mother, through the Arabs, of much of our mathematics; mother, through the Buddha, of the ideals embodied in Christianity; mother, through the village community, of self-government and democracy. Mother India is in many ways the mother of us all.”