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Synopsis Modern history-writing, by giving Muslims a single identity from the time that different groups practising Islam started arriving in India, has made an arbitrarily clear distinction between early and later immigrants. This has produced the mindset, still strongly entrenched and often receiving academic support, that Indian history, and Indian citizens, are divisible on the basis of religion. The question whether this indeed was the perspective of Indians of earlier times has never been thoroughly investigated with reference to relevant written sources. While accepting that written sources alone cannot reveal all strands of thinking, this monograph nevertheless examines a wide range of epigraphic and historical texts to examine how differently newcomers to Indian society could figure in different contexts. The monograph also seeks to offer, in cultural terms, an explanation for these different, often contradictory representations, of those who are singled out as outsiders to Indian society.