"Often described merely as a colonial construction, the phenomenon of thuggee remains one of the more contentious and controversial subjects of nineteenth-century South Asian history. Based largely on new material, this book constitutes the first in-depth examination of thuggee as a type of banditry emerging in a specific socio-economic and geographic context. Thuggee was not an essence or a caste-like phenomenon, but a means of obtaining a livelihood reverted to by all strata of Indian society in certain areas. As such it constituted a highly institutionalized practice related to issues of patronage and retainership, identity and legitimacy, and it was defined by the appropriation of high status rituals and the martial ethos. The British usually described the thugs as fanatic assassins and Kali-worshippers, yet Wagner argues that the history of thuggee need no longer be limited to the study of its representation."