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Amritsar

City, 1849–1947

Rāmdāspurअमृतसरਅਮ੍ਰਿਤਸਰਅੰਮ੍ਰਿਤਸਰ

Today Amritsar, Punjab, India. Same place, same name.

Key facts

Historical name
Amritsar
Type
City
Coordinates
31.6269° N, 74.8770° E(seed dataset)
Governance
Directly administered
Record confidence
High confidence
Identifiers
Q48403

Directly administered by the Governor-General of India, and therefore part of British India in the statutory sense of the Interpretation Act 1889, s.18.

Location

Pin placed at the coordinates recorded for this place. Colonial-era boundaries are not drawn.

Description

Head-quarters of Amritsar District and, in the Imperial Gazetteer's words, 'holy city of the Sikhs', 33 miles east of Lahore.

Historical notes

Site of the Golden Temple (Harmandir Sahib) and the largest commercial town of the Punjab; the Jallianwala Bagh massacre took place there on 13 April 1919.

Administrative history

Administrative parenthood changed over time. Each row states the years it is recorded for, and the source it comes from.

Administrative units this place is recorded under, by year
YearsRelationUnitConfidence
from 1901Part ofPunjabProvince · Directly administeredSnapshot from the 1901 census and the Imperial Gazetteer of India (1908-31). End of the relationship not established; recorded as open rather than inferred.High confidencesource
from 1901Part ofAmritsarDistrict · Directly administeredSnapshot from the 1901 census and the Imperial Gazetteer of India (1908-31). End of the relationship not established; recorded as open rather than inferred.High confidencesource

Recorded names

Every documented spelling and transliteration held for this place. The historical name is canonical; modern names redirect to it.

Name variants recorded for this place
NameScriptTypeYears
AmritsarLatinHistorical English
AmbarsarLatinAlternative spelling
Amritsar (India)LatinAlternative spelling
Amritsar CityLatinAlternative spelling
RāmdāspurOther scriptAlternative spelling
अमृतसरDevanagariIndigenous
ਅਮ੍ਰਿਤਸਰGurmukhiIndigenous
ਅੰਮ੍ਰਿਤਸਰGurmukhiIndigenous

Records and references

Imperial Gazetteer of India
Imperial Gazetteer of India (1908-31), Vol. V (5), p. 328
Census of India
Census of India, 1901, Vol. XVII (17): Punjab, its Feudatories and the North-West Frontier Province

Sources

  1. Encyclopedia· generalCC BY-SA

    Wikipedia: Amritsar, Wikimedia Foundation

    Wikipedia contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0

    Retrieved 2026-08-29

  2. Database· identityCC0

    Wikidata (Q48403), Wikimedia Foundation

    Wikidata, CC0 1.0

    Retrieved 2026-08-29

  3. Gazetteer· administrativeLicence unverified

    Imperial Gazetteer of India (1908–31), DSAL entry: Amritsar City, University of Chicago / Digital South Asia Library

    Digital South Asia Library, University of Chicago — the 1908–31 text is public domain, but DSAL's digital presentation states no licence; link-out only

    Retrieved 2026-08-29

  4. Archive· descriptionPublic domain

    Internet Archive scan: in.gov.ignca.31019, Internet Archive

    Scanned volume of a pre-1929 publication (Imperial Gazetteer of India 1908–31 / Census of India 1901); public domain. Digitisation courtesy of the Internet Archive.

    Retrieved 2026-08-29

Sources tagged “Licence unverified” are linked to rather than reproduced. Scans and images are only displayed inline where the licence is confirmed permissive.