He Never Signed

Akbar did not want to fight Mewar. He wanted Mewar to sign.

By the 1570s almost every Rajput house had. Amber had, and given a daughter to the imperial household, and Raja Man Singh of Amber was now one of Akbar's most capable generals. Marwar had come to terms. Bikaner had. The arrangement on offer was not humiliating by the standards of the age.

Keep your throne. Keep your religion. Acknowledge the emperor. Send a contingent when called. Most took it and most prospered.

Mewar did not, and the reason is older than Pratap.

Birth and inheritance

Maharana Pratap was born on 9 May 1540 at Kumbhalgarh, to Maharana Udai Singh II and Maharani Jaiwanta Bai. The house he was born into had already lost Chittor. Twice sacked before his father's time.

And sacked again by Akbar himself in 1568. Udai Singh withdrew then, to the lake city he had founded and which carries his name. Pratap inherited in 1572 a kingdom with its capital gone, its treasury thin, and its peers already accommodated.

The Sisodias of Mewar held the senior position among Rajput houses.