No More Learning

Both Barani and Ibn Batūtah are lost in astonishment
at his arrogance, his piety, his humility, his pride, his lavish
generosity, his care for his people, his hostility to them, his pre-
ference for foreigners, his love of justice and his ferocious cruelty,
and can find no better description of their patron than that he was
a freak of creation.


## p. 173 (#215) ############################################

CHAPTER VII
THE REIGN OF FIRŪZ TUGHLUQ, THE DECLINE AND
EXTINCTION OF THE DYNASTY, AND THE INVASION
OF INDIA BY TAIMUR
The death of Muhammad left the army without a leader and
threw it into confusion. Some historians allege that on his death-
bed he designated his cousin, Firūz, the son of Rajab, as his heir,
but these are the panegyrists of Firūz, who made no attempt to
claim the throne but merely associated himself with other officers
in the endeavour to extricate it from a perilous situation. Its
Mughul allies under Oltūn Bahādur were regarded with apprehen-
sion and, having been rewarded for their services, were requested
to retire to their own country. They were already retreating when
they were joined by Naurūz Gurgin, a Mughal officer who had
served Muhammad for some years and now deserted with his con-
tingent and disclosed to Oltūn the confusion which reigned in the
army. The army had already begun a straggling and disorderly
retreat when it was attacked in flank by the Mughuls and in rear
by the Sindis and plundered, almost without opposition, by both.
The dispirited and demoralised host had been at the mercy of its
enemies for two days when the officers urged Firūz, now forty-six
years of age, to ascend the throne, but the situation was complicated
by his professed unwillingness to accept their nomination and by the
presence of a competitor, a child named Dāvar Malik, whose claims
were vehemently urged by his mother, a daughter of Ghiyās-ud-din
Tughluq. She was silenced by the objection that the crisis required
a man, not a child, at the head of affairs, and on March 23, 1351,
the nobles overcame the protests of Firüz by forcing him on to the
throne and acclaiming him. Having ransomed the captives taken by
the Mughuls and the Sindis he attacked and drove off the enemy, so
that the army was able to continue its retreat to Delhi without
molestation, while a force was left in Sind to deal with the rebel
Taghi.
On his way towards Delhi Fīrūz learned that the aged minister,
Khvāja Jahān, had proclaimed in the capital, under the title of
Ghiyās-ud-din Muhammad, a child whom he declared to be the son
of Muhammad Tughluq, but whom the historians represent as sup-
posititious. We have, however, no impartial chronicle of this reign


## p. 174 (#216) ############################################

174
(CH
THE LATER TUGHLUQS
and there is much to justify the belief that the child was Mu.
hammad's son and that the allegation that he was not was an
attempt by panegyrists to improve their patron's feeble hereditary
title!
To the people of Delhi the boy's relationship, whether genuine
or fictitious, to their old tyrant was no recommendation, and num:
bers fled from the city to join Fīrūz. The king was relieved of much
anxiety by the receipt of the news of the death of Taghi in Sind,
and by the adhesion to his cause of Malik Maqbūl, the ablest noble
in the kingdom, a Brāhman of Telingāna who had accepted Islām
and whom he made his minister.
The cause of the child king was hopeless and Khvāja Jahān re-
paired as a suppliant to the camp and was kindly received and
pardoned, against the advice of the officers of the army, but as he
was retiring to Sāmāna, where be proposed to spend the rest of his
life in seclusion, he was followed by an officer entitled Sher Khān,
who put him to death.
On August 25, 1351, Fīrūz entered Delhi without opposition and
ascended the throne. He conciliated his subjects by remitting all
debts due to the state and by abstaining from any endeavour to
recover the treasure which had been lavished by Khvāja Jahān in
his attempt to establish his nominee. For the first year of his reign
he was fully employed in restoring peace and order in the kingdom,
which had been harried and distracted by the freaks and exactions
of his predecessor. Bengal and the Deccan were lost, and he made
no serious attempt to recover either, but in the extensive territory
still subject to Delhi he did his best to repair Muhammad's errors.
He appointed Khvāja Hisām-ud-din Junaid assessor of the revenue,
and within a period of six years the assessor completed a tour of
inspection of the kingdom and submitted his report. Firūz reduced
the demand on account of land revenue so as to leave ample pro-
vision for the cultivator and further lightened his burdens by
abolishing the pernicious custom of levying benevolences from pro-
vincial governors, both on first appointment and annually. The
result of these wise measures an enormous expansion of the
cultivated area, though the statement that no village lay waste and
no culturable land remained untilled is certainly an exaggeration.
In fertile tracts thriving villages inhabited by a contented peasantry
dotted the country at intervals of two miles or less, and in the
neighbourhood of Delhi alone there were 1200 garden villages in
which fruit was grown and which paid yearly to the treasury 180,000
1 Sce J. R. A. S. , for July, 1922,
was


## p. 175 (#217) ############################################

11 ]
PUBLIC WORKS OF FIROZ
175
tangas. The revenues from the Doāb, which had been nearly de-
populated by the exactions of Muhammad amounted to 8,000,000
tangas, and that of the crown lands of the whole kingdum to
C8,500,000 tangas, each worth about twenty pence. At a later period
of his reign, in 1375, Firüz abolished some twenty-five vexatious
cesses, mostly of the nature of octroi duties, which had weighed
heavily upon merchants and tradesmen. The immediate loss to the
public exchequer was computed at 3,000,000 tangas annually, but
the removal of these restrictions on trade and agriculture naturally
produced a fall in prices, so that wheat sold in Delhi at eight
jitals and pulse and barley at four jītals the man, the jital being
worth rather more than one-third of a penny. These rates
were virtually the same as those fixed by 'Alā-ud-Din Khalji, but in
the reign of Fīruz there was no arbitrary interference with the law
of supply and demand, except in the case of sweatmeats, the manu-
facturers of which were justly compelled to allow the consumer to
benefit by the fall in the price of the raw material.
It was not only by lightening the cultivator's burden that Fīrūz
encouraged agriculture. He is still remembered as the author of
schemes of irrigation, and traces of his canals yet remain. Of these
there were five, the most important being the canal, 150 miles long
which carried the waters of the Jumna into the arid tract in which
he founded his city of Hisār-i Firūza (Hissār). He also sank 150
wells for purposes of irrigation and for the use of travellers and
indulged a passion for building which equalled, if it did not surpass
that of the Roman Emperor Augustus. The enumeration of three
hundred towns founded by him must be regarded as an exaggeration
unless we include in the number waste villages restored and re-
populated during his reign, but the towns of Firūzābād, or New
Delhi, Fathābād, Hissār, Fīrūzpūr near Budaun, and Jaunpur were
founded by him, and he is credited with the construction or restora-
tion of four mosques, thirty palaces, two hundred caravanserais, five
reservoirs, five hospitals, a hundred tombs, ten baths, ten monu-
mental pillars, and a hundred bridges.
While resting at Delhi after his return from Sind Firūz per-
formed the quaintly pious duty of atoning vicariously for the sins
of his cousin. In his own words he caused the heirs of those who
had been executed during the reign of his late lord and master,
and those who had been deprived of a limb, nose, or eye to be
appeased with gifts and reconciled to the late king, so that they
executed deeds, duly attested by witnesses, declaring themselves
to be satisfied. These were placed in a chest, which was deposited


## p. 176 (#218) ############################################

176
[CH.
THE LATER TUGHLUQS
in the tomb of Muhammad in the hope that God would show him
mercy.
Bengal had for some years ceased to acknowledge the authority
of Delhi. In 1338 Mubārak, styling himself Fakhr-ud-din Mubārak
Shāh, had established himself in Eastern Bengal, and had been
succeeded in 1349 by Ikhtiyār-ud-din Ghāzi Shāh; and in 1339
'Alā-ud din 'Ali Shāh had assumed independence in Western Bengal.
In 1345 Hāji Iliyās, styling himself Shams-ud-din Iliyās Shāh, had
made himself master of Western Bengal, and in 1352 had over-
thrown Ghāzi Shāh and established his dominion over the whole of
Bengal. Emboldened by success, and by the indifference of Firūz,
Iliyās had rashly invaded Tirhut with the object of annexing the
south-eastern districts of the new restricted kingdom of Delhi,
but Filūz was now free to punish this act of aggression, and in
November, 1353, marched from Delhi with 70,000 horse to repel
the invader. Iliyās retired before him into Tirhut, and thence to
his capital, Pāndua, but mistrusting the strength of this stronghold,
continued his retreat to Ikdāla, a village situated on islands in the
Brāhmaputra and protected by the dense jungle which clothed the
river's banks, whither Firūz followed him. Firüz failed to reduce
Ikdāla and Iliyās endeavoured to detain the invaders in Bengal
until the advent of the rainy season, in the hope that the un-
healthiness of the climate and the difficulty of communicating with
Delhi would place them at his mercy, but Fīrūz preferred an
dignified retreat to almost certain disaster. Iliyās followed and
.
attacked him, but was defeated with some loss and Firūz continued
his retreat without further molestation and on September 1, 1354,
entered Delhi.
After his return he founded on the banks of the Jumna im.
mediately to the south of the present city of Delhi, a new capital
which he called Fīrūzābād, a name which he had already vauntingly
bestowed on the city of Pāndua. The new town occupied the sites
of the old town of Indarpat and eleven other villages or hamlets,
and contained no fewer than eight large mosques. A regular service
of public conveyances, with fixed rates of hire connected it with
Old Delhi, ten miles distant. In the following year Firūz, when
visiting Dipālpūr, gave directions for the cutting of a canal from
the Sutlej to Jhajjar, a town within forty miles of Delhi, and in
1356 he founded Hissār on the sites of two villages Larās. i. Buzurg
and Larās-i-Khurd. The neighbourhood was arid, and the new
town was supplied with water by two canals, one from the Jumna,
in the neighbourhood of Karnāl, and the other from the Sutlej,
un-


## p. 177 (#219) ############################################

VII ]
EXPEDITION TO BENGAL
177
near the point at which it emerges from the mountains. The canal
from Dipālpūr to Jhajjar also passed at no great distance from the
new town.
In December, 1356, the king was gratified by the receipt of a
robe of honour and a commission recognising his sovereignty in
India from the puppet Abbasid Caliph in Egypt, but the envoy
also bore a letter which commended to him the Bahmani dynasty
of the Deccan in terms which made it clear that the Caliph recog-
nised its independence. At the same time envoys arrived with
complimentary gifts from Iliyās, and obtained from Fīrūz recog-
nition of the independence of Bengal.
Throughout this reign the country was remarkably free from
irruptions of the Mughuls, of which only two are recorded, both of
them being successfully repulsed.
In 1358 a plot was formed against the life of Fīrūz. His cousin
Khudāvandzāda, who had unsuccessfully claimed the throne for
her son, now lived at Delhi, and she and her husband arranged
that the king should be assassinated by armed men on the occasion
of a visit to her house, but the plot was frustrated by her son,
Dāvar Malik, who was not in sympathy with his stepfather, Khusrav
Malik, and contrived to apprise Firūz by signs that his life was in
danger, thus causing him to depart sooner than was his wont, and
before the arrangements for his assassination were complete. On
returning to his palace he sent troops to surround the house, and
the men who were to have slain him were arrested and disclosed
the plot. Khudāvandzāda was imprisoned, her great wealth was
confiscated, and her husband was banished.
Iliyās was now dead, and had been succeeded in Bengal by his
son, Sikandar Shāh, and in 1359 Firüz, regardless of his treaty
with the father, invaded with a large army the dominions of the
son. The transparently frivolous pretext for the expedition was
the vindication of the rights of Zafar Khān, a Persian who had
married the daughter of Fakhr-ud-din Mubārak Shāh of Eastern
Bengal and whose hopes of sitting on the throne of his father-in-law
had been shattered by the conquest and annexation of Eastern
Bengal by Iliyās. On the conquest of the country Zafar Khān had
fled to the coast and embarked on a ship which carried him round
Cape Comorin to Tattah, whence he had made his way to the
court of Firūz, who appointed him, in 1357, deputy minister of the
kingdom.
Firūz halted for six months at Zafarābād on the Gumti and
founded in its neighbourhood a city which became known
C H. I. III
12
as


## p. 178 (#220) ############################################

178
(ch.
THE LATER TUGHLUQS
Jaunpur. Muslim historians derive the name from Jauna, the title
by which Muhammad Tughluq had been known before his accesº
sion, but the city of Firūz was not the first town on the site and
Hindus derive the name, which occasionally takes the form of Jamna-
pur, from Jamadagni, a famous rishi.
At the end of the rainy season Fīrūz continued his march into
Bengal, and Sikandar, following his father's example, retired to
Ikdāla. The second siege was no more successful than the first,
and Sikandar was able to obtain peace on very favourable terms.
He is said to have promised to surrender Sonārgāon, the capital
of Eastern Bengal, to Zafar Khān, but the promise, even if made,
cost him nothing, for Zafar Khān preferred the security and emolu.
ments of his place at court to the precarious tenure of a vassal
throne. From partial historians we learn that Sikandar agreed to
pay an annual tribute of forty elephants, but the same historians
are constrained to admit that he obtained from Fīrūz recognition
of his royal title, a jewelled crown worth 80,000 tangas and 5,000
Arab and Turkish horses.
Firūz halted at Jaunpur during the rainy season of 1360, and
in the autumn led an expedition into Orissa. It is not easy, from
the various accounts of the operations, to follow his movements
with accuracy, but his objective was Purī, famous for the great
temple of Jagannāth. As he advanced into Orissa, which is des-
cribed as a fertile and wealthy country, the raja fled and took
ship for a port on the coast of Telingāna. Firūz reached Purī,
occupied the raja's palace, and took the great idol, which he sent
to Delhi to be trodden underfoot by the faithful. Rumours of an
intended pursuit reached the raja, who sent envoys to sue for
peace, which he obtained by the surrender of twenty elephants
and a promise to send the same number annually to Delhi, and
Firüz began his retreat. He attempted to reach Kara on the
Ganges, where he had left his heavy baggage, by a route more
direct than that by which he had advanced, traversing the little
known districts of Chota Nāgpur. The army lost its way, and wan.
dered for six months through a country sparsely populated, hilly,
and covered with dense jungle. Supplies were not to be had, and
numbers perished from the hardships and privations which they
suffered, but at length the troops emerged from the hills and
forests in which they had been wandering into the open plain.
Meanwhile the absence of news from the army had caused at Delhi
unrest so grave that Maqbūl, the regent, had considerable difficulty
in maintaining order, but news of the army allayed the excitement
>
1


## p. 179 (#221) ############################################

VII)
CAPTURE OF KANGRA
179
of the populace, and the king was received on his return with great
rejoicing
In 1351 Fīrūz marched from Delhi with the object of attempting
to recover the fortress of Daulatābād, but his progress
was arrested
by reports that the raja of Kāngra had ventured to invade his
kingdom and plunder some of the districts lying at the foot of the
mountains, and he marched to Sirhind with the object of attacking
Kāngra. On his way to Sirhind he observed that a canal might be
cut to connect the waters of the Saraswati with those of another
river, probably the Markanda, which rises near Nāhan and flows past
Shāhābad, to the south of Ambāla. The two streams were divided
by high ground, but the canal was completed by the labours of
50,000 workmen. In the course of the excavation large fossil bones
were discovered, some of which were correctly identified as those
of elephants, while others were ignorantly supposed to be those of a
race of prehistoric men. The records of the reign have proved useful
as a guide to later and more scientific investigators, and led to the
discovery of the fossil bones of sixty-four genera of mammals which
lived at the foot of the Himālaya in Pliocene (Siwālik) times, of
which only thirty-nine genera have species now living. Of eleven
species of the elephant only one now survives in India, and of six
species of bos but two remain.
Firuz enriched Sirhind with a new fort, which he named Fīrūzpur,
and continued his march northwards towards Kāngra by way of
the famous temple of Jwālamukhi, where he dealt less harshly
than usual with the Brāhman priests. A panegyrist defends him
from the imputation of encouraging idolatory by presenting a golden
umbrella to be hung over the head of the idol, which he seems, in
fact, to have removed; but he ordered that some of the sacred
books, of which there were 1300 in the temple, should be trans-
lated, and one in particular, treating of natural science, augury,
and divination, was rendered into Persian verse by a court poet,
A'azz-ud-din Khālid Khānī, and named by him Dalāʻil-i-Firuz
Shāhi. Firishta describes the book as a compendium of theoretical
and practical science, and even the rigidly orthodox Budaunī admits
that it is moderately good, free neither from beauties nor defects,
which is high praise from him. Budauni mentions also some
profitable and trivial works on prosody, music, and dancing,' which
were translated. There seems to be no reason for crediting the
statement, made with some diffidence by Firishta, that Fīrūz broke
up the idols of Jwālamukhi, mixed their fragments with the flesh
of cows, and hung them in nosebags round the Brāhmans' necks,
un-
12-2


## p. 180 (#222) ############################################

180
(CH.
THE LATER TUGHLUQS
and that he sent the principal idol as a trophy to Medina. The
raja of Kāngra surrendered after standing a very short siege, and
was courteously received and permitted to retain his territory as a
fief of Delhi.
The enforced retreat from Sind and the insolence of the Sindis
had rankled in the memory of Fīrūz ever since his accession, and
in 1362 he set out for that country with an army of 90,000 horse
and 480 elephants. He collected on the Indus a large fleet of boats,
which accompanied the army down-stream to Tattah, the capital of
the Jāms of Sind, which was situated on both banks of the river.
The ruler was now Jām Māli, son of Jām Unnar, and he was assisted
in the government by his brother's son, Bābaniya. Both were reso-
lute in defending the city, and the royal army was exposed to the
sorties of the garrison and suffered from a severe famine and from
an epizootic disease which carried off or disabled three-quarters of
the horses of the cavalry. The garrison, observing their plight,
sallied forth and attacked them in force, and though they were
driven back within the walls Fīrūz, who was humiliated at the same
time by the capture of his entire fleet, decided to retreat for a time
to Gujarāt, where his troops might recruit their strength and replace
their horses.
The troops suffered more severely during the retreat than during
the siege. The disease among the horses lost none of its virulence,
and grain still rose in price. The starving soldiery fell out by the
way and died, and the survivors were reduced to eating carrion
and hides. The principal officers were obliged to march on foot
with their men, and treacherous guides led the army into the Rann
of Cutch, where there was no fresh water, so that thirst was added
to their other privations, and they suffered terrible losses. Once
again no news of the army reached Delhi for some months, and
Maqbūl, the regent, had great difficulty in restraining the turbulence
of the anxious and excited populace, and was at length reduced to
the expedient of producing a forged dispatch. The execution of
one of the treacherous guides induced the others to extricate the
army from its perilous position and it emerged at length from the
desert and salt morass into the fertile plains of Gujarāt. Dispatches
to Delhi restored order in the city, and the governor of Gujarāt,
Nizām-ul-Mulk, who had failed to send either guides or supplies to
the army, was dismissed from his post, Zafar Khān being appointed
in his place.
During the rainy season of 1363 Fīrüz was employed in Gujarāt
in repairing the losses of his army. Officers and men received


## p. 181 (#223) ############################################

VII ]
CONQUEST OF SIND
181
-
liberal grants to enable them to replace their horses, the revenues
of the province were appropriated to the reorganisation of the army,
and requisitions for material of war were sent to Delhi. The king
was obliged to forgo a favourable opportunity for interference in the
affairs of the Deccan, where Bahman Shāh had died in 1358 and
had been succeeded by his son, Muhammad I. His son-in-law,
Bahrãm Khān Māzandarāni, who was governor of Daulatābād,
resented the elevation of Muhammad, against whom he openly
rebelled three years later, and now invited Firūz to recover the
Deccan, promising him his support, but the king would not abandon
his enterprise in Sind, and Bahrām was disappointed.
Firūz Shāh's return to Sind was unexpected, and the people,
who were quietly tilling their fields, fled before him destroyed that
portion of Tattah which stood on the eastern bank of the Indus,
and took refuge behind the fortifications of mud on the western
bank. Firūz, hesitating to attempt the passage of the river under
these defences, sent two officers with their contingents up the Indus,
which they crossed at a cansiderable distance above the town and,
marching down the western bank, made an unsuccessful attack on
the town. After this failure they were recalled and the king sent to
Delhi for reinforcements and, while awaiting their arrival reaped
and garnered the crops, so that his army was well supplied while
the garrison of Tattah began to feel the pinch of famine. When the
reinforcements arrived the Jām lost heart and sent an envoy to sue
for peace. Fīrūz was inclined to leniency, and Bābaniya and the
Jām, on making their submission to him, were courteously received,
but were informed that they would be required to accompany him
to Delhi and that an annual tribute of 400,000 tangas, of which the
first instalment was to be paid at once, would be required. These
terms were accepted and the Jām and Bābaniya accompanied Firūz
to Delhi as guests under mild restraint. The rejoicings on the
return of the army were marred by the lamentations of those who
had lost relations during the disastrous retreat to Gujarāt, and Firūz,
who had already, while wandering in the Rann, sworn never again
to wage war but for the suppression of rebellion, now publicly ex-
pressed regret for having undertaken the expedition to Sind, and
ordered that the estates and property of the deceased should des-
cend, rent-free, to their heirs.
In 1365—66 envoys from Bahrām Khān Māzandarāni, who was
now in rebellion against Muhammad Shāh Bahmanī, arrived at
court and besought Firūz to come to the aid of those who wished
to return to the allegiance of Delhi, but were curtly told that
>


## p. 182 (#224) ############################################

182
( CH.
THE LATER TUGHLUQS
whatever they suffered was the just and natural punishment of
their rebellion against Muhammad Tughluq, and were dismissed.
In 1372–73 the faithful minister, Maqbul Khānjahān, died,
and was succeeded in his honours and emoluments by his son, who
received his father's title of Khānjahān; and in the following year
Zafar Khān, governor of Gujarāt, died, and was succeeded by his
son, Daryā Khān, who also received his father's title.
The affectionate disposition of Fīrūz received a severe blow
from the death of his eldest son, Fath Khān, on July 23, 1374, and
we may attribute to his grief the gradual impairment of his faculties,
evidence of which may be observed shortly after his son's death.
At first he withdrew entirely from public business, and when he
resumed its responsibilities one of his first acts was entirely foreign
to his previous character. Shams-ud-din Dāmaghāni, a meddle-
some and envious noble, insisted that the province of Gujarāt was
assessed for revenue at too low a rate, and offered, if placed in
charge of it, to send annually to Delhi, in addition to the revenue
for which the province had been assessed, 100 elephants, 400,000
tangas, 400 slaves, and 200 horses. Fīrūz was loth to disturb Zafar
Khān, but demanded of his deputy, Abú Rijā, the additional con-
tributions suggested by Dāmaghāni. Abū Rijā declared that the
province could not bear this impost and Fīrūz ordinarily solicitous
to alleviate the burdens of his subjects, dismissed him and his master,
Zafar Khān, and appointed Dāmaghāni governor of Gujarāt. On
his arrival in the province the new governor encountered the most
determined opposition to his extortionate demands and, finding
himself unable to fulfil his promise, raised the standard of rebellion,
but was overpowered and slain by the centurions of Gujarāt, who
sent his head to court. Firūz then appointed to the government of
Gujarāt Malik Mufrih, who received the title of Farhat-ul-Mulk.
In 1377 Fīrūz was engaged in repressing a rebellion in the
Etāwah district, where the revenue could seldom be collected but
by armed force; and two years later found it necessary to take
precautions against a threatened inroad of the Mughuls, which his
preparations averted. In the same year his usually mild nature
was stirred to a deed of vengeance worthy of his predecessor.
Kharkū, the raja of Katehr, had invited to his house Sayyid Mu-
hammad, governor of Budaun, and his two brothers, and trea-
cherously slew them. In the king's pious estimation the heinousness
of the crime was aggravated by the descent of the victims and in
the spring of 1380 he marched into Katehr and there directed a
massacre of the Hindus so general and so in discriminate that, as


## p. 183 (#225) ############################################

vit ]
DEVASTATION OF KATEHR
183
one historian says, 'the spirits of the murdered Sayyids themselves
arose to intercede'. Kharkū fled into Kumaun and was followed
by the royal troops who, unable to discover his hiding place, visited
their disappointment on the wretched inhabitants, of whom vast
numbers were slain and 23,000 captured and enslaved. The ap-
proach of the rainy season warned Firūz to retire from the hills of
Kumaun, but his thirst for vengeance was not yet sated. Before
leaving for Delhi he appointed an Afghān to the government of
Sambhal, and ordered him to devastate Katehr annually with fire
and sword. He himself visited the district every year for the next
five years and so supplemented the Afghān's bloody work that 'in
those years not an acre of land was cultivated, no man slept in
house, and the death of the three Sayyids was avenged by that of
countless thousands of Hindus. '
In 1385, the last year of these raids, Firūz founded near Budaun
a strong fort which he named Fīrūzpur, but the miserable in-
habitants called it in derision Ākhirīnpūr ('the last of his cities')
and the gibe was fulfilled, for Firūz now lapsed into a condition of
senile decay, and could no more found cities or direct the ship of
state. As a natural consequence of the failure of his intellect his
minister, Khānjahān, became all powerful, and soon abused his
power. In 1387 he persuaded Fīrūz that Muhammad Khān, his
eldest surviving son, was conspiring with Zafar Khān and other
nobles to remove him and ascend the throne. Fīrūz, without in.
quiring into the matter, authorised the minister to arrest those
whom he had accused, and Zaſar Khān was summoned from his
fief of Mahoba on the pretext that his accounts were to be exa-
mined, and was confined in Khānjahān's house. The prince evaded,
on the plea of ill-health, attendance at a darbār at which he was
to have been arrested, but privately gained access to the royal
harem by arriving at the gate in a veiled litter which was supposed
to contain his wife. His appearance, fully armed, in the inner
apartments at first caused consternation, but he was able to gain
his father's ear, and easily persuaded him that the real traitor was
Khānjahān, who intended to pave his own way to the throne by
the destruction of the royal family. Armed with his father's autho-
rity, he led the household troops numbering ten or twelve thousand,
and the royal elephants to Khānjahān's house. The minister, on
hearing of his approach, put Zafar Khān to dcath and sallied
forth with his own troops to meet his enemies. He was wounded
1
Perhaps the village about three miles south of Budaun, which appears in the
Indian Atlas as Firūzpūr Iklehri.


## p. 184 (#226) ############################################

184
[ .
THE LATER TUGHLUQS
un-
and retired into his house, whence he made his escape by an
guarded door and fled into Mewāt, where he took refuge with a
Rājput chieſtain, Koka the Chauhān. His house was plundered
and his followers were slain, and Muhammad Khān returned to
the palace. Fīrūz, no longer capable of governing, associated his
son with himself not only in the administration, but also in the
royal title, and caused him to be proclaimed, on August 22, 1387,
under the style of Nāsir-ud-din Muhammad Shāh.
One of Muhammad's first acts was to send Sikandar Khān,
master of the horse, into Mewāt to seize Khānjahān, with a promise
of the government of Gujarāt as the reward of success. Khānjahān
was surrendered by Koka, and Sikandar Khān, after carrying his
head to Delhi, set out for Gujarāt. Muhammad was hunting in
Sirmūr when he heard that Farhat-ul-Mulk and the centurions of
Gujarāt had defeated and slain Sikandar Khān, whose broken troops
had returned to Delhi. He returned at once to the capital, but
instead of taking any steps to punish the rebels neglected all
public business and devoted himself entirely to pleasure. For five
months the administrative machinery, which had been adjusted by
Firuz in the earlier years of his reign, worked automatically, but
the apathy and incompetence of Muhammad became daily more
intolerable, and many of the old servants of the crown assembled
a large force and rose against him nominally in the interests of
Firūz. An envoy who was sent to treat with them was stoned and
wounded, and Muhammad was forced to take the field against
them, but, when hard pressed, they succeeded in forcing their way
into the palace and, after two days' indecisive fighting, placed the
decrepit Firūz in a litter and carried him into the field. The device,
which is of frequent occurrence in Indian history, succeeded. The
troops with Muhammad believed that their old master had deliber-
ately taken the field against his son and deserted Muhammad, who
fled into Sirmūr with a few retainers. Firūz promoted his grandson,
Tughluq Khān, son of the deceased Fath Khān, to the position
lately held by Muhammad, and conferred on him the royal title.
On September 20, 1388, Firūz died, at the age of eighty-three, after
a reign of thirty-seven years.
Indian historians praise Fīruz as the most just, merciful, and
beneficent ruler since the days of Nāsir-ud-din Mahmūd, son of
Iltutmish, and there is some similarity between the characters of
the two, though Fīrūz was in almost every respect superior. Both
were weak rulers, but Firūz was far less weak and vacillating than
Mahmúd, and both were benevolent, but the benevolence of Firūz
3
a


## p. 185 (#227) ############################################

vn]
DEATH OF FİRUZ
185
was more active than that of Mahmūd. Fīrūz possessed far more
ability than Mahmūd, and his weakness consisted largely in an
indolent man's distaste for the details of business and in unwilling-
ness to cause pain. His benevolence was indiscriminate, for he
showed as much indulgence to the corrupt official as to the indigent
husbandman, and his passion for constructing works of public utility
was due probably as much to vanity as to benevolence. The dis-
continuance of the practice of demanding large gifts from place-
holders was intended to relieve the poorer classes, on whom the
burden ultimately fell, and was perhaps not wholly without effect,
but placeholders continued to enrich themselves, and many amassed
large fortunes. Firūz Shāh's connivance at corruption and his
culpable leniency destroyed the effect of his own reforms. Old and
inefficient soldiers were not compelled to retire but were permitted
to provide substitutes of whose fitness they were the judges, and the
annual inspection of cavalry horses was rendered futile by the many
evasions devised by the king himself. One story is told of his over-
hearing a trooper bewailing to a comrade the hardship of being
compelled to submit his horse for inspection. He called the man
to him and asked him wherein the hardship lay, and he explained
that he could not expect that his horse would be passed unless he
offered the inspector at least a gold tanga, and Fīrūz gave him the
coin. The perversity of the act is not perceived by the historian
who records it, and he merely praises Fīrūz for his benevolence.
Similar laxity prevailed in the thirty-six departments of state, and
in the checking and auditing of the accounts of fiefs and provincial
governments. There was a great show of order and method, and a
pretence was made of annually scrutinising all accounts, but not-
withstanding all formalities 'the king was very lenient, not from
ignorance of accounts and business, which he understood well, but
from temperament and generosity. ' The working of the mint sup-
plies an instance of the fraud and peculation which were rife. In
1370-71 Firuz extended his coinage by minting, for the convenience
of the poorer classes, pieces of small denominations, and the integrity
of the officers of the mint was not proof against the opportunity
for peculation offered by this large issue. Two informers reported
that the six jītal pieces were a grain short of standard purity, and
the minister, Maqbul Khānjahān, whose anxiety to hush the matter
up suggests his complicity, sent for Kajar Shāh, the mintmaster,
who was the principal offender, and directed him to devise a means
of establishing, to the king's satisfaction, the purity of the coin.
Kajar Shāh arranged that the coins should be melted before the


## p. 186 (#228) ############################################

186
(cu.
THE LATER TUGHLUQS
metal was assayed, approached the goldsmiths whose duty it would
be to conduct the experiment in the king's presence, and desired
them secretly to cast into the crucible sufficient silver to bring the
molten metal to the standard of purity. They objected that in
accordance with the ordinary precautions on such occasions they
would be so denuded of clothing that they would be unable to
secrete any silver on their persons, but offered to do what was
required if the silver could be placed within their reach. Kajar
Shāh accordingly arranged that the necessary quantity of silver
should be concealed in one of the pieces of charcoal used for heating
the crucible, and the goldsmiths succeeded in conveying it into the
vessel without being observed, so that the king was hoodwinked
and the metal when assayed, was found to be of the standard
purity. Kajar Shāh's presumed innocence was publicly recognised
by his being carried through the city on one of the royal elephants,
and the two informers were banished, but both the investigations
and the public justification of the mintmaster were mere sops to
public opinion, for Kajar Shāh was shortly afterwards dismissed.
The comments of the contemporary historian are even more in-
teresting, as an example of the view which an educated and intelligent
man could then take of such an affair, than his simple record of the
facts. He can
He can see nothing wrong in the concealment of a crime, in
the punishment of the innocent and the vindication of the guilty,
or in the deception practised on the simple Firūz, but commends
Maqbul Khānjahān for having dexteriously averted a public scandal
The same historian, who has nothing but approval for whatever
was established or permitted in the reign of Firüz, applauds another
serious abuse.
Of the irregular troops some received their salaries
in cash from the treasury but those stationed at a distance from the
capital were paid by transferable assignments on the revenue. A
class of brokers made it their business to buy these drafts in the
capital at one-third of their nominal value and to sell them to the
soldiers in the districts at one-half. Shams-i-Sirāj 'Afif has no word
of andemnation for the fraud perpetrated on the unfortunate soldier,
and nothing but commendation for a system which enabled so many
knaves to enrich themselves without labour.
Some of the measures introduced by Firüz for the welfare of
his subjects may be described as grandmotherly legislation. One
of them was a marriage bureau and another an employment bureau.
The marriage of girls who have reached marriageable age is regarded
in India, with some reason, as a religious duty, and Firūz charged
himself with the task of seeing that no girl of his own faith remained
a


## p. 187 (#229) ############################################

VII]
THE PILLARS OF ASOKA
187
unmarried for want of a dowry. His agency worked chiefly among
the middle class and the widows and orphans of public servants,
and was most efficient. The employment agency, unlike those of
our day, was concerned chiefly with those who desired clerical and
administrative employment, for at this time the extension of cul.
tivation and the construction of public works provided ample
employment for labourers and handicraftsmen. It was the duty
of the kotwal of Delhi to seek those who were without employment
and to produce them at court. Here Firūz personally made inquiry
into their circumstances and qualifications, and after consulting, as
far as possible, their inclination, provided them with employment.
Whether there was any demand for their services lay beyond the
scope of the inquiry, for the business was conducted on charitable
rather than on economic principles and probably provided sinecures
for many a young idler.
The interest of Firūz in public works was not purely utilitarian,
and he is remembered for two feats of engineering which appear
to indicate an interest in archaeology, but may be more justly at-
tributed to vanity. These were the removal to Delhi, from the sites
on which they had been erected by Asoka, of two great inscribed
monoliths. The first, known as the Mināra-yi-Zarin, or golden
pillars, was transferred from a village near Khizrābād, on the upper
Jumna, to Delhi, where it was re-erected near the palace and great
mosque at Firūzābād, and the second was transported from Meerut
and set up on a mound near the Kushk-i-Shikār, or hunting palace,
near Delhi. The curious may find, in the pages of Shams-i-Sirāj
'Afif, an elaborate and detailed description of the ingenious manner
in which these two great pillars were removed and erected in their
new positions. The difficult feat elicited the admiration of the
Amir Tīmūr when he invaded India, and the pillars, which are still
standing, attracted the attention, in 1615, of 'the famous unwearied
walker,' Tom Coryate, who erroneously supposed the Sanskrit and
Prākrit inscriptions of Asok a to be Greek, and referred them to the
time of Alexander the Great.
The harsher side of Fīrūz Shāh's piety was displayed in the per-
secution of heretics, sectaries, and Hindus. His decree abolishing
capital punishment applied only to those of his own faith, for he
burnt to death a Brāhman accused of trying to propagate his
religion, and the ruthless massacres with which he avenged the
murder of the three Sayyids in Budaun prove his benevolence
to have been strictly limited. In general it seems to have been
due to weakness of character and love of ease, but he could


## p. 188 (#230) ############################################

188
| CH.
THE LATER TUGHLUQS
be firm when a question of principle arose. In the course of years
Brāhmans had acquired, probably by the influence of Hindu officials,
exemption from the jizya, or poll-tax, leviable by the Islamic law
from all non-Muslims, and Firūz was resolved to terminate an ano.
maly which exempted the leaders of dissent from a tax on dissent,
but the exemption had acquired the character of a prescriptive
right, and his decision raised a storm of discontent. The Brāhmans
surrounded his palace and loudly protested against the invasion of
their ancient privilege, threatening to burn themselves alive, and
thus to call down upon him, according to their belief, the wrath of
heaven. 1 Firūz replied that they might burn themselves as soon as
they pleased, and the sooner the better, but they shrank from the
ordeal, and attempted to work on his superstitious fears by sitting
without food at his palace gates. He still remained obdurate, but
they had better success with the members of their own faith, and it
was ultimately arranged that the tax leviable from the Brāhmans
should be borne, in addition to their own burden, by the lower
castes of the Hindus.
The reign of Firūz closes the most brilliant epoch of Muslim
rule in India before the reign of Akbar. ‘Alā-ud-din Khalji, who,
though differing much from Akbar in most respects, resembled him
in desiring to establish a religion of his own devising, had not only
extended the empire over almost the whole of India, but had
welded the loose confederacy of fiefs which had owned allegiance
to the Slave Kings into a homogeneous state. The disorders which
followed his death failed to shake seriously the great fabric which
he had erected, and the energy of Tughluq and, at first, of his son
Muhammad gave it solidity. The latter prince possessed qualities
which might have made him the greatest of the rulers of Delhi had
they not been marred by a disordered imagination. The loss of the
Deccan and Bengal, occasioned by his tyranny, was not an unmixed
evil. The difficulty of governing the former, owing to its distance
from the centre of administration, had been acknowledged by the
1This is an extreme example of the practice of dharna, so common at one time in
India that it was found necessary to make it an offence under the Penal Code. The
aggrieved person sits at the door of his enemy and threatens to. starve himself to
death, in the belief, common to both, that his enemy will be held responsible for
his death and thus become the object of divine wrath. By the Brāhmanical law
the slaying of a Brāhman involves an infinitely greater degree of guilt than any
other crime, and it is difficult to persuade a Brāhman that his person is not more
sacred than that of other men. Lord Macaulay's description, in his essay
Warren Hastings, of the scene at the execution of Nanda Kumār is, like much
else in his historical writings, pure fiction, but it was certainly only by slow de-
grees that Hindus learned the principles of a law which is the same for the Brāh.
man as for the outcaste.
a
on


## p. 189 (#231) ############################################

189
VII).
TUGHLUQ II
ill-considered attempt to transfer the capital to Daulatābād, and
the allegiance of the latter had seldom been spontaneous and had
depended chiefly on the personality of the reigning sovereign of
Delhi, an uncertain quantity. What remained of the kingdom was
more than sufficient to engross the attention of a ruler of ordinary
abilities, and Firūz had, in spite of two great defects of character,
succeeded in improving the administration and in alleviating the
lot and winning the affection of his subjects. Military capacity and
diligence in matters of detail are qualities indispensable to an
oriental despot, and Fīrūz lacked both. After two unsuccessful
expeditions into Bengal he was ſain to recognise the independence
of that country, and his rashness twice imperilled the existence of
his army. His easy tolerance of abuses would have completely
destroyed the efficiency of that mainstay of absolute power, had it
not been counteracted by the vigilance and energy of his officers,
who were carefully selected and entirely trusted by him. His judge-
ment of character was, indeed, the principal counterpoise to his
imaptience of the disagreeable details of government, and the
personal popularity which he enjoyed as the kindly and genial
successor of a capricious tyrant secured the fidelity of his trusted
officers, but his extensive delegation of authority to them under-
mined the power of the crown. No policy, however well devised,
could have sustained this power under the feeble rule of his
successors and the terrible blow dealt at the kingdom within ten
years of his death, but his system of decentralisation would have
embarrassed the ablest successors, and undoubtedly accelerated
the downfall of his dynasty.
Firüz was succeeded at Delhi by his grandson, who took the
title of Ghiyās-ud-din Tughluq Shāh II, while his uncle, Nāsir-ud-din
Muhammad, in his retreat in the Sirmūr hills, prepared to assert
his claim to the throne. Tughluq sent against him an army under
the command of Malik Firūz 'Ali, whom he had made minister with
the title of Khānjahān, and Bahādur Nāhir, a Rājput chieftain of
Mewāt who had accepted Islām and now became a prominent figure
on the political stage. Muhammad retired to a chosen position in
the hills, but was defeated and fled to Kāngra, and Khānjahān, who
shrank from attacking the fortress, returned to Delhi, satisfied with
his partial success.
Tughluq, thus temporarily relieved of anxiety, plunged into
dissipation and sought to secure his tenure of the throne by re-
moving possible competitors. By imprisoning his brother, Sālār
Shāh, he so alarmed his cousin Abu Bakr that that prince was
1


## p. 190 (#232) ############################################

190
[ CH.
THE LATER TUGHLUQS
constrained, in self-defence, to become a conspirator. He found
a willing supporter in the ambitious Rukn-ud-din, Khānjahān's
deputy, who had much influence with the household troops. Their
defection transferred the royal power from Tughluq to Abu Bakr
and Tughluq and Khānjahān fled from the palace by a door opening
towards the Jumna. They were overtaken and slain by a body of
the household troops led by Rukn-ud-din, and on February 19, 1389,
the nobles at Delhi acclaimed Abu Bakr Shāh as their king. The
appointment of Rukn-ud-din as minister followed as a matter of
course, but he was almost immediately detected in a conspiracy
to usurp the throne, and was put to death. This prompt action
established for a time Abu Bakr's authority at Delhi, but a serious
rebellion broke out in the province immediately to the north of
the capital. The centurions of Sāmāna rose against their governor,
Khushdil, a loyal adherent of Abu Bakr, put him to death at Sunām,
and sent his head to Nāsir-ud-din Muhammad, whom they invited
to make another attempt to gain the throne. Muhammad marched
from Kāngra to Sāmāna, where he was proclaimed king on April 24,
1389. He continued his march towards Delhi, and before reaching
the neighbourhood of the city received such accessions of strength
as to find himself at the head of 50,000 horse, and he was able to
take up his quarters in the Jahānnumā palace in the old city. On
April 29 some fighting took place at Firūzābād between the troops
of the rival kings, but the arrival of Bahādur Nāhir from Mewāt
so strengthened Abu Bakr that on the following day he marched
out to meet his uncle and inflicted on him so crushing a defeat that
he was glad escape across the Jumna into the Doāb with no
more than 2000 horse. He retired to Jalesar; which he made his
headquarters, and sent his second son, Humāyūn Khān, to Sāmāna
to rally the fugitives and raise fresh recruits. At Jalesar he was
joined by many discontented nobles, including Malik Sarvar, lately
chief of the police at Delhi, whom he made his minister, with the
title of Khvāja Jahān, and Nasir-ul-Mulk, who received the title
of Khizr Khān, by which he was afterwards to be known as the
founder of the Sayyid dynasty. Muhammad was thus enabled, by
July, again to take the field with 50,000 horse, and marched on
Delhi, but was defeated at the village of Khondli and compelled to
retire to Jalesar. Notwithstanding this second blow his authority
was acknowledged in Multān, Lahore, Sāmāna, Hissār, Hānsi and
other districts to the north of Delhi, and was confirmed by execu-
tions of those disaffected to him, but the general effect of the
prolonged struggle for the throne was temporary eclipse of the


## p. 191 (#233) ############################################

VII ]
NĀSIR-UD-DIN MUHAMMAD
191
>
power and authority of the dominant race. Hindus ceased to pay
the poll-tax and in many of the larger cities of the kingdom menaced
Muslim supremacy. In January, 1390, Humāyūn Khān advanced
ſrom Sāmāna to Pānīpat and plundered the country as far as the
walls of Delhi, but was defeated and driven back to Sāmāna. Abu
Bakr had hitherto been detained in Delhi by the fear that his
enemies in the city would admit Humāyūn in his absence, but this
success encouraged him to attack Muhammad in his stronghold,
and in April he left Delhi. As he approached Jalesar Muhammad,
with 4000 horse, eluded him, reached Delhi by forced marches, and
occupied the palace. Abu Bakr at once retraced his steps, and as he
entered the city Muhammad fled and returned to Jalesar. Abu
Bakr's success was, however, illusory and transient ; his authority
was confined to the capital and the district of Mewāt, where
Bahādur Nāhir supported his cause, and even at Delhi his rival had
many partisans. In August Islām Khān, a courtier who had
a
great influence in the army, opened communications with
Muhammad and placed himself at the head of his adherents in
Delhi. The discovery of the conspiracy so alarmed Abu Bakr that he
retired with his partisans to Mewāt, and Muhammad, on August 31,
entered the capital and was enthroned in the palace of Fīrūzābād.
He ordered the expulsion from Delhi of all the household troops
of Fīrūz Shāh, whose share in the late revolutions had proved them
to be a danger to the State. Most of these troops joined Abu Bakr
in Mewāt and those who claimed the right, as natives of Delhi, of
remaining in the city were required to pronounce the shibb leth
khārā (“brackish'). Those who pronounced it khāri, after the manner
of the inhabitants of eastern Hindūstan and Bengal were adjudged
to be royal slaves imported from those regions, and were put to
death.
The nobles from the provinces now assembled at Delhi and
acknowledged Muhammad as king, and Humāyūn Khān was sent
into Mewāt to crush Abu Bakr and his faction. The army arrived
before Bahādur Nāhir’s stronghold in December 1390, and, being
fiercely attacked by the enemy, suffered considerable loss, but
eventually drove Bahādur Nāhir into the fortresz. Muhammad
himself arrived with reinforcements and Abu Bakr and Bahādur
Nāhir were compelled to surrender. The latter was pardoned, but
Abu Bakr was sent as a prisoner to Meerut, where he soon after.
wards died. Muhammad, on his return to Delhi, learnt that Farhat-
ul-Mulk, who had been left undisturbed in Gujarāt after his victory
over Sikandar Khān, refused to recognise his authority and sent to


## p. 192 (#234) ############################################

192
[CH.
THE LATER TUGHLUQS
>
Gujarāt as governor Zafar Khān, son of Wajih-ul-Mulk, a convert-
ed Rajput.
In 1392 the Hindus of Etāwah, led by Nar Singh, Sarvadhāran
the Rāhtor, and Bir Bhan, chief of Bhansor, rose in rebellion, and
Islām Khān was sent against them, defeated them, and carried
Nar Singh to Delhi; but as soon as his back was turned the
rebellion broke out afresh and Sarvadhāran attacked the town of
Talgrām? . Muhammad now marched in person against the rebels,
who shut themselves up in Etāwa, and when hard pressed escaped
from the town by night and fled. The king dismantled the fortifi.
cations of Etāwah and marched to Kanauj and Dalmau, where
he punished many who had participated in the rebellion, and
thence to Jalesar, where he built a new fortress, which he named
Muhammadābād.
In June, while he was still at Jalesar, the eunuch Malik Sarvar,
Khvāja Jahān, who had been left as regent at Delhi, reported that
Islām Khān, who had been appointed minister, was about to leave
Delhi for Lahore, in order to head a rebellion in the Punjab. Mu-
hammad hastily returned and taxed Islām Khān with harbouring
treasonable designs. He protested his innocence, but the faithless-
ness of his conduct towards Abu Bakr was fresh in the memory of
all, his nephew appeared as a witness against him, and he was put
to death.
In 1393 the Rājputs of Etāwah again rebelled, but the governor
of Jalesar enticed their leaders, by fair words, into Kanauj, and there
treacherously slew all except Sarvadhāran, who escaped and took
refuge in Etāwah. In August of the same year the king marched
through the rebellious district of Mewāt, laying it waste, and on
reaching Jalesar fell sick, but was unable to enjoy the repose which
he needed, for Bahādur Nahir again took the field and Muhammad
was compelled to march against him, and defeated him. From
Jalesar he wrote to his son, Humāyūn Khān, directing him to
march into the Punjab and quell the rebellion of Shaikhā the
Khokar. The prince was preparing to leave Delhi when he heard
of the death of his father at Jalesar on January 20, 1394, and on
January 22 he ascended the throne at Delhi under the title of 'Alā.
ud-din Sikandar Shāh. His reign was brief, for he fell sick almost
immediately after his accession and died on March 8.
1 Bilgrām is another reading, but it is far more probable that Talgrām in the
Doāb was the town attacked, for the Hindus were attempting to establish themselves
in the Doāb, and it is difficult to see why they should have crossed the Ganges and
attacked Bilgrām.


## p. 192 (#235) ############################################

The Cambridge History of India, Vol. Itt
Map 4

68
72
78
#4
es
35
Parashi
Jbelum
Chenēb
Rari
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Taldea
Multan
к,
GDOM
Brabmaputra
DELHI
Loder son
OF
DELHI
AUNPUR
Ajudhy
Jaunpur
Gumid
Ganges
Loomiapura
Paris
Tropic of
Cancer
BLE NGA
MAL
Askibāra
Mánda]
so
SARATH
Nerbeda
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Krisbng.
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15
Vijayanagar
Lungobbeting
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INDIA
in 1398
The Political boundaries are shown thus:
-. -.
10 Countries and Peoples thus. . .
BENGAL
Towas. . .
Parasbar
Rre. . .
Mahancat
10
Sales
3950 180 200
English Miles
1000 390
Y lassetres
80
79
78
80
88


## p. 192 (#236) ############################################

.
1


## p. 193 (#237) ############################################

VII)
NÀSIR-UD-DİN MAHMOD
193
So little respect did the royal house now command that the
provincial governors, who had assembled their troops at Delhi for
the expedition to Lahore, would have left the capital without
waiting for the enthronement of a new king, had not Malik Sarvar
induced them to enthrone, under the title of Nāsir-ud-din Mahmūd,
Humāyūn's brother, the youngest son of Muhammad.
The kingdom was now in a deplorable condition. The obedience
of the great nobles was regulated entirely by their caprice or
interest, and they used or abused the royal authority as occasion
served. In the eastern provinces the Hindus, who had for some
years past been in rebellion, threw off all semblance of obedience,
and the eunuch Malik Sarvar persuaded or compelled Mahmūd to
bestow upon him the lofty title of Sultân-ush-Sharq, or King of
the East, and to commit to him the duty of crushing the rebellion
and restoring order. He left Delhi in May, 1394, punished the
rebels, and after reducing to obedience the districts of Koil, Etāwah,
and Kanauj, occupied Jaunpur, where he established himself as an
independent ruler. The day on which he left Delhi may be assigned
as the date of the foundation of the dynasty of the Kings of the
East, or of Jaunpur.
Meanwhile Sārang Khān, who had been appointed on Mahmūd's
accession to the fief of Dipālpūr, was sent to restore order in the
north-western provinces. In September, 1394, having assembled
the army of Multān as well as his own contingent, he marched
towards Lahore, which was held by Shaikhā the Khokar. Shaikhā
carried the war into the enemy's country by advancing into the
Dipālpūr district and forming the siege of Ajūdhan (Pāk Pattan)
but, finding that this counterstroke failed to arrest Sārang Khān's
advance, hastily retraced his steps and attacked Sārang Khān before
he could reach Lahore. He was defeated, and fled into the Salt
Range, and Sārang Khān appointed his own brother, Malik Kandhū,
governor of Lahore, with the title of Ādil Khān.
During the course of these events the king visited Gwalior,
where Mallū Khān, a brother of Sārang Khān, plotted to overthrow
Sa'ādat Khān, a noble whose growing influence over the king's
feeble mind had excited the jealousy of the courtiers. The plot
was discovered and some of the leading conspirators were put to
death, but Mallu Khān fled to Delhi and took refuge with the
regent, Muqarrab Khān, who resented the ascendency of Sa'ādat
Khān and, on the king's return to the capital, closed the gates of
the city against him. For two months Delhi was in a state of siege
but in November Mahmūd, whose authority was disregarded by
C. H. I. III.
13


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194
( CH.
THE LATER TUGHLUQS
both parties, grew weary of his humiliating position at the gates of
his capital, and fled to the protection of Muqarrab Khān. Sa'ādat
Khān, enraged by his desertion, summoned from Mewāt Nusrat
Khān, a son of Fath Khān, the eldest son of Firūz, and proclaimed
him in Fīrūzābād under the title of Nāsir-ud-din Nusrat Shāh.
There were thus two titular kings, one at Delhi and the other at
Fīrūzābād, each a puppet in the hands of a powerful noble. Saʻādat
Khān's arrogance exasperated the old servants of Firūz who ad-
hered to Nusrat Shāh, and they expelled him from Fīrūzābād. He
fled, in his extremity, to Delhi, and humbled himself before his
enemy, Muqarrab Khān, who gave him an assurance of forgiveness,
but a few days later treacherously caused him to be put to death.
The various cities which had at different times been the capital
of the kingdom were now held by the factions of one puppet or the
other. Muqarrab Khān and Mahmūd Shāh were in Delhi, Nusrat
Shāh and the old nobles and servants of Firūz in Firūzābād,
Bahādur Nāhir, whose allegiance had been temporarily secured by
Muqarrab Khān, was in Old Delhi, and Mallū, who owed his life to
Muqarrab Khān and had received from him the title of Iqbāl Khān,
was in Sirī, but neither Nāhir nor Mallū was a warm partisan, and
each was prepared to shape his conduct by the course of events.
For three years an indecisive but destructive strife was carried
on in the names of Mahmud and Nusrat, but the kingdom of the
former, who had been first in the field, was bounded by the walls
of Delhi, though Muqarrab Khān reckoned Old Delhi and Sirī as
appanages of this realm, while the upstart Nusrat Shāh claimed
the nominal allegiance of the districts of the Doāb, Sambhal, Pāni.
pat, Jhajjar, and Rohtak. The great provinces were independent.
In 1395-96 Sārang Khān of Dipālpūr quarrelled with Khizr Khan
the Sayyid, governor of Multān, expelled him from that city, and an-
nexed his fief. Emboldened by this success he marched, in June, 1397,
to Sāmāna, and there besieged the governor, Ghālib Khān, who fled
and joined Tātār Khān, Nusrat's minister, at Pānīpat. Nusrat Shāh
sent a small reinforcement to Tātār Khān, who on October 8 attacked
and defeated Sārang Khān and reinstated Ghālib Khān at Sāmāna.
At the close of this year a harbinger of the terrible Amir Tīmūr
appeared in India. Pir Muhammad, son of Jahāngir, the eldest son
of the great conqueror, crossed the Indus and besieged Uch, which
was held for Sārang Khān by 'Ali Malik. A force was sent to the
relief of Uch, but Pir Muhammad attacked it and drove it into
Multān, where Sārang Khān then was. In May, 1398, he was com-
pelled to surrender and Pir Muhammad occupied Multān.


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VII )
TIMŪR'S INVASION
195
In June, 1398, the deadlock at Delhi was brought to an end
by a series of acts of extraordinary perfidy and treachery, Mallū,
resenting the dominance of his benefactor, Muqarrab Khān, deserted
Mahmud and joined Nusrat, whom he conducted in triumph into
Jahānpanāh, after swearing allegiance to him on the Koran. Two
days later he suddenly attacked his new master and drove him to
Firūzābād and thence to Pānīpat, where he took refuge with Tātār
Khān. Although Nusrat had thus disappeared from the scene the
contest was maintained for two months by Mallū on the one hand
and Muqarrab Khān, with Mahmūd, on the other. At length Mallū
feigned a reconciliation with Muqarrab Khān, who entered Jahān.
panāh in triumph with Mahmūd Shāh while Mallü remained in
Siri. Almost immediately afterwards Mallū treacherously attacked
Muqarrab Khān in his house at Jahānpanāh, captured and slew
him, and, having gained possession of the person of Mahmūd Shāh
exercised the royal authority in his name.
There still remained Tātār Khān and Nusrat Shāh to be dealt
with, and in August Mallū, carrying Mahmūd with him, marched
to Pānīpat. Tātār Khān eluded him and marched to Delhi by
another road, but while engaged in a vain attempt to force an entry
into the capital learnt that Mallū had captured Pānīpat, taken all
his baggage and elephants, and was returning towards Delhi. Tātār
Khān fled and joined his father Zafar Khān, who had, two years
before this time, proclaimed his independence in Gujarāt, and was
now known as Muzaffar Shāh, and Nusrat Shāh found an asylum in
the Doāb.
This was the state of affairs at Delhi when, in October, 1398,
news was received that Tīmūr the Lame, 'Lord of the Fortunate
Conjunction,' Amir of Samarqand and conqueror of Persia, Afghāni-
stān, and Mesopotamia, had crossed the Indus, the Chenāb, and the
Ravī, taken Talamba, and occupied Multān, already held by his
grandson. Tīmūr seldom required either a pretext or a stimulus
for his depredations, but India supplied him with both. The pretext
was the toleration of idolatry by the Muslim rulers of Delhi and the
stimulus was the disintegration of the kingdom, unparalleled since
its earliest days. The invader's object was plunder, for if he ever
had any idea of the permanent conquest of India he certainly
abandoned it before he reached Delhi.
Tīmūr had left Samarqand in April, but had been delayed on
his way to India by an expedition in Kāfiristān, by the construction
of fortresses on the road which he followed, and by the business of
his vast empire. He left Kābul on August 15, crossed the Indus
13-2


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196
THE LATER TUGHLUQS
( CH.
on September 24, and two days later reached the Jhelum, where
he was delayed by the contumacy of a local ruler, Shihāb-ud-din
Mubārak, styling himself Shāh, who, having submitted to Pir-Mu-
hammad, had changed his policy when that prince appeared to be
in difficulties and ventured to oppose Tīmūr, who drove him from
his island fortress on the Jhelum. Mubārak and his whole family
perished in the river and Tīmūr crossed the Jhelum and the Rāvi
and on October 13 encamped before Talamba. He agreed to spare
the ancient town in consideration of a ransom, but differences
regarding its assessment or undue harshness in levying it provoked
resistance and furnished him with a pretext for a massacre.
His advance was delayed by the necessity for disposing of Jasrat,
brother of Shaikhā the Khokar, who had re-established himself in
Lahore when Sārang Khān was overcome by Pir Muhammad.
Jasrat had entrenched himself in a village near the north bank of the
Sutlej and menaced the invader's communications. His stronghold
was taken and he fled, and on October 25 Tīmūr reached the
northern bank of the Sutlej, where he met his baggage train and
the ladies of his harem. On the following day he was joined by
Pir Muhammad, whose movements had been retarded by an epi-
zootic disease which destroyed most of the horses of his army. Tīmūr's
resources, replenished by plunder, enabled him to supply 30,000
remounts for his grandson's troops and Pir Muhammad accompanied
him and commanded the right wing of his army during the rest of
the Indian campaign.
The camp was situated on the Sutlej about midway between
Ajūdhan (Pāk Pattan) and Dipālpūr, both of which towns had
incurred Tīmūr's resentment by rising against Pir Muhammad.
He marched to Pāk Pattan, where he visited the tomb of Shaikh
Farid-ud-din Ganj-i-Shakar, dispatched his harem and heavy bag-
gage by way of Dipālpūr to Sāmāna, started from Pāk Pattan on
November 6, and by the morning of the following day arrived,
after a march of eighty miles, at Bhatnair, where the fugitives
from Dipālpūr and Pāk Pattan had taken refuge. The ruler of
Bhatnair was a Bhāti Rājput named Dul Chand, but his tribe was
already undergoing the process of conversion to Islām, and his
brother bore the Muslim name of Kamāl-ud-din. The city was
captured, with great loss to the Hindus, and on November 9 Dul
Chand, who had shut himself up in the citadel, surrendered. The
refugees were collected and 500 of the citizens of Dīpālpūr were
put to death to avenge their slaughter of Pir Muhammad's garrison
in that town. The citizens of Pāk Pattan were flogged, plundered,


## p. 197 (#241) ############################################

VII )
ADVANCE OF THE INVADER
197
and enslaved. The assessment and collection of the ransom of
Bhatnair again provoked resistance on the part of the inhabitants,
and after a general massacre the city was burnt and laid waste, ‘so
that one would have said that no living being had ever drawn breath
in that neighbourhood. '
On November 13 Tīmūr left this scene of desolation, already
offensive from the putrefying bodies of the dead, and marched
through Sirsa and Fathābad, pursuing and slaughtering the in-
habitants, who fled before him. Aharwān was plundered and burnt,
at Tohāna about 2000 Jāts were slain, and on November 21 Tīmūr
reached the bank of the Ghaggar, near Sāmāna, where he halted for
four days to allow his heavy baggage to come up. On November 25,
near the bridge of Kotla, he was joined by the left wing of his army,
which had marched from Kābul by a more northerly route and had
captured and plundered every fortress which it had passed. On
November 29 the whole army was assembled at Kaithal and on
December 2 Tīmūr marched through a desolate country, whence
the inhabitants had fled to Delhi, to Pānīpat. On December 7 the
right wing of the army reached Jahānnumā, north of Delhi and
near the northern extremity of the famous Ridge, overlooking the
Jumna. On December 9 the army crossed the river and on the
following day captured Lonī, the Hindu inhabitants of which were
put to death. The fortress, which was surrounded by good pasture
land, was made the headquarters of the army.
The invader's rapid and davastating advance struck terror and
dismay into the hearts of Mahmud Shāh and Mallū, for the limits
and resources of what remained to them of the kingdom were so re-
stricted that no adequate preparations for resistance were possible,
but such troops as remained were collected within the walls of the
city which was also crowded with the host of fugitives who had
fled before Tīmūr's advance. On December 12, as Tīmūr, who had
led a reconnaissance in force across the river, was returning to Lonī,
Mallu attacked his rearguard. Two divisions were promptly sent to
its assistance, Mallū was defeated and driven back into Delhi, and
the only fruit of his enterprise was a terrible massacre. Tīmūr had
collected in his camp about 100,000 adult male Hindu captives, and
when Mallù delivered his attack these poor wretches could not
entirely conceal their joy at the prospect of a rescue.