Mewar 06: Samarsi, Mahmud's Invasion
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Mewar 06: Samarsi, Mahmud's Invasion
Samarsi, Samar Singh
Having established Bappa on the throne of Chitor S. 784 (a.d. 728), we will proceed to glean from the annals, from the period of his departure for Iran, S. 820 (a.d. 764) to another halting point— the reign of Samarsi, S. 1249 (a.d. 1193) ; 4 an important epoch, not only in the history of Mewar, but to the whole Hindu race ; when the diadem of sovereignty was torn from the brow of the Hindu to adorn that of the Tatar. We shall not, however, overleap the four intervening centuries, though we may not be able to fill up the reigns of the eighteen princes 5 whose " banner at this time was a golden sun on a crimson field," 6 and several of whose names yet live recorded " with an iron pen on the rock " of their native abodes.
An intermediate period, from Bappa to Samarsi, that of Sakti Kumar, is fixed by the Aitpur inscription in S. 1024 (a.d. 968) ; 1 A new era had commenced, not of Yazdegird's accession, as is sup posed, which would have been vain indeed, when the throne was tottering under him, but consequent to the completion of the grand cycle of 1440 years. He was slain at Merv in a.d. 651, the 31st of the Hegira; on the eleventh year of which, or a.d. 632 (according to Moreri), he commenced his reign. 2 Gibbon was wrong. India afforded them an asylum, and their issue constitutes the most wealthy, the most respected, and the most enhghtened part of the native community of Bombay and the chief towns of that presid ency. 3 Gibbon, Miscellaneous Works, ' Sur la Monarchic des Medes,' vol. iii. 4 [" We now know that Samar Singh was alive up to 1299, only four years before Alau-d-dln's siege of Chitor, and that in several inscriptions his dates are given as 1273, 1274, 1285, etc. . . . Instead of being the father of Karan Singh I., as stated by Tod, Samar Singh came eight genei-ations after him, and was the father of Ratan Singh I., who, according to Muham madan historians, was the ruler of Chitor during the reign of Alau-d-dln, and the husband of Padmini " (Erskine ii. A. 14 f.)] 5 See Genealogical Table. 6 This, according to the roll, was the standard of Bappa. and from the more perishable yet excellent authority of an ancient Jain HIS. the era of Allat, the ancestor of Sakti Kumar, was S. 922 (a.d. 866), four generations anterior. From Bappa's departure for Iran, in a.d. 764, to the subversion of Hindu dominion in the reign of Samarsi, in a.d. 1193, we find recorded an intermediate Islamite invasion. This was during the reign of Khuman, between a.d. 812 and 836, which event forms the chief subject of the Khuman-Raesa, the most ancient of the poetic chronicles of Mewar [241].
As the history of India at this period is totally dark, we gladly take advantage of the lights thus afforded. By combining these facts with what is received as authentic, though scarcely less obscure or more exact than these native legends, we may furnish materials for the future historian. With this view, let us take a rapid sketch of the irruptions of the Arabians into India, from the rise of Islamism to the foundation of the Ghaznivid empire, which sealed the fate of the Hindus. The materials are but scanty. El-Makin, in his history of the Cahphs, passes over such intercourse almost without notice. Abu-1-Fazl, though not diffuse, is minute in what he does say, and we can confide in his veracity. Ferishta has a chapter devoted to this subject, which merits a better translation than yet exists.1 We shall, however, in the first place, touch on Bappa's descendants, till we arrive at the point proper for the introduction of the intended sketch. Of the twenty-four tribes of Guhilot, several issued from the founder, Bappa. Shortly after the conquest of Chitor, Bappa pro ceeded to Saurashtra and married the daughter of Yusufgol, prince of the island of Bandardiva.2 With his bride he conveyed 1 Amongst the passages which Dow [i. 37] has slurred over in his trans lation is the interesting account of the origin of the Afghans ; who, when they first came in contact with those of the new faith, in a.h. 62, dwelt around the Koh-i-Sulaiman.
Ferishta, quoting authority, says : " The Afghans were Copts, ruled by Pharaun, many of whom were converted to the laws and rehgion of Moses ; but others, who were stubborn in their worship to their gods, fled towards Hindustan, and took possession of the country adjoining the Koh-i-Sulaiman. They were visited by Kasim from Sind, and in the 143rd year of the Hegira had possessed themselves of the provinces of Kirman, Peshawar, and all within their bounds {sinoran)," which Dow has converted into a province. The whole geographical descrip tion of the Kohistan, the etymology of the term Rohilla, and other important matter, is omitted by him [see Briggs, trans, i. 6 f.]. 2 [The island Diu.] Yusufgol is stated to have held Chaul on the main to Chitor the statue of Vyanmata, the tutelary goddess of her race, who still divides with Eklinga the devotion of the Guhilot princes. The temple in which he enshrined this islandic goddess yet stands on the summit of Chitor, with many other monuments assigned by tradition to Bappa. This princess bore him Aparajit, who from bemg born in Chitor was nominated successor to the throne, to the exclusion of his less fortunate elder brother, Asil (born of the daughter of the Kaba (Pramara) prince of Kalibao near Dwaraka), who, however, obtained possessions in Saurashtra, and founded a race called the Asila Guhilots,1 whose descendants were so numerous, even in Akbar's reign, as to [242] be supposed able to bring into the field fifty thousand men at arms. We have nothing important to record of the actions of Aparajit, who had two sons Kalbhoj - and Nandkumar. Kalbhoj succeeded Aparajit, and his warlike qualities are extolled in an inscription discovered by the author in the valley of Nagda. Nandkumar slew Bhimsen Dor (Doda), and possessed himself of Deogarh in the Deccan.
Khuman I
Khuman succeeded Kalbhoj . His name is remark able in the history of Mewar. He came to the throne at the land. He was most probably the father of Vanaraja Chawara, the founder of Patan Anhilwara, whose ancestors, on the authority of the Kumarpal Charitra, were princes of Bandardiva, held by the Portuguese since the time of Albuquerque, who changed its name to Deo. [But Yusufgol, if he existed, must have been a Musahnan. Vanaraja Chawara was son of Jayasekhara, said to have been slain in battle, a.d. 696, leaving his wife pregnant (BG, i. Part i. 150 f.). Yusufgol does not appear in the local history.]
1 The ancient roll from which this is taken mentions Asil giving his name to a fortress, called Asilgarh. His son, Bijai Pal, was slain in attempting to wrest Khambayat (Cambay) from Sangram Dabhi. One of his wives, from a violent death, was prematurely deUvered of a boy, called Setu ; and as, in such cases, the Hindu supposes the deceased to become a discontented spirit {churail), Churaila became the name of the tribe. Bija, the twelfth from Asil, obtained Sonal from his maternal uncle, Khengar Dabhi, prince of Girnar, but was slain by Jai Singh Deo, prince of Surat. From these names compounded, Dabi and Churaila, we may have the Dabisalima of Mahmud. [The Asil Guhilots are now included in the Mers of the Kathiawar coast ; their numbers are exaggerated in the text (Ain, ii. 247 ; BG, ix. Parti. 126).] [See p. 266 above.] 2 Also called Kama. He it was who excavated the Boraila lake, and erected the grand temple of EkUnga on the site of the hermitage of Harita, whose descendant, the present officiating priest, reckons sixty six descents, while the princes of Mewar amount to seventy-two in the same period.beginning of the ninth century, when Chitor was assailed by another formidable invasion of Muhammadans. The chief object of the Khuman Raesa is to celebrate the defence made on this occasion, and the value of this Raesa consists in the catalogue of the princes who aided in defending this bulwark of the Hindu faith. The bard, in an animated strain, makes his sovereign on this occasion successfully defend the ' crimson standard ' of Mewar, treat with contempt the demand for tribute, and after a violent assault, in which the ' barbarian ' is driven back, follow and discomfit him in the plan, carrying back the hostile leader, Mahmud, captive. With this event, which introduces the name of Mahmud two centuries before the conqueror of Ghazni, we will pause, and resume the promised sketch of the intercourse of Arabia and Hindustan at this period.
The Muhammadan Invasion, a.d. 644-55
The first intimation of the Moslems attempting the invasion of India is during the caliphat of Omar, who built the port of Bassorah at the mouth of the Tigris, chiefly to secure the trade of Gujarat and Sind ; into which latter coimtry a powerful army penetrated under Abul Aas,1 who was killed in battle at Aror. The Caliph Osman, who succeeded Omar, sent to explore the state of India, while he prepared an army to invade it in person : a design which he never fulfilled. The generals of the Caliph Ali made conquests in Sind, which they abandoned at All's death. While Yazid was governor of Khorasan several attempts were made on India, as also during the caliphat of Abdu-1 Malik, but without any last ing [243] results. It was not till the reign of Walid '2 that any successful invasion took place. He not only finally conquered Sind and the adjoining continent of India, but rendered tributary all that part of India on this side the Ganges.3 What an exalted idea must we not form of the energy and rapidity of such con quests, when we find the arms of Islam at once on the Ganges and the Ebro, and two regal dynasties simultaneously cut off, that of Roderic, the last of the Goths of Andaloos, and Dahir Despati in the valley of the Indus. It was in a.h. 99 (a.d. 712, S. 774) that Muhammad bin Kasim vanquished and slew Dahir,
1 [Ferishta (i. 2) calls him Sayyid bin Abiu-1-Aas.] 2 See Table next page. 3 Marigny (quoting EI-Makin), Hist, of the Arabians, vol. ii. p. 283 ; Mod. Univ. Hint. vol. ii. p. 47.
prince of Sind, after numerous conflicts. Amongst the spoils of victory sent to the cliph on this occasion were the daughters of the subjugated monarch, who were the cause of Kasim's de struction,1 when he was on the eve of earrjdng the war against Raja [244] Harchand of Kanauj. Some authorities state that he actually prosecuted it ; and as Sind remained a dependency of the caliphat during several successive reigns, the successor of Kasim may have executed his plans. Little is said of India from this period to the reign of Al-Mansur, except in regard to the rebellion of Yazid in Khorasan, and the flight of his son to Sind. The eight sovereigns, who rapidly followed, were too much engaged with the Christians of the west and the Huns on the Caspian to think of India. Their armies were then in the heart of France, which was only saved from the Koran by their overthrow at Tours by Charles Martel.
Al-Mansur, when only the lieutenant of the Caliph Abbas, held the government of Sind and of India, and made the island of Bakhar on the Indus, and the adjacent Aror,2 the ancient capital, his residence, naming it Mansura ; and it was during his govern ment that Bappa Rawal abandoned Chitor for Iran. The celebrated Harunu-r-rashid, contemporary of Charle magne, in apportioning his immense empire amongst his sons, gave to the second, Al-Mamun, Khorasan, Zabulistan, Kabulistan, Sind, and Hindustan.3 Al-Mamun, on the death of Ilarun, de posed his brother, and became caliph in A.ii. 198 or a.d. 813, and ruled to 833, the exact period of the reign of Khuman, prince of Chitor. The domestic history brings the enemy assailant of Chitor from Zabulistan ; and as the leader's name is given Mahmud Khorasan Pat, there can be little doubt that it is an error arising from ignorance of the copyist, and should be Mamun.
1 " The two young princesses, in order to revenge the death of their father, represented falsely to the Khahf that Muhammad bin Kasim had been connected with them. The Khalif , in a rage, gave order for Muhammad bin Kasim to be sewed up in a raw hide, and sent in that condition to court. When the mandate arrived at Tatta, Kasim was prepared to carry an ex pedition against Harchand, monarch of Kanauj. When he arrived at court, the Khalif showed him to the daughters of Dahir, who expressed their joy upon beholding their father's murderer in'such a condition " [Ain/ii. 345 ; Elliot-Dowson i. 209 f.]. 2 Aror is seven miles east of Bakhar. 3 Marigny, vol. iii. p. 83 ; Univ. Hist. vol. ii. p. 162.
Mahmud's Invasion
Within twenty years after this event, the sword of conquest and conversion was withdrawn from India, and Sind was the only province left to Mutawakkil (a.d. 850 [847 861]), the grandson of Harun, for a century after whom the throne of Baghdad, like that of ancient Rome, was sold by her jiraetorians to the highest bidder. From this time we find no mention what ever of Hindustan, or even of Sind, imtil Sabuktigin,1 governor of Khorasan, hoisted the standard of independent sovereignty at Ghazni. In A.n. 365 (a.d. 974) he carried his arms [245] across the Indus, forcing the inhabitants to abandon the religion of their ancestors, and to read the Koran from the altars of Bal and Krishna. Towards the close of this century he made his last invasion, accompanied by his son, the celebrated Mahmud, destined to be the scourge of the Hindu race, who early imbibed the paternal lesson inculcating the extirpation of infidels. Twelve several visitations did Mahmud make with his Tatar hordes, sweeping India of her riches, destroying her temples and archi tectural remains, and leaving the country plunged in poverty and ignorance. From the effect of these incursions she never recovered ; for though she had a respite of a century between Mahmud and the final conquest, it was too short to repair what it had cost ages to rear : the temples of Somnath, of Chitor, and Girnar are but types of the magnificence of past times. The memorial of Sakti Kumar proves him to have been the contem porary of Sabuktigin, and to one of his son's visitations is attri buted the destruction of the ' city of the sun ' (Aitpur),2 his capital.
Attack on Chitor
Having thus condensed the little informa tion afforded by Muhammadan historians of the connexion between the caliphs of Baghdad and princes of Hind, from the first to the end of the fourth century of the Hegira, we shall revert to the first recorded attack on the Mori prince of Chitor, which brought Bappa into notice. This was either by Yazid or Muham mad bin Kasim from Sind.' Though in the histories of the caliphs we can only expect to find recorded those expeditions 1 His father's name was Aliptigin, termed a slave by Ferishta and his authorities ; though EI-Makin gives him an ancestor in Yazdegird. [He was a slave (Elliot-Dowson iv. 159).] 2 Ait, contracted from Aditya : hence Itwar, ' Sunday.' 3 [This is not corroborated by Musulraan authorities.] which were successful, or had some lasting results, there are inroads of their revolted lieutenants or their frontier deputies, which frequently, though indistinctly, alluded to in Hindu annals, have no place in Muhammadan records. Throughout the period mentioned there was a stir amongst the Hindu nations, in which we find confusion and dethronement from an unknown invader, who is described as coming sometimes by Sind, sometimes by sea, and not unfrequently as a demon and magician ; but invariably as mlechchha, or ' barbarian.' 1From S. 750 to S. 780 (a.d. 694 to [246] 724), the annals of the Yadus, the Chauhans, the Chawaras , and the Guhilots, bear evidence to simultaneous convulsions in their respective houses at this period. In S. 750 (a.h. 75) the Yadu Bhatti was driven from his capital Salpura in the Panjab, across the Sutlej into the Indian desert ; the invader named Farid. At the same period Manika Rae, the Chauhan prince of Ajmer, was assailed and slain.2
1 Even from the puerilities of Hindu legends something may be extracted. A mendicant dervesh, called Roshan All {i.e. the ' light of All '), had found his way to Garh Bitli (the ancient name of the Ajmer fortress), and having thrust his hand into a vessel of curds destined for the Raja, had his finger cut off. The disjointed member flew to Mecca, and was recognized as belonging to the saint. An army was equipped in the disguise of horse merchants, which invaded Ajmer, whose prince was slain. May we not gather from this incident that an insult to the first Islamite missionary, in the person of Roshan Ah, brought upon the prince the arms of the Cahph ? The same Chauhan legends state that Ajaipal was prince of Ajmer at this time ; that in this invasion by sea he hastened to Anjar (on the coast of Cutch), where he held the ' guard of the ocean ' {Samudra lei Chaulci), where he fell in opposing the landing. An altar was erected on the spot, on which was sculptured the figure of the prince on horseback, with his lance at rest, and which still annually attracts multitudes at the ' fair (Mela) of Ajaipal.' The subsequent invasion alluded to in the text, of S. 750 (a.d. 694), is marked by a curious anecdote. When the ' Asurs ' had blockaded Ajmer, Lot, the infant son of Manika Rae, was playing on the battlements, when an arrow from the foe killed the heir of Ajmer, who has ever since been worshipped amongst the lares and penates of the Chauhans ; and as he had on a silver chain anklet at the time, this ornament is forbid to the children of the race. In all these Rajput families there is a putra {adolesceyis) amongst the penates, always one who has come to an untimely end, and chiefly worshipped by females ; having a strong resemblance to the rites in honour of Adonis. We have traced several Roman and Grecian terms to Sanskrit origin ; may we add that of lares, from larla, ' dear ' or ' beloved '?[?].
-[The story is " puerile and fictitious : independent of which the Arabs liad quite enough to do nearer home " (Elliot-Dowson i. 426).]
The Muster of the Clans
The first of the Khichi princes who occupied the Duab of Sindsagar in the Panjab, as well as the ancestor of the Haras established in Golkonda, was expelled at the same time. The invader is treated in the genuine Hindu style as a Danava, or demon, and is named Ghairaram 1 (i.e. restless), from Kujliban,2 a term geographically given to a portion of the Himalaya mountains about the glaciers of the Ganges. The ancestor of the founder of Patan was expelled from his petty islandic dominion on the coast of Saurashtra at the same time. This is the period when Yazid was the caliph's lieutenant in Khorasan, and when the arms of Walid conquered to the Ganges ; nor is there a doubt that Yazid or Kasim was the author of all these revolutions in the Hindu dynasties. We are supported in this by the names of the princes contained in the catalogue who aided to defend Chitor and the Mori prince on this occasion. It is evident that Chitor was, alternately with Ujjain, the seat of sovereignty of the Pramara at this period, and, as it became the rallying point of the Hindus, that this race was the first in con sequence.^ We find the prince of Ajmer, and the quotas of
1 [Persian : not a likely name.] 2 Signifying ' Elephant forests,' and described in a Hindu map (stamped on cloth and painted) of India from Kujiiban to Lanka, and the provinces west of the Indus to Calcutta ; presented by me to the Royal Asiatic Society. 3 The list of the vassal princes at the court of the Mori confirms the statement of the bard Ohand, of the supremacy of Ram Pramara, and the partition of his dominion, as described (see p. 63, note) amongst the princes who founded separate dynasties at this period ; hitherto in vassalage or subordinate to the Pramara. We can scarcely suppose the fauiily to have suffered any decay since their ancestor, Chandragupta, connected by marriage with as well as the ally of the Grecian Seleucus, and who held Greeks in his pay. From such connexion, the arts of sculpture and archi tecture may have derived a character hitherto unnoticed. Amidst the ruins of Barolli are seen sculptured the Grecian helmet ; and the elegant ornament, the Kumbha, or ' vessel of desire,' on the temple of Annapurna (i.e. ' giver of food '), the Hindu Ceres, has much affinity to the Grecian device. From the inscription (see No. 2) it is evident that Chitor was an appanage of Ujjain, the seat of Pramar empire. Its monarch, Chandragupta (Mori [Maurya]), degraded into the barber (Maurya) tribe, was the descendant of Srenika, prince of Rajagriha, v/ho, according to the Jain work, Kalpadruma Kalka, flourished in the year 477 before Vikramaditya, and from whom Chandra gupta was the thirteenth in descent. The names as follows : Kanika, Udsen, and nine in succession of the name of Nanda, thence called the Nau-nanda. These, at twenty-two years to a reign (see p. 64), would give 286 years, which— 477 = 191 s.v. + 56 = 247 a.c. Now it was in a.c. 260, Saurashtra and Gujarat [247] ; Angatsi, lord of the Huns ; Busa, the lord of the North ; Sheo, the prince of the Jarejas ; the Johya, lord of Jangaldes ; the Aswaria, the Sepat, the Kulhar, the Malan, the Ohir, the Hul, and many others, having nothing of the Hindu in name, now extinct. But the most conspicuous is ' Dahir Despati from Debal.' This is erroneously written Delhi, the seat of the Tuars ; whereas we recognize the name of the prince of Sind, slain by Kasim, whose expatriated son doubtless found refuge in Chit or. 3
The Defeat of the Enemy
This attack on the Mori prince was defeated chiefly through the bravery of the youthful Guhilot. The foe from Kujliban, though stated to have advanced by Mathura, retreated by Saurashtra and Sind, pursued by Bappa. He found the ancient seat of his ancestors, Gajni,2 still in the possession of the ' Asur ' : a term as well as mlechchha, or ' bar barian,' always given to the Islamite at this period. Salim, who held Gajni, was attacked and forced to surrender, and Bappa in according to Bayer, that the treaty was formed between Seleucus and Chandragupta ; so that this scrap of Jain history may be regarded as authentic and valuable. Asoka (a name of weight in Jain annals) succeeded Chandragupta. He by Kunala, whose son was Samprati, with whose name ends the hne of Srenika, according to the authority from which I made the extract. The name of Samprati is well known from Ajnier to Saurashtra, and his era is given in a valuable chronogrammatic catalogue in an ancient Jain manuscript from the temple of Nadol, at 202 of the Virat Samvat. He is mentioned both traditionally and by books as the great supporter of the Jain faith, and the remains of temples dedicated to Mahavira, erected by this prince, yet exist at Ajrr.er, on Abu, Kumbhalmer, and Girnar. [Much of this needs correction, which cannot be done in the hunts of a note. For the Nanda dynasty see Smith, EHI, 40, and for Chandragupta Maurya and Asoka, 115 ff.]
1 [This and the second catalogue are fictions. They conflict with the conditions then existing in Gujarat, and such motley arrays are a favourite bardic theme (Forbes, Easmala, 31, note ; A8R, ii. 379).] 2 It has already been stated that the ancient name of Cambay was Gaini or Gajni, whose ruins are three miles from the present city [see p. 254 above]. There is also a Gajni on the estuary of the Mahi, and Abu-1 Fazl incidentally mentions a Gajnagar as one of the most important fortresses of Gujarat, belonging to Ahmad Shah; in attempting to obtain which by stratagem, his antagonist, Hoshang, king of Malwa, was made prisoner. I am unaware of the site of this place, though there are remains of an exten sive fortress near the capital, founded by Ahmad, and which preserves no name. It may be the ancient Gajnagar.
[The Author confuses the place in Gujarat with Jajnagar or Jajpur in Orissa, captured through a stratagem by Hoshang {Ain, ii. 219 ; Ferishta iv. 178 ; BG, i. Part i. 359).] ducted into this stronghold of his ancestors a nephew of his own. It is no less singular than honourable to their veracity that the annals should record the fact, so contrary to their religion, of Bappa having married the daughter of the conquered Salim ; and we have a right to infer that it was from the influence acquired by this union tliat he ultimately abandoned the sovereignty of Mewar and the title of ' Hindua Suraj ' to become the founder of the ' one hundred and thirty tribes of Naushahra [248] Pathans ' of the west. It is fair to conclude from all these notices regarding the founder of the Guhilot race in Chitor that he must have abjured his faith for that of Islam ; and it is probable (though the surmise must ever remain unproved) that, under some new title applicable to such change, we may have, in one of the early distinguished leaders of ' the Faith,' the ancestor of the Guhilots.
