The Delhi Sultanate or the Sultanate of Delhi was a late medieval empire primarily based in Delhi that stretched over large parts of the Indian subcontinent for more than three centuries.Delhi Sultanate, Encyclopædia BritannicaA. Schimmel, Islam in the Indian Subcontinent, Leiden, 1980 The sultanate was established in 1206 in the former Ghurid territories in India. Its history is generally divided into five periods: Mamluk (1206–1290), Khalji (1290–1320), Tughlaq (1320–1414), Sayyid (1414–1451), and Lodi (1451–1526). It covered large swaths of territory in modern-day India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, as well as some parts of southern Nepal.
The foundation of the sultanate was laid by the Ghurid conqueror Muhammad Ghori, who routed the Rajput Confederacy, led by Ajmer ruler Prithviraj Chauhan, in 1192 near Tarain, in a reversal of an earlier battle. As a successor to the Ghurid dynasty, the Delhi Sultanate was originally one of several principalities ruled by the Turkic slave-generals of Muhammad Ghori, including Taj al-Din Yildiz, Qutb ud-Din Aibak, Bahauddin Tughril and Nasir ad-Din Qabacha, who had inherited and divided the Ghurid territories amongst themselves. Khalji and Tughlaq rule ushered a new wave of rapid and continual Muslim conquests deep into South India. The sultanate reached its geographical zenith under the Tughlaq dynasty, occupying most of the Indian subcontinent during the reign of Muhammad bin Tughluq. A major political transformation occurred across northern India, triggered by the Central Asian king Timur's devastating raid on Delhi in 1398, coinciding with the re-emergence of rival Hindu powers such as Vijayanagara Empire and Kingdom of Mewar, and new Muslim sultanates such as the Bengal and Bahmani Sultanates asserting independence.Hermann Kulke and Dietmar Rothermund, A History of India, 3rd ed., Routledge, 1998, , p. 187-190. In 1526, Timurid ruler Babur invaded northern India and conquered the sultanate, leading to its succession by the Mughal Empire.
The establishment of the Sultanate drew the Indian subcontinent more closely into international and multicultural Islamic social and economic networks, as seen concretely in the development of the Hindustani language and Indo-Islamic architecture.A. Welch, "Architectural Patronage and the Past: The Tughluq Sultans of India", Muqarnas 10, 1993, Brill Publishers, p. 311-322.J. A. Page, Guide to the Qutb, Delhi, Calcutta, 1927, p. 2-7. It was also one of the few powers to repel attacks by the Mongols (from the Chagatai Khanate) and saw the enthronement of one of the few female rulers in Islamic history, Razia Sultana (r. 1236 – 1240).Bowering et al., The Princeton Encyclopedia of Islamic Political Thought, , Princeton University Press The sultans generally accepted Hindu officials and vassals as well as native Muslims converted from Hinduism in the administration, and presented themselves as a paramount power instead of sovereigns, according to the Hindu political traditions. However, there were cases like Bakhtiyar Khalji's annexations, which involved a large-scale desecration of Hindu and Buddhist temples and the destruction of universities and libraries.Gul and Khan (2008)"Growth and Development of Oriental Libraries in India", Library Philosophy and Practice, University of Nebraska–LincolnRichard Eaton, , (2004) Mongolian raids on West and Central Asia set the scene for centuries of migration of fleeing soldiers, intelligentsia, mystics, traders, artists, and artisans from those regions into the subcontinent, thereby establishing Islamic culture there.
Name Although conventionally named after its principal capital city, Delhi, the terminology applied to the Delhi Sultanate was often not fixed. It was called the "Empire of Delhi" (Persian: Mamalik-i-Delhi) by Minhaj-i Siraj Juzjani and Ziauddin Barani, while Ibn Battuta referred to the empire under Muhammad bin Tughlaq as "Hind and Sind". The Delhi Sultanate was also known as the "Empire of Hindustan" (Persian: Mamalik-i-Hindustan), a name that gained currency during this period.
History Background
Like other agrarian societies in history, those in the Indian subcontinent have been attacked by nomadic tribes throughout its long history. The northwestern subcontinent was a frequent target of tribes raiding from Central Asia in the pre-Islamic era, and the Muslim intrusions and later Muslim invasions were not dissimilar to those of the earlier invasions during the 1st millennium.Richard M. Frye, "Pre-Islamic and Early Islamic Cultures in Central Asia", in Turko-Persia in Historical Perspective, ed. Robert L. Canfield (Cambridge University Press, c. 1991), 35-53.
The rise of the Delhi Sultanate in India was part of a wider trend affecting much of the Asian continent, including the whole of southern and western Asia: the influx of nomadic Turkic peoples from the Central Asian steppes that traces back to the 9th century when the Islamic Caliphate began fragmenting in the Middle East. Muslim rulers in rival states began enslaving non-Muslim nomadic Turks from the Central Asian steppes and raising many of them to become loyal army slaves called Mamluks. Soon, Turks were migrating to Muslim lands and becoming Islamicized. Many of the Turkic Mamluk slaves eventually rose to become rulers and conquered large parts of the Muslim world, establishing Mamluk Sultanates from Egypt to present-day Afghanistan, before turning their attention to the Indian subcontinent.
By 962 CE, Hindu and Buddhist kingdoms in South Asia faced a series of raids from Muslim armies from Central Asia.See: M. Reza Pirbha, Reconsidering Islam in a South Asian Context, , Brill The Islamic frontier in the East: Expansion into South Asia, Journal of South Asian Studies, 4(1), p. 91–109 Sookoohy M., Bhadreswar – Oldest Islamic Monuments in India, , Brill Academic; see discussion of earliest raids in Gujarat Among them was Mahmud of Ghazni, the son of a Turkic Mamluk military slave, who raided and plundered kingdoms in northern India from east of the Indus river to west of the Yamuna river seventeen times between 997 and 1030. Mahmud of Ghazni raided the treasuries but retreated each time, only extending Islamic rule into western Punjab.
The series of raids on northern and western Indian kingdoms by Muslim warlords continued after Mahmud of Ghazni. The raids did not establish or extend the permanent boundaries of the Islamic kingdoms. In contrast, the Ghurid Sultan Mu'izz ad-Din Muhammad Ghori (commonly known as Muhammad of Ghor) began a systematic war of expansion into northern India in 1173.MUHAMMAD B. SAM Mu'izz AL-DIN, T.W. Haig, Encyclopaedia of Islam, Vol. VII, ed. C.E.Bosworth, E.van Donzel, W.P. Heinrichs and C. Pellat, (Brill, 1993) He sought to carve out a principality for himself and expand the Islamic world.C.E. Bosworth, Tidge History of Iran, Vol. 5, ed. J. A. Boyle, John Andrew Boyle, (Cambridge University Press, 1968), p 161-170 Muhammad of Ghor created a Sunni Islamic kingdom of his own extending east of the Indus River, and he thus laid the foundation for the Muslim kingdom called the Delhi Sultanate. Some historians chronicle the Delhi Sultanate from 1192 due to the presence and geographical claims of Muhammad of Ghor in South Asia by that time.History of South Asia: A Chronological Outline Columbia University (2010)
Muhammad of Ghor was assassinated in 1206 by Isma'ili Shia Muslims.Muʿizz al-Dīn Muḥammad ibn Sām Encyclopædia Britannica (2011) After the assassination, one of Ghor's slaves (or Mamluks), the Turkic Qutb ud-Din Aibak, assumed power, becoming the first Sultan of Delhi.
Dynasties
Mamluk dynasty (1206–1290)
Qutb ud-Din Aibak, a former slave of Mu'izz ad-Din Muhammad Ghori, was the first ruler of the Delhi Sultanate. Aibak was of Turkic Cuman-Kipchak origin, and due to his background, the dynasty he founded is known as the Mamluk dynasty.Jackson P. (1990), The Mamlūk institution in early Muslim India, Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain & Ireland (New Series), 122(02), p. 340-358. Aibak reigned as the Sultan of Delhi for four years, from 1206 to 1210. He was praised by the contemporary and later accounts for his generosity and was known with the sobriquet of Lakhbaksh (provider of lakhs).
After Aibak died, Aram Shah assumed power in 1210, but he was assassinated in 1211 by Aibak's son-in-law, Shams ud-Din Iltutmish.C.E. Bosworth, The New Islamic Dynasties, Columbia University Press (1996) Iltutmish's power was precarious, and several Muslim amirs (nobles) challenged his authority as they had been supporters of Qutb al-Din Aibak. After a series of conquests and brutal executions of opposition, Iltutmish consolidated his power.Barnett & Haig (1926), A review of History of Mediaeval India, from ad 647 to the Mughal Conquest – Ishwari Prasad, Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain & Ireland (New Series), 58(04), p. 780-783
His rule was challenged several times, such as by Qubacha, and this led to a series of wars. Iltutmish conquered Multan and Bengal from contesting Muslim rulers, as well as Ranthambore and Sivalik from the Hindu rulers. He also attacked, defeated, and executed Taj al-Din Yildiz, who asserted his rights as heir to Mu'izz ad-Din Muhammad Ghori.Anzalone, Christopher (2008), "Delhi Sultanate", in Ackermann, M. E. etc. (Editors), Encyclopedia of World History 2, Iltutmish's rule lasted until 1236. Following his death, the Delhi Sultanate saw a succession of weak rulers, rebellious Muslim nobility, assassinations, and short-lived tenures. Power shifted from Rukn ud-Din Firuz to Razia Sultana and others, until Ghiyas ud-Din Balban came to power and ruled from 1266 to 1287. Ghiyasuddin Balban destroyed the power of the Corps of Forty, a council of usually forty Turkic slaves who had played a role as kingmakers and had been independent of the sultan. He was succeeded by 17-year-old Muiz ud-Din Qaiqabad, who appointed Jalal ud-Din Firuz Khalji as the commander of the army. Khalji assassinated Qaiqabad and assumed power in the Khalji Revolution, thus ending the Mamluk dynasty and founding the Khalji dynasty.
Qutb ud-Din Aibak initiated the construction of the Qutb Minar but died before it was completed. It was later completed by his son-in-law, Iltutmish. The Quwwat-ul-Islam (Might of Islam) Mosque was built by Aibak, now a UNESCO world heritage site. The Qutub Minar Complex was expanded by Iltutmish, and later by Ala ud-Din Khalji in the early 14th century.Qutb Minar and its Monuments, Delhi UNESCO During the Mamluk dynasty, many nobles from Afghanistan and Persia migrated and settled in India, as West Asia came under Mongol onslaught.
Khalji dynasty (1290–1320)
The Khalji dynasty was of Turko-Afghan heritage. They were originally Turkic, but due to their long presence in Afghanistan, they were treated by others as Afghan as they adopted Afghan habits and customs.
The first ruler of the Khalji dynasty was Jalal ud-Din Firuz Khalji. He was around 70 years old at the time of his ascension and was known as a mild-mannered, humble and kind monarch to the general public. Jalal ud-Din Firuz ruled for 6 years before he was murdered in 1296 by Muhammad Salim of Samana, on the orders of his nephew and son-in-law Juna Muhammad Khalji, who later came to be known as Ala ud-Din Khalji.