Read Online The Age of Wrath: A History of the Delhi Sultanate by Abraham Eraly - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Abraham Eraly
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According to Al-Utbi an army he once deployed in Central Asia consisted of ‘Turks, Indians, Khaljis, Afghans and Ghaznavids.’ It is significant that Mahmud was as ruthless in his fight against Muslims of the ‘heretic’ Ismaili sect as he was in his fight against Hindus, and he had no qualms whatever about destroying the centuries-old Muslim kingdom of Multan, massacring a large number of Ismailis there, desecrating their mosques, and, as Al-Utbi reports, in levying from them ‘20,000,000 dirhams with which to alleviate their sins.’
Religious fervour evidently subserved Mahmud’s temporal goals of amassing booty and expanding his power. As for his soldiers, the prospect of booty was undoubtedly their primary motive, though it was religious frenzy and bloodlust that galvanized them. Often, in a single raid into India, they obtained several times more wealth than they could have ever dreamed of acquiring in a whole lifetime of mundane toil. Apart from material treasures, the Turks also seized a large number of people in India—men, women and children—for serving them as slaves, or for selling them to slave traders back home.
WARS EVERYWHERE IN the medieval world were savage. Mahmud’s Indian campaigns were particularly so. This savagery was often deliberately inflamed by Mahmud, as it served the dual purpose of rousing the ferocity of his soldiers, and of terrifying the enemy. These were the major factors that enabled Mahmud to be invariably victorious in his battles—and those victories in turn endowed him with an aura of invincibility, so that his adversaries often fled on his very approach, as before a tornado of fire. And this craven flight of adversaries in turn boosted the self-confidence of Mahmud and his soldiers, and they came to regard themselves as invincible. And indeed, they became invincible.
Sometimes, when confronted with an overwhelming enemy force, Mahmud prostrated on the ground ardently praying for god’s help—and that, whether god intervened or not, did ignite the valour of his soldiers, so they won the ensuing battle. Mahmud however was not a reckless adventurer. His raids, for all their seeming impetuosity, were not random, impulsive acts, but were all very carefully planned, after meticulously gathering information about his adversaries by sending spies to scout them out. And he avoided needless risks.On one occasion, during his 1008 campaign against Shahi king Anandapala, son of Jayapala, he lay entrenched before the enemy for as many as forty days, unwilling to risk launching an attack against the vast enemy horde, but sought to provoke Anandapala to attack, which he unwisely did in the end, and was routed. It was this potent combination of caution, meticulous planning, and faith-driven battlefield ferocity that made Mahmud invincible.
There is a good amount of information on Mahmud and his campaigns in medieval Arabic and Persian chronicles, which are generally reliable in recording the broad sweep of events in his life. But some of the details in the chronicles are suspect. The accounts of the havoc caused by Mahmud in India, and of the amount of booty he seized there, often seem exaggerated in the chronicles, evidently to glorify the heroism and religious fervour of the sultan. For instance, in one campaign he is said to have taken, apart from a vast amount of treasure, 380 elephants and 53,000 captives. And in another campaign he is reported to have captured 500 elephants! Similarly, the slaughter attributed to Mahmud is often preposterous—15,000 in one battle, 20,000 in another battle, and, most incredible of all, 50,000 in the temple town of Somnath—all that with sword and spear and arrows, in battles that usually lasted just a few hours!
But even if we discount the exaggeration in these accounts, it cannot be denied that Mahmud’s raids were horrendous orgies of animal ferocity. Ghaznavids killed not only the enemy soldiers, but also common folks in countless numbers.
Religious fervour evidently subserved Mahmud’s temporal goals of amassing booty and expanding his power. As for his soldiers, the prospect of booty was undoubtedly their primary motive, though it was religious frenzy and bloodlust that galvanized them. Often, in a single raid into India, they obtained several times more wealth than they could have ever dreamed of acquiring in a whole lifetime of mundane toil. Apart from material treasures, the Turks also seized a large number of people in India—men, women and children—for serving them as slaves, or for selling them to slave traders back home.
WARS EVERYWHERE IN the medieval world were savage. Mahmud’s Indian campaigns were particularly so. This savagery was often deliberately inflamed by Mahmud, as it served the dual purpose of rousing the ferocity of his soldiers, and of terrifying the enemy. These were the major factors that enabled Mahmud to be invariably victorious in his battles—and those victories in turn endowed him with an aura of invincibility, so that his adversaries often fled on his very approach, as before a tornado of fire. And this craven flight of adversaries in turn boosted the self-confidence of Mahmud and his soldiers, and they came to regard themselves as invincible. And indeed, they became invincible.
Sometimes, when confronted with an overwhelming enemy force, Mahmud prostrated on the ground ardently praying for god’s help—and that, whether god intervened or not, did ignite the valour of his soldiers, so they won the ensuing battle. Mahmud however was not a reckless adventurer. His raids, for all their seeming impetuosity, were not random, impulsive acts, but were all very carefully planned, after meticulously gathering information about his adversaries by sending spies to scout them out. And he avoided needless risks.On one occasion, during his 1008 campaign against Shahi king Anandapala, son of Jayapala, he lay entrenched before the enemy for as many as forty days, unwilling to risk launching an attack against the vast enemy horde, but sought to provoke Anandapala to attack, which he unwisely did in the end, and was routed. It was this potent combination of caution, meticulous planning, and faith-driven battlefield ferocity that made Mahmud invincible.
There is a good amount of information on Mahmud and his campaigns in medieval Arabic and Persian chronicles, which are generally reliable in recording the broad sweep of events in his life. But some of the details in the chronicles are suspect. The accounts of the havoc caused by Mahmud in India, and of the amount of booty he seized there, often seem exaggerated in the chronicles, evidently to glorify the heroism and religious fervour of the sultan. For instance, in one campaign he is said to have taken, apart from a vast amount of treasure, 380 elephants and 53,000 captives. And in another campaign he is reported to have captured 500 elephants! Similarly, the slaughter attributed to Mahmud is often preposterous—15,000 in one battle, 20,000 in another battle, and, most incredible of all, 50,000 in the temple town of Somnath—all that with sword and spear and arrows, in battles that usually lasted just a few hours!
But even if we discount the exaggeration in these accounts, it cannot be denied that Mahmud’s raids were horrendous orgies of animal ferocity. Ghaznavids killed not only the enemy soldiers, but also common folks in countless numbers.
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