[6] Translations of its two much-admired Persian inscriptions are given below pages 370–371. [↑]
[7] On the Tárápúr gateway a Persian inscription of the reign of the emperor Akbar (a.d. 1556–1605) states that the royal road that passed through this gateway was repaired by Táhir Muhammad Hasan Imád-ud-dín. [↑]
[8] The Persian references and extracts in this section are contributed by Khán Sáheb Fazl-ul-láh Lutfulláh Farídi of Surat. [↑]
[9] Sir John Malcolm in Eastwick’s Handbook of the Panjáb, 119. This reference has not been traced. Farishtah (Elliot, VI. 563) says Mándu was built by Anand Dev of the Bais tribe, who was a contemporary of Khusrao Parwíz the Sassanian (a.d. 591–621). [↑]
[10] The date is uncertain. Compare Elphinstone’s History, 323; Briggs’ Farishtah, I. 210–211; Tabakát-i-Násiri in Elliot, II. 328. The conquest of Mándu in a.d. 1227 is not Mándu in Málwa as Elphinstone and Briggs supposed, but Mandúr in the Siwálik Hills. See Elliot, Vol. II. page 325 Note 1. The Persian text of Farishtah (I. 115), though by mistake calling it Mándu (not Mándu), notes that it was the Mandu in the Siwálik hills. The poetical date-script also terms it Biládi-Siwálik or the Siwálik countries. The date of the conquest of the Siwálik Mándu by Altamsh is given by Farishtah (Ditto) as a.h. 624 (a.d. 1226). The conquest of Málwa by Altamsh, the taking by him of Bhilsah and Ujjain, and the destruction of the temple of Maha Káli and of the statue or image of Bikramájit are given as occurring in a.h. 631 (a.d. 1233). The Mirăt-i-Sikandari (Persian Text, 13) notices an expedition made in a.d. 1395 by Zafar Khán (Muzaffar I. of Gujarát) against a Hindu chief of Mándu, who, it was reported, was oppressing the Musalmáns. A siege of more than twelve months failed to capture the fort. [↑]
[11] Briggs’ Farishtah, IV. 170. [↑]
[12] Briggs’ Farishtah, IV. 168. According to the Wákiăt-i-Mushtáki (Elliot, IV. 553) Diláwar Khán, or as the writer calls him Amín Sháh, through the good offices of a merchant whom he had refrained from plundering obtained the grant of Mándu, which was entirely desolate. The king sent a robe and a horse, and Amín gave up walking and took to riding. He made his friends ride, enlisted horsemen, and promoted the cultivation of the country (Elliot, IV. 552). Farishtah (Pers. Text, II. 460–61) states that when Sultán Muhammad, the son of Fírúz Tughlak, made Khwájah Sarwar his chief minister with the title of Khwájah Jehán, and gave Zafar Khán the viceroyalty of Gujarát and Khizr Khán that of Multán, he sent Diláwar Khán to be governor of Málwa. In another passage Farishtah (II. 461) states that one of Diláwar’s grandfathers, Sultán Shaháb-ud-dín, came from Ghor and took service in the court of the Dehli Sultáns. His son rose to be an Amír, and his grandson Diláwar Khán, in the time of Sultán Fírúz, became a leading nobleman, and in the reign of Muhammad, son of Fírúz, obtained Málwa in fief. When the power of the Tughlaks went to ruin Diláwar assumed the royal emblems of the umbrella and the red-tent. [↑]
[13] Diláwar Khán Ghori, whose original name was Husein, was one of the grandsons of Sultán Shaháb-ud-dín Muhammad bin Sám. He was one of the nobles of Muhammad, the son of Fírúz Tughlak, who after the death of that monarch, settled in and asserted his power over Málwa. (Pers. Text Faristah, II. 460). The emperor Jehángír (who calls him Âmíd Sháh Ghori) attributes to him the construction of the fort of Dhár. He says (Memoirs Pers. Text, 201–202): Dhár is one of the oldest cities of India. Rája Bhoj, one of the famous ancient Hindu kings, lived in this city. From his time up to this a thousand years have passed. Dhár was also the capital of the Muhammadan rulers of Málwa. When Sultán Muhammad Tughlak (a.d. 1325) was on his way to the conquest of the Dakhan he built a cut-stone fort on a raised site. Its outline is very elegant and beautiful, but the space inside is empty of buildings. Âmíd Sháh Ghori, known as Diláwar Khán, who in the days of Sultán Muhammad the son of Sultán Fírúz, king of Dehli, gained the independent rule of Málwa, built outside this fort an assembly mosque, which has in front of it fixed in the ground a four-cornered iron column about four feet round. When Sultán Bahádur of Gujarát took Málwa (a.d. 1530–31) he wished to carry this column to Gujarát. In digging it up the pillar fell and broke in two, one piece measuring twenty-two feet the other thirteen feet. As it was lying here uncared-for, I (Jehángír) ordered the big piece to be carried to Ágra to be put up in the courtyard of the shrine of him whose abode is the heavenly throne (Akbar), to be utilised as a lamp post. The mosque has two gates. In front of the arch of one gate they have fixed a stone tablet engraved with a prose passage to the effect that Âhmíd Sháh Ghori in the year H. 808 (a.d. 1405) laid the foundation of this mosque. On the other arch they have written a poetic inscription of which the following verses are a part:
The liege lord of the world.
The star of the sphere of glory.