The next expedition (1025) is the most famous of all. The point to which it was directed was the temple of Somnath on the coast of the Gujarāt peninsula. After an arduous journey by Multan, and through part of Rajputana, he reached Somnath, and met with a very vigorous but fruitless resistance on the part of the Hindus of Gujarāt. Moslem feet soon trod the courts of the great temple. The chief object of worship it contained was broken up, and the fragments kept to be carried off to Ghazni. The story is often told of the hollow figure, cleft by Mahmud’s battle-axe, pouring out great store of costly jewels and gold. But the idol in this Sivite temple was only a tall block or pillar of hewn stone, of a familiar kind. The popular legend is a very natural one. Mahmud, it was well known, made Hindu temples yield up their most precious things. He was a determined idol-breaker. And the stone block in this temple was enriched with a crown of jewels, the gifts of wealthy worshippers. These data readily give the Somnath exploit its more dramatic form. For the more recent story of the Somnath gates see [Somnath].
After the successes at Somnath, Mahmud remained some months in India before returning to Ghazni. Then in 1026 he crossed the Indus once more into the Punjab. His brilliant military career closed with an expedition to Persia, in the third year after this, his last, visit to India. The Indian campaigns of Mahmud and his father were almost, but not altogether, unvarying successes. The Moslem historians touch lightly on reverses. And, although the annals of Rajputana tell how Sabuktagīn was defeated by one raja of Ajmere and Mahmud by his successor, the course of events which followed shows how little these and other reverses affected the invader’s progress. Mahmud’s failure at Ajmere, when the brave raja Bisal-deo obliged him to raise the siege but was himself slain, was when the Moslem army was on its way to Somnath. Yet Mahmud’s Indian conquests, striking and important in themselves, were, after all, in great measure barren, except to the Ghazni treasury. Mahmud retained no possessions in India under his own direct rule. But after the repeated defeats, by his father and himself, of two successive rajas of Lahore, the conqueror assumed the right of nominating the governors of the Punjab as a dependency of Ghazni, a right which continued to be exercised by seven of his successors. And for a time, in the reign of Masa‘ud II. (1098-1114), Lahore was the place of residence of the Ghaznevid sovereign.
Mahmud died at Ghazni in 1030, the year following his expedition to Persia. He is conspicuous for his military ardour, his ambition, strong will, perseverance, watchfulness and energy, combined with great courage and unbounded self-reliance. But his tastes were not exclusively military. His love of literature brought men of learning to Ghazni, and his acquaintance with Moslem theology was recognized by the learned doctors.
The principal histories of Mahmud’s reign are—Kitāb-i-Yamīnī (Utbi); Tarīkh-us-Subuktigīn (Baihaki); Tabakāt i Nasiri (Minhāj el-Sirāj); Rauzat-us-Safa (Mir Khond); Habīb-us-Sivar (Khondamir). See Elliot, History of India; Elphinstone, History of India; and Roos-Keppel’s translation of the Tarīkh-i-Sultan Mahmūd-i-Ghaznavi (1901).
[1] The name is strictly Maḥmūd.
MAHOBA, an ancient town in India, in Hamirpur district of the United Provinces. Pop. (1901), 10,074. As the capital of the Chandel dynasty, who ruled over Bundelkhand from the 9th to the 13th century, the neighbourhood is covered with architectural antiquities, prominent among which are artificial lakes, formed by banking up valleys with masonry dams. The largest of these is more than 4 m. in circuit.
MAHOGANY, a dark-coloured wood largely used for household furniture, the product of a large tree indigenous to Central America and the West Indies. It was originally received from Jamaica; 521,300 ft. were exported from that island in 1753. It is known botanically as Swietenia Mahogani, and is a member of the order Meliaceae. It bears compound leaves, resembling those of the ash, and clusters of small flowers, with five sepals and petals and ten stamens which are united into a tube. The fruit is a pear-shaped woody capsule, and contains many winged seeds. The dark-coloured bark has been considered a febrifuge, and the seeds were used by the ancient Aztecs with oil for a cosmetic, but the most valuable product is the timber, first noticed by the carpenter on board Sir Walter Raleigh’s ship in 1595 for its great beauty, hardness and durability. Dr Gibbons brought it into notice as well adapted for furniture in the early part of the 18th century, and its use as a cabinet wood was first practically established by a cabinet-maker named Wollaston, who was employed by Gibbons to work up some mahogany brought to England by his brother. It was introduced into India in 1795, and is now cultivated in Bengal and as far north as Saharunpur.