Kannauj

"Kanauj, writes he (Alberuni), was “a very large place”, but “most of it is now in ruins and desolate”. He thus confirms the statement of AI Masudi, quoted earlier, that at one time Kanauj was very populous and prosperous, but he knew of its destruction in 1018-19 ; hence the remark."

"Then a scion of the Gupta line, Harsha-Vardhana, recaptured northern India, built a capital at Kanauj, and for forty-two years gave peace and security to a wide realm, in which once more native arts and letters flourished. We may conjecture the size, splendor and prosperity of Kanauj from the one unbelievable item that when the Moslems sacked it (1018 A.D.) they destroyed 10,000 temples. Its fine public gardens and free bathing tanks were but a small part of the beneficence of the new dynasty."

"Kinnouge, before the period of the Mahometan conquest, ranked amongst the most populous and opulent cities of Hindostan. It is mentioned in testimony of its grandeur, that Kinnouge contained thirty thousand shops for the sale of betle and afforded employment for six thousand female dancers and musicians. – A vast mass of ruins interspersed through a wide space, marks the ancient extent and grandeur of Kinnouge; though few distinct vestiges now exist, except some parts of a stone temple erected in ancient times to the honour of Setah, the wife of Ram, which has been exorcised by some zealous Mahometan, and converted into a place of worship."

"The Sultan advanced to the fortifications of Kanauj, which consisted of seven distinct forts, washed by the Ganges which flowed under them like the ocean. In Kanauj there were nearly ten thousand temples, which the idolaters falsely and absurdly represented to have been founded by their ancestors two or three hundred thousand years ago. They worshipped and offered their vows and supplications to them in consequence of their great antiquity. Many of the inhabitants of the place fled and were scattered abroad like so many wretched widows and orphans, from the fear which oppressed them, in consequence of witnessing the fate of their deaf and dumb idols. Many of them thus effected their escape, and those who did not fly were put to death. The Sultan took all seven forts in one day, and gave his soldiers leave to plunder them and take prisoners."

"Mahmud broke temples and desecrated idols wherever he went. The number of temples destroyed by him during his campaigns is so large that a detailed list is neither possible nor necessary. However, he concentrated more on razing renowned temples to bring glory to Islam rather than waste time on small ones. Some famous temples destroyed by him may be noted here. At Thaneshwar, the temple of Chakraswamin was sacked and its bronze image of Vishnu was taken to Ghazni to be thrown into the hippodrome of the city. Similarly, the magnificent central temple of Mathura was destroyed and its idols broken. At Mathura there was no armed resistance; the people had fled, and Mahmud had been greatly impressed with the beauty and grandeur of the shrines. And yet the temples in the city were thoroughly sacked. Kanauj had a large number of temples (Utbi’s ‘ten thousand’ merely signifies a large number), some of great antiquity. Their destruction was made easy by the flight of those who were not prepared either to die or embrace Islam. Somnath shared the fate of Chakraswamin."

"When Muhammad later took Kanauj, in A. D. 1017, he took so much booty and so many prisoners that the fingers of those who counted them would have tired '."

"While describing ‘the conquest of Kanauj’, Utbi sums up the situation thus: ‘The Sultan levelled to the ground every fort…, and the inhabitants of them either accepted Islam, or took up arms against him.” ...According to Nizamuddin Ahmad, ‘Islam spread in this part of the country by the consent of the people and the influence of force’."

"From that place the Sultan proceeded to a certain city, which was accounted holy by the people of the country. In that city the men of Ghaznin saw so many strange and wonderful things, that to tell them or to write a description of them is not easy' In short, the Sultan Mahmud having possessed himself of the booty, burned their idol temples and proceeded towards Kanauj.....The Ghaznivids found in these forts and their dependencies 10,000 idol temples, and they ascertained the vicious belief of the Hindus to be, that since the erection of these buildings no less than three or four hundred thousand years had elapsed. Sultan Mahmud during this expedition achieved many other conquests after he left Kanauj, and sent to hell many of the infidels with blows of the well tempered sword. Such a number of slaves were assembled in that great camp, that the price of a single one did not exceed ten dirhams."

"Kanauj was the capital of Hind, which the infidels regarded as their pole-star."

"The author's colleagues felt that he was being unduly mild while describing a major molestation of Hindu civilisation. They promptly showed the author Volume I of Cunningham's report. The author cannot help quoting, however sparingly, from what the most outstanding archaeologist of India reported: The Jama or Dina Masjid of Kanoj is cited by Fergusson (James Fergusson was a British architect who surveyed many buildings in north India during the 19th century) as a specimen of Hindu cloisters, which has been rearranged to suit the purposes of Muhammadan worship; and in this opinion I most fully concur ... it must originally have been the site of some Hindu building of considerable importance. This conclusion is partly confirmed by the traditions of the temple, who, however, most absurdly call the place Sita-ka-Rasui, or "Sita 's kitchen" ... When I first visited Kanoj in January 1838, the arrangement of the pillars was somewhat different from what I found in November 1862. The cloisters which originally extended all round the square, are now confined to the masjid itself, that is, to the west side only. This change is said to have been made by a Muhammadan Tahsildar shortly before 1857. The same individual is also accused of having destroyed all the remains of figures that had been built into the walls of the Jama and Makhdum Jahaniya masjids ... Also, the inscription over the doorway is said to have been removed at the same time for the purpose of cutting off a Hindu figure on the back of it. I recovered this inscription by sending for the present Tahsildar. The Gazetteer of Farrukhabad district edited and compiled by E.R. Neave, 15 ICS, 1911, is even more forthright. To quote: The iconoclastic fury of Mahmud Ghazni swept awa~ all the Hindu religious edifices of dates anterior to the tenth century, and later buildings of any size or importance are almost exclusively Muhammdan ... A luckily preserved copy of the much obliterated inscription over the entrance doorway shows that it was by Ibrahim Shah of Jaunpur that the building was regenerated in 1406 AD."

"An observation or two about the surviving Makhdum Jahaniya is necessary if an archaeological highlight is not to be missed in our report on Kannauj. The mosquecum- tomb is situated on a lofty mound or a peak, in what has come to be known as the Sikhana Mahalla. Apart from what has been briefly mentioned earlier, there is little that is noteworthy except what Cunningham reported. When he visited, there was inscribed on a panel on the back wall the name of Allah on a tablet suspended by a rope. He goes on: The appearance of the tablet and rope is so like that of the Hindu bell and chain that one is almost tempted to believe that the Muhammadan architect must have simply chiselled away the bolder points of the Hindu ornament to suit his own design. Incidentally, he goes on to say that during his 1838 visit: I had found a broken figure of Shasti, the goddess of fecundity, and a pedestal with a short inscription, dated in Sam vat 119 3, or A.D. 113 6. The people also affirm that a large statue formerly stood under a tree close by. All of these are now gone, but the fact that two of them were built into the entrance steps is sufficient to show that the mound on which the masjid stands must once have been the site of some important Hindu building. Moved by the rampant destruction that he saw as well as surmised, towards the end of his report on Kannauj, Cunningham says: The probable position of these Brahmanical temples was on the high mound ofMakhdum Jahaniya, in the Sikhana Mahalla which is about 700 feet to the south of the last mentioned mound in the Bhatpuri Mahalla. That this mound was the site of one or more Brahmanical temples seems almost certain from my discovery of a figure of Shasti, the goddess of fecundity, and of a pedestal. bearing the date of Sam vat 119 3 or AD 113 6."

"In AD 1016, when Mahmud of Ghazni approached Kanoj, the historian relates that he there saw a city which raised its head to the skies, and which in strength and structure might justly boast to have no equal. Just one century earlier, or in AD 915, Kanoj is mentioned by Masudi as the capital of one of the Kings of India, and about AD 900 Abu Zaid, on the authority of Ibn Wahab, calls Kaduge, a great city in the kingdom ofGozar. At a still earlier date in AD 634, we have the account of the Chinese pilgrim Hwen Thasang, who describes Kanoj as being 20 li, or three and a quarter miles, in length, and 4 or 5 li, or three quarter of a mile, in breadth. The city was surrounded by strong walls and deep ditches, and was washed by the Ganges along its eastern face. The last fact is corroborated by Fa Hian, who states that the city touched the River Heng (Ganges) when he visited it in AD 400. Kanoj is also mentioned by Ptolemy, about AD 140, as Kanogiza. But the earliest notice of the place is undoubtedly the old familiar legend of the Puranas, which refers the Sanskrit name ofKanya-Kubja, or the hump-backed maiden to the curse of the sage Vayu on the hundred daughters of Kusanabha."

"Having read what was said by Cunningham as well as Neave, it would be useful to also see what Stanley Lane-Poole, wrote: Sultan Mahmud Ghazni fought his greatest campaign in 1018, and pushed further east than ever before. He marched upon Kanauj, the capital of the To mara rajas and then reputed the chief city of Hindus tan. The march was an orgy and an ovation... Kanauj was reached before Christmas. The raja had already fled at the mere bruit of the sultan's coming, and the seven forts of the great city on the Ganges fell in one day. Of all its gorgeous shrines not a temple was spared. Nor were the neighbouring princes more fortunate. 174 years later came another cataclysm this time perpetrated by Muhammad Ghauri in 1192. The Rathorsjled south to found a new principality at Marwar, and Kanauj and Benares became part of the empire of Ghor."

"In the year 409 H. (1018-19 A.D.), during the season of flowery spring, when the days and nights are equal, when the lord of vegetation leads his army of verdure and of odoriferous herbs over the deserts and gardens, and when from the temperature of the air of Ardibihisht,. and from the blowing of the morning breeze, he has subdued the citadels of the green rose-buds, Yaminu-d daula again formed the resolution of warring against the infidels of Hindustan. With an excellent anny of 20,000 volunteers, who, for the sake of obtaining the reward of making war upon infidels, had joined the mighty camp, he marched towards Kanauj, which was distant a three months journey. In the middle of his way he came upon an impregnable fort, which was the residence of a certain king possessed of bravery in war. When that [p. 152] king saw the multitudes of the warriors of the religion of the chief of the righteous, having come to the foot of the fort, he confessed the unity of God. .... The Sultan then directed his steps towards a fort which was in the possession of a certain infidel named Kulchand. Kulchand fought with the faithful, but the infidels were defeated; and Kulchand, through excessive ignorance, having drawn his dagger, first killed his wife and then plunged it into his own breast, and thus went to hell. Out of the country of Kulchand the dependents of Yaminu-d daula obtained 185 elephants. .... From that place the Sultan proceeded to a certain city, which was accounted holy by the people of the country. In that city the men of Ghaznin saw so many strange and wonderful things, that to tell them or to write a description of them is no easy matter. There were a hundred palaces made of stone and marble, and the Sultan, in writing a description of these buildings to the nobles at Ghaznin, said “that if anyone wished to make palaces like these, even if he expended a hundred thousand times thousand dinars, and employed experienced superintendents for 200 years, even then they would not be finished. Again, they found five idols of the purest gold, in the eyes of each of which there were placed two rubies, and each of these rubies was worth 50,000 dinars: in another idol there were sapphires, which weighed 600 drachms. The number of silver idols upon the spot was more than 100.5 In short, Sultan Mahmud, having possessed himself of the booty, burned their idol-temples, and proceeded towards Kanauj.... Jaipal, who was the King of Kanauj, hearing of the Sultan’s approach, fled, and on the 18th of Sha’ban, of [p. 153] the year above mentioned, Yaminu-d daula, having arrived in that country, saw on the banks of the Ganges seven forts, like those of Khalbar, but, as they were destitute of brave men, he subdued them in one day. The Ghaznivides found in these forts and their dependencies 10,000 idol-temples, and they ascertained the vicious belief of the Hindus to be, that since the erection of those buildings no less than three or four hundred thousand years had elapsed. Sultan Mahmud during this expedition achieved many other conquests after he left Kanauj,6 and sent to hell many of the infidels with blows of the well-tempered sword. Such a number of slaves were assembled in that great camp, that the price of a single one did not exceed ten dirhams."

"Kanauj was the most important of the religious centres of early medieval India, the brahmanical capital of Madhyadesha, a very large city, consisting of seven fortresses (qilii', qal'ajiit), with a total of 10,000 'idolhouses' (buyut al-asniim, butkhiinahii), 'in which enormous treasure was collected', on the west bank of the Ganges, where 'kings and brahmans' (riiyiin-o-bariihima) from far away came to seek religious liberation and do worship 'in the tradition of their ancestors' (bi-taqlZd-i-asliij).141 'Utbi refers to the Kanauj ruler as 'the chief (muqaddam) of the kings of Hind'. It was, in effect, the capital of the Gurjara Pratiharas from 815 to 1019 AD, when it was sacked by Mahmud. By then the dynasty was already powerless. But Kanauj may well have been the wealthiest of Indian cities still. When the Muslim army approached, most of the inhabitants had taken refuge 'with the gods', i.e. in the temples. The city was taken possession of in one day, and emptied of its treasure. The 'idols' were destroyed; the 'infidels', 'worshipers of the sun and fire' Cubbiid ash-shams wa-l-niir), fleeing, were pursued by the Muslims, and great numbers of them were killed. Kanauj probably never recovered its status as sacred capital of the brahmans. In Biruni's time, Kanauj was still in ruins, and the reigning king had removed himself to the town of Bari, east of the Ganges. Later in the eleventh and twelfth century the city revived under a northern branch of the Rashtrakutas and then the Gahadavalas; it ceased to be of any real importance by 1193 AD, when the last of the Gahadavala kings was defeated."

"The Mosque at Qanauj : This mosque stands on an elevated ground inside the Fort of Qanauj. It is well-known that it was built on the foundations of some Hindu temple (that stood) here. It is a beautiful mosque. They say that it was built by Ibrahim Sharqi in H. 809 as is (recorded) in ‘Gharabat Nigar’."