History Of India

"The conclusions of modern science are the very conclusions the Vedanta reached ages ago; only in modern science they are written in the language of matter. Today we find wonderful discoveries of modern science coming upon us like bolts from the blue, opening our eyes to marvels we never dreamt of. But many of these are only re-discoveries of what had been found ages ago. ... All science is bound to this conclusion in the long run. Manifestation, and not creation, is the word of science today, and the Hindu is only glad that what he has been cherishing in his bosom for ages is going to be taught in more forcible language, and with further light from the latest conclusions of science."

"Indian students should value their religious culture and of course, the classical Indian culture bears importantly on the meaning of life and values. I would not separate the two. To separate science and Indian culture would be harmful … I don’t think it is practical to keep scientific and spiritual culture separate."

"In the West they learnt from Plato and Aristotle and in India “Arab scholars sat at the feet of Buddhist monks and Brahman Pandits to learn philosophy, astronomy, mathematics, medicine, chemistry and other subjects.” Caliph Mansur’s (754-76) zeal for learning attracted many Hindu scholars to the Abbasid court. A deputation of Sindhi representatives in 771 C.E. presented many treatises to the Caliph and the Brahma Siddhanta of Brahmagupta and his Khanda-Khadyaka, works on the science of astronomy, were translated by Ibrahim al-Fazari into Arabic with the help of Indian scholars in Baghdad. The Barmak (originally Buddhist Pramukh) family of ministers who had been converted to Islam and served under the Khilafat of Harun-ur-Rashid (786-808 C.E.) sent Muslim scholars to India and welcomed Hindu scholars to Baghdad. Once when Caliph Harun-ur-Rashid suffered from a serious disease which baffled his physicians, he called for an Indian physician, Manka (Manikya), who cured him. Manka settled at Baghdad, was attached to the hospital of the Barmaks, and translated several books from Sanskrit into Persian and Arabic. Many Indian physicians like Ibn Dhan and Salih, reputed to be descendants of Dhanapti and Bhola respectively, were superintendents of hospitals at Baghdad. Indian medical works of Charak, Sushruta, the Ashtangahrdaya, the Nidana, the Siddhayoga, and other works on diseases of women, poisons and their antidotes, drugs, intoxicants, nervous diseases etc. were translated into Pahlavi and Arabic during the Abbasid Caliphate. Such works helped the Muslims in extending their knowledge about numerals and medicine."

"It was India, not Greece, that taught Islam in the impressionable years of its youth, formed its philosophy and esoteric religious ideals, and inspired its most characteristic expression in literature, art and architecture."

"Fakhr-i-Mudabbir gives primacy to the bow and the sword as the most effective weapons of the horseman. Both these weapons were of different varieties. Among them all, the Hindu sword was the best and most lustrous (gawhardartar). Their export to such distant areas as Ummayad Spain and Seljuq Anatolia too is attested. He also declares that there is no better lance than the Indian."

"The skill of the Indian in the production of delicate woven fabrics ... in all manner of technical arts has from very early times enjoyed worldwide celebrity."

"We catch a glimpse of the great river of science which never ceases to flow in India. For India has carried and scattered the data of intellectual progress for the whole world, ever since the pre-Buddhist period when she produced the Sankhya philosophy and the atomic theory."

"Although it would seem as if we had already furnished sufficient proofs that modern science has little or no reason to boast of originality, yet before closing this volume we will adduce a few more to place the matter beyond doubt... In the famous and recent work of Christna et le Christ, we find the following tabulation: [...]"Mathematics.--They invented the decimal system, algebra, the differential, integral, and infinitesimal calculi. They also discovered geometry and trigonometry, and in these two sciences they constructed and proved theorems which were only discovered in Europe as late as the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries[...] [...]"Chemistry.--They knew the composition of water, and formulated for gases the famous law, which we know only from yesterday, that the volumes of gas are in inverse ratio to the pressures that they support. They knew how to prepare sulphuric, nitric, and muriatic acids; the oxides of copper, iron, lead, tin, and zinc; the sulphurets of iron, copper, mercury, antimony, and arsenic; the sulphates of zinc and iron; the carbonates of iron, lead, and soda; nitrate of silver; and powder. "Medicine.--Their knowledge was truly astonishing. In Tcharaka and Sousruta, the two princes of Hindu medicine, is laid down the system which Hippocrates appropriated later. Sousruta notably enunciates the principles of preventive medicine or hygiene, which he places much above curative medicine--too often, according to him, empyrical. Are we more advanced to-day? It is not without interest to remark that the Arab physicians, who enjoyed a merited celebrity in the middle ages--Averroes among others--constantly spoke of the Hindu physicians, and regarded them as the initiators of the Greeks and themselves. [...]"Surgery.--In this they are not less remarkable. They made the operation for the stone, succeeded admirably in the operation for cataract, and the extraction of the foetus, of which all the unusual or dangerous cases are described by Tcharaka with an extraordinary scientific accuracy. [...]"Architecture.--They seem to have exhausted all that the genius of man is capable of conceiving. Domes, inexpressibly bold; tapering cupolas; minarets, with marble lace; Gothic towers; Greek hemicycles; polychrome style--all kinds and all epochs are there, betokening the origin and date of the different colonies, which, in emigrating, carried with them their souvenirs of their native art." Such were the results attained by this ancient and imposing Brahmanical civilization.... Beside the discoverers of geometry and algebra, the constructors of human speech, the parents of philosophy, the primal expounders of religion, the adepts in psychological and physical science, how even the greatest of our biologists and theologians seem dwarfed! Name to us any modern discovery, and we venture to say, that Indian history need not long be searched before the prototype will be found of record."

"In the time of Alexander, says Garrison, "Hindu physicians and surgeons enjoyed a well-deserved reputation for superior knowledge and skill," and even Aristotle is believed by some students to have been indebted to them."

"Sushruta described many surgical operations cataract, hernia, lithotomy, Caesarian section, etc. and 121 surgical instruments, including lancets, sounds, forceps, catheters, and rectal and vaginal speculums. Despite Brahmanical prohibitions he advocated the dissection of dead bodies as indispensable in the training of surgeons. He was the first to graft upon a torn ear portions of skin taken from another part of the body; and from him and his Hindu successors rhinoplasty the surgical reconstruction of the nose descended into modern medicine. "The ancient Hindus," says Garrison, "performed almost every major opera- tion except ligation of the arteries.""

"In the Vedic Age, India was very religious, but it was also ahead of the rest in mathematics and astronomy. Thus, the geometry of the Shulba Sutras, geometrical appendices to the manuals of ritual (Shrauta Sutras), include the oldest known formulation of the theorem named after Pythagoras, developed in the context of Vedic altar-building. Modern Hindus are fond of recalling this scientific element in their tradition, e.g. by quoting Carl Sagan: “Hindu cosmology gives a time-scale for the earth and the universe which is consonant with that of modern scientific cosmology”, as opposed to the limited Biblical-Quranic cosmology, which was protected against more far-sighted alternatives by a vigilant religious orthodoxy."

"In order to instill a proper and well-founded pride in Hindus, it is (once more) most important to restore the truth about Hindu history, especially about Hindu society's glorious achievements. In technology, it cannot match China, which was the world leader until a mere three, four centuries ago. But in abstract sciences like linguistics, logic, mathematics, Hindu culture has been the chief pioneer. In psychology, it is still unsurpassed, though this is not yet fully recognized in the West, the part of the world that still arbitrates on what can count as rational and scientific."

"Said the great and magnanimous Laplace: 'It is India that gave us the ingenious method of expressing all numbers by ten symbols, each receiving a value of position as well as an absolute value; a profound and important idea which appears so simple to us now that we ignore its true merit. But its very simplicity, the great ease which it has lent to all computations, puts our arithmetic in the first rank of useful inventions; and we shall appreciate the grandeur of this achievement the more when we remember that it escaped the genius of Archimedes and Apollonius, two of the greatest men produced by antiquity.'"

"It is India that gave us the ingenious method of expressing all numbers by ten symbols, each receiving a value of position as well as an absolute value; a profound and important idea which appears so simple to us now that we ignore its true merit."

"The Hindus seem to have been the first people to mine gold.... Much of the gold used in the Persian Empire in the fifth century before Christ came from India. Silver, copper, lead, tin, zinc and iron were also mined-iron as early as 1500 B.C. U The art of tempering and casting iron developed in India long before its known appearance in Europe; Vikramaditya, for example, erected at Delhi (ca. 380 A.D.) an iron pillar that stands untarnished today after fifteen centuries; and the quality of metal, or manner of treatment, which has preserved it from rust or decay is still a mystery to modern metallurgical science." Before the European invasion the smelting of iron in small char- coal furnaces was one of the major industries of India. The Industrial Revolution taught Europe how to carry out these processes more cheaply on a larger scale, and the Indian industry died under the competition... Europe looked upon the Hindus as experts in almost every line of manufacture—wood-work, ivory-work, metal-work, bleaching, dyeing, tanning, soap-making, glass-blowing, gunpowder, fireworks, cement, etc.21 China imported eyeglasses from India in 1260 A.D."

"Chemistry developed from two sources—medicine and industry. Something has been said about the chemical excellence of cast iron in ancient India, and about the high industrial development of Gupta times, when India was looked to, even by Imperial Rome, as the most skilled of the nations in such chemical industries as dyeing, tanning, soap-making, glass and cement. As early as the second century B.C. Nagarjuna devoted an entire volume to mercury. By the sixth century the Hindus were far ahead of Europe in industrial chemistry; they were masters of calcination, distillation, sublimation, steaming, fixation, the production of light without heat, the mixing of anesthetic and soporific powders, and the preparation of metallic salts, compounds and alloys. The tempering of steel was brought in ancient India to a perfection unknown in Europe till our own times; King Porus is said to have selected, as a specially valuable gift for Alexander, not gold or silver, but thirty pounds of steel.22 The Moslems took much of this Hindu chemical science and industry to the Near East and Europe; the secret of manufacturing “Damascus” blades, for example, was taken by the Arabs from the Persians, and by the Persians from India."

"The Hindus were not so successful in geometry. In the measurement and construction of altars the priests formulated the Pythagorean theorem (by which the square of the hypotenuse of a right-angled triangle equals the sum of the squares of the other sides) several hundred years before the birth of Christ. Aryabhata, probably influenced by the Greeks, found the area of a triangle, a trapezium and a circle, and calculated the value of π (the relation of diameter to circumference in a circle) at 3.1416—a figure not equaled in accuracy until the days of Purbach (1423-61) in Europe. Bhaskara crudely anticipated the differential calculus, Aryabhata drew up a table of sines, and the Surya Siddhanta provided a system of trigonometry more advanced than anything known to the Greeks."

"Algebra was developed in apparent independence by both the Hindus and the Greeks; but our adoption of its Arabic name (al-jabr, adjustment) indicates that it came to western Europe from the Arabs—i.e., from India—rather than from Greece. The great Hindu leaders in this field, as in astronomy, were Aryabhata, Brahmagupta and Bhaskara. The last (b. 1114 A.D.), appears to have invented the radical sign, and many algebraic symbols. These men created the conception of a negative quantity, without which algebra would have been impossible; they formulated rules for finding permutations and combinations; they found the square root of 2, and solved, in the eighth century A.D., indeterminate equations of the second degree that were unknown to Europe until the days of Euler a thousand years later.14 They expressed their science in poetic form, and gave to mathematical problems a grace characteristic of India’s Golden Age."

"The decimal system was known to Aryabhata and Brahmagupta long before its appearance in the writings of the Arabs and the Syrians; it was adopted by China from Buddhist missionaries; and Muhammad Ibn Musa al-Khwarazmi, the greatest mathematician of his age (d. ca. 850 A.D.), seems to have introduced it into Baghdad. The oldest known use of the zero in Asia or EuropeI is in an Arabic document dated 873 A.D., three years sooner than its first known appearance in India; but by general consent the Arabs borrowed this too from India, and the most modest and most valuable of all numerals is one of the subtle gifts of India to mankind."

"To make these complex calculations the Hindus developed a system of mathematics superior, in everything except geometry, to that of the Greeks. Among the most vital parts of our Oriental heritage are the “Arabic” numerals and the decimal system, both of which came to us, through the Arabs, from India. The miscalled “Arabic” numerals are found on the Rock Edicts of Ashoka (256 B.C.), a thousand years before their occurrence in Arabic literature."

"INDIA'S work in science is both very old and very young: young as an independent and secular pursuit, old as a subsidiary interest of her priests."

"The sciences may be more ancient in India than in Egypt."

"Many of the advances in the sciences that we consider today to have been made in Europe were in fact made in India centuries ago."

"The Encyclopaedia of Diderot likewise suggested, in the article on India, that the"sciences may be more ancient in India than in Egypt"."

"The motion of the stars calculated by the Hindus some 4500 years before vary not even a single minute from the modern tables of Cassini and Meyer."

"Hindu sciences have retired far away from those parts of the country conquered by us, and have fled to places which our hand cannot yet reach, to Kashmir, Benaras and other places."

"The Hindu systems of astronomy are by far the oldest, and that from which the Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, and even the Jews derived Hindus their knowledge."

"[The Father of Christians (Pae dos Christos),] he should obtain knowledge of the times and days when the festivals of the infidels, such as that of areca-tree, Setim and others, came, in order that persons may be prevented from participating therein and those guilty of participating may be punished. The same would apply to the times of the pilgrimages to the temples ; they should ascertain whether any of our infidel subjects go on such pilgrimages and whether, others who are not our subjects pass through our lands for that purpose, in order to prevent their doing so and punish those who do so, as His Majesty has ordered. The same would apply to the times when the Hindus customarily celebrate their marriages with Hindu. ceremonies. and festivities, in order to prevent them and punish those who perform them, although Hindu marriages performed without ceremonies and festivities cannot be prevented. He should ascertain whether in the parts where the infidels live there are any orphans who are without father, mother and grandparents and are aged under 14 years, so that they may, be sent to the College, as the king has ordered, educated and baptised ; they should also ascertain whether any infidels have removed the said orphans to the mainland for being kept until they cross the said age, so that they may not be baptised, and in the mean- while enjoy the income of their estates, in order that such persons might be punished as the king has ordered ; and the said estates sequestrated in the hands of Christians of sound credit, as the viceroy has ordered. And through his own efforts and those of the secular Pae dos Christaos, the solicitor and the procurator, he should see that this is put fully into execution and that Christian tutors are given to as many orphans of the infidels as may be possible, in conformity with the relevant provision as the king has ordered.’’"

"In 1545, the Vicar General, Fr. Minguel Vaz with Diogo Borba prepared a 41-point plan to effect the conversion ofnatives. Point No. 3 stated, Since idolatry is so great an offence against God, as is manifest to all, it is just that Your Majesty (king of Portugal) should not permit it within your territories, and an order should be promulgated in Goa to the effect that in the whole island there should not be any temple public or secret, contravention whereof should entail grave penalties; that no official should make idols in any form, neither of stone, nor of wood, nor of copper, nor of any other metal; and that no Hindu festival should be publicly celebrated in the whole island..."

"Goa was divested of its hallowed sites during the period of Portuguese political ascendancy. A letter by Andre Corsali, dated 6th January 1515, mentioned an early instance of violation, In this island of Goa and of the whole of India there are innumerable ancient edifices of the gentiles and in a little neighbouring island that is called Divari, the Portuguese in order to build the land (town) of Goa, have destroyed an ancient temple called a pagoda which was built with wonderful skill, with ancient figures of a certain black stone worked with very great perfection..."

"In the present chapter it is proposed to review in brief various measures taken by the Portuguese rulers in India with the object of converting the natives to Christianity. The measures fall into two broad categories. Firstly, there were those the object of which was to make it difficult for the natives to continue to retain their old religion. The temples and shrines of the Hindus were destroyed and they were forbidden to erect or maintain new ones even outside the Portuguese territories ; practice of Hindu rites and ceremonies such as the marriage ceremony, the ceremony of wearing the sacred thread, ceremony performed at the birth of a child, was banned ; priests and teachers of the Hindus were banished ; Hindus whose presence was considered as undersirable from the point of view of propagation of Christianity were sent into exile; those who remained were deprived of their means of subsistence and ancestral rights in village communities; they were also subjected to various humiliations, indignities and disabilities; “ orphan ” children of the Hindus were snatched away from their families for being baptised ; and men and women were compelled to listen to the preaching of Christian doctrine..."

"There also took place in this year the destruction of the Hindu temples which existed in the territories of Your Majesty, of which none remains, for the priests of St. Francis also razed out f memory all those which existed in Bardez."

"Since idolatry is so great an offence against God, as is manifest to all, it is just that Your Majesty should not permit it within your territories, and an order should be promulgated in Goa to the effect that in the whole island there should not be any temple public or secret, contravention whereof should entail grave penalties; that no official should make idols in any form, neither of stone, nor of wood, nor of copper nor of any other metal; that no Hindu festival should be publicly celebrated in the whole island,; that Brahmin preachers from the mainland should not gather in the houses of the Hindus; and that persons who are in charge of St. Paul’s should have the power to search the houses of the Brahmins and other Hindus, in case there exist a presumption or suspicion of the existence of idols there."

"Around the territories of the neighbours of Goa, there exist in that island temples in which status of the enemy of the Cross are worshipped and every year their festivals are celebrated. These are attended by many Christians, both Europeans and natives, which is very wrong in that it promotes idolatry. It will be service to God if these temples in the island of Goa are destroyed and in their stead churches with saints are erected, and it is ordered that whosoever desires to live in this island and have house and lands there should become a Christian, and if he does not wish to be one should go out of the island. I assure Your Majesty that there would be no individual who did not turn to the faith of Our Lord Christ, because if exiled from this island he will have no means of livelihood."

"As to the torture itself, it combined all that the ferocity of savages and the ingenuity of civilized man had till then invented. Besides the ordinary rack, thumb-screws, and leg crushers or Spanish boots, there were spiked wheels over which the victims were drawn with weights on their feet; boiling oil was poured over their legs, burning sulphur dropped on their bodies, and lighted candles held beneath their armpits."

"The papers which comprised the archive of that tribunal were found to be a vast mass. I am informed that in them exist papers relating to all the suits tried by the Holy Office since its inception, and if they are not guarded with all care, therein would be found motives to defame, even falsely, all the families in the state and these would provide occasions to feed the enmities and intrigues which so abound in this country. ... As I am persuade that it is not expedient that they should be seen by any person it appears meet to me that it would be appropriate to burn them."

"Goa is sadly famous for its inquisition, equally contrary to humanity and commerce. The Portuguese monks made us believe that the people worshiped the devil, and it is they who have served him."

"In 1567 the Captain of Rachol Fort in South Goa bragged to his Portuguese king back home, “For nights and nights went on the demolishing, demolishing, demolishing of 280 Hindu temples. Not one remained in the happy lands of our division.” Jesuit historian Francisco de Souza jubilantly praised the feat, “It is incredible–the sentiment that the gentile were seized of when they saw their respective temple burning.”"

"At least from 1540 onwards, and in the island of Goa before that year, all the Hindu idols had been annihilated or had disappeared, all the temples had been destroyed and their sites and building materials were in most cases utilised to erect new Christian churches and chapels. Various vice regal and Church council decrees banished the Hindu priests from the Portuguese territories; the public practice of Hindu rites including marriage rites, was banned; the state took upon itself the task of bringing up the Hindu orphan children; the Hindus were denied certain employments, while the Christians were preferred; it was ensured that the Hindus would not harass those who became Christians, and on the contrary, the Hindus were obliged to assemble periodically in churches to listen to preaching or to the refutation of their religion."

"And, above all, don't let us forget India, the cradle of the human race, or at least of that part of it to which we belong, where first Mohammedans, and then Christians, were most cruelly infuriated against the adherents of the original faith of mankind. The destruction or disfigurement of the ancient temples and idols, a lamentable, mischievous and barbarous act, still bears witness to the monotheistic fury of the Mohammedans, carried on from Mahmud the Ghaznevid of cursed memory down to Aureng Zeb, the fratricide, whom the Portuguese Christians have zealously imitated by destruction of temples and the auto da fe of the inquisition at Goa."

"The papers which comprised the archive of that tribunal were found to be a vast mass, and there was no room in the office of the Secretary of State to permit of their being received, as I had decided. I, therefore ordered, that they be kept in the building of the Royal arsenal, being deposited in large sacks which would be sealed with the royal arms by the Inquisitor, and that the building be closed with three keys, one of which would remain with me, another at the secretariat, and the third in the hands of the intendant of the navy. I considered it was proper to take all these precautionary measures in respect of these records as I am informed that in them exist papers relating to al) the suits tried by the Holy Office since its inception, and if they are not guarded with all care, therein would be found motives to defame, even falsely, all the families in the state and these would provide occasions to feed the enmities and intrigues which so much abound in this country. It is meet that your Royal Highness should determine what should be done with this massof papers and processes. As I am persuaded that it is not expedient that they should be seen by any person, it appears to me that it would be appropriate to burn them.” ... [In reply to this communication dated September 27, 1818, contained the following directions on this point : ] As regards the huge mass of papers existing in the archive of the Inquisition, as-it does not appear wise to burn them without some kind of review, nor to commit them to the care of a person who is not in the secret of the said papers, His Royal Highness decided for this purpose'to order that the Promoter, in whom are found the talent and probity necessary for this task, should be placed in charge of such examination and as soon as he has finished and has made the necessary separation. of those papers which are worthy of being preserved, you will arrange to burn the rest, and remit those which are retained under proper security to this office of the Secretary of the State."

"In 1560, the year the Inquisition was set up, 13,092 Hindus were forcibly converted. In 1578, the… missionaries pulled down 350 temples and converted 100,000 people."

"Apparently this market not only served the export trade but was in much demand by the local Portuguese whose lifestyle was extravagant and profligate. But we are also told that there was a lively trade in Kaffirs, a derogatory term for the natives of the Portuguese colony of Mozambique. The girls, who, we are told, were very much in demand, were paraded for sale in the nude."

"“Religious bigotry and proselytism, fostered by the Inquisition, sapped the vitals of the empire while mere cruel terrorism took the place of the strength—albeit cruel strength—on which the early giants had relied. In so faras any one date can be taken as of prime importance in the ruin of the Portuguese empire, it is 6 May 1542, when Francis Xavier sct foot.ashore at Goa. From then on the Jesuits did their worst, using every form of bribery, threat, and torture to effect a conversion. Burton, writing 80 years ago, refers to “ fire and steel, the dungeon and the rack, the rice pot and the rupee, ” which played ‘“ the persuasive part in the good work...assigned to them.” Facetious as_ this quotation may seem it sums up in nutshell the methods used, and the satisfaction at the result, for the Jesuits were fanatics, and like all fanatics they did irreparable harm.”"

"In 1534 Goa was made a bishopric with authority extending over the entire Far East. Special instructions were issued to the Portuguese Viceroy to root out the infidels. Hindu temples in Goa were destroyed and their property distributed to religious orders (like the Franciscans) in 1540 . The Inquisition was established in 1560."

"The Portuguese power became ruthless the more it got itself established in India. Royal Charters were issued from time to time making invidious distinctions between Christians and non-Christians and subjecting the latter to untold disabilities. In 1559 an enactment was passed debarring all Hindus from holding any public office. In the same year another law was enacted confiscating the properties of non-Christian orphans if they refused to be converted to Christianity. Yet another law ordered destruction of Hindu temples and images and prohibited all non-Christian religious festivals. In 1560 all the Brahmans and goldsmiths were ordered to accept Christianity otherwise they were to be turned out of Goa. By a law passed in 1567 the Hindus were prohibited from performing their important religious ceremonies such as investiture of sacred thread, marriage ceremonies and even cremation rites. Hindu religious books were proscribed. All non-Christians above the age of 15 were forced to attend the preaching of Christian religion. Hindu temples were destroyed and in their place churches were built. In 1575 another law was passed by which the Hindu nationals were debarred from their civic right of renting state land. People of Goa were prohibited to use their native language by an order of 1684 and were allowed three years to learn the Portuguese language under pain of being proceeded against under law of the land."

"Uruguay-based Alfredo de Mello, a Goan born historian, in his Memoirs of Goa (2003) writes how in a span of 252 years, the inquisition held sway in Goa “with a power that Stalin and other tyrants would have liked to hold.” Referring to the dreaded Goan Inquisition de Mello calls it “the worst of the existing inquisitions in the Catholic orb of the five parts of the world”."

"In its two and a half centuries of existence at Goa, the Inquisition burned at the stake 57 alive and 64 in effigy. Others sentenced to various cruel punishments totaled 4,046. The people who were converted but still continued secretly to perform Hindu rituals were treated even more harshly… The manner in which the Church enriched itself was just scandalous. Half the property of a person found in possession of idols went to the Church…The Church acquired urban and rural properties on an impressive scale. The open performances of Hindu ceremonies were replaced by great public processions on Christian feast days. One of the worst criminals was Francis Xavier, later to be made into a saint."

"According to Qazvini, Shahjahan’s orders in this regard were that captives were not to be sold to Hindus as slaves, and under Muslim customers they could only become Musalman."

"Of considerable numerical importance was probably the conversion of slaves and other captives, including harem inmates. Slaves had to be obtained ‘among infidels’ (min al-kuffàr), since there was a prohibition against enslaving Muslims—a prohibition that was enforced, albeit imperfectly. There is abundant evidence that during military campaigns large numbers of such ‘infidels’ were made captives, especially women and children, and that these were often enslaved. An unknown number of these slaves were transported westwards, as had been the case in earlier centuries. Tìmùr still carried off great numbers of enslaved captives to Samarqand. But in Hind itself there arose numerous specialized slave markets (bàzàr-i-burda), and by all accounts slavery was ubiquitous in a variety of contexts, including the military, and especially the domestic one. We are told there were 12,000 slaves at the court of Muhammad bin Tughluq. There were 180,000 slaves, according to 'Afìf, in Delhi and the various iq†à's under Firuz Shah Tughluq.In the Bahmanì empire there were 60,000 or 70,000 captives from Vijayanagara, mostly women. How many of these converted to Islam is not stated, but there are indications that many of them may have, possibly all of them. Of Muhammad bin Tughluq’s slave girls, it is stated, ‘many knew the Qur"àn by heart.’ Firuz Shah Tughluq, during his forty-year reign, ordered all his iq†à'dàrs to collect slaves wherever they were at war and send them to court; many of these, we are told, learned to read, and some entered into religious studies, memorizing the Qur"àn, and going on pilgrimage to Mecca, while they were employed in all sorts of occupations and married off to each other, and often sent back into the provinces. Village chiefs and headmen ‘were torn from their old lands’ in Sannam, Samana and Kaithal by Muhammad bin Tughluq, and carried off to Delhi, where they were converted, with their wives and children. In another instance, we are informed that eleven captive sons of a Hindu king became ‘Muslim amirs."