Mewar 06: Samarsi, Mahmud's Invasion - Revision history

Pdewan: /* The Muhammadan Invasion, a.d. 644-55 */

2015-04-18T14:27:08Z

‎The Muhammadan Invasion, a.d. 644-55

Pdewan: Created page with "M M {| class="wikitable" |- |colspan="0"|
This page is an extract from
ANNALS AND ANTIQUITIES
2015-04-18T08:09:29Z

Created page with "M M {| class="wikitable" |- |colspan="0"|<div style="font-size:100%"> This page is an extract from <br/> ANNALS AND ANTIQUITIES <br..."

New page
[[Category:India |M ]]
[[Category:History |M ]]
{| class="wikitable"
|-
|colspan="0"|<div style="font-size:100%">
This page is an extract from <br/>
ANNALS AND ANTIQUITIES <br/>
OF <br/>
'''RAJASTHAN '''<br/>

OR THE CENTRAL AND WESTERN <br/>
RAJPUT STATES OF INDIA <br/>

By <br/>
LIEUT.-COL. JAMES TOD <br/>
Late Political Agent to the Western Rajput States <br/>

Edited with an Introduction and Notes by <br/>
WILLIAM CROOKE, CIE. <br/>
Hon. D.Sc. Oxon., B.A., F.R.A.l. <br/>
Late of the Indian Civil Service <br/>

In Three Volumes <br/>
VOL. IV: ANNALS OF MEWAR<br/>
[The Annals were completed in 1829]<br/>

HUMPHREY MILFORD <br/>
Oxford University Press <br/>
London Edinburgh Glasgow New York <br/>
Toronto Melbourne Bombay <br/>
1920 [The edition scanned] <br/>
</div>
|}
Note: This article is likely to contain several spelling mistakes that occurred during scanning. If these errors are reported as messages to the Facebook page, [http://www.facebook.com/Indpaedia Indpaedia.com] your help will be gratefully acknowledged.

=Mewar 06: Samarsi, Mahmud's Invasion=
==Samarsi, Samar Singh==
Having established Bappa on the throne
of Chitor S. 784 (a.d. 728), we will proceed to glean from the annals,
from the period of his departure for Iran, S. 820 (a.d. 764) to
another halting point— the reign of Samarsi, S. 1249 (a.d. 1193) ; 4
an important epoch, not only in the history of Mewar, but to the
whole Hindu race ; when the diadem of sovereignty was torn
from the brow of the Hindu to adorn that of the Tatar. We
shall not, however, overleap the four intervening centuries, though
we may not be able to fill up the reigns of the eighteen princes 5
whose " banner at this time was a golden sun on a crimson field," 6
and several of whose names yet live recorded " with an iron pen
on the rock " of their native abodes.

An intermediate period, from Bappa to Samarsi, that of Sakti
Kumar, is fixed by the Aitpur inscription in S. 1024 (a.d. 968) ;
1 A new era had commenced, not of Yazdegird's accession, as is sup
posed, which would have been vain indeed, when the throne was tottering
under him, but consequent to the completion of the grand cycle of 1440
years. He was slain at Merv in a.d. 651, the 31st of the Hegira; on the
eleventh year of which, or a.d. 632 (according to Moreri), he commenced his
reign.
2 Gibbon was wrong. India afforded them an asylum, and their issue
constitutes the most wealthy, the most respected, and the most enhghtened
part of the native community of Bombay and the chief towns of that presid
ency.
3 Gibbon, Miscellaneous Works, ' Sur la Monarchic des Medes,' vol. iii.
4 [" We now know that Samar Singh was alive up to 1299, only four
years before Alau-d-dln's siege of Chitor, and that in several inscriptions
his dates are given as 1273, 1274, 1285, etc. . . . Instead of being the father
of Karan Singh I., as stated by Tod, Samar Singh came eight genei-ations
after him, and was the father of Ratan Singh I., who, according to Muham
madan historians, was the ruler of Chitor during the reign of Alau-d-dln,
and the husband of Padmini " (Erskine ii. A. 14 f.)]
5 See Genealogical Table.
6 This, according to the roll, was the standard of Bappa.
and from the more perishable yet excellent authority of an ancient
Jain HIS. the era of Allat, the ancestor of Sakti Kumar, was S. 922
(a.d. 866), four generations anterior. From Bappa's departure
for Iran, in a.d. 764, to the subversion of Hindu dominion in the
reign of Samarsi, in a.d. 1193, we find recorded an intermediate
Islamite invasion. This was during the reign of Khuman,
between a.d. 812 and 836, which event forms the chief subject
of the Khuman-Raesa, the most ancient of the poetic chronicles
of Mewar [241].

As the history of India at this period is totally dark, we gladly
take advantage of the lights thus afforded. By combining these
facts with what is received as authentic, though scarcely less
obscure or more exact than these native legends, we may furnish
materials for the future historian. With this view, let us take
a rapid sketch of the irruptions of the Arabians into India, from
the rise of Islamism to the foundation of the Ghaznivid empire,
which sealed the fate of the Hindus. The materials are but
scanty. El-Makin, in his history of the Cahphs, passes over
such intercourse almost without notice. Abu-1-Fazl, though not
diffuse, is minute in what he does say, and we can confide in his
veracity. Ferishta has a chapter devoted to this subject, which
merits a better translation than yet exists.1 We shall, however,
in the first place, touch on Bappa's descendants, till we arrive at
the point proper for the introduction of the intended sketch.
Of the twenty-four tribes of Guhilot, several issued from the
founder, Bappa. Shortly after the conquest of Chitor, Bappa pro
ceeded to Saurashtra and married the daughter of Yusufgol,
prince of the island of Bandardiva.2 With his bride he conveyed
1 Amongst the passages which Dow [i. 37] has slurred over in his trans
lation is the interesting account of the origin of the Afghans ; who, when
they first came in contact with those of the new faith, in a.h. 62, dwelt
around the Koh-i-Sulaiman.

Ferishta, quoting authority, says : " The
Afghans were Copts, ruled by Pharaun, many of whom were converted to
the laws and rehgion of Moses ; but others, who were stubborn in their
worship to their gods, fled towards Hindustan, and took possession of the
country adjoining the Koh-i-Sulaiman. They were visited by Kasim from
Sind, and in the 143rd year of the Hegira had possessed themselves of the
provinces of Kirman, Peshawar, and all within their bounds {sinoran),"
which Dow has converted into a province. The whole geographical descrip
tion of the Kohistan, the etymology of the term Rohilla, and other important
matter, is omitted by him [see Briggs, trans, i. 6 f.].
2 [The island Diu.] Yusufgol is stated to have held Chaul on the main
to Chitor the statue of Vyanmata, the tutelary goddess of her
race, who still divides with Eklinga the devotion of the Guhilot
princes. The temple in which he enshrined this islandic goddess
yet stands on the summit of Chitor, with many other monuments
assigned by tradition to Bappa. This princess bore him Aparajit,
who from bemg born in Chitor was nominated successor to the
throne, to the exclusion of his less fortunate elder brother, Asil
(born of the daughter of the Kaba (Pramara) prince of Kalibao near
Dwaraka), who, however, obtained possessions in Saurashtra, and
founded a race called the Asila Guhilots,1 whose descendants were
so numerous, even in Akbar's reign, as to [242] be supposed able to
bring into the field fifty thousand men at arms. We have nothing
important to record of the actions of Aparajit, who had two sons
Kalbhoj - and Nandkumar. Kalbhoj succeeded Aparajit, and
his warlike qualities are extolled in an inscription discovered
by the author in the valley of Nagda. Nandkumar slew Bhimsen
Dor (Doda), and possessed himself of Deogarh in the Deccan.

==Khuman I==

Khuman succeeded Kalbhoj . His name is remark
able in the history of Mewar. He came to the throne at the
land. He was most probably the father of Vanaraja Chawara, the founder
of Patan Anhilwara, whose ancestors, on the authority of the Kumarpal
Charitra, were princes of Bandardiva, held by the Portuguese since the
time of Albuquerque, who changed its name to Deo. [But Yusufgol, if he
existed, must have been a Musahnan. Vanaraja Chawara was son of
Jayasekhara, said to have been slain in battle, a.d. 696, leaving his wife
pregnant (BG, i. Part i. 150 f.). Yusufgol does not appear in the local
history.]

1 The ancient roll from which this is taken mentions Asil giving his name
to a fortress, called Asilgarh. His son, Bijai Pal, was slain in attempting to
wrest Khambayat (Cambay) from Sangram Dabhi. One of his wives, from
a violent death, was prematurely deUvered of a boy, called Setu ; and as,
in such cases, the Hindu supposes the deceased to become a discontented
spirit {churail), Churaila became the name of the tribe. Bija, the twelfth
from Asil, obtained Sonal from his maternal uncle, Khengar Dabhi, prince
of Girnar, but was slain by Jai Singh Deo, prince of Surat. From these
names compounded, Dabi and Churaila, we may have the Dabisalima of
Mahmud. [The Asil Guhilots are now included in the Mers of the Kathiawar
coast ; their numbers are exaggerated in the text (Ain, ii. 247 ; BG, ix.
Parti. 126).] [See p. 266 above.]
2 Also called Kama. He it was who excavated the Boraila lake, and
erected the grand temple of EkUnga on the site of the hermitage of
Harita, whose descendant, the present officiating priest, reckons sixty
six descents, while the princes of Mewar amount to seventy-two in the same
period.beginning of the ninth century, when Chitor was assailed by
another formidable invasion of Muhammadans. The chief object
of the Khuman Raesa is to celebrate the defence made on this
occasion, and the value of this Raesa consists in the catalogue of
the princes who aided in defending this bulwark of the Hindu
faith. The bard, in an animated strain, makes his sovereign on
this occasion successfully defend the ' crimson standard ' of
Mewar, treat with contempt the demand for tribute, and after
a violent assault, in which the ' barbarian ' is driven back, follow
and discomfit him in the plan, carrying back the hostile leader,
Mahmud, captive. With this event, which introduces the name
of Mahmud two centuries before the conqueror of Ghazni, we will
pause, and resume the promised sketch of the intercourse of Arabia
and Hindustan at this period.

==The Muhammadan Invasion, a.d. 644-55==
The first intimation
of the Moslems attempting the invasion of India is during the
caliphat of Omar, who built the port of Bassorah at the mouth of
the Tigris, chiefly to secure the trade of Gujarat and Sind ; into
which latter coimtry a powerful army penetrated under Abul
Aas,1 who was killed in battle at Aror. The Caliph Osman,
who succeeded Omar, sent to explore the state of India, while
he prepared an army to invade it in person : a design which he
never fulfilled. The generals of the Caliph Ali made conquests
in Sind, which they abandoned at All's death. While Yazid was
governor of Khorasan several attempts were made on India, as
also during the caliphat of Abdu-1 Malik, but without any last
ing [243] results. It was not till the reign of Walid '2 that any
successful invasion took place. He not only finally conquered
Sind and the adjoining continent of India, but rendered tributary
all that part of India on this side the Ganges.3 What an exalted
idea must we not form of the energy and rapidity of such con
quests, when we find the arms of Islam at once on the Ganges
and the Ebro, and two regal dynasties simultaneously cut off,
that of Roderic, the last of the Goths of Andaloos, and Dahir
Despati in the valley of the Indus. It was in a.h. 99 (a.d. 712,
S. 774) that Muhammad bin Kasim vanquished and slew Dahir,

1 [Ferishta (i. 2) calls him Sayyid bin Abiu-1-Aas.]
2 See Table next page.
3 Marigny (quoting EI-Makin), Hist, of the Arabians, vol. ii. p. 283 ;
Mod. Univ. Hint. vol. ii. p. 47.

[[File: the muhammada invantion.png||frame|500px]]

prince of Sind, after numerous conflicts. Amongst the spoils
of victory sent to the cliph on this occasion were the daughters
of the subjugated monarch, who were the cause of Kasim's de
struction,1 when he was on the eve of earrjdng the war against
Raja [244] Harchand of Kanauj. Some authorities state that
he actually prosecuted it ; and as Sind remained a dependency
of the caliphat during several successive reigns, the successor of
Kasim may have executed his plans. Little is said of India from
this period to the reign of Al-Mansur, except in regard to the
rebellion of Yazid in Khorasan, and the flight of his son to Sind.
The eight sovereigns, who rapidly followed, were too much engaged
with the Christians of the west and the Huns on the Caspian to
think of India. Their armies were then in the heart of France,
which was only saved from the Koran by their overthrow at
Tours by Charles Martel.

Al-Mansur, when only the lieutenant of the Caliph Abbas, held
the government of Sind and of India, and made the island of
Bakhar on the Indus, and the adjacent Aror,2 the ancient capital,
his residence, naming it Mansura ; and it was during his govern
ment that Bappa Rawal abandoned Chitor for Iran.
The celebrated Harunu-r-rashid, contemporary of Charle
magne, in apportioning his immense empire amongst his sons,
gave to the second, Al-Mamun, Khorasan, Zabulistan, Kabulistan,
Sind, and Hindustan.3 Al-Mamun, on the death of Ilarun, de
posed his brother, and became caliph in A.ii. 198 or a.d. 813, and
ruled to 833, the exact period of the reign of Khuman, prince of
Chitor. The domestic history brings the enemy assailant of
Chitor from Zabulistan ; and as the leader's name is given
Mahmud Khorasan Pat, there can be little doubt that it is an
error arising from ignorance of the copyist, and should be
Mamun.

1 " The two young princesses, in order to revenge the death of their
father, represented falsely to the Khahf that Muhammad bin Kasim had
been connected with them. The Khalif , in a rage, gave order for Muhammad
bin Kasim to be sewed up in a raw hide, and sent in that condition to court.
When the mandate arrived at Tatta, Kasim was prepared to carry an ex
pedition against Harchand, monarch of Kanauj. When he arrived at court,
the Khalif showed him to the daughters of Dahir, who expressed their joy
upon beholding their father's murderer in'such a condition " [Ain/ii. 345 ;
Elliot-Dowson i. 209 f.].
2 Aror is seven miles east of Bakhar.
3 Marigny, vol. iii. p. 83 ; Univ. Hist. vol. ii. p. 162.

==Mahmud's Invasion==
Within twenty years after this event,
the sword of conquest and conversion was withdrawn from India,
and Sind was the only province left to Mutawakkil (a.d. 850 [847
861]), the grandson of Harun, for a century after whom the throne
of Baghdad, like that of ancient Rome, was sold by her jiraetorians
to the highest bidder. From this time we find no mention what
ever of Hindustan, or even of Sind, imtil Sabuktigin,1 governor
of Khorasan, hoisted the standard of independent sovereignty
at Ghazni. In A.n. 365 (a.d. 974) he carried his arms [245] across
the Indus, forcing the inhabitants to abandon the religion of their
ancestors, and to read the Koran from the altars of Bal and
Krishna. Towards the close of this century he made his last
invasion, accompanied by his son, the celebrated Mahmud,
destined to be the scourge of the Hindu race, who early imbibed
the paternal lesson inculcating the extirpation of infidels. Twelve
several visitations did Mahmud make with his Tatar hordes,
sweeping India of her riches, destroying her temples and archi
tectural remains, and leaving the country plunged in poverty
and ignorance. From the effect of these incursions she never
recovered ; for though she had a respite of a century between
Mahmud and the final conquest, it was too short to repair what
it had cost ages to rear : the temples of Somnath, of Chitor, and
Girnar are but types of the magnificence of past times. The
memorial of Sakti Kumar proves him to have been the contem
porary of Sabuktigin, and to one of his son's visitations is attri
buted the destruction of the ' city of the sun ' (Aitpur),2 his
capital.

==Attack on Chitor==
Having thus condensed the little informa
tion afforded by Muhammadan historians of the connexion
between the caliphs of Baghdad and princes of Hind, from the
first to the end of the fourth century of the Hegira, we shall revert
to the first recorded attack on the Mori prince of Chitor, which
brought Bappa into notice. This was either by Yazid or Muham
mad bin Kasim from Sind.' Though in the histories of the
caliphs we can only expect to find recorded those expeditions
1 His father's name was Aliptigin, termed a slave by Ferishta and his
authorities ; though EI-Makin gives him an ancestor in Yazdegird. [He
was a slave (Elliot-Dowson iv. 159).]
2 Ait, contracted from Aditya : hence Itwar, ' Sunday.'
3 [This is not corroborated by Musulraan authorities.]
which were successful, or had some lasting results, there are
inroads of their revolted lieutenants or their frontier deputies,
which frequently, though indistinctly, alluded to in Hindu annals,
have no place in Muhammadan records. Throughout the period
mentioned there was a stir amongst the Hindu nations, in which
we find confusion and dethronement from an unknown invader,
who is described as coming sometimes by Sind, sometimes by sea,
and not unfrequently as a demon and magician ; but invariably
as mlechchha, or ' barbarian.' 1From S. 750 to S. 780 (a.d. 694
to [246] 724), the annals of the Yadus, the Chauhans, the Chawaras ,
and the Guhilots, bear evidence to simultaneous convulsions in
their respective houses at this period. In S. 750 (a.h. 75) the
Yadu Bhatti was driven from his capital Salpura in the Panjab,
across the Sutlej into the Indian desert ; the invader named
Farid. At the same period Manika Rae, the Chauhan prince of
Ajmer, was assailed and slain.2

1 Even from the puerilities of Hindu legends something may be extracted.
A mendicant dervesh, called Roshan All {i.e. the ' light of All '), had found
his way to Garh Bitli (the ancient name of the Ajmer fortress), and having
thrust his hand into a vessel of curds destined for the Raja, had his finger
cut off. The disjointed member flew to Mecca, and was recognized as
belonging to the saint. An army was equipped in the disguise of horse
merchants, which invaded Ajmer, whose prince was slain. May we not
gather from this incident that an insult to the first Islamite missionary,
in the person of Roshan Ah, brought upon the prince the arms of the Cahph ?
The same Chauhan legends state that Ajaipal was prince of Ajmer at this
time ; that in this invasion by sea he hastened to Anjar (on the coast of
Cutch), where he held the ' guard of the ocean ' {Samudra lei Chaulci), where
he fell in opposing the landing. An altar was erected on the spot, on
which was sculptured the figure of the prince on horseback, with his lance
at rest, and which still annually attracts multitudes at the ' fair (Mela) of
Ajaipal.' The subsequent invasion alluded to in the text, of S. 750 (a.d.
694), is marked by a curious anecdote. When the ' Asurs ' had blockaded
Ajmer, Lot, the infant son of Manika Rae, was playing on the battlements,
when an arrow from the foe killed the heir of Ajmer, who has ever since
been worshipped amongst the lares and penates of the Chauhans ; and as
he had on a silver chain anklet at the time, this ornament is forbid to the
children of the race. In all these Rajput families there is a putra {adolesceyis)
amongst the penates, always one who has come to an untimely end, and
chiefly worshipped by females ; having a strong resemblance to the rites
in honour of Adonis. We have traced several Roman and Grecian terms
to Sanskrit origin ; may we add that of lares, from larla, ' dear ' or
' beloved '?[?].

-[The story is " puerile and fictitious : independent of which the Arabs
liad quite enough to do nearer home " (Elliot-Dowson i. 426).]

==The Muster of the Clans==

The first of the Khichi princes who
occupied the Duab of Sindsagar in the Panjab, as well as the
ancestor of the Haras established in Golkonda, was expelled at the
same time. The invader is treated in the genuine Hindu style as a
Danava, or demon, and is named Ghairaram 1 (i.e. restless), from
Kujliban,2 a term geographically given to a portion of the
Himalaya mountains about the glaciers of the Ganges. The
ancestor of the founder of Patan was expelled from his petty
islandic dominion on the coast of Saurashtra at the same time.
This is the period when Yazid was the caliph's lieutenant in
Khorasan, and when the arms of Walid conquered to the Ganges ;
nor is there a doubt that Yazid or Kasim was the author of all
these revolutions in the Hindu dynasties. We are supported in
this by the names of the princes contained in the catalogue who
aided to defend Chitor and the Mori prince on this occasion. It
is evident that Chitor was, alternately with Ujjain, the seat of
sovereignty of the Pramara at this period, and, as it became the
rallying point of the Hindus, that this race was the first in con
sequence.^ We find the prince of Ajmer, and the quotas of

1 [Persian : not a likely name.]
2 Signifying ' Elephant forests,' and described in a Hindu map (stamped
on cloth and painted) of India from Kujiiban to Lanka, and the provinces
west of the Indus to Calcutta ; presented by me to the Royal Asiatic Society.
3 The list of the vassal princes at the court of the Mori confirms the
statement of the bard Ohand, of the supremacy of Ram Pramara, and the
partition of his dominion, as described (see p. 63, note) amongst the princes
who founded separate dynasties at this period ; hitherto in vassalage or
subordinate to the Pramara. We can scarcely suppose the fauiily to have
suffered any decay since their ancestor, Chandragupta, connected by
marriage with as well as the ally of the Grecian Seleucus, and who held
Greeks in his pay. From such connexion, the arts of sculpture and archi
tecture may have derived a character hitherto unnoticed. Amidst the ruins
of Barolli are seen sculptured the Grecian helmet ; and the elegant ornament,
the Kumbha, or ' vessel of desire,' on the temple of Annapurna (i.e. ' giver
of food '), the Hindu Ceres, has much affinity to the Grecian device. From
the inscription (see No. 2) it is evident that Chitor was an appanage of Ujjain,
the seat of Pramar empire. Its monarch, Chandragupta (Mori [Maurya]),
degraded into the barber (Maurya) tribe, was the descendant of Srenika,
prince of Rajagriha, v/ho, according to the Jain work, Kalpadruma Kalka,
flourished in the year 477 before Vikramaditya, and from whom Chandra
gupta was the thirteenth in descent. The names as follows : Kanika,
Udsen, and nine in succession of the name of Nanda, thence called the
Nau-nanda. These, at twenty-two years to a reign (see p. 64), would give
286 years, which— 477 = 191 s.v. + 56 = 247 a.c. Now it was in a.c. 260,
Saurashtra and Gujarat [247] ; Angatsi, lord of the Huns ; Busa,
the lord of the North ; Sheo, the prince of the Jarejas ; the Johya,
lord of Jangaldes ; the Aswaria, the Sepat, the Kulhar, the Malan,
the Ohir, the Hul, and many others, having nothing of the Hindu
in name, now extinct. But the most conspicuous is ' Dahir
Despati from Debal.' This is erroneously written Delhi, the seat
of the Tuars ; whereas we recognize the name of the prince of
Sind, slain by Kasim, whose expatriated son doubtless found
refuge in Chit or. 3

==The Defeat of the Enemy==
This attack on the Mori prince was
defeated chiefly through the bravery of the youthful Guhilot.
The foe from Kujliban, though stated to have advanced by
Mathura, retreated by Saurashtra and Sind, pursued by Bappa.
He found the ancient seat of his ancestors, Gajni,2 still in the
possession of the ' Asur ' : a term as well as mlechchha, or ' bar
barian,' always given to the Islamite at this period. Salim, who
held Gajni, was attacked and forced to surrender, and Bappa in
according to Bayer, that the treaty was formed between Seleucus and
Chandragupta ; so that this scrap of Jain history may be regarded as
authentic and valuable. Asoka (a name of weight in Jain annals) succeeded
Chandragupta. He by Kunala, whose son was Samprati, with whose
name ends the hne of Srenika, according to the authority from which I
made the extract. The name of Samprati is well known from Ajnier to
Saurashtra, and his era is given in a valuable chronogrammatic catalogue
in an ancient Jain manuscript from the temple of Nadol, at 202 of the Virat
Samvat. He is mentioned both traditionally and by books as the great
supporter of the Jain faith, and the remains of temples dedicated to Mahavira,
erected by this prince, yet exist at Ajrr.er, on Abu, Kumbhalmer, and Girnar.
[Much of this needs correction, which cannot be done in the hunts of a note.
For the Nanda dynasty see Smith, EHI, 40, and for Chandragupta Maurya
and Asoka, 115 ff.]

1 [This and the second catalogue are fictions. They conflict with the
conditions then existing in Gujarat, and such motley arrays are a favourite
bardic theme (Forbes, Easmala, 31, note ; A8R, ii. 379).]
2 It has already been stated that the ancient name of Cambay was Gaini
or Gajni, whose ruins are three miles from the present city [see p. 254
above]. There is also a Gajni on the estuary of the Mahi, and Abu-1 Fazl
incidentally mentions a Gajnagar as one of the most important fortresses
of Gujarat, belonging to Ahmad Shah; in attempting to obtain which by
stratagem, his antagonist, Hoshang, king of Malwa, was made prisoner.
I am unaware of the site of this place, though there are remains of an exten
sive fortress near the capital, founded by Ahmad, and which preserves no
name. It may be the ancient Gajnagar.

[The Author confuses the place
in Gujarat with Jajnagar or Jajpur in Orissa, captured through a stratagem
by Hoshang {Ain, ii. 219 ; Ferishta iv. 178 ; BG, i. Part i. 359).]
ducted into this stronghold of his ancestors a nephew of his own.
It is no less singular than honourable to their veracity that the
annals should record the fact, so contrary to their religion, of
Bappa having married the daughter of the conquered Salim ; and
we have a right to infer that it was from the influence acquired
by this union tliat he ultimately abandoned the sovereignty of
Mewar and the title of ' Hindua Suraj ' to become the founder of
the ' one hundred and thirty tribes of Naushahra [248] Pathans '
of the west. It is fair to conclude from all these notices regarding
the founder of the Guhilot race in Chitor that he must have
abjured his faith for that of Islam ; and it is probable (though
the surmise must ever remain unproved) that, under some new
title applicable to such change, we may have, in one of the early
distinguished leaders of ' the Faith,' the ancestor of the Guhilots.