A Highlight · History
The Islamic Conquest of North India
Ghaznavid raids to the Delhi Sultanate, 1000–1526 — the temples destroyed, Nalanda burned, Delhi sacked twice, told without euphemism and without inventing what the sources don’t say.
Overview
- Mahmud of GhazniMahmud of Ghazni (971–1030 CE) was the ruler of the Ghaznavid empire, centered in present-day Afghanistan, remembered chiefly for seventeen military campaigns into northern India between 1000 and 1027 CE, including the destruction of the Somnath temple.
- Delhi SultanateThe Delhi Sultanate (1206–1526 CE) was a series of five Turkic and Afghan Muslim dynasties that ruled large parts of the Indian subcontinent from Delhi, beginning with the Mamluk dynasty founded by Qutb-ud-din Aibak.
- Timur's invasion of IndiaTimur's invasion of India was a campaign by the Turco-Mongol conqueror Timur, known as Tamerlane, against the Delhi Sultanate in 1398, culminating in the sack of Delhi and the mass killing of its population.
The Delhi Sultanate dynasties
- Mamluk dynasty of DelhiThe Mamluk dynasty founded the Delhi Sultanate in 1206, ruled northern India for eighty-four years, and survived the Mongol invasions that destroyed every comparable state to its west.
- Khalji dynastyThe Khalji dynasty was a Turko-Afghan ruling house that governed the Delhi Sultanate from 1290 to 1320, ending Mamluk (Slave dynasty) rule and expanding Delhi's power further into the Deccan and south India than any predecessor.
- Tughlaq dynastyThe Tughlaqs ruled Delhi from 1320 to 1414, took the Sultanate to its greatest extent under Muhammad bin Tughlaq, and lost most of it again within his own reign.
- Lodi dynastyThe Lodis were the last dynasty of the Delhi Sultanate, the first of Afghan rather than Turkish origin, and their defeat at Panipat in 1526 brought the Mughals to India.
What was destroyed
- Destruction of NalandaThe sack of Nalanda Mahavihara in Bihar, conventionally dated to 1193 CE and attributed to the Turkic military commander Bakhtiyar Khalji, ended the working life of one of the ancient world's largest Buddhist monastic universities.
- NalandaNalanda was a major Buddhist monastic university in ancient Magadha, in present-day Bihar, active from roughly the 5th to the 12th century CE and among the earliest and most influential centers of higher learning in the premodern world.
More collections
- The Indian Independence MovementFrom the 1857 revolt to Partition — every satyagraha, revolutionary and Congress leader, in one place.
- European Colonial Rule in IndiaFrom Vasco da Gama's landfall to the last Viceroy — the Company's conquest and every Governor-General who ruled after it.
- The Maurya EmpireFrom Chandragupta to Ashoka — the first pan-Indian empire, and the emperor who renounced conquest after seeing what it cost.
- The Gupta Golden AgeClassical India at its height — the age of Aryabhata, Kalidasa, and a revival of Sanskrit literature and science.
- The Chola EmpireSouth India's great maritime power — temple-building, a navy that reached Southeast Asia, and the longest-lived dynasty in Indian history.
- The Vijayanagara EmpireThe last great Hindu empire of the south, built in the fourteenth century as a bulwark against the Sultanates — and sacked in 1565.
- The Mughal EmpireFrom Babur to Aurangzeb — the empire that built the Taj Mahal, ran the Mansabdari system, and reached its widest extent just before it began to break apart.
- The Maratha EmpireShivaji’s hill forts to a confederacy that broke Mughal power across the Deccan and north India.
- The Bhakti MovementDevotion over ritual and caste — the poet-saints who reshaped Hindu religious life from the seventh century onward.