Mahmud of Ghazni


Mahmud of Ghazni was the first independent ruler of the Turkic dynasty of Ghaznavids, ruling from 999 to 1030. At the time of his death, his kingdom had been transformed into an extensive military empire, which extended from northwestern Iran proper to the Punjab in the Indian subcontinent, Khwarazm in Transoxiana, and Makran.
Highly Persianized, Sultan Mahmud continued the bureaucratic, political, and cultural customs of his predecessors, the Samanids, which established the ground for a Persianate state in northwestern India. His capital of Ghazni evolved into a significant cultural, commercial, and intellectual centre in the Islamic world, almost rivalling the important city of Baghdad. The capital appealed to many prominent figures, such as al-Biruni and Ferdowsi.
Mahmud ascended the throne at the age of 27 upon his father's death, albeit after a brief war of succession with his brother Ismail. He was the first ruler to hold the title Sultan, signifying the extent of his power while at the same time preserving an ideological link to the suzerainty of the Abbasid Caliphate. During his rule, he invaded and plundered the richest cities and temple towns in the regions of present day India seventeen times, and used the booty to build his capital in Ghazni.

Background

Mahmud was born in the town of Ghazni in the region of Zabulistan on 2 November 971. His father, Sabuktigin, was a Turkic slave commander who laid foundations to the Ghaznavid dynasty in Ghazni in 977, which he ruled as a subordinate of the Samanids, who ruled Khorasan and Transoxiana. Mahmud's mother was the daughter of an Iranian aristocrat from Zabulistan, and is therefore known in some sources as Mahmud-i Zavuli. Not much about Mahmud's early life is known, he was a school-fellow of Ahmad Maymandi, a Persian native of Zabulistan and foster brother of his.

Family

Mahmud married a woman named Kausari Jahan, and they had twin sons Mohammad and Ma'sud, who succeeded him one after the other; his grandson by Mas'ud, Maw'dud Ghaznavi, also later became ruler of the empire. His sister, Sitr-e-Mu'alla, was married to Dawood bin Ataullah Alavi, also known as Ghazi Salar Sahu, whose son was Ghazi Saiyyad Salar Masud.
Mahmud's companion and lover was a Georgian slave Malik Ayaz, and his love for him inspired poems and stories.

Early career

In 994 Mahmud joined his father Sabuktigin in the capture of Khorasan from the rebel Fa'iq in aid of the Samanid Emir, Nuh II. During this period, the Samanid Empire became highly unstable, with shifting internal political tides as various factions vied for control, the chief among them being Abu'l-Qasim Simjuri, Fa'iq, AbuAli, the General Bekhtuzin as well as the neighbouring Buyid dynasty and Kara-Khanid Khanate.

Reign

Sabuktigin died in 997, and was succeeded by his son Ismail as the ruler of the Ghaznavid dynasty. The reason behind Sabuktigin's choice to appoint Ismail as heir over the more experienced and older Mahmud is uncertain. It may due to Ismail's mother being the daughter of Sabuktigin's old master, Alptigin. Mahmud shortly revolted, and with the help of his other brother, Abu'l-Muzaffar, the governor of Bust, he defeated Ismail the following year at the battle of Ghazni and gained control over the Ghaznavid kingdom. That year, in 998, Mahmud then traveled to Balkh and paid homage to Amir Abu'l-Harith Mansur b. Nur II. He then appointed Abu'l-Hasan Isfaraini as his vizier, and then set out west from Ghazni to take the Kandahar region followed by Bost, where he turned it into a militarised city.
Mahmud initiated the first of numerous invasions of North India. On 28November 1001, his army fought and defeated the army of Raja Jayapala of the Kabul Shahis at the Battle of Peshawar. In 1002 Mahmud invaded Sistan and dethroned Khalaf ibn Ahmad, ending the Saffarid dynasty. From there he decided to focus on Hindustan to the southeast, particularly the highly fertile lands of the Punjab region.
Mahmud's first campaign to the south was against an Ismaili state first established at Multan in 965 by a da'i from the Fatimid Caliphate in a bid to curry political favor and recognition with the Abbasid Caliphate; he also engaged elsewhere with the Fatimids. At this point, Jayapala attempted to gain revenge for an earlier military defeat at the hands of Mahmud's father, who had controlled Ghazni in the late 980s and had cost Jayapala extensive territory. His son Anandapala succeeded him and continued the struggle to avenge his father's suicide. He assembled a powerful confederacy that suffered defeat as his elephant turned back from the battle at a crucial moment, turning the tide into Mahmud's favor once more at Lahore in 1008 and bringing Mahmud into control of the Shahi dominions of Udbandpura.

Ghaznavid campaigns in Indian Subcontinent

Following the defeat of the Indian Confederacy, after deciding to retaliate for their combined resistance, Mahmud then set out on regular expeditions against them, leaving the conquered kingdoms in the hands of Hindu vassals and annexing only the Punjab region. He also vowed to raid and loot the wealthy region of northwestern India every year.
In 1001 Mahmud of Ghazni first invaded modern day Afghanistan and Pakistan and then parts of India. Mahmud defeated, captured, and later released the Shahi ruler Jayapala, who had moved his capital to Peshawar. Jayapala killed himself and was succeeded by his son Anandapala. In 1005 Mahmud of Ghazni invaded Bhatia, and in 1006 he invaded Multan, at which time Anandapala's army attacked him. The following year Mahmud of Ghazni attacked and crushed Sukhapala, ruler of Bathinda. In 1013, during Mahmud's eighth expedition into eastern Afghanistan and Pakistan, the Shahi kingdom was overthrown.
In 1014 Mahmud led an expedition to Thanesar. The next year he unsuccessfully attacked Kashmir. In 1018 he attacked Mathura and defeated a coalition of rulers there while also killing a ruler called Chandrapala. In 1021 Mahmud supported the Kannauj king against Chandela Ganda, who was defeated. That same year Shahi Trilochanapala was killed at Rahib and his son Bhimapala succeeded him. Lahore was annexed by Mahmud. Mahmud besieged Gwalior, in 1023, where he was given tribute. Mahmud attacked Somnath in 1025, and its ruler Bhima I fled. The next year, he captured Somnath and marched to Kachch against Bhima I. That same year Mahmud also attacked the Jats of Jud.
Christoph Baumer notes that in 1026 CE, Jats "inflicted heavy losses" on the army of Mahmud while it was on its way from Somnath to Multan. Later in 1027 CE, he avenged the attack by Jats, who had also been impervious to "forced Islamisation" for the last three centuries, by ravaging the fleet of Jats in the Indus river. Even though Jats had a bigger fleet than Mahmud, he is said to have around 20 archers on each of his 1400 boats, who were stocked with "special projectiles" carrying naphtha, and Jats' fleet was blazed by them.
The Indian kingdoms of Nagarkot, Thanesar, Kannauj, and Gwalior were all conquered and left in the hands of Hindu, Jain, and Buddhist kings as vassal states and he was pragmatic enough not to neglect making alliances and enlisting local peoples into his armies at all ranks. Since Mahmud never kept a permanent presence in the northwestern subcontinent, he engaged in a policy of destroying Hindu temples and monuments to crush any move by the Hindus to attack the Empire; Nagarkot, Thanesar, Mathura, Kannauj, Kalinjar and Somnath all submitted or were raided.

Attack on the Somnath Temple

The most famous of Mahmud's raids was that of Somnath. The temple was maintained by 10,000 villages, a thousand Brahmins and 500 girls sung and danced at its door. The Hindus believed that the Moon-god would destroy the Turks. In 1025 Mahmud raided Gujarat, plundering the Somnath temple and breaking its jyotirlinga. At first, the Rajput princes who had gathered there repulsed Mahmud, but the Hindus were defeated in the end and Mahmud entered the temple, which was a lofty structure supported by 56 pillars. Immense booty was acquired in the form of diamonds, rubies and pearls and 2 million dinars. The conquest of Somnath was followed by a punitive invasion of Anhilwara. Historians estimate the damage to the temple to have been minimal because there are records of pilgrimages to the temple in 1038 that make no mention of any damage. However, powerful legends with intricate detail had developed regarding Mahmud's raid in the Turko-Persian literature, which "electrified" the Muslim world according to scholar Meenakshi Jain.

Historiography concerning Somnath

Historians including Thapar, Eaton, and A. K. Majumdar have questioned the iconoclastic historiography of this incident. Thapar quoted Majmudar :
Thapar also argued against the prevalent narrative:

Political challenges

The last four years of Mahmud's life were spent contending with the influx of Oghuz and Seljuk Turks from Central Asia and the Buyid dynasty. Initially, after being repulsed by Mahmud, the Seljuks retired to Khwarezm, but Togrül and Çagrı led them to capture Merv and Nishapur. Later, they repeatedly raided and traded territory with his successors across Khorasan and Balkh and even sacked Ghazni in 1037. In 1040, at the Battle of Dandanaqan, they decisively defeated Mahmud's son, Mas'udI, resulting in Mas'ud abandoning most of his western territories to the Seljuks.
Sultan Mahmud died on 30 April 1030. His mausoleum is located in Ghazni, Afghanistan.

Campaign timeline

As emir

Ghor and Muhammad ibn Suri are then captured by Mahmud, made prisoner along with Muhammad ibn Suri's son, and taken to Ghazni, where Muhammad ibn Suri dies.
Appoints Sewakpal to administer the region. Anandapala flees to Kashmir, fort in the hills on the western border of Kashmir.
Under the reign of Mahmud of Ghazni, the region broke away from the Samanid sphere of influence. While he acknowledged the Abbasids as caliph as a matter of form, he was also granted the title Sultan in recognition of his independence.
Following Mahmud's recognition by the Abbasid caliphate in 999, he pledged a jihad and a raid on India every year. In 1005 Mahmud conducted a series of campaigns during which the Ismailis of Multan were massacred.
In the context of his religious policies toward Hindus, modern historians such as Romila Thapar and Richard M. Eaton have commented that his policies were in contrast to his general image in the modern era.
Mahmud used his plundered wealth to finance his armies which included mercenaries. The Indian soldiers, which Romila Thapar presumed to be Hindus, were one of the components of the army with their commander called sipahsalar-i-Hinduwan lived in their quarter of Ghazna practicing their own religion. Indian soldiers under their commander Suvendhray remained loyal to Mahmud. They were also used against a Turkic rebel, with the command given to a Hindu named Tilak according to Baihaki.
Indian historian Mohammad Habib states that there was no imposition of Jizya on "non-Muslims" during the reign of Mahmud of Ghazni nor any mention of "forced conversions":
A. V. Williams Jackson, Professor of Indo-Iranian Languages in Columbia University has written in his book History of India, "Mahmud vowed that every year he would wage a Holy War against the infidels of Hindustan"

Legacy

By the end of his reign, the Ghaznavid Empire extended from Ray in the west to Samarkand in the north-east, and from the Caspian Sea to the Yamuna. Although his raids carried his forces across the Indian subcontinent, only a portion of the Punjab and of Sindh in modern-day Pakistan came under his semi-permanent rule; Kashmir, the Doab, Rajasthan, and Gujarat remained under the control of the local Hindu dynasties.
The booty brought back to Ghazni was enormous, and contemporary historians give descriptions of the magnificence of the capital, as well as of the conqueror's munificent support of literature. He transformed Ghazni, the first centre of Persian literature, into one of the leading cities of Central Asia, patronizing scholars, establishing colleges, laying out gardens, and building mosques, palaces, and caravansaries. Mahmud brought whole libraries from Ray and Isfahan to Ghazni. He even demanded that the Khwarizmshah court send its men of learning to Ghazni.
Mahmud patronized the notable poet Ferdowsi, who after laboring 27 years, went to Ghazni and presented the Shahnameh to him. There are various stories in medieval texts describing the lack of interest shown by Mahmud to Ferdowsi and his life's work. According to historians, Mahmud had promised Ferdowsi a dinar for every distich written in the Shahnameh, but later retracted his promise and presented him with dirhams, at that time the equivalent of only 200dinars. His expedition across the Gangetic plains in 1017 inspired Al-Biruni to compose his Tarikh Al-Hind in order to understand the Indians and their beliefs. During Mahmud's rule, universities were founded to study various subjects such as mathematics, religion, the humanities, and medicine.
On 30 April 1030 Sultan Mahmud died in Ghazni at the age of 58. Sultan Mahmud had contracted malaria during his last invasion. The medical complication from malaria had caused lethal tuberculosis.
The Ghaznavid Empire was ruled by his successors for 157 years. The expanding Seljuk empire absorbed most of the Ghaznavid west. The Ghorids captured Ghazni in 1150, and Mu'izz al-Din captured the last Ghaznavid stronghold at Lahore in 1187.
The military of Pakistan has named its short-range ballistic missile the Ghaznavi Missile in honour of Mahmud of Ghazni. In addition, the Pakistan Military Academy, where cadets are trained to become officers of the Pakistan Army, also gives tribute to Mahmud of Ghazni by naming one of its twelve companies Ghaznavi Company.

Personality

Sultan Mahmud thought of himself as "the Shadow of the God on Earth", an absolute power whose will is law. He paid great attention to details in almost everything, personally overseeing the work of every department of his diwan. He watched closely over the activities of the highest statesmen of his empire, especially his military commanders as he would not tolerate any mistreatment with regard to ordinary people.
Mahmud appointed all his ministers himself without advising his wazir or diwan, though occasionally he had to, as his religion dictated that Muslims should consult each other on all issues. Most of the time he was suspicious of his ministers, particularly of the wazir, and the following words are widely believed to be his: "wazirs are the enemies of kings..." Sultan Mahmud had numerous spies across his empire, supervised by the special department within his diwan.
Mahmud was a patron of literature, especially poetry, and he was occasionally found in the company of talented poets either in his palace or in the royal garden. He was often generous to them, paying unstingtingly for their works according to their talent and worth.