Abdur Rahman's The last two dynasties of the Sahis is considered to be the best book over Shahis. But, I am not getting any confidence over this. Compare these two sets.
I am interested to know how knowledged this gentleman is, on Sanskrit original of Rajatarangini and other Hindu/Buddhist books on the topic.
One should be realistic enough. Pakistan has fought three wars with India and no Indian will have access to Chhota Lahore or Hund. All they can quote is from some other reference or from historic memory.
How is this a benchmark when whole industry is destroyed and the people fled across Khyber? This is slowly becoming more of a study of Mahmud of Ghazni and Arabs in Sistan and the study of Shahis in that context.
Another royal mess up. Are Hepathlites Huns or Turks? Or are both same?
Main lesson: The Muslim chronicles didn't have an effing clue as to who is who and who is where. The less we rely them to glean information, the better. Use them only for cold facts.
Seriously? How many ethnographies do we have that say Rajputs(not as a whole but a tribe) fled the Gokturks in Central Asia? And how were they accepted as Kshatriyas? Or is this pure Pakology in it's full glory?
May be A=B. Hence, proved that A=B🤦♀️
Mayurasarma's son was Kangavarma🥱 And looks like our dearie, even after mentioning Chach of Sind didn't notice the similarities of the story between Chach and Kallar.
Ah!! The neutrality of a historian is for all to see.
Just notice the bigotry. The language for Uthman is not seen for Ali because Shias trace his origin to him.
The outrage and ululation of an invader defeating a native!! Will have to wait and see what he writes over Bhimapala's Rawalpindi stand against the invading Mahmud of Ghazni.
And when the invader breaks the pact, let's just brush it away.
And here ends the historic value of the book. Abu Ubaidah was under the command of his brother Yazid who invaded Kabul. The army was destroyed, Yazid was killed and Abu captured. The relief army was completely routed and the prisoners had to be ransomed off.
Today I learnt that the first Caliph was succeeded by Caliph II as Caliph of Islam.
AFAIK there is no proof that Abdurrahman Ibn al-Ash’ath was surrendered by the Zunbil. Either I need to check the originals or present my accolades for this fertile imagination.
Again, we side the invaders for their subterfuge 😎
Is the Shahi clever or are the Arabs stupid? What do you call a kingdom which falls to the same trick again and again and never learns?
So, Phrom Kesar(739-745) fought and imposed tribute on donkeys? Or was that monkeys?
When a Muslim makes such a mistake, the mistake becomes gospel😎
Yes, we know of Arabs entering Wazirastan but there is no proof that they reached Indus. By the way, did they confuse Indus with some other like Kurram or Gomal?
So sad. We had to kill the Shahi before his time because we need to fit a new one into our chronology. And if you declared Lak is a tribe name and you have a Kamaluka-Toramana, what's the chance that Lak-Toramana is a name?
People complained to Kallar and Kallar arrested his master. And then, he got a change of mood and increased the sentence. What sort of tamasha is this🤦♀️
Pandeyji is wrong to count all names from coins but Al Beruni is wrong not to count all the names from coins.
Kalhana doesn't hint a change in dynasty but let's make Al Beruni's Kallar a beggar and then make him rich.
Ah!! The crooked Brahmin who toppled the king illegally and immorally. I am really surprised this Brahmin bashing came this late in the book - in page 90.
Now, because Kalhana is a Hindu, let's declare what he wrote is junk.
And the flowery imagination flies high
A coppersmith should be extolled for becoming a dacoit.
Yes. A band of 50 led by an ex-dacoit defeated an army of 40,000. We understand that is history.
Well, this book, Tarikh-i-Sistan is the main reference for Abdur Rahman 🤷♀️
How does it even matter? Is this a book on Shahis or is this an updated version of Tarikh-i-Sistan?
We don't know who he is. Let's make him a separate person and heap abuses on him.
A dacoit turned coppersmith is a legendary hero and a king in his own right is elevated from a joke to a legend.
An older tweet.
So, Phrom Kesar(739-745) fought and imposed tribute on donkeys? Or was that monkeys?
@khatvaanga - Check now. instead of screenshot, I selected the section and copied it. Anduke background transparent vachhindi.
Some issues with the thread and needed some cleaup. Anyways. Back to the game.
Next assumption game. Because we assumed Kallar's reign started in 843 and Lalliya's ended in 902, we can't say both are the same person.
I love these stories. All he need to do is to link Al Beruni's 60 generations with this and the Tochi Valley Inscriptions which he mentioned elsewhere. When Kuzala and Phromo can be used as titles, why not Toramana? Especially the last one, according to him is Lak-Toramana?
Let's assume Asata is Kamalavarman's brother. Now, let's invent a civil war between them.
Default assumption. Did anyone even think how Bhimadeva established a temple which gave Mahmud 3 crore Shahi Dirhams and the Shahi throne that distant from the core of Shahi territories? Being a Pakistani, he should have at least read some proper Pakistani research papers.
Last time, it was 50. This time it's 500.
I am sure this is one of the toughest pieces in the book easily. When Sabuktegin decides money is more important than Islam, what sort of monkey-balancing should our dearie indulge in?
Now, Abdur Rahman makes amends. 500 stays but 40000 becomes 100000
Again. 15000 with Mahmud and Jayapala with 45000 and he is still awaiting reinforcements. Can we safely assume Jayapala had no more than 4500? A parallel would be, can the British have Jhansi under siege and defeat 25000 troops led by Tatya Tope in less than a day with 1500 men?
Can the personal guard of the king be larger than that of the army? Mahmud sent 6000 and lost 6000, Trilochanapala sent 30000 and killed 5000, and Mahmud pushed back the 30000 and the main Shahi force with his personal guard? And in spite of that only 20000 died.
The title of the book should have been "How the Might of Islam crushed the Infidels of Afghanistan and Gandhara". This is more of a story of Sistan and Mahmud than that of Shahis. Shahis were just there to fill the gaps.
The puny infidel learns his lesson.
Just think about it. A Pakistani ululating at the defeats of the natives of Pakistan in the hands of an invader just because the invader has the same religion as his. When a highly educated scholar has his mindset, what mindset will an average Pakistani have?
See. How magnanimous the invader is. Why should a Pakistani be shameful when he gets such sort of a benefactor?
Another fantasy here. A temple is destroyed and Trilochanapala is in his rights to be angry. But no. He isn't. His ego is too much that he was offended by the criticism of the act and not the act. By the way, the stage is set to create a new villain here - Bhimapala.
And yes. Mahmud is bound to be angry because Trilochanapala is angry because of hurt ego.
How ashamed our dearie is, that an infidel stopped a Muslim, that too one as mighty as Mahmud for months, that too in Islamabad? No wonder he abhors the word Nidar Bhim and not once he used it.
Whoever this guy is, he is more considerate than Ussher who said Earth was formed in 4004 BC. This guy says earth formed in 6000 BC.
Another fantasy here. Notice, there are no references for this story.
We know Bhoja and Vidyadhara coordinated, but do we know whether they combined their armies? This is what happens when you blindly follow Muslim historians without doing a cross-check.
Again, there is no proof of this outside Muslim annals.
Why didn't the Shahis issue coins? Because they didn't understand the concept of sovereign currency 😎 And what proof have we got? Some usurers during Ghaznavid rule(not Shahi).
And guess what? Awfi was also writing stories. Because we can't accept he is writing stories, we need to attribute some sources to him.
And what justification does he give for that? Hindu hatred for Muslim iconography.
On the Shahi mint marks. Those careless and ignorant fools!! They don't even know how to cast a mark properly.
Circular logic. Let's assume A = B. Hence it is proven that B = A. All this monkey-balancing is because our invader lover can't digest the fact that a Hindu king can coronate himself in Kabul in 923.
All of this hinges on the point that Mahmud chased Anandapala till Sodra. Which fellow with common sense will take such a route to crush rebellion? All of this is due to Firishta's Lahore which people believe it to be on Indian border but is on the outskirts of Hund.
Recommendation: Don't read. Read some other book on this topic and have this as a gap filler. But, for a student of history, it's a must keep. goodreads.com/review/show/39…
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In 1542, Vijayanagara fought the Bahmanid coalition and defeated it. It was a massive battle and sensing a window, the three brothers - Ramaraya split the army into three and he along with his brothers Tirumala and Venkatadri marched in three directions chasing the big three - Ramaraya went on Golconda, Tirumala on Ahmednagar and Venkatadri on Bijapur.
Venkatadri clashed with the fleeing troops at Adoni, Kurakacherla and Manuva - in fact, Asad Khan who was holding Adoni abandoned the fort - while he fled with a select troop to raid Venkatadri's camp, he ordered the garrison to join the Adil Shah and Barid Shah.
He attacked Venkatadri's camp in the night and pillaged it - even to the extent of taking families hostage but was severely defeated. After this, he captured Amir Barid and overran Bidar. With Bidar collapsing, Adil Shah had no option but to flee even faster -
Vira Narasingaraya who held the coast from Pulicat till almost Rameshwaram earned a revenue of 11 lakhs under Krishnaraya. Sewell gives it to around 3.5 rupees. He paid one third in tribute, maintained 30000 foot, 3000 horse, 30 elephants.
This is a good metric for Indian troop strengths.
39 lakh rupees revenue - 30000 infantry - 3000 horse - 30 elephant
Considering 30 lakhs, we will have a decent ratio -
1 lakh revenue - 1000 infantry - 100 horse - 1 elephant
While this is the number from around 1500, I don't see why this number should be different all history. There is only one counter metric. How does 30 lakh revenue translate to a cavalry based army.
Example, consider Battle of Raichur where Krishnaraya threw the full weight of the Empire. Now, if Narasinga Raya's contribution is 30k infantry, total Tamil country can be no more than a lakh. And total Vijayanagara, 3-3.5 lakh. Now, assuming he fielded a third of his army there(which is the maximum because of his logistics and the need for domestic security), the best Vijayanagara can field is 1-1.1 lakhs. We have another metric there to help us. Vijayanagara camp size is 7.36 lakh soldiers. Now, if we assume 10 camp followers for every soldier( you have shopkeepers, food supplies, barbers, grooms, everyone - some are capable of fighting anyways), we arrive at 73,600 troops. 75000 troops against a projection of 1 lakh seems a decent approximation. Now, what is this number? It's one-fifth of Vijayanagara's capacity. Can we assume A kingdom can field 20% of it's strength for a campaign? In case of Vijayanagara, it can be 75k troops, 7500 horse and 75-100 elephants with a 20% margin.
Summarizing,
1 lakh revenue - 1000 soldiers - 100 horse - 1 elephant
A kingdom can field 20-25% of it's total troop strength in a single campaign. Exceptions exist where you go for a total mobilization as in the case of a conquest but from a position of strength, this number holds.
Another story. When Krishna Raya was ruling, the Chola country was ruled by Virashekhara Chola and Pandya country was ruled by Chandrashekhara Pandya. But, Virashekhara invaded Pandya country and ejected the Pandya out. The Pandya went to Vijayanagara and petitioned Krishna Raya.
Krishna Raya chastised Nagama Nayaka as the Tamil Country was under his mandate, how did things go this bad? And he asked Nagama Nayaka to take an army personally and fix the things. He told that the Chola country will have to be annexed into the royal territory and order should
be restored in the Pandya country. Nagama Nayaka went, defeated the Chola and chased him away, removed the Chola garrisons in the Pandya country and while he was restoring order, Chandrashekhara Pandya went to Krishna Raya again saying "while you ordered Nagama Nayaka to seize
The Story of the Ahoms
A Mong Mao prince Sukhapha was appointed as the heir apparent in absence of succession and when the king Pao Meo Pung. Pao Meo Pung got a son after nineteen years, to avoid a conflict, Sukhapha left the kingdom in 1215 and crossed the Paktai Mountains. He and his followers were generally migrants and not invaders, and though they had to force their way through, they eventually settled in Kamarupa, which eventually came to be known as Assam after them.
The traditional dating of the kingdom’s foundation is given as 1228. They called their kingdom Mong Dun Shun Kham – the Casket of Gold. Sukhapha moved from place to place till he finally settled in Charaideo which would emerge as the ritual capital of the Ahoms even after they shifted the capital city from there. He would divide the administration into two parts, each headed by one of the Dangaria – Burhagohain and Borgohain. The Ahoms stayed as vassals of Mong Mao till Mong Kwang succeeded it.
The Ahom estate started to expand even from the time of Sukhapa’s son Suteupha who clashed with the Kacharis, Mong Kwang and Kamata being the earliest campaigns. Sukhrangpha would see a rebellion from his brother and his brother Sutupha would start the long drawn war with the Sutiya Empire. Though Ahoms won the war by 1376, Sutupha was murdered by the Sutiyas who was invited for peace talks. This led to an interregnum and Tyao Khamti, a son of Sutupha was made the ruler after four years.
Ambedkar is a really tricky topic. He was born with a silver spoon - his family was the traditional palanquin bearers of the village temple in his place and he spent most of his childhood in a cantonment where his father was a teacher - what persecution are we talking here?
Now, as like many of the aspiring class of that India including a bulk of Indian freedom fighters, he went to England to study and returned back exactly how the main names like Jinnahbhai or Gandhi or Sardar Patel returned back. But, unlike the rest, he had another baggage with
him - caste. Many worked for the British and many openly sided them because it would hurt their career. How do you suppose great Congress leaders like Tej Bahadur Sapru made their money? Now, Ambedkar was the first legislator from his caste and people looked towards him as
Let me propose a slightly different theory over Brahmin hatred in India. We understand that they being the guardians of Hinduism had to face the ire of Buddhists and Jain's during their days of ascendancy but then these cults were just corrective actions on Hinduism.
Their retreat was chaotic and still had local support. On the other hand, Rashtrakutas are one of the first kingdoms in India who expanded that massively and rapidly. This introduced a level of low level churning in the government. To establish control in the kingdom
and to ensure the resurgence of Hinduism, Rashtrakutas planted Brahmins and Agraharas all over the kingdom. This was less of a counterweight to those two decaying cults but more as a direct challenge to the local nobility.