HISTORICAL SUMMARY.
Heg. 716 (A.D.1316).—On the death of Alla-ood-Deen, his youngest son, Oomar Chan, was raised to the throne by Mullik Kafoor. This prince was deposed and imprisoned after a reign of three months and some days.
Heg. 717 (1317).—Moobarik Khiljy ascended the throne on the seventh Mohurrum.
Heg. 721 (1321).—The king was cut off by a conspiracy, and Mullik Khoosrow, the chief conspirator, raised to the throne; but he was put to death after a reign of only five months by Gheias-ood-Deen Toghluk; and with his death terminated the second Tartar dynasty of the kings of Delhi.
Heg. 721 (1321).—Gheias-ood-Deen Toghluk was the first of the third Tartar dynasty of the kings of Delhi. When he ascended the throne he regulated the affairs of the government in a manner so satisfactory as to obtain general esteem. He declared his eldest son heir-apparent, with the title of Aluf Chan, and conferred upon him the ensign of royalty.
Heg. 722 (1322).—This year the new citadel at Delhi was completed, to which the king gave the name of Toghlukabad.
Heg. 724 (1323).—The king, after having appointed his son, Aluf Chan, governor of Delhi, marched in person towards Bengal to stop the oppressions committed by the Rajahs of Luknowty and Soonargam. On his return towards his capital the king was met at Afghanpoor by his son and the nobles of his court, who advanced to congratulate him upon his safe return. Here Aluf Chan had erected, in the short space of three days, a temporary wooden building for his fathers reception. When the entertainment was over, the king ordered his equipage to proceed. Everybody hastened out and stood ready to accompany him, when the roof of the building suddenly fell, and the king and five of his attendants were crushed to death beneath the ruins.
Heg. 725 (1325).—Aluf Chan ascended the throne by the title of Mahomed Toghluk. He was the most eloquent and accomplished prince of his time; and his letters, both in Arabic and Persian, display so much elegance, good taste, and good sense, that the most able secretaries of later times study them with admiration.
Heg. 727 (1327).—The king caused a copper coin to be struck, issued it at an imaginary value, and, by a royal decree, caused it to pass current throughoutHindostan. This was the cause of great distress, the bankers and merchants alone benefiting at the expense of the sovereign and his people.
Heg. 738 (1337).—Mahomed Toghluk conceived the idea of conquering China, and sent an army of one hundred thousand horse into Nepaul and the countries on either side of the Himalaya mountains. The expedition utterly failed, nearly the whole army having perished in those mountainous regions.
Heg. 741 (1340).—The king obtained possession of the strong fort of Kondhana, the modern Singur, near Poma, which he starved into a surrender. He removed his family to Dowlutabad, which he resolved to make his capital, leaving the noble metropolis of Delhi a resort for bats and a dwelling-place for the beasts of the desert.
Heg. 742 (1341).—Mahomed Toghluk laid heavy contributions upon Dowlutabad and the neighbouring provinces, which caused an insurrection; but his numerous and well-appointed army soon reduced the insurgents to their former state of slavery. This year the king nearly fell a victim to a pestilence which broke out in his camp with such violence that it swept off a great part of his army. Having lost one of his teeth, he ordered it to be buried with much ceremony at Beer, and caused a magnificent tomb to be raised over it, which still remains a monument of his vanity and folly.
Heg. 743 (1342).—Mullik Heidur, chief of the Ghoorkas, slew Tartar Chan, the viceroy of Lahore.
Heg. 744 (1344).—The confederate Hindoos seized the country occupied by the Mahomedans in the Deccan and expelled them, so that within a few months Mahomed had no possessions in that quarter except Dowlutabad.
Heg. 747 (1346).—The king promoted several persons in the meanest stations to the rank of nobles, which occasioned the hereditary Omrahs to revolt; but their leader Azeez, upon the king’s troops advancing to attack him, becoming panic-stricken, fell from his horse, was made prisoner, and suffered a cruel death. His forces were totally routed.
Heg. 748 (1347).—Dowlutabad fell into the hands of the insurgents, who put the king’s officers to death and divided the public treasure.
Heg. 752 (1351).—Mahomed Toghluk, having eaten to excess of fish, was seized with fever of which he died, after a tyrannical reign of twenty-seven years, and was succeeded by his cousin Feroze Toghluk.
Heg. 755 (1354).—The king built the city of Ferozabad, adjoining that of Delhi, and on the following year dug a canal forty-eight coss in length. He likewise constructed another canal between the hills of Mundvy and Surmore, from the Jumna, into which he conducted seven minor streams, which all uniting ran in one channel through Hansy, and from thence to Raiseen, where he built a strong fort, which he called Hissar Feroza.
Heg. 762 (1360).—The king sent the celebrated image of Nowshaba to Mecca, to be thrown upon the road, that it might be trodden under foot by the pilgrims.
Heg. 776 (1375).—The celebrated Mujahid Shah ascended the throne of the Deccan. In his fourteenth year, in a struggle with his father’s spice-bearer, Moobarik, a man of great strength, he threw him and broke his neck.
Heg. 779 (1378).—He was assassinated after a reign of not quite three years. Hajy Mahomed Kandahary states that he received his death-wound from the son of Moobarik the spice-bearer.
Heg. 781 (1379).—Kurgoo, the Zemindar of Kutehr, invited to his house Syud Mahomed, governor of Budaoon, together with his two brothers, and basely murdered them. Enraged at this treachery, Feroze Toghluk instantly marched and took severe vengeance on the associates and kindred of the Zemindar, putting them to the sword, and levelling their houses with the ground. The murderer made his escape to the mountains of Camaoon, and was protected by the Rajahs of those parts. Feroze ordered a detachment of his army against them, and nearly twenty thousand of those mountaineers were made prisoners and condemned to slavery; but Kurgoo contrived to elude the vigilance of the king’s general.
Heg. 790 (1388).—Feroze Toghluk died, after having reached the almost patriarchal age of ninety years.