The first congregational mosque of the conquest, built inside the citadel on a levelled platform of temple plinths: Wikipedia has construction beginning in 1193 under Aibak, the stone screen across the prayer hall added in 1196, and the first storey of the victory tower about 1200.
A Persian inscription counts twenty-seven Hindu and Jain temples taken down for the stone. The Iron Pillar of the fourth century stands in the court and Aibak built the mosque around it. The mosque is the garrison's endowment and the sign of the new rule.
Who holds it
- Name
- Aibak (patron); the imam and qazi are not named
- Title
- Head or custodian
- Since
- 1193
- Born
- not pinned
- Confidence
- low
Wikipedia, Quwwat-ul-Islam Mosque.
How things stand that morning
In building: the screen is up (1196), the tower is at its first courses (about 1200).
Where the sources disagree
- The campaign board says the mosque is dated by its own inscription to 1198; Wikipedia's page does not give that date. The campaign board dates the start of the Qutb Minar to 1199; Wikipedia says about 1200 for the first storey.
Evidence: Wikipedia's mosque page.
"The campaign board" is OMNIA's working map. These notes record where its earlier claims were checked against the sources.
Primary sources for Ghurids
Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.
- The Chronography of Bar Hebraeus, Gregory Bar Hebraeus (Abu'l-Faraj) (about 1275 to 1286). A later compilation that for 1200 relies on Michael the Syrian and Ibn al-Athir, but adds the Jacobite church's own memory of the Jazira, Mosul, Melitene and the Artuqid and Zangid courts, and carries Michael's story past 1195: the Seljuk brothers' war in Rum, the Khwarazmian and Ghurid wars in the east, Mosul under Nur al-Din Arslan Shah, and the caliph al-Nasir. Read online
- The Complete History, Izz al-Din Ibn al-Athir (about 1200 to 1231, at Mosul). The widest Muslim narrative for the years 596 to 597 AH (1199 to 1201): al-Adil's entry into Cairo and his taking of the sultanate from his nephew al-Mansur Muhammad early in 1200, the quarrels of the Ayyubid princes at Damascus, Aleppo and Hama, the Nile failure and the great famine of Egypt, Mosul under Nur al-Din Arslan Shah and the Jazira under Gokbori and the Artuqids, Baghdad under the caliph al-Nasir, the Khwarazmshah Tekish's death in 1200 and Muhammad's accession, the Ghurid wars in Khurasan, the Eldiguzids and Georgia, the Almohads in the west, and the Seljuks of Rum in passing. Read online
- The History of the World Conqueror, Ata-Malik Juvayni (1252 to 1260). Written for the Mongols but with a long retrospective on the powers they destroyed. Read online
- The Life of Sultan Jalal al-Din Mankubirti, Shihab al-Din Muhammad al-Nasawi (about 1241, at Aleppo). A Khwarazmian secretary's life of the last Khwarazmshah. Read online
- The Nasirid Generations: a General History of the Muslim Dynasties, Minhaj-i Siraj Juzjani (1259 to 1260, at Delhi). The Ghurid court's own history, by a man born in 1193 whose family served the sultans of Ghur and Ghazna. Read online
- The Crown of Glorious Deeds, Hasan Nizami (Sadr al-Din Muhammad ibn Hasan Nizami of Nishapur) (begun about 1205 at Delhi, carried on to about 1217). The earliest history written in Muslim India and the only contemporary account of Qutb al-Din Aibak's campaigns. Read online
- The Nasirean Generations (a general history of the Muslim dynasties), Minhaj-i Siraj Juzjani (completed 1260 at Delhi). The fullest narrative of the Ghurid conquest of northern India. Read online
- The Tree of Genealogies, and the Manners of War and Bravery, Fakhr-i Mudabbir (Fakhr al-Din Muhammad ibn Mansur Mubarakshah) (the Shajara about 1206, dedicated to Qutb al-Din Aibak; the Adab al-harb in the 1220s for Iltutmish). The prose introduction to the Shajara, written within six years of 1200, praises Aibak and tells of his rise under Mu'izz al-Din of Ghur, his consecration at Lahore in 1206 and the Ghurid campaigns in Hindustan, with some notice of the Turkish peoples.
3 more in the sources library for Persia and the Eastern Islamic World.
Sources and studies
- Wikipedia, 'Qutb complex (Quwwat-ul-Islam Mosque)'
- Wikipedia, 'Qutb ud-Din Aibak' (after K. A. Nizami in Habib and Nizami (eds), A Comprehensive History of India vol. 5, 1992)
- OMNIA board notes for the place (a lead only; checked against the sources above)
Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.