Meerut and Baran

Who he is

Title

Commanders of Meerut and of Baran

Since

1192

Born

not pinned

Family

not known

Confidence

low

Wikipedia (Aibak) says Aibak took Meerut and Baran in 1192. Minhaj says Iltutmish, whom Aibak bought after the sack of Anhilwara (Nizami 1992, p. 197), held Gwalior, Baran and then Badaun; the dates are not given, and the Baran post probably falls after 1200. Neither fort has a named commander on 1 January 1200 in the sources we reached.

Overlord

Qutb al-Din Aibak

What it holds

• Meerut and the upper Doab
• Baran (Bulandshahr) on the Kali Nadi
• Loni and the Baghpat ferry on the Yamuna
• Deoband, the last tax-paying market on the road north

How it was acquired

Taken in the first sweep of 1192.

Allies and rivals

Subordinate to Aibak. Koil and Budaun beyond are Ghurid conquests of 1194 and 1197 to 1198.

How things stand that morning

A string of garrison posts. No campaign recorded for 1199 to 1200.

Wealth

Doab grain and cane; river tolls.

Military

Garrisons; no counts.

Threats

• Hill rajas of the Siwalik foot
• Dor and other Rajput chiefs of the middle Doab (in the Ganges plain record)

Places of note

• Loni: A small mud and brick fort on the east bank of the Yamuna above Delhi
• Baghpat ferry: The Yamuna ferry on the road into the Doab

Where the sources disagree

• The campaign board entry baran-bulandshahr says it 'later becomes an iqta of Iltutmish'; Minhaj puts Iltutmish at Baran before Badaun, and the date is not pinned. It is not Iltutmish's on 1 January 1200 so far as we can tell.

Evidence: One sentence in Wikipedia on the 1192 capture; the campaign board.

"The campaign board" is OMNIA's working map. These notes record where its earlier claims were checked against the sources.

On the map: Garrison posts and their villages; the Doab is held as a string of forts, not as a block.

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.