CHAPTER IX. HISTORY. The following sketch of Berár history is drawn mainly from a few well-known authorities; some official papers have also been consulted, and local inquiries made, but there is no pretence to deep or wide research, nor attempt at critical analysis of sources of information: PRE-MAHOMEDAN PERIOD. The name Berár seems to have designated a separate territory (called Vaidarbha in the Puráns) from very ancient times; but the derivations given of the word carry little historic value. No ancient inscriptions* have yet been deciphered which preserve record of the Hindú kings who ruled this country up to the Mahomedan period. We know, however, that the greater part of the Dakhan, up northward so far as the Narbada, was subject for some centuries to Rajpút princes of the Chálukia race, whose capital was at Kalyán, near Kalbarga, from about 1000 A.D. to 1200 A.D. And Rámdeo, who was conquered and slain by Alá-ud-dín, was the last of the Yádava line of kings, who reigned not without fame at Deogarh, the modern Daulatábád, down to the end of the 13th century A.D. So we may be allowed to guess that Berár was at one period under the sway of Kalyán, or of Deogarh, probably of both successively, though the south-eastern districts of the old province may have belonged to the kingdom ruled by the ancient Hindú rájas at Warangal. Moreover, the most striking remains of ancient Hindú architecture found in the Dakhan are supposed to date from the era of these dynasties; while in Berár we have many fine specimens of the massive stone temples with their rich ornamental sculptures, their porticoes, and pillared colonnades, that belong to the style called Chálukian. Most of these buildings are founded in the hilly country above the Gháts, or in that section of the Berár valley which lies between those southern gháts and the Púrna river; north of that river they are rare. In India ancient races and dynasties are traced and remembered chiefly by their architecture; the prevalence of a style may connote the extent of dynastic dominion-so these ruins may help to attest the received hypothesis that the province must long have formed part of that principal Rajpút kingdom which occupied the heart of the Dakhan. But all local tradition tells of independent rájas who governed Berár from Elichpúr, which is said to take its name from one of them, called Rája I'l. Whether this personage was in truth one of the Deogarh princes, or a governor under them at Elichpúr, or whether he really ruled a separate state-are questions not yet solved by researches. He is supposed to have been defeated and slain at Elichpúr by Mahomedans; and he may have been the last of his line, for he * Two inscriptions have just been sent to the Asiatic Society of Bengal. History. Præ-Mahomedan Pe riod. History. Præ-Maho medan Pe. riod. Mahomedan appears to enjoy the usual compensatory fame of a melancholy kind which the sympathies and regrets of a people confer on those unfortunate rulers who close a national dynasty by losing their throne and life in resisting foreign invaders. His name often appears in the Hindú legends which account for the relics of a past age. He is said to have built the curious Jain temple which still exists at Sirpúr (a spot now sacred among Saráugís); of course he founded Elichpúr; and the Asiatic Researches* mention that his name is popularly connected with Elora. This last notion is probably mere guessing by sound,† but it shows how far the rája's name has been heard. On the other hand, it is very likely that the Hindú kings of these parts (or their ministers at least) were Jains in the eleventh or twelfth century A.D. Close to Elichpúr, by a waterfall at the far end of a picturesque ravine that indents the Satpura hills, is a cluster of Jain temples of some antiquity, Then the covered cisterns on the Narnála hill were certainly built by the master of that fortress,-and their peculiar construction is attributed to the precautions of religionists who cover up water lest insects should be drowned in it. But the dates of these buildings have yet to be fixed by competent authority; it is certain, at any rate, that, according to the historic tradition of the province, its princes immediately before the Mahomedan invasion were Jains. MAHOMEDAN PERIOD. In A.D. 1294 Alá-ud-dín, nephew and son-in-law to the Delhi Emperor Firoz Ghilzí, made his first expedition to the Dakhan. A.D. 1294. Málwa and Guzerát had before this been invaded and subdued by the Patháns, but we hear nothing of Berár until Alá-ud-dín suddenly appeared before Elichpúr with his army. Two accounts agree in the story that Elichpúr was the first place attacked in the Dakhan by Alá-ud-dín; so it may be inferred that he came over the Sátpura hills, probably from Hindia, in order to surprise Berár and to avoid the hostile Hindús of Khandesh. The Rája fought stoutly, according to story, and a huge mound called the Ganj-Shahid is still shown, which is said to have been piled over the martyred adventurers who fell when the Mahomedans stormed the infidel city. Thence he made a flying march to Deogarh, where he defeated the Yádava prince, Rám Deo, who bought him out of the country by a heavy ransom. Alá-ud-din is said also to have exacted the cession of Elichpur with lands attached to it, as if it had been then subject to Deogarh; and, as he left a garrison there on the skirts of the Satpuras, he may possibly have gone back to Upper India through the hillpasses just north of the town, the place being occupied to keep open those passes for his return. Alá-ud-din soon after murdered his uncle, and usurped the Delhi throne. On this occasion he conferred on * Vol. vi., 1799. It is believed that the village at these caves is properly called Yerula. his brother the title of Elich* Khán, an uncommon name with a Turkoman sound, that suggests a derivation for Elichpúr, since most of the neighbouring towns (Hoshangábád, Burhánpúr, Ahmadnagar, for example) were called after their early Pathán conquerors or founders. Throughout Alá-ud-dín's reign the Dakhan was plundered by successive bands of Mahomedans from the north; but at his death the Hindús seem to have recovered the provinces previously subject to Deogarh, However, this insurrection was crushed in 1318-19 by Mubárak Ghilzí, when he flayed alive the last Hindú A.D. 1318-19. prince of Deogarh; and Berár has ever since been nominally under the dominion of Musalmán rulers. Under them it has always kept its distinct name; and there is reason to believe that from the first it formed a separate provincial charge, of course with constant change of boundaries. The notorious Emperor Mahomed Toghluk of Delhi, who attempted in the fourteenth century all sorts of civilized improvements after a most barbarous fashion-insomuch that he resembles a modern administrator run stark mad-appointed a Viceroy of the Dakhan, and divided it into four provinces. Probably Berár was one of these, for it is mentioned as one of the divisions under the Amír Jadidah, or foreign officers appointed by the Emperor to manage his southern dominions. But the new system of government, which included an inspectorship of husbandry (quite a nineteenth-century appointment), broke down altogether. The Amír Jadidah plundered their divisions, and rebelled against their Emperor, who had summoned them all to council at Daulatábád, and was having them transferred under a guard to Guzarát, where he hoped to cut their throats. Mahomed Toghluk attacked the rebel officers, but only got a drawn battle; mean while Guzarát revolted in his rear, and the Emperor went off there to restore order. In his absence the Amír Jadidah, joined by the nobles of Berár, defeated and slew Imád-ul-Mulk, who governed Berár and Khandesh from Elichpúr. There was a general revolt of the Dakhanis while Mahomed Toghluk was pursuing the Guzarát rebels into Sindh; so that when the Emperor died of a fish surfeit on the Indus all these southern provinces fell away from his house, and maintained for 250 years their independence of the Delhi sovereignty. This was in 1351. For the next 130 years Berár remained under the dominions of the kings called Báhmani, because the founder of their line, elected after the revolt from Mahomed Toghluk, was either a Bráhman or a Bráhman's servant. This man ruled all the Dakhan under the title of Alá-ud-dín Hasan Sháh, and divided his kingdom into four provinces, of which Máhúr, Rámgarh, and part of Berár formed one. Perhaps it was then that the boundaries of Berár proper were extended, and the whole province called by that name, for Rámgarh and Máhúr both belonged to the independent kingdom of Berár when it was afterwards set up. A.D. 1351. We may venture to describe roughly the Báhmani province of Berár as stretching from the Sátpura range southward to the Godávari river, from Khandesh and Daulatábád eastward to the Wardha river. There * Reference to the original Persian has been mislaid. Possibly the name was Khalich. Compare Chin Khalích Khán, one of the names of the first Nizám. History. Mahomedan Period. History. Mahomedan Period. can be little doubt, however, that the Báhmani kings, when their power was at its zenith, pushed their conquests far beyond the Wardha, and at the least occupied the open country which afterwards belonged to Akbar's subah, with most of the tract which the Maráthas took from a Gond Rája at Chánda. But how far they extended their settled domination, and how much of this territory was included in Berár, are questions which can only be determined by minute local research.* In those days Berár seems to have been a troublesome border-country, with debateable frontiers on the north and east, exposed to attack by the highland chiefs of the Sátpura and by the wild tribes across the Wardha. We read of an insurrection in the province against Mahomed Shah Báhmani, perhaps the most ferocious of this bloody line of kings; while in A.D. 1398 it was invaded by the Rája of Kherla in the Sátpuras, who carried fire and sword from the hills down to Máhúr, on the Painganga. King Feroz Sháh was just then fighting the Hindú prince of Bijnagar, but he returned northward, and drove the Kherla Rája back into his stronghold, the ruins of which may still be seen within a few miles of the present head-quarters of the Baitúl district of the Central Provinces. Rája Narsing Ráya was obliged to surrender himself to the king at Elichpúr. Ahmed Shah Báhmani, who began to reign about A.D. 1420, resided a year at Elichpúr, repairing the Narnála fort and constructing (says Ferishta) the Gáwilgarh fort. But Colonel Briggs truly remarks that the name of Gáwilgarht shows that the hill must have been fortified much earlier by the Gaulis, who are still a numerous tribe on these ranges. The Kherla Rájas are supposed to have been shepherd-kings of the clan; and Narsing Ráya, the last of these, held his mountain-kingdom with much courage and address against the two violent and powerful princes of Málwa and the Dakhan, between whom he was placed. By the help of Ahmad Shah, who probably did not care to let Sultan Hoshang Shah of Málwa annex the hills above Elichpúr, he gave that monarch a severe repulse; but a few years later Hoshang Sháh slew him in battle, and wiped out for ever this poor little highland chieftainship. It may be granted that Narsing Ráya and his caterans lived by plundering the lowlands like their Scottish cotemporaries, and must have been very troublesome neighbours. Yet in those days the main object of all governments was rapine and conquest, with a difference only in the scale of operations; and there is something pitiful in the fate of these petty tribal chiefs who disappeared under the conquering sweep of the Pathán adventurer's scimitar. A.D. 1420. Ahmad Shah's son, Alá-ud-dín, married the daughter of the Khandesh king, but neglected her for a captive Hindú princess. So in A.D. 1437 the lawful wife called in her father, who combined with the Guzarát *The hereditary deshmukh and deshpándia still exist across the Wardha as far east as the Wainganga river, and have been there from time immemorial. These offices are sometimes supposed to be of early Mahomedan origin; certainly they did not exist wherever the aboriginal chiefs maintained unbroken independence, while the Maráthas always endeavoured to get rid of them. † Gauli-garh; compare Asá A'hírgarh-Asirgarh. It is questionable whether the Gaulis (herdsmen) of the Satpuras ever existed as a separate tribal stock, and the Kherla dynasty is said in the Nágpúr Gazetteer to have been Gond. |