The Adventures of Ibn Battuta

"The Adventures of Ibn Battuta A Muslim Traveler of the 14th Century" by Ross Dunn is based on the travels of the famous fourteenth century Moroccan traveler Ibn Battuta. He visited and stayed in India during the reign of Muhammad bin Tughluq. He recorded the general state of politics and society in India. The book shed light on the precarious situation of the Hindus; nothing less than relegation to second-class status.

I have pulled out the most interesting quotes from the book-

 ....The first phase of the Muslim conquest of North India was a splendid ghazi adventure of looting, shooting, and smashing up the gods of Hindu idolators. The new kings of Dehli, however, imposed civil order on the conquered areas and created a structure of despotism designed to tax rather than slaughter the native peasantry.

Like the Turkish rulers of the Middle East and Anatolia, the sultans learned proper Muslim statecraft from the Abbasid tradition, though adding here and there colorful bits of Hindu ceremonial. Within several decades of the founding of the sultanate, these erstwhile tribal chieftains were transforming themselves into Indo–Persian monarchs, secluded from the populace at the center of a maze of intimidating ritual and an ever-growing army of officials, courtiers, and bodyguards. 

Delhi grew rapidly in the thirteenth century, not because it was an important center of industry or a key intersection of trade, but because it was the imperial residence. As Ibn Battuta had witnessed in other leading capitals, the operation of the army, the bureaucracy, and the royal household required an immense supporting staff of clerks, servants, soldiers, construction workers, merchants, artisans, transporters, shopkeepers, tailors, and barbers. Delhi was typical of parasitic medieval capitals, its royal establishment feeding magnificently off the labor of the lower orders and the revenues of hundreds of thousands of Hindu farmers. 

Also from central Islamdom came belle-lettrists, historians, poets, and musicians to entertain the imperial court, chronicle its achievements, and extol the virtues of the king. Though Hindi, Turkish, Gujarati, and numerous other Indian tongues could be heard in the streets and bazaars of Delhi, Persian was used in polite circles, thus extending its range as the language of literate prestige all the way from Anatolia to Bengal. Speaking and writing in Persian, the Muslim elite of India reaffirmed in effect their cultural and historical connections to the central lands and at the same time created a linguistic barrier of exclusivity and privilege between themselves and the Hindu masses. 

Delhi, like other rising Muslim cities of that period, grew outward from a hub of grand public buildings — mosques, palaces, Sufi khanqas, colleges, and mausolea — that incorporated the domes, arches, and calligraphic inscriptions characteristic of Middle Period architecture in Persia. Since the immigrant community was small, however, Hindu artisans and laborers had to be hired in large numbers to carry out most of the work. Thus all sorts of native structural and decorative elements found their way into these buildings, some of them built with the sandstone blocks of demolished Hindu temples. 

The prospering of Muslim life in Delhi and numerous other Hindustani towns in the thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries was evidence of a continuous stream of native conversion. India’s immigrant population of Turks, Afghans, Persians, and Arabs never represented more than a small minority of the total. By the time Ibn Battuta visited the country, the great majority of Muslims there were Indian-born. Most of India’s rural population remained true to the Hindu tradition. 

The Chinese emissaries had earlier arrived in Delhi with 100 slaves and cartloads of fine clothing, brocade, musk, and swords, compliments of Toghon Temur. Muhammad Tughluq naturally felt obliged to reciprocate with an even more magnificent array of gifts. The list included 200 Hindu slaves, songstresses, and dancers, 15 pages, 100 horses, and wondrous quantities of choice textiles, robes, dishware, and swords. 

By the 1340s, however, the conditions of travel, even under armed escort, had changed drastically. Seven years of famine, repeated rebellion, and disastrous government had left the rural areas of what remained of the empire more and more difficult to control. Hindu insurgency and brigandage had become endemic outside the walls of the garrison towns, even in the Ganges heartland. Traffic on the high roads connecting the major cities was even more susceptible to interference than when Ibn Battuta had his first encounter with Hindu dacoits on his way to Delhi in 1334.