#Ahmadnagar Sultanate

[bhramanti]

DEVAGIRI FORT

Daulatabad Fort, also known as Devagiri Fort or Deogiri Fort, is a historic fortified citadel located in Daulatabad village near Aurangabad, Maharashtra, India. It was the capital of the Yadava dynasty (9th century–14th century CE)

[buzz-london]

Malik Ambar - from Ethiopian Slave to a King in India | How He Fought the Mughal Empire

Malik Ambar's story is an incredible tale of success against all odds -- of a slave building a new life for himself in a foreign land, and of the Deccan region in India attempting to hold the expansionary Mughal Empire at bay.  Mughal Emperors Akbar and Jahangir were obsessed with conquering the Deccan region of India, putting them at odds with Malik Ambar and other Habshis (East Africans in India, primarily slaves, ex-slaves, and free descendants).  As de facto King of Ahmadnagar, Malik Ambar successfully navigated the Sultanate through a period of crisis and helped cultivate the might of the Marathas.

I hope this video inspires you to learn more about East Africans and their long and influential history in the Indian subcontinent (stretching back thousands of years!).

https://youtu.be/beXIBdLvvPc

[yeaskhatun]

7 Epic Heroic Stories of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj

chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj is one of India’s most revered historical figures, known for his military genius, visionary leadership, and commitment to the cause of Swarajya (self-rule). Born in a time of political instability and foreign rule, Shivaji Maharaj’s rise to power marked the beginning of a new era in Indian history. His life is a testament to the power of determination, strategy, and governance. In this comprehensive exploration, we will delve into his early life, military accomplishments, governance, family, and the lasting legacy of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj.

Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj was born on February 19, 1630, at Shivneri Fort in the Pune district of Maharashtra.and dead in 3 April 1680 (age 50 years), Fort Raigad.

1. Birth and Family Tree of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj

Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj was born on February 19, 1630, at Shivneri Fort in the Pune district of Maharashtra. His birth took place in a time when the region was under the rule of the Bijapur Sultanate, and India was largely dominated by foreign powers, including the Mughals, the Portuguese, and other regional Sultanates. His birth at Shivneri, a well-protected fort, was seen as auspicious, and it is said that his mother, Jijabai, prayed to the goddess Bhavani for a son who would bring glory to his people.

Bijapur Sultanate map

Shivaji Maharaj was born into the Bhosale dynasty, which belonged to the Maratha clan. His father, Shahaji Bhosale, was a general who served the Bijapur Sultanate, while his mother, Jijabai, was a deeply religious and patriotic woman. Shahaji was a skilled warrior and administrator who held jagirs (landholdings) in Pune and Bengaluru. However, due to the political alliances he had with various Sultanates, he was often away from his family, leaving Jijabai to play a major role in raising young Shivaji.

Jijabai Bhosale was affectionately called as Rajmata. She was a strong warrior and a fierce matriarch who had a major role in shaping the Maratha empire.

18 March 1594 – 23 January 1664) was a 17th century Indian military leader who served the Ahmadnagar Sultanate, the Bijapur Sultanate, and the Mughal Empire at various points in his career

Jijabai’s influence on Shivaji Maharaj was immense. She nurtured him with stories of great Hindu epics like the Ramayan and the Mahabharata, instilling in him a sense of duty and justice. This early exposure to stories of heroism and righteousness shaped Shivaji’s character, fueling his determination to establish Swarajya—a kingdom free from foreign rule.

[peashooter85]

"Malik-i-Maidan", a 55 tonnes bronze cannon cast in 1549 in the Sultanate of Ahmadnagar, and is now located in Bijapur fort in India. It is considered one of the largest medieval guns ever made

[khwaabon-ki-madhushala]

Malik Ambar- the african slave who turned into a king

Born in the Adal Sultunate, in present-day Ethiopia, Malik was sold as a child by his parents and brought to India as a slave. While in India he created a mercenary force numbering up to 1500 men. It was based in the Deccan region and was hired by local kings. Malik became a popular Prime Minister of the Ahmadnagar Sultanate, showing administrative acumen. He is also regarded as a pioneer in guerilla warfare in the region. He is credited with carrying out a revenue settlement of much of the Deccan, which formed the basis for subsequent settlements. He is a figure of veneration to the Siddis of Gujarat. He humbled the might of the Mughals and Adil Shah of Bijapur and raised the low status of the Nizam Shah.

Source- Wikipedia

[harvardfineartslib]

Malik ‘Ambar (1548–1626) was an Ethiopian military leader in India. Born near Harar, in the Horn of Africa, he was sold as a child by his parents and was brought to India as a slave. In the Deccan region of southern India, he created a mercenary force numbering up to 1,500 men. Malik ‘Ambar became a popular prime minister and regent of the Ahmadnagar Sultanate. An able military leader, he fought off attacks by the Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan and by local rivals. He died in 1626 at the age of 80. Portrait of an African courtier, possibly Malik 'Ambar c. early 17th century Opaque watercolor and gold on paper 30.5cm x 21.1cm Deccani Indian Repository: Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Massachusetts. HOLLIS Number : 8001310840 Harvard Fine Arts Library, The Stuart Cary Welch Islamic and South Asian Photograph Collection.

[checkoutafrica]

Malik Ambar, The Ethiopian Slave Who Later Became King In India

Malik Ambar was among the tens of thousands of men, women, and children captured in Africa and sold into slavery in the Middle East and India over nearly nine centuries.  His story is also an indication of the ability of some in the predominantly Muslim Indian Ocean world to rise far above their initial servile status. Born Chapu in 1548 in Harar Province, Ethiopia, Ambar (as he was later called) was stripped of his family, his name, and permanently removed from his homeland.  Nevertheless, half a century later he had transformed himself into a king-maker in southern India’s interior region known as the Deccan where he led the area’s most powerful army against Mughal rule.

Traveling first by caravan, and then by dhow, young Ambar was taken across the Red Sea to the port of Mocha in southern Arabia (Yemen). He was re-sold and sent to Baghdad, where he was educated before being sent to India to serve Chengiz Khan, the Regent Minister of the Sultan of Nizam Shahi in Ahmadnagar.  For twenty years, the Ethiopian, now a Muslim, loyally served Khan, an Ethiopian like himself who converted to Islam, but—unlike Ambar—was no longer enslaved. Over this period Ambar assumed increasing responsibility in the Nizam’s court where he observed and learned diplomacy, military strategy, and political organization, crucial training that he carried into his life as a free man.

Upon Khan’s death in approximately 1594, Ambar was manumitted and soon launched one of the most formidable careers in the political history of the Deccan. Initially working as a mercenary, by 1595, he commanded a cavalry force of 150 men, and began organizing a rebel army which quickly grew into the thousands. By 1600 the African, now a full-fledged mercenary general, emerged as the leading figure in the resistance movement against the spread of the Mughal Empire into the Deccan. Defeating in battle the armies of two Mughal emperors, Akbar and Jahangir, Ambar’s armies were for a quarter of a century the inspiration for those resisting the attempted Mughal occupation of southern India.

By 1620, Ambar’s army numbered fifty thousand men; forty thousand Marathas (Hindu warriors) and ten thousand Habshi (fellow Africans). By then he had already installed two young princes to the Nizam’s throne in succession, each time making himself Regent Minister, and, unlike his former master, functioning as de facto ruler.

Ambar also forged alliances along India’s western coast with the African-descended sailors-turned-rulers of Janjira Island.  His innovative techniques in guerrilla warfare including the use of British-manufactured artillery, prevented the Mughals from occupying the southern half of India, endlessly frustrating the empire’s rulers, who referred to their indomitable foe as the “rebel of black fortune.”

In approximately 1619, Ambar founded the city of Khadki (the future site of Aurangabad), where he built several palaces, developed an irrigation system, patronized Hindu and Muslim craftsmen and artists (including the great portrait artist Hashim), and married his daughter and son into the families of Indian nobility—thus integrating Africans into elite South Asian society. When Ambar died in 1627, he was known across the Deccan as one of the greatest leaders of the region.

CONTRIBUTED BY: OMAR H. ALI

The post Malik Ambar, The Ethiopian Slave Who Later Became King In India appeared first on CheckoutAfrica.

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[india09]

"Malik-i-Maidan", a 55 tonnes bronze cannon cast in 1549 in the Sultanate of Ahmadnagar, and is now located in Bijapur fort in India. It is considered one of the largest medieval guns ever made.

[reeiiedu]

Tribes, Nomads And Settled Communities

Traders Big and Small 

Many kinds of traders including Banjaras-Several pony traders, shaped associations-headmen negotiated on their behalf with warriors who purchased ponies as traders had to pass through many kingdoms and timberlands, they traveled in caravans-framed organizations to secure their interests-several such societies in south India from the eighth century onwards–most famous being the Manigramam and Nanadesi-societies traded widely both within the peninsula and with Southeast Asia and China-people group like the Chettiars and the Marwari Oswal proceeded to turn into the principal trading gatherings of the nation Gujarati traders, including the networks of Hindu Baniyas and Muslim Bohras, traded broadly with the ports of the Red Sea, Persian Gulf, East Africa, Southeast Asia and China-sold materials and flavors in these ports - in exchange, brought gold and ivory from Africa-flavors, tin, Chinese blue stoneware and silver from Southeast Asia and China-towns on the west coast were home to Arab, Persian, Chinese, Jewish and Syrian Christian traders-Indian flavors and fabric sold in the Red Sea ports were purchased by Italian traders-eventually reached European markets, fetching high profits-Spices are filled in tropical climates (pepper, cinnamon, nutmeg, dried ginger, and so on)- became an important part of European cooking, and cotton material eventually attracted European traders to India. 

Crafts in Towns 

Craftspersons of Bidar were famed for their inlay work in copper and silver-it came to be called Bidri. Panchalas or Vishwakarma people group, comprise of goldsmiths, bronze smiths, blacksmiths, masons and carpenters-they were essential to the building of temples-also played an important part in the development of palaces, big buildings, tanks and stores weavers, for example, the Saliyar or Kaikkolars rose as prosperous networks made donations to temples. Aspects of material making like cotton cleaning, spinning and dyeing became specialized-became independent crafts. 

A Closer Look: Hampi, Masulipatnam and Surat 

The Architectural Splendor of Hampi 

Hampi located in the Krishna-Tungabhadra basin framed the core of the Vijayanagara Empire, established in 1336-magnificent Hampi ruins reveal a very much invigorated city-No mortar or cementing agent was utilized in the development of this walls-procedure followed was to wedge them together by interlocking-architecture of Hampi was distinctive-buildings in the royal complex had wonderful arches, vaults and pillared halls with specialties for holding models had all around planned orchards and pleasure gardens with sculptural themes, for example, the lotus and corbels-In the fifteenth sixteenth hundreds of years, Hampi clamored with commercial and cultural activities-Muslim merchants, Chettis and agents of European traders, for example, the Portuguese, swarmed the markets of Hampi-Temples were the center of cultural activities-devadasis (temple dancers) performed before the god, royalty and masses in the many-pillared halls in the Virupaksha (a type of Shiva) temple-The Mahanavami festival, referred to today as Navaratri in the south, was one of the main festivals celebrated at Hampi-Archeologists have discovered the Mahanavami platform where the king got visitors and accepted recognitions from subordinate bosses king also watched dance and music performances, as well as wrestling sessions from here-Hampi, fell into ruin following the defeat of Vijayanagara in 1565 by the Deccani Sultans–the leaders of Golconda, Bijapur, Ahmadnagar, Berar and Bidar. 

[fiaz-ul-hassan-sarwari-qadri]

Hazrat Pir Sultan Fiaz ul Hassan Sarwari Qadri Sahib in Mehfil e Ziker e Hussain @ Ahmadnagar Chiniot https://www.instagram.com/p/CFo7kgcFqMv/?igshid=1g6lhldi92lkh

[famousplacesinindia]

#DaulatabadFort, also known as #Devagiri or #Deogiri, is a historical fortified citadel located in #Aurangabad, #Maharashtra, India. It was the capital of the Yadava dynasty (9th century–14th century CE), for a brief time the capital of the Delhi Sultanate (1327–1334), and later a secondary capital of the Ahmadnagar Sultanate (1499–1636). Around the sixth century CE, Devagiri emerged as an important uplands town near present-day Aurangabad, along caravan routes going towards western and southern India. The historical triangular fortress in the city was initially built around 1187 by the first Yadava king, Bhillama V. In 1308, the city was annexed by Sultan Alauddin Khalji of the Delhi Sultanate, which ruled over most of the Indian subcontinent. In 1327, Sultan Muhammad bin Tughluq of the Delhi Sultanate renamed the city as "Daulatabad" and shifted his imperial capital to the city from Delhi, ordering a mass migration of Delhi's population to Daulatabad. However, Muhammad bin Tughluq reversed his decision in 1334 and the capital of the Delhi Sultanate was shifted back from Daulatabad to Delhi. In 1499, Daulatabad became a part of the Ahmadnagar Sultanate, who used it as their secondary capital. In 1610, near Daulatabad Fort, the new city of Aurangabad, then named Khadki, was established to serve as the capital of the Ahmadnagar Sultanate by the Ethiopian military leader Malik Ambar, who was brought to India as a slave but rose to become a popular Prime Minister of the Ahmadnagar Sultanate. Most of the present-day fortification at Daulatabad Fort was constructed under the Ahmadnagar Sultanate. https://www.instagram.com/p/CEalJFZBLgL/?igshid=1nx192f8gag70

[thetimesofhistory-blog]

Shivaji Maharaj was the son of Shahaji Bhosale and Jijabai and father of Sambhaji Maharaj. Shahaji Bhosale was a military leader who served at Ahmadnagar Sultanate, Bijapur Dynasty and Mughal Empire at points in his life. Follow|Share Facebook|Instagram|Twitter|Tumblr #chhatrapati #chhatrapatishivajimaharaj #marathaempire #maratha #shivajimaharaj #shivajibhosale #mughalempire #mughalrule #raigadfort #raigad #emperor #indianking #indianhistory #historyofmaharashtra #konkan #shivneri #sambhajimaharaj #shahajiraje #jijamata #jijabai #historyofindia #historyfacts #history #historynerd #historygram #historylovers #historygram #historymemes #historyteacher #timesofhistory (at Raigad Fort) https://www.instagram.com/p/CCjVQX0JqNS/?igshid=1bopas4ga8bne

[prime4eva]

🌍De facto King Malik Ambar (1548-1626) Malik Ambar was an Ethiopian military leader in the Deccan region of India. Sold as a child by his parents, Malik was brought to India as a slave. While in India he created a mercenary force numbering up to 1500 men. It was based in the Deccan region and was hired by local kings. Malik became a popular Prime Minister of the Ahmadnagar Sultanate, showing administrative acumen. He is also regarded as a pioneer in guerilla warfare in the region. He is credited with carrying out a revenue settlement of much of the Deccan, which formed the basis for subsequent settlements. He is a figure of veneration to the Siddis of Gujarat. He humbled the might of the Mughals and Adil Shah of Bijapur and raised the low status of the Nizam Shah. 📚👀🧠 #DoTheKnowledge #OurHistory365 #BlackHistory365 #Alkebulan 🌍 https://www.instagram.com/p/B8ly-mgnp0_/?igshid=6shmfosvy4m

[totaltravel360-blog]

#shivneri  #total_travel360

          Shivneri Fort is a 17th-century military fortification located near Junnar in Pune district in Maharashtra, India. It is the birthplace of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj, the founder of Maratha Empire.          Shivneri is known to be a place of Buddhist dominion from the 1st century AD. Its caves, rock-cut architecture and water system indicate the presence of habitation since 1st century AD. Shivneri got its name as it was under the possession of the Yadavas of Devagiri. This fort was mainly used to guard the old trading route from Desh to the port city of Kalyan. The place passed on to the Bahmani Sultanate after the weakening of Delhi Sultanate during the 15th century and it then passed on to the Ahmadnagar Sultanate in the 16th century. In 1595, a Maratha chief named Maloji Bhonsle, the grandfather of Chhatrapati Shivaji Bhosale, was enabled by the Ahmadnagar Sultan, Bahadur Nizam Shah and he gave him Shivneri and Chakan. Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Bhosale was born at the fort on 19 February 1630 (some accounts place it 1627), and spent his childhood there. Inside the fort is a small temple dedicated to the goddess Shivai Devi, after whom Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Bhonsale was named. The English traveller Fraze visited the fort in 1673 and found it invincible. According to his accounts the fort was well-stocked to feed thousand families for seven years. The fort came under the control of the British Rule in 1820 after the Third Anglo-Maratha War.             Shivneri is a hill fort having a triangular shape and has its entrance from the South-west side of the hill. Apart from the main gate there is an entrance to the fort from side called locally as the chain gate, where in one has to hold chains to climb up to the fort gate. The fort extends up to 1 mi (1.6 km) with seven spiral well-defended gates. There are mud walls all around the fort. Inside the fort, the major buildings are the prayer hall, a tomb and a mosque. There is an overhanging where executions took place.There are many gates structures protecting this fort. Mana Daravaja is one of the many gates of the fort. There are statues of Jijabai and young Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj inside the fort. At the centre of the fort is a water pond which is called 'Badami Talav'. To the South of 'Badami Talav' are the statues Jijabai and a young Shivaji Maharaj. In the fort there are two water springs, called Ganges and Yamuna, which have water throughout the year. Two kilometers away from this fort there are the Lenyadri caves which is one of Ashtavinayak temple in Maharashtra. It has been declared as a protected monument.           The nearest town Junnar is a taluka place and is well connected by road. Junnar is about 90 km from Pune. The fort is at about 2-3 km from the junnar town. It is easy to reach the fort top via main entrance, however the trekkers with proper climbing equipment can try the chain route which is located on the western scarp of the fort. From the top of the fort, Narayangad, Hadsar, Chavand and Nimgiri forts can easily be seen. https://buff.ly/2YAK0vt 

https://buff.ly/2Klo1gO 

https://buff.ly/2OgPC9p

[omgindiablog]

Ganesh Utsav, Pune, India: The City of Pune, situated in the western state of Maharashtra, India, becomes vibrant with colours, cheerful celebrations, and a deep sense of devotion at the time of the felicitous occasion of the Ganpati Festival. ...Pune is a city in Maharashtra state in the Deccan plateau in Western India. Pune is one of the largest IT hubs in India. It is also one of the most important automobile and manufacturing hubs of India. Pune at different points in time has been ruled by the Rashtrakuta dynasty, Ahmadnagar Sultanate, the Mughals, and the Adil Shahi dynasty. Wikipedia.

[afishtrap]

According to conventional understandings of the Military Revolution, the introduction of firearms in early modern European warfare yielded wide-ranging consequences that were by no means confined to the realm of military affairs. This essay examines the earliest known introduction of firearms technology in India, with a view to evaluating how its consequences there compared or contrasted with those claimed to have occurred in early modern Europe. We further ask: Why did cannon appear in the dry, upland plateau of peninsular India, Known as the Deccan, before anywhere else in India? Within the Deccan, how can we explain the different responses to the advent of gunpowder technologies? What effects did new military technologies have on the Deccan’s architectural landscape, and on its society at large?

Eaton, R. M.  & Wagoner, P. B. "Warfare on the Deccan Plateau, 1450–1600: A Military Revolution in Early Modern India?" Journal of World History, vol. 25 no. 1, 2014, pp. 5-50.

Around the turn of the sixteenth century there appeared three new players whose actions would govern subsequent struggles over the Raichur Doab. First, in 1490, amid the Bahmani kingdom’s growing internal decay, the governor of that kingdom’s important provincial town of Bijapur, Yusuf ‘Adil Khan, declared his independence, at the same time claiming the Raichur Doab as part of his domain. He would become known as the founder of the ‘Adil Shahi sultanate of Bijapur (1490– 1686). Second, from 1498 the Portuguese Estado da India, determined to monopolize control over Arabian Sea commerce, emerged as a powerful naval and land power in western India. Its commercial and political influence would soon extend from several coastal enclaves to the Deccan’s interior. And third, in 1505 there appeared in Vijayanagara a vigorous new dynasty of kings under whom the balance of power in the Doab would tilt toward the south for the first time in a century and a half. In 1509 the throne passed to the renowned Krishna Raya (r. 1509–1529), whose twenty years of rule are widely acclaimed as the acme of Vijayanagara’s power and glory. As heir to Vijayanagara’s long-standing quest to possess the Raichur Doab, Krishna Raya would find support for his cause in the Portuguese, whose general hostility toward Muslim states like Bijapur had been shaped by the previous century’s anti-Muslim reconquista movement in Spain and Portugal. Thus, in 1510 the Estado’s viceroy and master strategist from 1509 to 1515, Afonso de Albuquerque, assisted by a coastal warlord loyal to Vijayanagara, seized the port of Goa from Yusuf ‘Adil Khan’s fledgling kingdom of Bijapur. The Raichur Doab now became the object of a three-cornered struggle involving Bijapur, Vijayanagara, and, supporting the latter from their base in Goa, the Portuguese Estado da India.

[...]

Notwithstanding Gommans’s reservations, there is considerable evidence, both literary and archaeological, that firearms were indeed being used in peninsular India prior to the rise of Portuguese power in the region. The most conclusive archaeological evidence of this is the gun ports that Bahmani rulers built into the walls at three of their principal forts: Bidar, Kalyana, and Raichur. They were circular or arched at Bidar and Kalyana, and square at Raichur8 (Fig. 1). At Kalyana the construction of walls bearing such ports appears to date to 1461–1463,9 those of Raichur to 1468–1470,10 and those of Bidar to the reign of Muhammad III (1463–1482).11 These nearly simultaneous construction activities thus point to the 1460s as the earliest horizon for the use of cannon in the Deccan—indeed, in India. Literary evidence for the advent of gunpowder technology in the region appears at about the same time. The famous Bahmani vazir Mahmud Gawan (fl. 1453–1481) wrote that in January 1471 troops under his command besieged and demolished the fort of Machal (in the Sahyadri range inland from the Arabian Sea port of Ratnagiri) by deploying “roaring thunder [r‘ad], which having the effect of a thunderbolt, showered [on the fort] like rain”—a passage that suggests the use of siege cannon.12 This report would seem to support a statement of the Persian chronicler Firishta that in the very next year, Bahmani forces used cannon (tup and zarbuzan) during their siege of Belgaum, an ally of Vijayanagara. 13 Firishta adds that on that occasion engineers under Gawan’s command called atish-bazan (“fire-workers”) deployed explosive mines that peoples of the Deccan had never seen before.14

European sources dating to the period shortly after the advent of the Portuguese also refer to the use of firearms among local powers in the region. Gaspar Correia, Albuquerque’s secretary and an early chronicler of the Estado da India, records that in 1502 Portuguese naval squadrons were bombarded from the hilltop overlooking the port of Bhatkal.15 Several years later the Italian traveler Ludovico di Varthema recorded seeing artillery at the port of Chaul, then controlled by Bijapur’s neighbor, the sultanate of Ahmadnagar.16 Albuquerque’s own son recalled that when his father took Goa in 1510, Bijapuri defenders greeted the invaders with artillery fire.17 Later that same year, after first losing and then recapturing the city, Albuquerque seized from Bijapur’s defenders a hundred large guns (bombardas) and a “large quantity” of smaller artillery.18

The presence of cannon technology in the Deccan prior to European maritime contact, then, seems beyond dispute. More challenging is reconstructing the vectors by which such technology reached the Deccan in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries. It is theoretically possible that the ordnance used at Bhatkal in 1502, or seen at Chaul several years later, had been captured from the Portuguese in some naval engagement and then subsequently turned against the same Europeans. But this is unlikely, given the very short time that had elapsed since Vasco da Gama’s 1498 voyage to Calicut—the dawn of Portuguese presence in the Indian Ocean—and especially given the Bahmanis’ known offensive and defensive use of cannon in the Deccan interior since the 1460s. In our view, the most likely source of this technology was the Mamluk sultans of Egypt, who possessed both cannon technology and a vested interest in the lucrative spice trade from India to Europe during the latter half of the fifteenth century.19 We also know that the Bahmani vazir Mahmud Gawan, the same figure who wrote of besieging the fort of Machal in 1471 with “roaring thunder [r‘ad],” maintained close commercial and diplomatic relations with both Mamluk Egypt and the Ottomans.20 Having captured the strategic seaport of Goa (then a protectorate of Vijayanagara) in 1472,21 Gawan for the next ten years sent Bahmani agents through Mamluk Egypt to Bursa, in western Anatolia, and from there into the Ottoman Balkans to market Indian textiles.22

It is thus very likely that the Mamluks furnished the Bahmanis with ordnance in exchange for textiles, spices, and other commodities destined for Western markets. The best material evidence for this inference is the wrought iron tube cannons that still lie on the ramparts of former Bahmani forts at Bidar, Medak, Yadgir, and Devarakonda (Fig. 2). Made in two parts with separable barrels and powder chambers, these early cannons appear typologically identical to those that the Ottomans reportedly captured from the Mamluks in the late fifteenth or early sixteenth century, which are preserved in Istanbul’s Military Museum.23 Inasmuch as walls with gun ports were being built in at least three major Bahmani forts in or soon after the 1460s, as noted above, we may infer that the tube cannons presently standing on the four above-mentioned forts were either introduced to the Deccan from across the Arabian Sea or, still more likely, produced in the Deccan from Mamluk prototypes.