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Pillars, Palimpsests, and Princely Practices: Translating the past in Sultanate Author(s): Finbarr B. Flood Source: RES: Anthropology and Aesthetics, No. 43, Islamic Arts (Spring, 2003), pp. 95-116 Published by: The President and Fellows of Harvard College acting through the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20167592 . Accessed: 31/07/2011 08:17

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http://www.jstor.org Pillars, palimpsests, and princely practices

Translating the past in sultanate Delhi

FINBARRB. FLOOD

In the traditional master narratives of South Asian the past is instantiated for us today were already antique history, the conquest of northern India by the army of in the early pre-modern period. Enduring through time the Ghurid sultan Ghiyath al-Din Muhammad (r. and dynastic change, such artifacts often ensured 1163-1203) in the last quarter of the twelfth century continuity in the process of imagining and re-imagining a figures profound rupture in the cultural fabric of the the past, providing a focus for the "necessary region. Many of the monuments erected in the wake of sedimentation of meaning that accumulates as part of to the conquest appear confirm this, for they make the process of historical change."3 The palimpsest nature extensive use of architectural elements that predate the of such artifacts was intrinsic to their role as sites for an are to conquest and assumed have been purloined from ongoing process of "translating" the past, a process that temples destroyed in itswake. The idea of the trophy frequently encompassed a physical displacement. This in was looms large published discussions of these a past that inhered not only in objects, however, but monuments, largely on the basis of a practice of reuse also in the practices and rituals associated with them. has never to that been subjected any serious analysis. The act of physical appropriation might itself be Analysis has been obviated, in large measure, by the palimpsest upon earlier reuses of the same or similar reuse widespread perception that offers support for the objects, thus serving to construct a dynamic continuity lurid and highly formulaic tales of looting, spoliation, between contemporary practices and their historical and desecration found in the medieval texts that have antecedents. in the construction case a been privileged of histories (and This is the with number of pre-lslamic even art histories) of the period.1 commemorative pillars ( or lats) that were re In to an addition the circularity of such approach, the erected in Delhi during the thirteenth and fourteenth disciplinary divisions written into Orientalist discourse centuries. Essential ist notions of Islamic cultural on South Asia at its frustrate the of inception assumption practices have combined with traditional disciplinary a diachronic approach to the material culture of the divisions to obscure the transcultural nature of these some region.2 Yet of the objects and buildings inwhich pillars, which were central to the self-conscious an articulation of imagined relationship between the Much of the research for this paper was undertaken in 2000-2001, sultans of Delhi and the Indian past. The relocation of when I held an Ai IsaMellon Bruce Senior at the Center for Fellowship the pillars appears to reference a past that encompassed Advanced in the Visual Study Arts, the National Gallery of Art, both the of a Indian D.C. Itwas written while Iwas a Smithsonian Senior mythic kings dimly perceived Washington and the more at antiquity immediate of the Fellow the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery inWashington, D.C., in 2002. predecessors Iam to Delhi who a for the reuse grateful both institutions for their support. Many of the themes sultans, provide precedent discussed will be dealt at in here with greater length my forthcoming (that is, reinscription and/or relocation) of similar book on the and reuse of cultural artifacts within the looting, gifting, pillars.4 The existence of indigenous precedents for such Ghurid sultanate. a 1. For critique of this position see Alka Arvind Ratel, "Islamic Architecture of Western India 12th?14th Continuities 3. Annie E. (Mid Centuries): Coombes, "Translating the Rast: Apartheid and Harvard Monuments in Interpretations" (D.Phil, thesis, University, 2000), pp. Post-Apartheid South Africa," in Hybridity and its 325-358. Discontents: Politics, Science, Culture, ed. Avtar Brah & Annie E. 2. Finbarr Iconoclasm: Mutilation Coombes Barry Flood, "Refiguring Image (New York & London: Routledge, 2002), p. 175. and Aesthetic Innovation in the Indian in the 4. As will Early Mosque/' Negating become clear below, "reuse" here implies a historicist Case Studies of Past ed. Anne L. McLanan & in was Image: Iconoclasms, gesture which "the 'second user' aware of his or her posterior Jeffrey Johnson (London: Ashgate Press, forthcoming); idem., status:" Anthony Cutler, "Reuse or Use? Theoretical and Practical Ruins Difference: Architectural as Attitudes Toward in the e "Transcribing Inscribing Photography Objects Early Middle Ages," in Ideologie Practice in Colonial to the Ethnographic India/' paper presented Pratiche del Reimpiego nell'Alto Medioevo, Settimane di Studio del in the Islamic 19th-20th Centro symposium "Photography World, Centuries," Italiano di Studi suIl'Alto Medioevo 46, (Spoleto: Presso la Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Harvard University, December 8, 2000. Sede del Centro, 1999), pp. 1056-1057. 96 RES 43 SPRING 2003

Figure 1. pillar and qibla screen, Ghurid FridayMosque, Delhi. Flood: Pillars, palimpsests, and princely practices 97

reuses of the past suggests that there was much greater continuity in the characteristic cultural practices of Indian rulers between the pre- and postconquest periods than has previously been acknowledged. What have been read as trophies at first glance, on closer inspection appear to offer evidence for transculturation in the ritual practices of the earliest Delhi sultans. The earliest instance of reuse following the conquest is evidenced by a seven-and-a-half-meter-high iron pillar standing in the courtyard of the Friday Mosque built after the Ghurid conquest of Delhi in 1192, the mosque known today as the Quwwat al-lslam (fig. 1). The pillar, which stands on the axis of the mosque, directly in front of the prayer hall, is crowned with a fluted bell capital and a molding consisting of three superimposed a ?malakas and square pedestal, now empty (fig. 2). It can be counted among a number of commemorative columns often referred to in inscriptions as pillars of fame (kirtistambhas) or pillars of victory (jayastambhas), which were erected by medieval Indian rulers to memorialize their architectural patronage, donations to temples, or military and spiritual victories.5 So deeply embedded in the rituals of medieval Indian kingship was the notion of a pillar of victory that the term was sometimes used metaphorically, to refer to other types of

5. John Faithful Fleet, "Mandasor Pillar of Yasodharman," The Indian Antiquary 15 (1886): 255, 257; E. Hultzsch, South-Indian Inscriptions, vol. 3, part 1 (Madras: Government Press, 1899), pp. 52, 64, 69; Henry Cousens, "The Iron Pillar at Dhar," Archaeological Survey of India Annual Report (1902-1903): 207-208; Michael D. Willis, "Religious and Royal Patronage in North India," in Gods, Guardians, and Lovers, Temple Sculptures from North India a.d. 700-1200, ed. Vishaka N. Desai & Darielle Mason (New York: The Asia Society, 1993), p. 54, fig. 17; Ram Nath, Jain Kirtti- of Chittorgadh [c. 1300 a.D.] (Jaipur: The Historical Research Documentary Program, 1994), pp. 8, 13, 55, 59, 61. In addition to those which survive, such pillars are frequently mentioned in royal inscriptions: John Faithful Fleet, " and Old-Kanarese Inscriptions No. 185. Mahakuta Pillar Inscription of Mangalesa," The Indian Antiquary 19 (1890): 16, 19; Rai Bahadur Hira Lai, "Khairha Plates of Yasahkarnadeva [Kalachuri] Samvat 823," Epigraphia Indica 12 (1913-1914): 216; Radhagovinda Basak, "Rampai Copper-Plate Grant of Srichandradeva," Epigraphia Indica 12 (1913-1914): 140. To suggest that the victory more commemorated by such pillars, "was one of a spiritual nature see than politico-military character" (Ratel, note 1, p. 213), is to ignore the abundant epigraphic evidence for their erection in association with military campaigns, including victories over Turushka or Turkish armies. I have suggested elsewhere that the tradition of commemorating victories by the erection of pillars had an impact on the manner in which Ghaznavid and Ghurid sultans memorialized their own

triumphs: Finbarr Barry Flood, "Between Ghazna and Delhi: Lahore and its Lost Manara," in Cairo to Kabul: Afghan and Islamic Studies Presented to Ralph Pinder-Wilson, ed. Warwick Ball & Leonard Harrow (London: Melisende, 2002), pp. 102-112. Figure 2. Detail of the iron pillar showing its capital. 98 RES 43 SPRING 2003

Figure 3. Gupta inscription on the iron pillar.

objects or structures that memorialized martial triumphs The Delhi column is unusual because it is iron rather or were an territorial conquest.6 Such pillars considered than stone and survived so long without being melted appropriate locus for royal inscriptions, and a Sanskrit down, but it is by no means unique. Fragments survive text inscribed upon the Delhi iron pillar (fig. 3) tells us of a much larger iron pillar, over thirteen meters in that itwas originally dedicated as a standard (dhvaja) to length and bearing a Sanskrit inscription, which was re a temple by the fourth- or fifth-century ruler Chandra, whose military prowess the inscription celebrates.7 Gupta Kings and Their Successors, Corpus Inscriptionum Indicarum, vol. 3 (Varanasi: Reprinted by the Indological Book House, 1970), pp. 139-142; J.A. Rage, An Historical Memoir on the Qutb: Delhi, 6. For example, Aditya Chola (r. 850-871) had the head of his Memoirs of the Archaeological Survey of India No. 22, originally in as a defeated Randya rival set up the Chola capital pillar of victory: Calcutta, Government of India, 1926 (Delhi: Reprinted by Swati a Rao Sahil K. Krishna Sastri, South-Indian Inscriptions, vol. 3, part 3 Publications, 1991), pp. 44-45. For complete copy of the inscription a (Madras: Government Press, 1920), pp. 387, 420. After military see Ram Nath, Monuments of Delhi (New Delhi: Ambika Publications, victory in the early eleventh century, Rajendra Chola marched golden 1978), Inscription 1. There is some debate as to whether the Chandra water to on on vessels of Ganges back his capital the heads of captured mentioned the pillar is Chandragupta Ior II, or indeed any Gupta prisoners. There he created a vast artificial lake, referred to in ruler: Vincent A. Smith, "The Iron Pillar of Delhi (Mihrauli) and the as a contemporary inscriptions "liquid pillar of victory": Vidya Dehejia, Emperor Candra (Chandra)," Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society Art of the Imperial Cholas (New York: The Asia Society, 1990), p. 79. (1897): 1-18; M. M. Havaprasad Shastri, "King Chandra of the 7. T. S. Burt & Alexander Cunningham, "Lithographs and Meharauli Iron Pillar Inscription," The Indian Antiquary 42 (1913): translations of inscriptions taken in ectype by Captain T. S. Burt, 217-219; R. D. Banerji, "A Note on King Chandra of the Meharauli A. Engineers: and of one, from Ghosi taken by Captain Cunningham, Inscription," Epigraphia Indica 14 (1917-18): 367-371; J. Ph. Vogel, same of the Corps," Journal of the Asiatic Society of (1838): "Facts and Fancies about the Iron Pillar of Old-Delhi," Journal of the 629-631; Garcin deTassey, "Description des monuments de Dehli," Panjab Historical Society 9, no. 1 (1923): 82-86; Dines Chandra Journal Asiatique, 5th series, 15-16 (1860): 226-229; Alexander Sircar, "Digvijaya of King Chandra of the Meharauli Pillar Inscription," Cunningham, Four Reports Made During the Years 1862-63-64-65, Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, Letters 5 (1939): 407-415. The an Archaeological Survey of India Reports, vol. 1, (Delhi & Varanasi: pillar was originally surmounted by animal figure, which most 1871; reprint Indological Book House, 1972), pp. 170-174; Carr scholars (e.g. Smith, ibid., p. 18) have assumed was removed when it Stephens, The Archaeology and Monuments of Delhi (Simla & was placed in the mosque; this was not necessarily the case, however, Calcutta, 1876), pp. 17-24; John Faithful Fleet, Inscriptions of the Early given that animal figures proliferate throughout the mosque. Flood: Pillars, palimpsests, and princely practices 99

Figure 4. Fragments of an iron pillar outside the Mosque of Dilawar Khan, Dhar.

erected in front of a mosque at Dhar in central India in fourteenth-century T?r?kh-i Fir?z Sh?hJ of Shams-i Siraj 1404 (fig. 4).8The Dhar column has been interpreted as 'Afif, however, the pillar was set up in this position not a pillar of victory (jayastambha) erected by a local by Qutb al-Din Aybak, but by Shams al-Din lltutmish. Paramara ruler in the twelfth or thirteenth century.9 A was a former Turkish slave who had risen much smaller pillar in the form of a trident dated Samvat through the ranks of the army in the service of Aybak, 1468 (a.D. 1412) stands in front of the Achal?svar before acceding to the Indian sultanate that had temple on Mount Abu in Rajasthan (fig. 5), and is emerged after the death of the last of the Ghurid sultans reportedly cast from the arms abandoned by a defeated with effective control over the empire, in 1206. The date Muslim army.10 at which the pillar was installed is unknown, but itwas It has generally been assumed that the erection of the presumably after the accession of lltutmish in 1211, and pillar was contemporary with the foundation of the possibly around or before 1229, when the area of the Delhi mosque by Qutb al-Din Aybak, the slave general mosque was more than tripled, one of numerous of the Ghurid sultans, in 1192.11 According to the architectural projects sponsored by the sultan.12

8. Wheeler Thackston, The Jahangirnama, Memoirs of Jahangir, Sultans of India," Muqarnas 10 (1993): 319-320; Catherine B. Asher, Emperor of India (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), p. 235. "Appropriating the Past: Jah?ng?r's Pillars." Islamic Culture 71, no. 4 9. Cousens (see note 5), especially p. 210; B. V. Subbarayappa, (1997): 8. "Dimensions of Iron Technology in India up to the end of the 18th 12. Finbarr Barry Flood, "PersianateTrends in Sultanate Century/' Journal of Central Asia 3, no. 2 (1980): 25; J. Burton-Page, Architecture: the Great Mosque of Bada'un," in Bernard O'Kane, ed., new "Dh?r. Monuments," The Encyclopaedia of Islam, ed., vol. 2 Festschrift for Robert Hillenbrand (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University was (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1965), p. 219. Among the inscriptions carved after Press, forthcoming). Some have argued that the pillar already a on was the pillar had fallen from its original position is one recording the halt standing before temple this site, and incorporated into the as of the Mughal emperor Jahangir, who mentions the pillar in his mosque it stood: deTassey (see note 7), pp. 228-229; D. S. Triveda, or memoirs: Thackston (see note 8), p. 235. Visnudhvaja Qutb Manar (Varanasi: The Chowkhamba Sanskrit 10. Cousens (see note 5), p. 207. Series Office, 1962), p. 251; Sunil Kumar, "Qutb and Modern 11. Anthony Welch & Howard Crane, "TheTughluqs: Master Memory," in The Partitions of Memory: The Afterlife of the Division of Builders of the /' Muqarnas 1 (1983): 127, 133; India, ed. Suvir Kaul (New Delhi: Permanent Balck, 2001), pp. 142, n. Anthony Welch, "Architectural Patronage and the Rast: TheTughluq 176 3. The text states quite clearly, however, that the minara buzurg 100 RES 43 SPRING 2003

al-Din Tughluq (r. 1320-1325) may have included a pre lslamic pillar in the mosque which he built at Tughluqabad, but 'Afif makes it clear that itwas the precedent set by lltutmish that inspired the reuse of as many as ten antique pillars by one of his successors, Firuz Shah Tughluq (r. 1351-1388; figs. 6 and 7);13 many

13. Afif (see note 12), pp. 313-314; H. M. Elliot & John Dowson, as The Told by its Own Historians, 4 vol., originally London: 1867-1877 (Delhi: Reprinted by Low Price Publications, was 1990), vol. 3, p. 353. For the suggestion that an Ashokan pillar see reused earlier in the mosque of Tughluqabad, Mehrdad Shokoohy & Natalie H. Shokoohy, "Tughluqabad: the earliest surviving town of the Delhi Sultanate," Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 57, no. 3 (1994): 548. Firishta lists ten monumental pillars among the works of Firuz Shah Tughluq, but this may be an exaggeration: John Briggs, History of the Rise of the Mahomedan Power in India, 4 vol., originally London: 1829 (New Delhi: Oriental Books Reprint Corporation, 1981), vol. 1, p. 270. Those that survive are at Fatehabad and Hisar in Haryana, and Firuzabad and Meerut in Delhi. The latter two can be associated with the activities of Firuz Shah

through contemporary textual evidence, while the former two are attributed to the activities of the same sultan through their architectural or context epigraphic content: James Prinsep, "Interpretation of the on most ancient of the inscriptions the pillar called the l?t of Feroz Sh?h, near Delhi, and that of the Allahabad, Radhia and Matthia pillar, or l?t, inscriptions which agree therewith," Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal 6 (1837): 566-609; de Tassey (see note 7), pp. 229-234; E. Hultzsch, Inscriptions ofAshoka, Corpus Inscriptionum Indicarum, vol. 1 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1925), pp. xvii, 107; B. C. Chhabra, "Asokan Pillar at Hissar, Panjab," Vishveshvaranand on Indological Journal 2 (1964): 319-322; James Prinsep, Essays Indian Antiquities, vol. 1 (Varanasi: Reprinted by the Indological Book House, 1971), pp. 324-325; Welch & Crane (see note 11), p. 133; Mehrdad Shokoohy, Haryana I: The Column of Firuz Shah and other Figure 5. Iron pillar in the form of a trident, Achalesvar Temple, Islamic Inscriptions from the District of Hisar, Corpus Inscriptionum Mount Abu. Iranicarum Part IV: Persian Inscriptions down to the Early Safavid Period, vol. XLVII: India, State of Harayana (London: 1988), pp. 15-22; Mehrdad Shokoohy & Natalie H. Shokoohy, His?r-i Flruza: Sultanate and Early Mughal Architecture in the District of Hisar, India (London: Monographs on Art, Archaeology and Architecture, South Asian Series, reuse Welch note William The of the Delhi iron pillar in the early 1988), pp. 32-33; (see 11), pp. 318-320; Jeffrey "The Monumental Pillars of Ffr?z Shah Ars thirteenth century inspired the actions of later McKibben, Tughluq," Orientalis 24 (1994): 105-118. A fifth pillar in Jaunpur was erected by Indo-lslamic rulers, who similarly relocated antique Ibrahim Na'ib Barbak, Firuz Shah's half-brother, by order of the sultan: as part of their architectural patronage. pillars Ghiyath de Tassey (see note 7), pp. 231-233; Alexander Cunningham, Report on Tours in the Gangetic Provinces from Badaon to Bihar, in 1875-76 and 1877-78, Archaeological Survey of India Reports, vol. 11 the Book in the Delhi mosque was erected {bar- avarda) by lltutmish: Shams-i (Varanasi: Reprinted by Indological House, 1968), pp. A. The Architecture of Siraj 'Afif, The Tarikh-i-Firoz Shahi, ed. Maulavi Vilayat Husain 105-106; F?hrer, Sharqi Jaunpur, Archaeological of India vol. 11 Z. A. (Calcutta: Asiatic Society, 1888), p. 314. The terms employed might Survey Reports, (Calcutta: 1889), pp. 26-27; from the Fort Indica equally refer to the (see note 22), but since the passage Desai, "Inscription Jaunpur Mosque," Epigraphia a reuse Arabic and Persian 23. It has been occurs amid lengthy discussion of Firuz Shah Tughluq's of Supplement (1974): recently argued assume to that the was not but was carved ex novo: antique pillars, it is safe to that the reference is the pillar in Jaunpur pillar antique, 110. In view of the of and the Delhi mosque rather than its minaret. That the pillar was set up McKibben, ibid., p. conjunction antique elements in the Fatehabad and Hisar again in the thirteenth century seems to be supported by the contemporary pillars (the antique a of which once have this is archaeological evidence, since the column is supported by series of parts may belonged together), quite iron bars soldered with lead, which rest upon the surface of a floor possible. Although it has sometimes been assumed that the Allahabad note 11 was also moved Firuz Shah assumed to be that of the temple that previously stood on the site of pillar (see Asher, ) by Tughluq, no the mosque: Smith (see note 7), pp. 4-5. there is evidence for this. Flood: Pillars, palimpsests, and princely practices 101

of these were re-erected within, or in close proximity to mosques. In the following century, pre-lslamic iron pillars were re-erected outside congregational mosques at Dhar (fig. 4) and Mandu inMalwa, probably in imitation of lltutmish's gesture.14 The re-erection of the iron pillar by lltutmish may also have been a factor in the later reuse of an Ashokan pillar at Allahabad fort by the Mughal emperor Jahangir (r. 1605-1627), although there is no evidence for this having been associated with a mosque. Catherine Asher has demonstrated that in its Mughal incarnation, the pillar was associated with a "chain of justice," a chain-hung bell by means of which those seeking justice from the ruler would make their presence known.15 This was a feature of Sasanian kingship as memorialized in Persian texts, but was also common inmedieval Indian courts, for reference is made to it in several royal inscriptions.16 According to Ibn Battuta, the palace of lltutmish in Delhi had such a chain.17 Although the subject awaits further investigation, it is quite possible that the inspiration for Jahangir's chain derived from indigenous kingship traditions mediated via the precedent of lltutmish as memorialized in pre-Mughal histories. As we shall see shortly, the reuse of the pillar itself points to the continuation of a practice that was well established in South Asia long before the Ghurid conquest in the twelfth century. Whatever contextually specific meanings each instance of reuse acquired, culturally and chronologically the relocation of the iron pillar by can lltutmish be seen as a pivotal act, linking the actions a of later Islamicate rulers with preconquest Figure 6. Ashokan pillar from Meerut re-erected by Firuz Shah tradition of reuse. Tughluq, Delhi. Although the Delhi mosque was constructed using large quantities of spolia (fig. 8), the inclusion of the was iron pillar in the mosque merited on something other than utilitarian grounds, for it fulfills no structural the conquered Hindu population of Delhi.18 This function, lltutmish's re-erection of the iron pillar in a assumption may be influenced by the European practice mosque constructed in the wake of the Muslim conquest of re-erecting ancient obelisks looted from colonial using an abundance of temple spolia has usually been possessions in metropolitan capitals, but it is also part of assumed to reflect the pillar's value as a trophy and its to over was consequent ability memorialize Muslim victory 18. See, among others, Burton-Page, who states that the pillar as a "doubtless placed there by the builders not only curious relic but a also as symbol of their triumph over the idolaters": "Dihl?," The new Encyclopaedia of Islam, ed., vol. 2, (Leiden: Brill Ltd., 1965), p. 14. Michael "The at Shadiabad Anthony Brand, Khalji Complex 260. See also Welch (note 11, p. 320), where the iron pillar is Mandu" Harvard 218-219. (D.Phil, thesis, University, 1986), pp. described as "a trophy celebrating Islam's 1192 victory in north India"; 15. Asher note 11 1. (see ), pp. 1-2, pi. Hillenbrand [Islamic Architecture, Form, Function and Meaning (New 16. For two see E. twelfth-century examples Hultzsch, South York: Columbia University Press, 1994), p. 158], where the small scale Indian vol. 3 Government Inscriptions, 2, part (Madras: Press, 1895), of the pillar, juxtaposed with that of the adjacent minaret, is said to be n. idem. South-Indian vol. 2 p. 311, 3; Inscriptions, 3, part (Madras: evocative of Muslim victory. Similarly, Catherine Asher refers to the Government 185. Press, 1903), p. reuse of pre-lslamic pillars in Delhi during the thirteenth and 17. H. A. R. The Travels of Ibn Batt?ta A.D. vol. Gibb, 1325-1354, fourteenth centuries "to proclaim the supremacy of Islam": Asher (see 3 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1971), p. 630. note 11), p. 8. Carl Ernst, in an article that criticizes the traditional 102 RES 43 SPRING 2003

Figure 7. Pillar inscribed with the genealogy of Firuz Shah Tughluq, Fatehabad. Flood: Pillars, palimpsests, and princely practices 103

buildings is standard in traditional discourse on South Asian art and architecture.20 Thus the iron pillar in Delhi is often referred to as the "Hindu" iron pillar, an object in direct opposition to the adjacent "Islamic" minaret (fig. 9),21 ignoring the fact that the terms stambha (pillar) and m/nar (minaret) were used interchangeably to refer to the same objects by medieval Indians, Hindus, and Muslims.22 Within such a paradigm, the presence of "Hindu" materials in a "Muslim" context is necessarily ascribed to the promulgation of sectarian victory rhetoric. In the case of the Delhi mosque, scholars have turned to its epigraphic program to provide a cultural and historical context for the reuse of Hindu and Jain elements in its construction. Most frequently cited are a number of Qur'anic inscriptions that place a strong emphasis on the rejection of idolatry, and a problematic Persian foundation inscription above the eastern

18 (2001): 41, 63-64. See also Cousens's (as in note 5, p. 210) unsubstantiated assumption that the Dhar pillar was "thrown down by Muhammadans," in spite of the evidence for its re-erection by the Muslim patron of the adjacent mosque. Earlier, Prinsep had asserted that at some point between the fourth century and the fourteenth, the Ashokan pillar at Allahabad was "overthrown again by the idol breaking zeal of the Musalm?n": James Prinsep, "Notes on the facsimiles of the various inscriptions on the ancient column at Allahabad, retaken by Captain Edward Smith, engineers," Journal of theAsiatic Society of Bengal 6 (1837): 968. 20. For a critical survey of the relevant material see Ratel (as in note 1 ). 21. Welch & Crane note "Islam and Figure 8. Ghurid FridayMosque of Delhi, general view. (see 11), p. 134; John Irwin, the Cosmic Pillar," in Investigating : Proceedings of a Symposium on the Development of Early Buddhist and Hindu Iconography held at the Museum of Indian Art, Berlin, May 1986 a broader belief in an Muslim for (Berlin: 1987), p. 134. essentially penchant 22. The lats and stambhas into sultanate the reuse of pre-lslamic incorporated triumphal gestures artifacts and are as involving mosques referred to miners in fourteenth-century Persian texts monuments identified as non-Islamic.19 The attribution (e.g. 'Afif [see note 12], p. 314), which can equally compare the of static sectarian to minaret of the Delhi to a stone note identities medieval objects and mosque pillar {sut?n): Nath (see as a 7), p. 28. Conversely, the Qutb Minar is identified jayastambha and kirtistambha in contemporary Sanskrit inscriptions: Pushpa Prasad, essentialist view of Muslim responses to the relics of the Indian past, Sanskrit Inscriptions of the Delhi Sultanate 1191-1256 (New Delhi: more concludes neutrally that the iron pillar is part of "the triumphant Oxford University Press, 1990), pp. xxx, 2-3, 18-19. The absence of use W. political of trophies": Carl Ernst, "Admiring the Works of the any functional minarets in the royal mosques in which the pillars were as Ancients. The Ellora Temples viewed by Indo-Muslim authors," in re-erected (at Firuzabad and Hisar) suggests that they were intended to Beyond Turk and Hindu: Rethinking Religious Identity in Islamicate replace freestanding minarets such as the Qutb Minar, an impression South Asia, ed. David Gilmartin & Bruce Lawrence, pp. 98-120. reinforced by the decoration of some of the pillars: Shokoohy & n. (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2000), p. 98 and 1. Shokoohy (see note 13), p. 33. As Ram Nath ("The Minaret vs. the Interpretations that foreground Muslim victory (as opposed to victory) Dhvajastambha," Indica 7, no. 1 [1970]: 29) remarks, "the idea is are on an more implicitly based assumed hostility toward reused objects symbolic than functional," with the lat acquiring a role as the in conceived of sectarian terms, is also manifest in scholarship dealing "conceptual equivalent" to the minar: McKibben (see note 13), p. 112. with the re-erection of stone in antique pillars the fourteenth century Formal similarities between pillar and minaret apparently enabled by Firuz Shah Tughluq. See for example the interpretation of Firuz these to be identified in the eyes of contemporaries, for the Shah's as over pillars representing "his triumph India's jahiliyya": identification oftall structures associated with Indian religious note 11 as Welch (see ), p. 320. monuments (temple sikaras, for example) miners is found as early 19. as an as Finbarr Barry Flood, "The Medieval Trophy Art Historical the ninth century in Arabic texts: Ahmad b. Yahya al-Baladhuri, Trope: Coptic and Byzantine 'Altars' in Islamic Contexts," Muqarnas Kit?b Futuh al-Buld?n, ed. M. J. de Goeje (Leiden: 1866), p. 437. 104 RES 43 SPRING 2003

Figure 9. The iron pillar and the Qutb Minar, Delhi. Flood: Pillars, palimpsests, and princely practices 105

entrance to to to the mosque, which appears refer the Ghazni's treatment of the Somnath linga, for example), desecration of twenty-seven temples and the reuse of and can be ascribed to the ability of the looted icons to their elements in its construction.23 However, not all the index the expanding frontiers of lltutmish's empire very monument are materials comprising the spolia, and publicly in the first mosque of the imperial capital.28 even to a reuse with regard the mosque's structural components While such of Indian artifacts might support the the whole question of reuse ismore complex than has idea that the iron pillar was intended to commemorate usually been assumed.24 The dangers of reading material "Muslim" victory, it should not be assumed that all the culture exclusively through the lens of textual rhetoric objects garnered within the mosque had the same or are (whether Qur'anic historical) amply demonstrated semantic function. The rejection of idolatry can hardly by the survival of contemporary Ghurid coin issues that be equated with a rejection of Indian culture in general, continue to feature images of Hindu deities.25 This as is too often assumed,29 and it is far from obvious that in to was pragmatic continuity is stark contrast the rhetoric of the pillar capable of functioning as an index of religious orthodoxy that permeates contemporary texts idolatry in the same way that looted Hindu icons could. to sorts and inscriptions, which make little reference the Moreover, there is nothing to suggest that the iron pillar was one of compromises with pr?existent traditions witnessed in seized during of lltutmish's military campaigns, the numismatic evidence. and it is unmentioned in the thirteenth-century sources We should also be aware of possible shifts in the that associate the installation of looted icons in the even over meaning of the Delhi mosque, relatively short Delhi mosque with the theme of imperial victory. of time. One shift was an periods such may have occurred The idea that the iron pillar Islamic trophy between the foundation of the mosque in or around finds no support inmedieval references to it, the earliest 1192 and the massive extension that it underwent of which date from the fourteenth century. Ibn Battuta, during the reign of lltutmish. There are indications that writing after a visit to the Delhi mosque in or around the eastern "foundation" text dates from the latter period 1333, gives the most extensive description of the pillar: rather than the former, and itmay have been set in place In the center of the mosque is the awe-inspiring column of as part of a massing of signs of various sorts within the which [it is said] nobody knows of what metal it is mosque during the reign of lltutmish.26 The Qur'anic constructed. One of their learned men told me that it is within the injunctions against idolatry mosque (and called Haftj?sh, which means 'seven metals' (sic), and that the once a especially Qutb Minar) found material it is composed of these seven. A part of this column, of a in a counterpart number of stone and metal Hindu icons finger's length, has been polished, and this polished part out a Iron no on looted during lltutmish's campaigns of conquest in gives brilliant gleam. makes impression it. It is cubits and we rolled a turban round and Ujjain (1233-1234), and resituated along the approach thirty high, it, the which encircled itmeasured cubits.30 to the mosque where they could be trampled by those portion eight entering it.27The of the loot harks back to display Ujjain In the Ta'rikh-i Firuz Sh?h? we are told that fifty years earlier Islamicate precedents Mahmud of (recalling later the Central Asian conqueror Timur was similarly awed by the pillars re-erected in Delhi by order of Firuz 23. (see note 7), 29; and Tomb: Rage p. Anthony Welch, "Qur'an Shah Tughluq (figs. 6 and 10).31 A reference in Elliott The of Two Sultanate Tombs in in Religious Epigraphs Early Delhi/' and Dowson's translation of the same work to these Indian Epigraphy, Its Bearing on the History of Art, ed. Frederick M. Asher and G. S. Gai (New Delhi: Oxford and IBH Publishing Co., 1985), pp. 260-264; Hussein Keshani, Anthony Welch, and Alexandra originally Calcutta, 1881 (New Delhi: Reprinted by theOriental Books Bain, "Epigraphs, Scripture, and Architecture in the Early Delhi Reprint Corporation, 1970), vol. 1, pp. 623, 628. For a discussion of the 28. Finbarr Sultanate," Muqarnas 19, (2002):12-43. Barry Flood, "Between Cult and Culture: Bamiyan, grammatical oddities in the foundation inscription see Ratel (as in note Islamic Iconoclasm, and the Museum," Art Bulletin 84/4 (2002):650-651. 101-114. 29. See as 1), pp. Flood (forthcoming, in note 2). 24. See Flood as in note 30. Gibb note 622. see (forthcoming, 2). (see 17), p. On the "seven metals" Iqbal 25. Hirananda Sastri, "Devan?gari and the Muhammadan rulers of Khan, "Views of Abul Fazl on the 'Birth' of Metals," in Art and Culture: India," Journal of the Bihar and Orissa Research Society 23 (1937): Felicitation Volume in Honour of Professor Nurul Hasan, ed. Ahsan Jan 495. This fact is as ignored by the epigraphic studies cited in note 23, Qaisar & Som Prakash Verma (Jaipur: Publication Scheme, 1993), pp. are recent monument studies of the that question the privileging of 105-109. Qur'anic epigraphy above all other modes of evidence. 31. 'Afif (see note 12), p. 314; Elliott & Dowson, (see note 13), vol. 26. Finbarr India: Art note Barry Flood, Translating and Transculturation 3, p. 353; Welch (see 11), p. 319. That the inscriptions on many in a Medieval Afghan Polity (forthcoming), chapter 8. of the surviving pillars stress their enduring nature and indicate a 27. H. G. Tabak?t-i-N?sirl: A to awe Raverty, General History of the desire evoke is hardly serendipitous: Fleet (1886, see note 5), Muhammadan Dynasties of Asia, including Hindustan, 2 vol., p. 257; idem., (1970, see note 7), p. 148. 106 RES 43 SPRING 2003

Figure 10. Re-erected Ashokan pillar, Kotla Firuz Shah, Firuzabad.

pillars being moved to Delhi "as trophies" is not borne In both cases, while the meaning of the reused pillars out by the published Persian text, where their value as is considered in relation to their connection (however wonders (caja'?b?n) is instead stressed.32 So far as vague) with the pre-lslamic history of India, the practice surviving fourteenth-century accounts go, awe and of reuse itself and its cultural antecedents remains mystery rather than triumph and victory are the keynotes unexamined. Ifone considers the antique pillars reused in the reception of these fragments of the Indian past. in sultanate Delhi diachronically, however, it quickly In a rare dissension from the tendency to ignore the becomes apparent that many of them had already transcultural nature of the pillars reused in Delhi, acquired complex genealogies through reuse and William McKibben notes that lltutmish "may have reinscription in preceding centuries. Just as Egyptian appropriated the iron pillar for the Quwwat al-lslam pharaons or Byzantine emperors inscribed their names mosque in part to glorify the achievements of past on columns and pillars that were already antique, civilizations and affirm the ideological beginnings of medieval Indian rajas were apparently prone to Islamic rule in India by aligning himself with pre-lslamic reinscribing existing commemorative pillars in order to own sovereigns."33 A similar interpretation of Jahangir's later commend their glorious deeds to history.35 Some of reuse of two pre-lslamic pillars was offered by Catherine these inscriptions correspond with the re-erection of the Asher, who very plausibly read the inscription of pillars during different phases of reuse, a fact that must on the Allahabad as an Jahangir's royal lineage pillar now 35. The pharaonic obelisk in New York was, for example, to link rule "to both the Timurid attempt Mughal inscribed by three different pharaohs between 1461 B.C. and 933 to B.C.: Bern tradition and deeply rooted Indian traditions."34 Dibner, Moving the Obelisks (Norwalk, Conn.: Burndy Library, 1952), p. 44. See also the dedication to the Byzantine emperor Phocas (r. 602-610) on a column set up in the Roman forum in the 32. 'Afif (see note 12), p. 308; Elliott & Dowson (see note 13), vol. third century by the emperor Diocletian: Marlia Mundell Mango, 3, p. 350. "Imperial Art in the Seventh Century," in New Constantines: the 33. McKibben (see note 13), p. 113. Rhythm of Imperial Renewal in Byzantium, 4th-13th Centuries, ed. 34. Asher (see note 11), p. 7. Raul Magdalino (London: Variorum, 1994), p. 110. Flood: Pillars, palimpsests, and princely practices 107

cause us to reconsider the idea that the re-erection of travails from the multiple texts that it bears in different a the iron pillar constituted specifically Islamic mode of languages and scripts, the pillar was first inscribed in commemorating victory. the third century B.c. by the Mauryan emperor Ashoka In case the of the Delhi iron pillar, although attention (although itmay even have been erected earlier),40 on has been focused the Gupta temple inwhich it first then reused in the late fourth century a.D. by the Gupta stood and the Ghurid mosque inwhich it eventually raja Samudra, when itwas carved with a list of his came to rest, in fact these only mark the beginning accomplishments and those of his ancestors.41 The same and a end of its history. Among number of less well pillar was re-erected once again in 1605, and carved recorded on column in with a text preserved inscriptions the Persian celebrating the lineage of Jahangir.42 the was one to nineteenth century that referred the Such documented instances of reuse may be but the tip Tomar in foundation of Delhi by the ruler Anang Ral of the iceberg, since those reusing the pillars may not Samvat 1109 (a.d. 1052).36 On epigraphic grounds it has always have inscribed them, and even inscriptions are been assumed that this is a contemporary inscription, liable to wear and erasure over time.43 at more carved Anang Ral's behest than six centuries While the reuse and reinscription of antique columns after the column had first been dedicated. Some of the by later Indian rulers provides a general context in in temple material reused the Delhi mosque is of similar which to locate lltutmish's appropriation of the iron and it has been was an date, suggested that the iron pillar pillar, the reuse of antique pillar in the vicinity of taken from its and a original location re-erected within Delhi in the decades before the Ghurid conquest points built the ruler in at time to more temple by Tomar 1052, the that immediate precedents. The pillar in question is the was On one pillar reinscribed.37 the basis of numismatic of five surviving from the architectural program of evidence, however, the date of Anang P?l's reign has Firuz Shah Tughluq, and still stands where itwas re recently been put at ca. 1130-1145.38 Since no attempt seems to have been made to correlate the epigraphic at Pillar-Cult Pray?ga (Allahabad): its pre-Asokan Origins," Journal of and numismatic evidence, this redating requires further the Royal Asiatic Society (1983): 253-280. research. If the later date is correct, however, the error in 40. For conflicting views about this see A. Ghosh, "The Pillars of the date inscribed on the column the suggests that Asoka?their purpose," East and West 17 (1967): 275, and Irwin see inscription is anachronistic and cannot therefore be used (1981, note 39), pp. 335-337. Although Irwin argues that the as Allahabad has stood on the same site since the time of Ashoka, evidence for the reuse of the pillar by Anang Pal in pillar earlier writers out the it re the eleventh pointed likelihood that had fallen and been century. texts on erected, since the the pillar include both horizontal The of the Delhi column is which would was complicated genealogy by inscriptions have been legible when it erect, and no means unusual. On on a the contrary, inscriptions vertical inscriptions presumably carved when the pillar had fallen: number of reused antique pillars tell the same story. The Prinsep (see note 19), p. 968; Krishnaswamy Rao Sahib & Amalananda Ghosh, "A Note on the of Journal of the Allahabad pillar reused by Jahangir in the early Asoka," Royal Asiatic same Society (1935): 703-704. The is true of the Dhar pillar. seventeenth century illustrates just how complex the life Hultzsch (1925, see note 13, p. xx) that the stood in its histories of such could be.39 its suggests pillar pillars Reconstructing original location when reinscribed in the Gupta period, but was subsequently moved by the Mughals. 41. John Faithful Fleet, Inscriptions of the Early Gupta Kings and 36. see note note Cunningham (1972, 7), p. 151; (see 7), p. 45. Their Successors, Corpus Inscriptionum Indicarum. vol. 3, (Varanasi: 37. see note Carr Cunningham (1972, 7), p. 153; Stephens (see Reprinted by the Indological Book House, 1970), pp. 1-12. note Smith note Hasan 42. 7), pp. 23-24; (see 7), pp. 13-15; Syed Barani, Burt (see note 33), pp. 107-108; Prinsep (see note 19), p. 968; of Delhi to the time of Timur's "History invasion/' Islamic Culture 12, James Fergusson, History of Indian and Eastern Architecture (London: no. 3 313. (1938): John Murray, 1876), p. 53; Asher (see note 11 ). 38. S. without the of 43. Burt note John Deyell, Living Silver, Monetary History (see 39), p. 109; Prinsep (see note 19), p. 969; Medieval North India Delhi: Oxford Chabbra note am Early (New University Press, (see 13), p. 320. I confining my remarks here to table 14. 1999), pp. 153-154, 157-167, inscriptions that mention historical rulers, or which may be considered 39. T. S. "A with of the Ancient Stone and offer some Burt, description, drawings, "official," therefore evidence for dating phases of Pillar at Allahabad called Bhim Sen's Gad? or with reuse. The Club, equally interesting, but less chronologically useful, graffiti of four in different left accompanying copies inscriptions engraved by merchants, travelers, and tourists would be an interesting characters its of the Asiatic of a upon surface," Journal Society Bengal 3 subject for separate study: Cunningham (1972, see note 7), p. 167; notes 13 & see note note (1834):105-121; Prinsep (see 19); Hultzsch (1925, Stephens (see 7), p. 24; J. A. Page, A Memoir on Kotla Firoz Shah, "'Asokan' Pillars: A 13), pp. xix, 156; John Irwin, Reassessment of the Memoirs of the Archaeological Survey of India No. 22 (Calcutta: The Evidence/7 Burlington Magazine 115(1973): 706-707, fig. 3; Government of India, 1937), p. 29; idem. (1991, see note 7), p. 45; "The Bull-Pillar: idem., Pray?ga another pre-Asokan Monument," Chhabra (see note 7), pp. 320-321; Prasad (see note 22), pp. 32, South Asian Archaeology 1979 (1981 ): fig. 15b; idem., "The Ancient 40-42. 108 RES 43 SPRING 2003

an erected in 1357, at the center of extraordinary Friday Mosque at Ajmir.47 The defeat of a Mleccha new pyramidal structure in the heart of Firuz Shah's (barbarian, presumably Ghurid) army is also among the capital, Firuzabad, just north of Ghurid Delhi (fig. 10). victories mentioned in the inscription carved on the When re-erected in this position, the pillar was crowned Firuzabad pillar at Visala Deva's command. Since it is a a with golden kalasa, gesture which offers incidental unlikely that this pillar remained in one spot for fifteen evidence of continuity in Indian royal ritual, for such centuries, it seems probable that itwas re-erected when was golden vases were often provided by medieval Indian it reused in the late twelfth century by Visala Deva rulers to crown the summit of temple sikaras44 to commemorate his military victories.48 The Firuzabad pillar predates the monument which it In eleventh- and twelfth-century Sanskrit texts, pillars now graces by over fifteen hundred years, for itmay of fame are, along with the pedestals of religious images already have been standing in the third century B.c., and copper plates, among the loci considered an when itwas inscribed with edict of the Buddhist appropriate for royal inscriptions.49 The manner in emperor Ashoka, written in Prakrit in brahmi script.45 which existing pillars were reinscribed, however, a a Just below this original dedication is Sanskrit indicates desire to highlight their function as inscription carved in devnagari script a millennium and palimpsests. On the Allahabad pillar, inscriptions of a half later, in 1164 (fig. 11). The inscription records the different dates and scripts are interlineated.50 In other conquests of prince Visala Deva, Vigraharaja IV of the cases, such as the Firuzabad pillar, the Prakrit and Chauhan dynasty which had taken Delhi from the Sanskrit inscriptions are juxtaposed in such a way that Tomars a few years previously and still ruled most of the later Sanskrit inscription frames the earlier Prakrit northwestern India at the time of the Ghurid conquest (fig. 11 ). The two texts are further distinguished not only three decades later.46 In an ironic twist, plays by their differing lengthsbut also by a strikingdifference concerning Visala Deva's battles against the Turushkas in script. Just as medieval Indian rulers could seek to or Turks (including one written by the raja himself) were link themselves with illustrious predecessors by citing found inscribed on stones later reused in the Ghurid earlier eras in their inscriptions, it seems likely that the

see note 44. Rage (1937, note 43), pp. 5, 41; 'Afif (see 12), p. 312; as Elliott & Dowson (see note 13), vol. 3, p. 352. The kalasa was 47. F. Kielhorn, "Sanskrit Plays, Partly Preserved Inscriptions at a to surmounted by globe and crescent similar those which seventeenth Ajmere," The Indian Antiquary (1891): 201-212; Har Bilas Sarda, century visitors still saw on the Meerut pillar, another of the pillars Ajmer: Historical and Descriptive (Ajmir: Fine Art Printing Press, 76-78. moved by Firuz Shah: William Foster, Early Travels in India 1583-1619 1941), pp. a context was (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1921), p. 157. The provision of 48. The precise from which the Firuzabad pillar on to not even terminal ?malaka and kalasa on the Jaunpur pillar and that at brought Delhi in the fourteenth century is entirely clear, if we came see Fatehabad further heightens the parallels with the crowning elements know that it from somewhere nearTopra: Rage (1937, note Sirat-i states of the temple: Cunningham (1968, see note 13), p. 106; Shokoohy 43), p. 29. The Firuz Sh?hi that Visala Deva found in a which (1988, see note 13), p. 17. Jahangir later crowned the Allahabad the pillar standing front temple there (ibid., p. 34), led a see note n. 28. For to assume that itwas inscribed Visala Deva while still pillar with kalasa: Irwin (1987, 20), p. 136, the Cunningham by in see Pandit in situ: note 167. The fact that when found the gifting of the kalasa pre-sultanate India Sahityacharya idem., (see 7), pp. 162, set a stone Bisheshwar Nath Reu, "Jalor Inscription of the Time of Paramara V?sala, pillar was, like many Ashokan pillars, upon foundation was in dated V.S. 1174," The Indian Antiquary 62 (1933): 41. It is possible might support the idea that it its original location: John Irwin, that the kalasa was intended as an aniconic substitute for the animal "'Asokan' Pillars: A Reassessment of the Evidence?II: Structure/' The 116 H. The of this figures that had earlier crowned many of these columns, although the Burlington Magazine (1974): 719, fig. replication Pillars: A in Firuzabad that the same two often appeared in conjunction: John Irwin, "'Asokan' arrangement demonstrates, however, be used in contexts. Reassessment of the Evidence?IV: Symbolism," The Burlington system could secondary Magazine 118(1976): 738, fig. 8. 49. Basak (see note 5), p. 140. see see 45. Hultzsch (1925, see note 13), pp. xv-xvi, 119; Irwin (1973, 50. Hultzsch (1925, note 13), p. 156; Irwin (1981, note see note 39), p. 709. 39), figs. 15b, 16b; Asher (see note 11), pp. 6-7. Prinsep (see note 19, one on the on the as 46. Henry Colebrooke, "Translation of of the Inscriptions p. 967) dismisses interlineations Allahabad pillar "merely a the Pillar at Dehlee, called the Lat of Feeroz Shah," Asiatick series of unconnected scribblings of various dates, cut in most likely as Researches 7 (1808): 175-182; F. Kielhorn, "Delhi Siwalik Pillar by attendants on the pillar a pretext for extracting a few rupees from visitors." Note a Persian on same Inscriptions ofVisaladeva; the Vikrama Year 1220," The Indian that later inscription the pillar a two an text: P. of Antiquary 19 (1890): 215-219. For complete copy of the overlays part of earlier O. Kejariwal, The Asiatic Society as of Past inscriptions see Nath (1978, in note 7), Inscription 2. On the Bengal and the Discovery India's (New Delhi: Oxford see 170. the Persian on identity of Visala Deva and Vigraharaja IV Dasharatha Sharma, University Press, 1988), p. Similarly, inscription the Fatehabad column overlies an earlier faded in an Early Chauh?n Dynasties, 2nd ed. (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidas, 1975), p. inscription unidentified Indie see note 17-18. 67; Deyell (see note 38), p. 167. language: Shokoohy (1988, 13), pp. Flood: Pillars, palimpsests, and princely practices 109

Figure 11. Detail of Ashokan and Chauhan inscriptions on the Firuzabad pillar.

act of or was reinscribing re-erecting the pillars intended This self-consciousness with regard to script, as a synecdochal appropriation of the valorized pasts to inscriptions, and reinscriptions contrasts with most texts which various antecedent bore witness.51 instances of reuse in the sultanate period, where (with one exception?fig. 7) there is a noticeable absence of Arabic or Persian This is since 51. Ronald B. Inden, Imagining India (Bloomington & Indianapolis: inscriptions.52 surprising, an Indiana University Press, 2000), pp. 249-250. Conversely, ascendant power might seek to assert its dominance by rejecting the era common as in use, when the Chalukya raja Vikramaditya VI of Time: Cultural Constructions of Temporal Maps and Images (Oxford abolished the Saka era and began using his own Chalukya one: K. P. & Providence: Berg, 1992), pp. 312-313. Jayaswal & R. D. Banerji, "The Hathigumpha Inscription of Kharavela," 52. The earlier exception is the pillar at Fatehabad (fig. 7), which is Epigraphia Indica 20 (1929-1930): 75. On the relationship between inscribed with a thirty-six-line Persian biographical genealogy of Firuz see a calendars and conquest and power Alfred Cell, The Anthropology Shah Tughluq. In rare coincidence between epigraphic content and 110 RES43 SPRING2003

the pre-lslamic inscriptions on the pillars reused in the faiths. That this fact has been overlooked is largely due fourteenth century were noticed, remarked on, and to the neglect of (or selective quotation from) the (where possible) translated by contemporaries, as we inscriptions on these remarkable artifacts within an shall see shortly. While it is difficult to account for the academic tradition partitioned inways that make it apparent reticence to inscribe the columns reused in difficult to deal diachronically with objects crossing sultanate monuments, the difference between epigraphic rather arbitrarily defined cultural or taxonomic reuse and anepigraphic phases of might conceivably boundaries.54 Yet its importance for understanding the reflect different conceptions of time. If the careful reuse of such artifacts by Indo-lslamic sultans can use juxtaposition of inscriptions attesting to phases of hardly be overstated. The cumulative weight of the and reuse evokes the cyclical and repetitious nature of evidence discussed above suggests that the ritual historical time in preconquest traditions, then perhaps practices of medieval north Indian kings encompassed the later reluctance to inscribe these ancient artifacts not only the erection of commemorative pillars but also as served to assert the status of Islam the end of the line the appropriation of those erected by royal predecessors. a rather than another in series.53 Based on the evidence of the Firuzabad pillar, we can Despite this seeming reluctance to inscribe the pillars be certain that the Chauhan rulers of Delhi were came that to grace the monuments of the Delhi sultans, reusing antique pillars less than three decades before the it is clear that some of them had previously been Ghurid conquest of the city. Moreover, in addition to transported around the north of the subcontinent over epigraphic evidence for the reuse of antique pillars in course a or more. the of millennium During this time the preconquest period, medieval inscriptions also attest were they erected and re-erected, inscribed and to the looting and destruction of the victory pillars reinscribed by rulers of different dynasties and different erected by contemporary rivals.55 The reuse of such a pillars, whether those of contemporary or a long-dead predecessor, was thus an intrinsic part of the ritual geographic location, many of the events that facilitated Firuz Shah's area: practices of medieval South Asian rise to power discussed in the inscription took place in this very kings. see Seen in this lltutmish's re-erection of the iron Shokoohy (1988, note 13), pp. 17-18. The Jaunpur pillar bears the light, a foundation text of mosque built in 761/1360, but this pillar may not pillar in the FridayMosque of Delhi has little to do with be McKibben (see note 110. For the of antique: 13), p. inscription cultural rupture and everything to do with cultural on see Jahangir's titles and lineage the Allahabad pillar Asher (note was no continuity. This mere appropriation of spolia 11), p. 4. to suggest a with pre 53. Like their Indian equivalents, the various models of medieval designed symbolic continuity Muslim but the actual continuation of a Persianate historiography emphasize recurring patterns in human kingship, history: Julie Scott Meisami, "The Past in the Service of the Present: practice associated with medieval Indian kings. The Two Views of inMedieval Poetics no. 2 History Persia," Today 14, gesture may have been intended to commemorate the (1993): Persian to the End 253, 261, 270-271; idem., Historiography victories of the Ghurids and their successors, but it did of the Twelfth Century (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), pp. 283-285; Gerhard Bowering, "Ideas of Time in Persian Mysticism" in The Persian Presence in the Islamic World, ed. Richard G. Hovannisian & Georges Sabagh (Cambridge: Cambridge University 54. Thus while Prakrit scholars have focused on the Ashokan 179. A Press, 1998), p. major difference, however, is the fact that, in inscription, Sanskritists have tended to highlight Gupta and later texts, a Persianate historiography, such patterns occur within history that while Islamicists have dealt with both as anomalies, whose presence "from a finite a in a on proceeds beginning?the Creation?to preordained mosque could be best explained by falling back the standard end": Meisami (1999), p. 285. Historical accounts of the pre-lslamic explanation of trophy value. William McKibben, for example, in an past in medieval Persian chronicles "come to full closure," unlike their extensive account of the pillars reused in sultanate architecture does Islamic not content counterparts: Mohammad Tavakoli-Targhi, "Contested discuss the of the pre-lslamic inscriptions. While he Memories: Narrative Structures and Iran's Pre mentions some of the on Allegorical Meanings of inscriptions the Firuzabad pillar in passing lslamic History," Iranian Studies 29, nos. 1-2 (1996): 152, 154-155). (see note 13, p. 117, n. 39), he omits any reference to the crucial See also John Irwin's interesting suggestion that the Qutb Minar and inscription of Visala Deva. iron in 55. a see the pillar the Delhi mosque represent different facets of time, For the looting of victory pillar the inscription of the "one see mytho-historical, the other actual": Irwin (1987, note 21), p. Rallava king Vijaya-Nandivarman III recording his seizure of the pillar 142. For a see Ottoman reuse of stood at the center of European parallel, pagan and early that Vatapi (modern Badami), the capital of his Christian artifacts to reflect the concept of a culminatio, "the Ottoman defeated Chalukya rival: Rao Sahib H. Krishna Sastri, South Indian a fulfillment of the concept of cumulative and culminating Christian Inscriptions, vol. 2 (Madras: Government Press, 1916), p. 511. See also Irene H. "Art with The Role of in the the destruction of the twin history": Forsyth, History: Spolia victory pillars {ranastambhas) erected by Cumulative Work of in or Art," Byzantine East, Latin West: Art-Historical the Rashtrakuta raja Kaka Kakara IIIby the western Chalukyan ruler in Honor II in Studies of Kurt Weitzmann, ed. Christopher Moss & Taila the tenth century: Fleet (1886, see note 5), pp. 255, 257; Katherine Kiefer (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995), p. 158. Vogel (see note 7), pp. 88, 90-91. Flood: Pillars, palimpsests, and princely practices 111

so in a us language and idiom adopted directly from Sh?h? tells that in setting up the iron pillar, lltutmish, Indian rulers. Ifone sees in a indigenous the re-erection of like every great king, wanted to establish lasting the iron in Delhi a pillar triumphal rejection of the pre memorial to his power.60 Although it has been suggested one is a lslamic traditions of India, therefore leftwith the that this entailed shift in emphasis in the meaning need to was explain why this particular royal tradition of these antique columns, "from an exclusively embraced so one enthusiastically by the Delhi sultans. Even cosmological role to that encompassed ideas of the association with a in the mosque finds parallels kingship and legitimacy/'61 the neglected epigraphic erection (and re-erection) of such pillars in front of evidence discussed above suggests that lltutmish was however different a preconquest temples, their form and following precedent rather than establishing one, even in case of function; the the Firuzabad pillar, its previous if subsequent Islamicate historiography saw otherwise. association with a Chauhan was familiar to temple those The association of the pillars with earlier Indian kings who reused it. relocation of or was The such pillars within (historical and mythical) not only stressed in near mosques may have been represented as an medieval Persian sources,62 but in some cases was Islamicization in contemporary textual rhetoric, but it literally legible. A keen interest in the original cultural was a clearly practice adopted from preconquest (and context of the reused pillars is suggested by attempts to mostly Hindu) kings.56 decipher the inscriptions on the pillars reused in the The and tribulations of peregrinations the antique fourteenth century by Firuz Shah Tughluq, an interest in bear pillars comparison with those of the icons and antique epigraphy that recalls the response of earlier that were and Persian insignia ritually appropriated reappropriated rulers to the relics of the pre-lslamic past.63 medieval Indian rulers.57 The of these were by meaning Sanskrit inscriptions evidently read with a high was objects directly related to their possession of a degree of accuracy, for the S?rat-i F?r?z Sh?h?, the history, to the existence of a genealogy memorialized in Persian text that records the removal of the Firuzabad narratives oral and or even contemporary (both textual), pillar, reports quite correctly that the writing on the inscribed upon the objects themselves and the buildings that housed them.58 Such relics were inalienable by 60. 'Afif (see note 12), p. 314; Elliott & Dowson (see note 13), vol. virtue an of indexical relationship with kingship and 3, p. 353. their consequent possession of the power to define 61. McKibben (see note 13), p. 113. See also Brand (as in note 14, 219), where the use of in is said to have the historical identity of those who deployed them. p. "captured pillars" mosques been a the sultans of Delhi. the to "attract new fictitious concept developed by early Possessing ability meanings, 62. In addition to the historical a and kings, widespread popular memories, altered ancestors/' tradition identified the with one genealogies, imagined pillars Bhim, of the legendary Randava inalienable are suited to confer once objects ideally brothers who ruled India. The pillars appropriated by Firuz Shah are to legitimacy on those associated with them.59 said have been the walking stick of Bhim: Elliott and Dowson (see note 13), vol. 3, 350. The Allahabad is The potential for legitimation inherent in these p. pillar similarly as are Ashokan in Bihar and the inalienable of was obvious to the identified, pillars Nepalese Tarai, and fragments antiquity a stambha erected at Badoh inMadhya Pradesh in the ninth century: Muslim rulers that reused them, for the Ta'rlkh-i Firuz Burt note F. (see 39), p. 106; Kielhorn, "Rathari Pillar Inscription of Parabala; [Vikrama-JSamvat 917," Epigraphia Indica 9 (107-108): 248; 56. note 34. See also notes 66 and 92. On the see note Rage (see 43), p. Hultzsch (1925, 13), pp. xviii, xxiii; Kejariwal (see note 50), association with see Irwin see note temples (1987, 21), p. 134; idem., p. 170; Michael D. Willis, Temples of Gopaksetra (London: British "Islam and the Cosmic South Asian Museum 75. Pillar/' Archaeology (London, Press, 1993), p. While Mughal sources preserved the 1985) p. 397, fig. 3. memory that the lat reused in Firuzabad was once associated with 57. Richard H. of War: The Case of the Hindu note Davis, "Trophies Chalukya rajas (Colebrooke [see 46], p. 177; Prinsep [see note 13], in of South Asia's Visual ed. Catherine B. Intruder," Perceptions Past, p. 566), seventeenth-century popular opinion had it that the pillars at Asher & Thomas R.Metcalf Delhi: & IBH were (New Oxford Publishing Co. Allahabad and Delhi erected by Alexander the Great: Pvt. 162-174. See also D. "The of War see Ltd., 1994), pp. Dayalan, Role Cunningham (1972, note 7), pp. 163-164; Foster (see note 44), pp. in Cultural Tamil Civilisation nos. 2-3 248. On the that accumulated Trophies Contact," 3, (1985): 177, legends around the Delhi pillar 134-137. see Vogel (as in note 7). 58. for the that came to rest in the 63. See, example, golden ?mage See, for example, the interest of the Buy id ruler 'Adud al Lakshmana at after twice looted and once in Temple Khajuraho being Dawla the Rahlavi inscriptions at Persepolis, where he had two as a in given gift, facts recorded the foundation inscription of the Arabic inscriptions carved to commemorate his visit in 344/955. it: F. temple that housed Kielhorn, "Inscriptions from Khajuraho," His son, Baha' al-Dawla, later commemorated his own visit in Indica 1 Richard H. "Indian Art an Epigraphia (1888-1891): 134; Davis, 392/1001-1002 with inscription located opposite a Rahlavi text: as of Asian Studies no. 1 29. Sheila S. Objects Loot," Journal 52, (1993): Blair, The Monumental Inscriptions from Early Islamic Iran 59. Annette B. Weiner, "Inalienable Wealth," American Ethnologist and Transoxiana (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1992), Nos. 6-7, 18, pp. 32-35, 12 (1985): 224. 60-62, figs. 10-12. 112 RES 43 SPRING 2003

column commemorates its reinscription by prince Visala the pillars transported by Firuz Shah Tughluq, and the Deva two centuries earlier, and notes its previous demise of later attempts to repeat such feats only serve a move association with temple.64 By contrast, the Prakrit to underline the extraordinary skills needed to the inscriptions on the Firuzabad pillar remained elusive, pillars, which could weigh up to thirty tons or more.68 a connoting a mythologized antiquity. Even here the The attempt to foster sense of legitimacy by forging were an a inscriptions integral to the perceived meaning of association with distinguished political lineage, and a the pillars, since monumental texts are capable of with the glories of real or imagined past, was a common concern evoking power not only through their content, but also of those engaged in the business of "through their location in space and the way they state formation inmedieval Iran and South Asia.69 In look/'65 That the only two pillars to be inscribed when both realms, the construction of genealogical histories reused in an Islamicate context (at Fatehabad [fig. 7] and relating the present to the glories of the past finds a Allahabad) were inscribed with genealogical texts very visual counterpart in the patronage of archaizing art and similar in content and nature to those that Gupta and architecture, or the reuse, recontextualization, and Chauhan rajas had earlier carved on similar pillars is reworking of carefully selected relics of the past.70 strong evidence for a continued association between reuse, kingship, and legitimacy.66 a Elliott & Dowson (see note 350-353. For similar The act of epigraphic translation prefigured physical 33-42; 13), pp. on translatio that was no less relevant to the issue of treatises moving antique columns and obelisks in early modern see Domenico Delia del ?'Obelisco for itwas not the that were Europe, Fontana, Transportatione legitimacy, only pillars Vaticano (Rome, 1596); Francesco Bianchini, Considerazioni teoriche but also the acts and associated palimpsests, practices e pratiche intorno all transporto della Colonna d'Antonino Pio to move re-erect with them. The very ability and these collocata in Monte Citorio (Rome: Stamperia della Reverenda Camera extraordinary relics of the Indian past echoed the Apost?lica, 1704). 68. The iron in Delhi over six tons, while act of creation, conveying messages pillar reportedly weighs original significant the Ashokan stone such as that moved to Firuzabad can about and in a manner determined pillars weigh patronage power over thirty tons: Smith (see note 7), p. 4; Triveda (see note 12), p. 249; Such heroic endeavors were by royal precedent. Irwin (1981, see note 39), p. 338. The Sirat-i Fir?z Sh?hl reports that in memorialized in contemporary Persian texts, which the fifty years before Firuz Shah's successful appropriation of theTopra on (that now in three and rulers prefigure European treatises similar topics by several pillar Firuzabad), Chingizid Chaghatai had tried to move it: (see note 43), 34. The centuries.67 The reported failure of earlier kings to move unsuccessfully Rage p. destruction of the iron pillar of Dhar is attributed to the attempt by Sultan Bahadur (r. 1526-1537) to carry it off to Gujarat. Jahangir later serve 64. 'Afif (see note 12), p. 312; Elliott & Dowson (see note 13), vol. intended to carry the largest fragment to Agra to as a lamp-stand, was never out: note 11 3, p. 352; Rage (see note 43), p. 34. On the translation of pre-lslamic but this carried Asher (see ), p. 8; Thackston on inscriptions in Islamic histories see Franz Rosenthal, A History of (see note 8), p. 235. See also Garth Fowden's remarks the political to to move Muslim Historiography, 2nd ed. (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1968), pp. kudos accruing Late Antique emperors from the ability 123-126. apparently immovable Egyptian obelisks to Constantinople and Rome: 65. Alan K. Bowman & Greg Woolf, Literacy and Power in the Garth Fowden, "Obelisks Between Polytheists and Christians: Julian, in Honour Ancient World (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), p. 8. EP.59," in Polyphonia Byzantina: Studies of Willem J. Aerts, was true of ed. Hero Edm? R. & Marinis M. Woesthuis Although written of classical antiquity, this equally many Hokwerda, Smits, 37. For a discussion of the pre-modern societies. Inmedieval China, the presence of archaic (Groningen, 1993), p. good logistics even in see inscriptions added to the value of antique bronzes, when neither involved in moving antique obelisks early modern Europe in note read nor legible: Craig Clunas, Superfluous Things, Material Culture Dibner (as 35). in ones and Social Status in Early Modern China (Cambridge: Polity Press, 69. "The role of history linking present rulers with past or 1991 ). As Catherine Asher notes of the inscriptions on the Allahabad (whether with those of ancient Iran with the caliphate) and thereby even were not to the transfer of to the current incumbents is pillar, though they probably accessible early legitimizing power clearly were as see 250. seventeenth-century viewers "they clearly recognized the crucial": Meisami (1993, note 53), p. See also Clifford 7. "The in Islamic and the product of an ancient Indian past": Asher (see note 11), p. Edmund Bosworth, Heritage of Rulership Early 66. Ibid., pp. 7-8. See also the suggestion that Firuz Shah Search for Dynastic Connections with the Past," Iran 11 (1973): 51-62. to on of For the of and in Tughluq's decision inscribe his memoirs the Jami' Masjid importance genealogies (mythological otherwise) a on see in Firuzabad was inspired (in general sense) by Ashoka's edict the medieval Indian kingship V. Raghavan, "Variety and Integration even Pattern Far Eastern no. 4 adjacent pillar, if illegible: K. A. Nizami, "The Futuhat-i-Firuz the of Indian Culture," The Quarterly 15, on Shahi as a Medieval Inscription," in Proceedings of Seminar (1956): 499; R. C Majumdar, "Ideas of History in Sanskrit Literature," Medieval Inscriptions (6-8th February 1970) (Aligarh: Centre of in Historians of India, Pakistan and Ceylon, ed. C H. Philips, (Oxford: 24. Advanced Study, Aligarh Muslim University, 1974), p. 30. Oxford University Press, 1961), p. are in a 67. Firuz Shah Tughluq's endeavors memorialized long 70. See the revival of Chola architectural styles by the Vijayanagara section of 'Afif's Ta'r?kh-i Fir?z Sh?hi and in the anonymous Sirat-i rulers of southern India, which has been read as a "visual statement of Flr?z Sh?hi: 'Afif (see note 12), pp. 308-314; Page (see note 43), pp. appropriation and incorporation" of the former territories of the earlier Flood: Pillars, palimpsests, and princely practices 113

a Occasionally the textual and artifactual coincided in the could be "instantly incorporated into victorious as articulation of genealogical claims, when Mughal tradition/'74 emperors reinscribed royal artifacts bearing the Like the Mirror for Princes literature of the eleventh accumulated names of illustrious predecessors,71 or and twelfth century, the Sh?h-n?ma, reportedly inspired an when epic passages from the Sh?h-n?ma, the Iranian by ancient Indian king's patronage of historical and were on a a book of kings, quoted the walls of cities and allegorical texts,75 provided paradigm for reframing an palaces, in an endeavor "to legitimize the present of the pre-lslamic kingly past within Islamicate matrix case through identification with the past/'72 The latter is that emphasized the shared experience of kingship.76 particularly interesting, evidencing as it does the ability The use of past precedent to frame the contemporary as an can seen of the mythologized pre-lslamic past to serve encounter with India be in the commissioning a instrument of legitimation through the operation of of the Sh?hriy?r-n?ma by the Ghaznavid sultan Mascud as was an type of isn?d paradigm. Just the appeal to authority in III (r. 1099-1115), who celebrated in epic contemporary Persianate histories was "linked to the poem inscribed on the walls of his palace, giving the appropriation of prior authoritative narratives/'73 the genealogy of the Ghaznavid sultans in the meter of the epic past enshrined in texts such as the Sh?h-n?ma Sh?h-n?ma.77 The Sh?hriy?r-n?ma details the Indian was could be appropriated by Muslim rulers seeking to exploits of the great-grandson of Rustam, and own construct a genealogy by means of which the present clearly intended to cast Mascud's Indian campaigns an in epic light. Slightly later, the Ghurid overlords of lltutmish devised a that related themselves both as lineage Chola empire: George Michell, "Revivalism the Imperial Mode: to the of Iran and to the Arabic-Islamic Religious Architecture During the Vijayanagara Period," in Perceptions kings pre-lslamic of South Asia's Visual Past, ed. Catherine B. Asher & Thomas R. Metcalf past embodied in the caliphate, invoking (like many IBH Co. Pvt. (New Delhi: Oxford and Publishing Ltd., 1994), pp. Persian kings before and after them) various material 192-193. This took several hundred miles from where its sources place relics of that past to bolster their claims to a noble a of inspiration stood, offering further parallel for the relocation of lineage.78 When it came to royal rhetoric appropriated ancient monuments discussed above. The phenomenon continued until the early modern period in South India: Mary Beth Coffman in Heston, "Images from the Past, Vision of the Future: The Art of Citations Baihaqi's Ta'rikh-i Mascudi," in XX. Deutscher vom Marttanda Varma," in Perceptions of South Asia's Visual Past, ibid., pp. Orientalistentag 3. bis 8. Oktober 1977 in Erlangen, ed. Wolfgang 201, 204. A more literal expression of the same impulse reveals itself Voigt (Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner Verlag GmBH, 1980). On the in the reuse of objects and architectural fragments associated with relationship between literary citation and other forms of cultural earlier dynasties: Joanna Williams, "A Re?ut Asokan Capital and the production in medieval Europe, see Cutler (see note 4), p. 1064; Gupta Attitude Towards the Past," Artibus Asiae 35 (1973): 225-240. In Umberto Eco, "Riflessioni sulle tecniche di citazione nel medioevo," e North India, Rajput and Sikh chiefs who challenged centralized in Ideologie Pratiche del Reimpiego nel l'Alto Medioevo (Spoleto: as authority Mughal power waned sometimes carried off fragments of Presso la Sede del Centro, 1999), Settimane di Studio del Centro reuse own Mughal monuments for in their buildings: Cunningham Italiano di Studi sull'Alto Medioevo 46, vol. 1, pp. 461-484. (1972, see note 7), p. 223: Janice Leoshko, "Mausoleum for an 74. Linda Seidel, "Images of the Crusades inWestern Art: Models as Empress," in Romance of the Taj Mahal (Los Angeles & London: Metaphors," in The Meeting of Two Worlds, Cultural Exchange Thames & Hudson, 1989), p. 84. Between East and West During the Period of the Crusades, ed. 71. Sheila S. Blair, "Timurid Signs of Sovereignty," Oriente Vladimir P. Goss (Kalamazoo: Medieval Institute Publications, Western no. numerous Moderno 76, 2 (1996): 571-572. There are, of course, Michigan University, 1986), p. 386. instances of the phenomenon from Late Antique and medieval Europe: 75. Vladimir Minorsky, "The Older Preface to the Sh?h-N?ma," in onore Kim Bowes, "Ivory Lists: Diptychs, Christian Appropriation and Studi Orientalistici in di Giorgio Levi della Vida (Rome: Istituto Polemics of Time in Late Antiquity," Art History 24, no. 3 (2001): 352. per l'Oriente, 1956), vol. 2, p. 167. On the impact of the text on see 72. Sheila S. Blair, "The llkhanid Palace," Ars Orientalis 23 (1993): Persianate historiography in India ibid., p. 167; M. Athar Ali 243-244; Alessio Bombaci, The K?fic Inscription in Persian Verses in "Ta'r?kh. 4. InMuslim India," The Encyclopaedia of Islam, new ed., the Court of the Royal Palace of Mascud III at Ghazni (Rome: IsMEO, vol. 10 (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1998), p. 295. 1966), p. 40. 76. See Meisami (1999, as in note 53, pp. 285-286 on the see 73. Meisami (1999, note 53), pp. 287-288. See especially the importance of the "great man" paradigm of Persian historiography. relationship between the translation of preexisting narratives in texts Bosworth (see note 73, p. 51) notes, however, the absence of as such the Sh?h-n?ma and the translatio imperii that led to the quotations from the Sh?h-n?ma in Bayhaqi's history of the deeds of the over use triumph of Persianate political culture its Arabicizing predecessor Ghaznavids in India. On the of quotations from the Sh?h-n?ma in an in Iran. For the role of citation inArabic and Persian histories of the Anatolian Seljuq Mirror for Princes, see Julie Scott Meisumi, "The a Ghaznavid period see ibid., pp. 291-292; Roberto Rubinacci, "Le Sah-n?me as Mirror for Princes: A Study in Reception" in Pand-o citazioni poetiche nell'AI-Ta'rih al-Yam?ni di Abu Nasr al-cUtb?," in A Sokhan, eds. Christophe Balay, Clair Kappler, and ZivaVesel (Teheran: Francesco Gabrieli, Studi Orientalistici offert! ne! sessantesimo Institut fran?ais de recherche en Iran, 1995), pp. 265-273. e 77. compleanno dai suoi colleghi discepoli (Rome: Dott. Giovanni Bombad (see note 72), pp. 40-42. Bardi, 1964), pp. 263-273; Clifford Edmund Bosworth, "The Poetical 78. Bosworth (see note 69), pp. 54-55. 114 RES 43 SPRING 2003

were were for genealogical purposes, cultural boundaries from contemporary Anatolia suggests that they as a relatively fluid. Thus, Indo-Muslim sultans might claim potentially assimilable variant of the known.81 The descent from the Pandavas (to whom many of the common use of the past in the self-representations of antique pillars were attributed), while later Indo-Persian both Persianate rulers and their Rajput equivalents may historians imagine the heroes of the Sh?h-n?ma and have facilitated the process of assimilation, for later attest Indian epics such as the R?m?yana as contemporaries European encounters with India the fact that whose colorful trajectories sometimes intersected.79 "symbolic representations of power could be 'translated' on The paradigmatic role of the pre-lslamic past in the basis of cross-cultural analogy."82 Both to mind Walter classic conferring legitimacy on parvenu Persianate dynasts undertakings bring Benjamin's art as "a somewhat offers one potential model for the co-option of the formulation of the translator's to Indian past and itsmaterial traces by lltutmish and provisional way of coming terms with the its Such even have the newly emergent Delhi sultanate. Contemporary foreignness" of object.83 pillars may evidence for the role of material remains, within such been familiar from preexisting descriptions of the region, a tale in the a paradigm may be found in Seljuq Anatolia, for preserved eleventh-century Egyptian but the Kit?b wa refers to geographically remote from sultanate India culturally compendium, al-Had?y? al-Tuhaf, a iron an earlier contiguous by virtue of its shared Persianate Turkic mysterious pillar encountered during to the cultural milieu. Seljuq participation in the pre-lslamic phase of Islamic conquest. According tale, 'Amr the of past of Anatolia was orchestrated by means of spolia, Hisham b. al-Taghlibi, 'Abbasid governor was an iron cubits historical and mythological tales, and textual quotation. Sind, confronted with pillar seventy in Scott Redford notes of the architectural program long in "Kandahar" (probably the region of Gandhara and northwestern undertaken at Sinop after its conquest in 1214 that: northeastern Afghanistan Pakistan) . . an to India in 768. The ". Sultan Izzedin Keykavus seems to have placed during attempt conquer governor was that the column was a monument erected himself in a mythic context, keeping company with the told victory or walls the celebrated ruler of kings of yore, whether Caesar Khusraw/'80 The by Tubba', pre-lslamic Yemen, of Konya erected by Alaeddin Keykubad in 1219-1221 and fashioned from the weapons used by his Persian in the that it commemorated.84 incorporated classical and Byzantine spolia along with allies gaining victory texts and The of to an indexical epigraphy, which included both religious recasting weapons produce as between monuments and the events quotations from the Sh?h-n?ma. The latter functioned relationship victory commemorate is and a vector of appropriation that extended the mythic age that they relatively common, similar claims made for medieval iron columns that of pre-lslamic Iran to Anatolia and permitted the in be relevant to the inwhich assimilation of a pre-lslamic past instantiated in the survive India may ways in was the material remains of cultures that, strictly speaking, lay the iron column Delhi perceived.85 Moreover, outside the cultural ambit of the text. Given this from the extrapolation mythologized past 81. See, however, the undated minars in the area around Kabul: Iran to the instantiated of of pre-lslamic past pre-lslamic Warwick Ball, "The so-called 'minars' of Kabul," Studia Iranica 13 see note 22 Anatolia, the pre-lslamic pillars reused in sultanate (1988): 117-127. On the issue of equivalence above. of a 82. Joan-Rau Rubies, Travel and Ethnology in the Renaissance. Delhi might be considered the material correlates South India Through European Eyes, 1250-1625 (Cambridge: citational practice encountered in contemporary University Press, 2000), p. 30. Persianate and reflected in Cambridge historiography occasionally 83. Walter Benjamin, [Harry Zohn, tr.], Illuminations (London: no for the princely practice. Although equivalent Fontana Press, 1992), p. 75. stambhas and lats of India existed in Iran, the evidence 84. Gh?da al-Hijj?w? al-Qaddum?, Book of Gifts and Rarities, a Kit?b al-Had?y? wa I-Tuhaf {Cambridge Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1996), pp. 180-181. The same story is repeated with Other? Sanskrit characteristic at the Ghaznavid court: 79. Brajadulal Chattopadhyaya, Representing the scepticism by al-Biruni, writing Mohammad Said Al-Beruni's Book on The Sources and the Muslims (8th to 14th Century) (New Delhi: Manohar, Hakim (tr.), Mineralogy: Book Most in on Precious Stones 1998), p. 84; Briggs, (see note 13), pp. liii-lxiii. Comprehensive Knowledge Pakistan 220. On Tubba' see 80. Scott Redford, "The Seljuqs of Rum and the Antique/' (Islamabad: Hijra Council, 1410/1989), p. and in A. F. L. The of new vol. Muqarnas 10 (1993): 154; idem., "Words, Books, Buildings Beeston, "Tubba'," Encyclopaedia Islam, ed., Formation in the Ottoman 10 E. J. 1999), 575-576. Seljuk Anatolia/' in Identity and Identity (Leiden: Brill, pp. 85. The iron on Mount Abu is said to have been cast from Middle East and the Balkans: A Volume of Essays in Honor of Norman pillar am the arms of a Muslim Cousens note 207. For a Itzkowitz, ed. Karl Barbir & Bakri Tezcan (forthcoming). I grateful fleeing army: (see 5), p. me a his modern see the inclusion of Iranian helmets in to Scott Redford for providing with copy of unpublished parallel captured Saddam Hussain's Arch in a monument fashioned paper. Victory Baghdad, Flood: Pillars, palimpsests, and princely practices 115

a association of the Kandahar column with known figure The translation of the Indian past into the sultanate sets from pre-lslamic Arabia the 'Abbasid campaign of present may have been read as a retrospective in an while how conquest epic context, demonstrating Islamicization according to existing paradigms developed of familiar figures antiquity coufd be associated with the in relation to other pre-lslamic pasts, but the manner in obscure relics of Indian In was antiquity. similar fashion, the which this achieved reveals a dependence on reused Firuz Shah came to be seen as pillars by Tughluq indigenous Indian models of legitimation.92 If the iron relics from the time of As a was a Alexander the Great.86 pillar itself fragment of the distant mythic past, the at a reuse curiosity that hinted wondrous technological of similar objects during the more recent Chauhan the iron was capacity, pillar may have evoked legends past conceivably within living memory when as concerning mythical kings such Alexander and lltutmish incorporated it into the Delhi mosque in the whose marvelous works were Solomon, represented early thirteenth century. The potential for legitimation both and in textually visually medieval Persianate resided not just in the pillar itself, therefore, but in the culture.87 act of translating it,which belonged in the normative Such identifications that what was at suggest stake realm of Indian kingly self-representation. in the of the was neither appropriation antique pillars The stability of certain kinds of ritualized activity the assimilation of a nor a living adversary past through periods of political change often serves to foster characterized a antecedent but the a sense of by single regime, continuity,93 and the benefits of conforming palimpsest of cumulative heroic pasts. It is this that to type were no doubt obvious to the Ghurid conquerors distinguishes the re-erection of the pillar in the Delhi of India and their parvenu successors such as lltutmish. from the of As mosque contemporary display recently McKibben notes perceptively, "recognition of the pre Indian loot in the same acquired monument.88 The lslamic Indian past (j?hiliyya) as an authoritative basis commemorative value of the iron column not in its an lay for rule and linkage to uninterrupted line of Indian associations with the historical of specific kings India,, sovereigns served to legitimize the sultan's claim to but in its to "the broader of a ability represent notion power in country where the Muslim population Indian of whether names or a kingship, regardless specific remained minority."94 Despite the undoubted political were deeds known/'89 As "visual substitutes" for history, as inalienable objects such insignia, regalia, or royal are 92. The later "Islamicization" of the Firuzabad its pillars of fame ideally suited to "bringing past time pillar through removal from a and reuse as a min?r of a is into the so that the histories of temple mosque celebrated present, ancestors, titles, in the SJrat-i Fir?z Sh?hJ: Rage (see note 43), p. 34. However, not all or events become an intrinsic of a mythological part the pillars reused by Firuz Shah were set up in mosques, and it is not The construction of is person's identity."90 identity clear how widespread such attitudes regarding the Islamicization of relevant to the relics or if one can them back into the directly re-erection of antique pillars by pre-lslamic were, project early thirteenth as even the Delhi sultans, for as William McKibben notes: century. Moreover, noted above, the secondary association with religious architecture has earlier Indian precedents. the 93. Through physical incorporation of the lat from its Richard Bradley, "Ritual, Time and History," World site to the new no. 2 211. For antique Islamic capital, the empires of pre Archaeology 23, (1991 ): further examples of continuity with in lslamic India (Dar al-Harb) were symbolically incorporated preconquest traditions the ritual practices of Ghurid and sultanate see into the Dar al-lsl?m.91 rulers, Richard M. Eaton, "Temple Desecration and Indo Muslim in Turk States," Beyond and Hindu: Rethinking Religious Identity in Islamicate South Asia, ed. David Gilmartin & Bruce from melted down Iranian Samir The weapons: al-Khalil, Monument: Lawrence (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2000), p. 269; and in Andre in Art, Vulgarity Responsibility Iraq (London: Deutsch, Flood (as note 26). Arjun Appadurai's work on the different 1991), 8. historical narratives that have a p. accumulated around single structure, a 86. See note 62. Sri Vaishnava in temple Madras, highlights how the maintenance of a 87. for a of the set of norms to the See, example, fourteenth-century representation relating authority, continuity, and interdependence metal wall built Alexander from the Great Sh?h-n?ma: of different narratives the by Mongol concerning past permitted "an orderly Glenn D. A Jeweller's Islamic Arts of the Book from the between Lowry, Eye, symbolic negotiation 'ritual' pasts and the contingencies of Vever Collection and London: Arthur M. (Seattle Sackler Gallery & The the present." The operation of such norms served to preserve cultural of No. 86-87. in the face of even University Washington Press, 1988), 12, pp. continuity changes, those wrought by the advent of 88. For a detailed discussion of Islamicate in looting practices colonial rule: Arjun Appadurai, "The Past as a Scarce Resource," Man South Asia during the eleventh to thirteenth centuries see Flood (as in n.s.16 (1981): 217-218. note 26), 3. 94. note chapter McKibben (see 13), pp. 113-114. Despite assertions that 89. McKibben note 113-114. (see 13), pp. "unbelievers, especially profa,ne idolaters" would not have been 90. Weiner note 210. to (see 59), p. permitted entry the Delhi mosque (Kumar, see note 12, pp. 91. McKibben (see note 114. we 13), p. 157-158), have little evidence for the audiences that gestures such 116 RES43 SPRING2003

in changes that followed the wake of the Ghurid This seamless integration of Ghurid and early sultanate conquest of India, the observance of certain established rulers into South Asian history as just the latest in a norms (the maintenance of existing coin types, for long line of conquering monarchs betrays little sense of a awareness example) shows keen of the benefits of the religious, political, and cultural rupture so often a manner projecting authority in congruent with past highlighted by historians and art historians alike. Such or precedents, wherever possible useful. assimilation may be a product of a pragmatic urge to the Through manipulation of inalienable objects, legitimize effective political authority,96 but it is surely successors as a lltutmish and his encompassed and just much product of the ability of early Indo an were incorporated Indian history within which they Islamic sultans to engage with existing traditions, to in turn their accommodated. That the process of project their authority in the expected manner. In part was a one articulating legitimate sovereignty bilateral is at least, the incorporation of the Delhi sultans into clear from the well-known Ralam inscription, written indigenous Indian histories and royal genealogies in 1276, eight decades after the conquest of Delhi. reflects the successful manipulation of semiotically Enumerating the dynastic changes in the region during charged artifacts whose power resided in the fact that to were a the eleventh thirteenth centuries, the author of the they already possessed of distinguished history. Sanskrit text writes:

The land of Hary?naka was first enjoyed by the Tomaras 96. Eaton (see note 93), p. 270. and then by the Chauh?nas. It is now ruled by the Saka kings (i.e. the sultans). First came S?habad?na (i.e. Shihab al-Din Ghuri), then Khudavad?na (i.e. Qutb al-Din Aybak), master of the earth, Samusd?na (i.e. Shams al-Din lltutmish), then Pherujs?hi (i.e. Firuz Shah), lord of the earth.95

as the re-erection of the iron pillar addressed. See, however, Catherine Asher's comments on the likelihood that some of those dwelling in early sultanate Delhi (and presumably using its Friday Mosque) were non-caste Hindu converts to Islam: Catherine B. Asher, "Delhi Walled: Changing Boundaries," in City Walls: The Urban Enceinte in Global Perspective, ed. James D. Tracy, (Cambridge: Cambridge University access Press, 2000), p. 255. In preconquest temples, the degree of to the sanctuary was related to such factors as caste status: Pierre-Sylvain au Filliozat, "Le droit d'entrer dans les temples de siva Xle si?cle," Journal Asiatique, 263 (1975): 103-117. 95. G. Yazdani, "The Inscriptions of the Turk Sultans of Delhi," note Epigraphia Indo-Moslemica (1913-1914): 4; Prasad (see 22), pp. 3-11. As Yazdani comments (ibid., p. 37), "the poet extols the no are greatness of the Ml?chha king in less flattering terms than used in in the panegyrics of the Hindu period." See also Chattopadhyaya (as note 79), pp. 48-54. For two other similar inscriptions from Delhi, one dated Samvat 1347 (a.D. 1291), the other Samvat 1384 (a.D. 1328), see Prasad (as in note 22), pp. 15-18, 27-30. The corollary to this is the inscription of the Ghurids and other "Muslim" conquerors into medieval lists of those vanquished by successful Indian rulers. The are means or vanquished incorporated into such lists by of dynastic as not on ethnic appellations (such Turushka), the basis of religious affiliation: Cynthia TaIbot, "Inscribing the Other, Inscribing the Self: Hindu-Muslim Identities in Pre-Colonial India," Comparative Studies in Society and History 37, no. 4 (1995): 692-722, especially p. 701. Similarly, it has been pointed out that the connotations of "Hindu" in pre-Mongol Persian literature "were primarily ethnic": Carl W. Ernst, a Eternal Garden: Mysticism, History, and Politics at South Asian Sufi Center (1992: State University of New York Press, 1992), pp. 24, 30-31.