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Chapter 10 THe delHi sUlTanaTe

For more than 150 years after the raids of Mahmud of Ghanzi, India did not face any major
invasion. During this period, the Rajput rulers of North India promoted trade with the Muslims.
Some Muslim traders even settled in India. The Sufis also began to enter India around this time.

Apart from coins, monuments and inscription, one of the main sources of information about the
Delhi Sultanate are the tawarikh or historical accounts written by courtiers, poets and other learned
men who lived in the cities.

The slave dynasTy (1206-1290 ad)

The first dynasty of the Delhi sultanate was called the
Slave or Mamluk Dynasty. The word Mamluk in Arabic
means an individual owned by someone else. All the
important rulers of this dynasty such as Iltutmish and
Balban were slaves before they became sultans.
IItumish and Balban were slaves of Qutb-ud-din Aibak,
who himself was a slave of Muhammad Ghori. Qutb-din-Aibak Qutab minar

QuTub-ud-din aibaK (1206-1210)

Qutb-Ud-Din strengthened his position by being generous to his subjects and by entering
into marriage alliances.

Qutb-ud-din built India’s oldest masjid (mosque) the Quwwat-ul-Islam Masjid in Delhi. A
masjid is a place of Islamic worship. Masjid means a place where people prostrate (lie flat
on the face) in worship.

shamsuddin ilTuTmish (1211-1236)

Iltutmish was a slave and son-in-law of Qutb-ud-din Aibak. He succeeded Aram Shah and
ruled for about 25 years.

He organised the army and administered his Sultanate efficiently. He also introduced the
money system by introducing the silver coins as ‘Tanka’ and copper coins called ‘Jital’
to pay salaries to his army in cash. He strengthened the
North-Western Frontier which protected the empire from
the Mongols from central Asia.

The Qutab Minar at Delhi was completed by Iltutmish. He
built a mosque at Badauh and a tomb at Delhi. He nominated

Tanka Jital his daughter Raziya as his successor to the throne.
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