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حبیب السیر 13.4

Habíbu-s Siyar of Khondamír (extracts) 13.4

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13.4

The next day, having returned to the strife, and having finished bringing into play the weapons of warfare, they vanquished the Hindus. Those ignorant men ran in crowds to the idol temple, embraced Somnat, and came out again to fight until they were killed. Fifty thousand infidels were killed round about the temple, and the rest who escaped from the sword embarked in ships and fled away. Sultan Mahmud, having entered into the idol temple, beheld an excessively long and broad room, insomuch that fifty-six pillars had been made to support the roof Somnat was an idol cut out of stone, whose height was five yards, of which three yards were visible, and two yards were concealed in the ground. Yaminu-d daula having broken that idol with his own hand, ordered that they should pack up pieces of the stone, take them to Ghaznin, and throw them on the threshold of the Jami' Masjid. The sum which the treasury of the Sultan Mahmud obtained from the idol-temple of Somnat was more than twenty thousand thousand dinars, inasmuch as those pillars were all adorned with precious jewels. Sultan Mahmud, after this glorious victory, reduced a fort in which the governor of Nahrwala had taken refuge,