Gazetteer of the Bombay Presidency, Vol. I, Part I: History of Gujarat c17.4

c17.4

¹ Finch in Kerr's Voyages, VIII. 301. Thirty years later the traveller Tavernier (Ball's Edition, II. 87) has: Bargant (Wangani in Jodhpur?) to Bimal 15 kos: Bimal to Modra 15 kos. Of Jhálor Ufflet has left the following description. Jhálor is a castle on the top of a steep mountain three kos in ascent by a fair stone causeway broad enough for two men. At the end of the first kos is a gate and a place of guard where the causeway is enclosed on both sides with walls. At the end of the second kos is a double gate strongly fortified; and at the third kos is the castle which is entered by three successive gates. The first is very strongly plated with iron, the second not so strong with places above for throwing down melted lead or boiling oil, and the third is thickly beset with iron spikes. Between each of these gates are spacious places of arms and at the inner gate is a strong portcullis. A bowshot within the castle is a splendid pagoda, built by the founders of the castle and ancestors of Ghazni (Gidney) Khan who were Gentiles. He turned Muhammadan and deprived his elder brother of this castle by the following stratagem. Having invited him and his women to a banquet which his brother requited by a similar entertainment he substituted chosen soldiers well armed instead of women, sending them two and two in a dhuli or litter who getting in by this device gained possession of the gates and held the place for the Great Mughal to whom it now (A.D. 1611) appertains being one of the strongest situated forts in the world. About half a kos within the gate is a goodly square tank cut out of the solid rock said to be fifty fathoms deep and full of excellent water. Quoted by Finch in, Kerr's Voyages, VIII. 300-301.