The Foundation of Muslim Rule in India: A History of the Establishment and Progress of the Turkish Sultanate of Delhi, 1206–1290 A.D. c19.6

c19.6

It is of course hardly to be expected that these factors would lead to the emergence, at this period, of the very modern idea of the individual being the unit of society; punishment of the offender's family which is instanced by some of the 13th century-rulers would not accord with such a notion. The family still remained the unit but its grouping under the *sar-i-khail* disappeared. The process must have been slow and its completion cannot be dated; Barani, writing in the fourteenth century still uses the generic term of *khail-khanah*. In any event, as indicative of social rank the *sar-i-khail* finds no further mention in the chronicles. The many cases of promotion recorded in the *Tabaqat-i-Nasiri* do not even include the *sipahsalar*; the *amir*, malik and the khan seem to include the entire personnel of the ahl-i-saif. Only in the case of Aibak his rank of sipahsalar is mentioned¹, and is included among his titles in one of the epigraphic records of his reign Subsequently, it appears to have lost rank and came to occupy the lowest position; even in the officer cadre of the army, early in the 14th century, Shahabuddin Abbas, in describing the Tughluq army organisation, assigns to it the smallest command and pay².