The Cambridge History of India, Vol. III: Turks and Afghans v3.c30.s1.49.3

v3.c30.s1.49.3

The outer wall has a perimeter of 2¾ miles and between it and the acropolis are three inner walls, each loopholed and battlemented and each furnished with fortified gateways, outworks and bastions, all so disposed that with the help of salient and re-entrant angles the maximum of fire could be directed against an assailant; in addition to which the outer wall is surrounded by a moat and glacis in much the same manner as the mediaeval fortresses of Europe. In the military architecture of Northern India—even including that of the Mughuls—there is nothing at all comparable for strength and ingenuity to these elaborate defences of Daulatābād. The Bahmanīs, indeed, who were largely responsible for them, seem to have done more for military engineering than any of their contemporaries, though it was left, it is true, to their successors in the following century to make the radical changes in military architecture which the introduction of artillery rendered necessary. Threatened as they constantly were by powerful enemies on every side—by the Rājas of Vijayanagar, Telingāna and Orissa, by the Gonds, and by the Sultans of Khāndesh, Mālwa and Gujarāt, the Bahmanīs were compelled to safeguard themselves by multiplying the number and increasing the strength of their fortresses.