History of the Khaljis, A.D. 1290–1320 c9.s1.54

c9.s1.54

Against these confused and varied accounts is the testimony of the contemporary historians, poets and travellers, Barani, 'Iṣāmī, Amīr Khusrau, Ibn Baṭṭūṭah, and the authors of *Tarikh-i-Muhammadi* and *Tarikh-i-Mubarak Shahi*, who never allude to the Padmini affair at all. All these historians and chroniclers cannot be accused of deliberately entering into a conspiracy of silence on the Chittor episode. Amīr Khusrau who accompanied the sultan to Chittor has very fearlessly and even exaggeratingly given the details relating to the siege. How can it be said that such an incident as that of Padmini, if it really happened, escaped mention from his pen? The story of Padmini is to be found in Jaisi's Padmavat, in traditional lore, and in those chronicles the accounts of which have borrowed it from the Padmavat and the traditions. Tradition is no doubt a source of history but it is surely the weakest one, and until it is corroborated by contemporary evidence—literary, historical, epigraphical and numismatical—it cannot be accepted as true history. In the case of Padmini the antiquity of the tradition which furnishes the story is not known, while the story itself is a long one. But it cannot be accepted simply because it was so popular and for so long a time. To say that where so much is alleged something must be true is not the historian's job.