The Dynastic History of Northern India (Early Mediaeval Period) v1.c11.78

v1.c11.78

The history of Sind approximately for the next hundred and fifty years (*circa* 879-1025 A.D.) which extends from the death of Yaʻqūb ibn Layth to the conquest of Sind by Sulṭān Maḥmūd, is largely the history of these smaller principalities. But our knowledge about them is very limited. We can only glean some facts from the stray notes of Ibn Khurdādbih (*circa* 300 A.H. = 912 A.D.),¹ Masʻūdī (*circa* 332 A.H. = 943 A.D.),² Iṣṭakhrī (*circa* 340 A.H. = 951 A.D.)³ and Ibn Ḥauqal (*circa* 366 A.H. = 976 A.D.).⁴ Masʻūdī who visited the Indus valley in the year 303-04 A.H. (A.D. 915-16), mainly notices two independent Arab principalities with Multan and Manṣūrah as their capitals. Multan is described by him as ‘one of the strongest frontier places of the Mussalmans, around which there are one hundred and twenty thousand towns, and villages.’ The king of Multan was a Quraisite, and the children of Usāmah ibn Lawī ibn Ghālib. ‘The crown,’ we are told, ‘has been hereditary in this family since ancient times, from the beginning of Islam.’⁵ The last passage probably indicates that Multan came into the possession of this Arab family a