The Dynastic History of Northern India (Early Mediaeval Period) v1.c15.125.1

v1.c15.125.1

If the identification proposed above be accepted, Vallabhadeva was probably contemporary with Muḥammad ibn Bakhtyār, when the latter after his conquest of Lakhṇavatī undertook his disastrous expedition to ‘Tibbat’ through Kāmrūd (Kāmarūpa). *The Ṭabaqāt-i-Nāṣirī*, the almost contemporary history of the period, supplies the following interesting account of this expedition: After his conquest of North Bengal (*c.* 1198 A.D.), about the middle of the year 1205 A.D., Muḥammad formed the ambition of seizing the country of Turkistān and Tibet, the mountain tracts which lay to the east of Lakhṇavatī. In those days three races of people, *viz.*, ‘the Kūnch (or Kūch), the Mej (or Mech), and the Tihārū (mod. Tharu), lived in the different mountain parts that separated Tibet from Lakhṇavatī. All of them had ‘Turkish countenances,’ and ‘a different idiom too between the language of Hind and Turk (or “Tibbat”).’ One of the chiefs of these tribes, who had fallen into the hands of Muḥammad, and was known as ‘Ali the Mej’ after his adoption of the Muḥammadan faith, agreed to conduct Muḥammad ibn Bakht-yar into those hills and act as guide. Under his guidance Muḥammad and a body of about 10,000 horse were conducted either from Lakhaṇavatī or from Dīw-kot (Damdamah, ncar Gangarampur, south of Dinajpur), the northern Musalman military outpost in these days, to Burdhan-koṭ (Vardhanakūṭī, north of Bogra, close to Govindganj in Long. 89°28′, Lat. 25°8′ 25″ on the Karatoya).