Social and Political Life in the Vijayanagara Empire (A.D. 1346 – A.D. 1646) v1.c9.s5.97

v1.c9.s5.97

There remains the third statement made in the *Bellary Gazetteer*—the looting of the capital on "the very next day", the arrival of the Muhammadans on the "third" day, and, finally, the deliberate destruction by the victors of everything destructible within the walls of the capital for the next five months. The entry of the "hordes of wandering gipsies", by which term we suppose the author of the *Bellary Gazetteer* refers to a particular class of forest tribes, is connected with the question of the reoccupation of the capital by the Hindus after the sad event. We shall say something about it presently. We shall examine the question of the stay of the Sultans in the Hindu capital. According to Firishtah the enemies halted for ten days on the battlefield, and for six months they made their stay in the great city.² The first statement of Firishtah is corroborated by the anonymous chronicler of the *Burhān-i-Ma'āṣir* who says that the allied armies halted for ten days on the field of action.³ Couto however remarks that the Muhammadans halted only for three days.⁴ Caesar Frederick adds his testimony to that of Firishtah as regards the number of months the Sultans were in the capital. ".... And the foure Kings of the Moores entred the Citie Bezeneger with great triumph, and there they remained sixe moneths, searching under houses and in all places for money and other things that were hidden, and then they departed to their owne Kingdomes, because they were not able to maintaine such a Kingdom as that was, so farre distant from their owne Countrie".⁵ If the fact of the occupation of the capital by the enemy for a period of six months following the battle is proved beyond doubt by the evidence of two independent writers, it cannot be that the capital could ever have been looted during this time by a horde of wandering gipsies, however strong these may have been in numbers, and whatever zeal they may have evinced to out-rival the Sultans in their greed for the hidden treasures of the Hindu capital. That the Muhammadans did not "destroy everything destructible within the walls of the capital", as is expressed in the *Bellary Gazetteer*, is clear from the remarks of Caesar Frederick: "And the Citie of Bezeneger is not altogether destroyed, yet the houses stand still, but emptie, and there is dwelling in them nothing, as is reported, but Tygres and other wild beasts".¹