Shivaji and His Times c6.s10.1

c6.s10.1

Among the Marathas the destruction of Afzal Khan caused the wildest exultation; it marked the dawn of their national independence. The defeat of Bijapur was complete: the chief had fallen, his army had ceased to exist, and the victory, both in respect of carnage and of booty, was the most complete possible. The incident caught hold of the public imagination of Maharashtra as the most glorious event in the history of the race. Ballads were composed by the wandering bards (gondhalis), in response to the popular demand, to celebrate the victory. The earliest and most valuable of them is lost (except for a single couplet.) Another, but much later and quite untrustworthy, poem has been preserved, which expands the contest into a Homeric duel with all its details and supernatural adjuncts. Every class of Marathas, from