History of Mediaeval Hindu India (being a History of India from 600 to 1200 A.D.) v3.c33.3

v3.c33.3

We have a detailed and authentic account of India in the ‘India’ of this famous writer which is invaluable for the history of the sub-period (1000-1200) treated of in this volume. It is as important for this period as that of Hiuen Tsang was for the first sub-period (600-800). For both Al-Beruni and Hiuen Tsang are foreigners and both had studied Sanskrit, the language of the wise men of India. Both had a critical acumen worthy of a historian. And Al-Beruni is in one respect the better of the two, as he shows an unbiassed mind. Mahomedan though he was, he did not look down with contempt upon the Indians, their religion and their philosophy, their science and their art. Like Hiuen Tsang he obtained knowledge about India and its science and philosophy on the spot, studying them under Indian Pandits at Multan and Peshawar, and collected and carefully sifted information obtainable from Hindu and Moslem travellers. He was a native of Khwarism and when Mahmud of Ghazni conquered that country, he brought him to Ghazni among the prisoners of that kingdom. Beruni was a learned man already, being a mathematician especially. He had studied astronomy including astrology as it was known to the Arabs from Greek sources, and he particularly studied Hindu astronomy and astrology which were equally advanced, if not more, at that time. We will chiefly rely upon his work ‘India’ in taking a general survey of the condition of India in this volume. But we here begin with describing India as it was divided politically at this time, from the chapter on the geography of India in this work (chap. 18, Vol. I p. 196 and following-Sachau). Al-Beruni had probably Indian works of geography also before him, perhaps among them a work of Rājaśekhara, court poet at Kanauj, for guidance which we will notice in a note. Al-Beruni gives distances also as ascertained from travellers; but these distances, though often correct, cannot be relied upon as they are given in ‘farsakhs,’ a measure (which is said to be nearly four English miles) not altogether free from doubt. With these introductory remarks we proceed to give the information recorded by Al-Beruni in the chapter above noted. Al-Beruni wrote about 1030 A. D. when Mahmud was just dead.