A History of Agriculture in India v2.c61: Chapter 9. The Sultanate

A History of Agriculture in India v2.c61

Language: English

v2.c61.s1 Description of the Trees of India and Their Fruits — 10 parts
v2.c61.s2 Cereals Which the People of India Sow and Use for Food — 5 parts
v2.c61.s3 Kerala—Pepper, Ginger, Sugarcane, Coconut and Pulses — 4 parts
v2.c61.s4 Betel Vines — 1 part
v2.c61.s5 Coconut Palm in Maldives — 3 parts
v2.c61.s6 Bengal—A Hell Full of Good Things — 1 part
v2.c61.s7 Account of Bengal by Mahaun, a Chinese — 2 parts
v2.c61.s8 Horse Breeding in Turkistan and Horse Trade with India — 2 parts
v2.c61.s9 Coinage — 1 part
v2.c61.s10 Weights — 12 parts

Chapter 9. The Sultanate

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CROPS, TREES AND FRUITS HORSE TRADE, COINAGE, WEIGHTS AND PRICES OF COMMODITIES

THE Muslim historians give detailed accounts of the victories of the Sultans, court intrigues, murders, quarrels and rebellions, but they do not mention what crops and fruit trees were grown by the Indians. The solitary record of crops and fruit-trees in the Sultanate period is by Ibn Battuta. When he entered the city of Sarsati (Sirsa), he mentions that it was a large town with quantities of rice of an excellent sort, which was exported to the capital, Delhi.

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Among the fruit trees he mentions *ber*, mango, jack-tree, *jamun*, *mahua*, and pomegranate.

Description of the Trees of India and Their Fruits

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‘The first town we entered was the city of Abuhar,’ states Ibn Battuta, ‘which is the first of these lands of Hind, a small but pretty place with a large population, and with flowing streams and trees. There are not to be found in India any trees of our country except the lote-tree (*Zizyphus lotus*), but there it is of great girth and its fruit is about as large as a gall nut, and very sweet. They have many trees none of which are to be found either in our country or elsewhere.

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‘One of them is the ’anbah (mango; from Hindi *amb*). It is a tree which resembles orange trees but is larger in size and more leafy. The shade which it gives is the densest of any, but it is oppressive and if one sleeps beneath it he becomes enervated. Its fruit is of the size of a large pear. When the fruit is green and not yet fully ripe the people gather those of them that fall, put salt on them and pickle them as limes and lemons are pickled in our country. The Indians pickle also green ginger and clusters of pepper, which they eat with meat dishes, taking after each mouthful a little of these pickled fruits. When the mango ripens in the season of autumn rains its fruit becomes yellow and then they eat it like apples, some people cutting it with a knife while others simply suck it. The fruit is sweet, with a little acidity mingled with its sweetness, and has a large stone which they plant, like orange pips and other fruit stones, and the trees sprout from them.

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‘Then there are the *shaki* and the *barki*—the jack-tree (*Artocarpus heterophyllus*). These are trees of great age with leaves like those of the walnut, and their fruits come out from the trunk of the tree itself. Those of them that are next to the ground are the *barki* and those higher up are the shaki. The former are sweeter and better-flavoured; the latter resemble large gourds and have a skin like ox-hide. When it yellows in the season of autumn they gather it and split it in half; inside each fruit there are from one to two hundred pods resembling cucumbers, between each of which there is a thin yellow skin. Each pod has a kernel resembling a large bean and when these kernels are roasted or boiled they taste like beans, and take the place of them, since beans are not to be found in that country. They store up these kernels in red earth and they keep until the next year. This shaki and barki is the best fruit in India.

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‘Another is the tandu (Diospyros melanoxylon), the fruit of the ebony trees, of about the size and colour of an apricot and very sweet.

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‘Then there is the jamun (Syzygium cumini), whose trees are of great age, and whose fruit resembles an olive; it is black in colour and has a single stone like the olive.

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‘Also the sweet orange, which is very plentiful in their country, but the bitter orange is seldom found; there is a third kind between sweet and bitter, about the size of a lime, which has an excellent flavour and I used to enjoy eating it.

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‘Another species is the mahua (Madhuca indica), long-lived trees, with leaves like those of the walnut except that there is red and yellow in them. Its fruit resembles a small pear and is very sweet. At the top of each fruit there is a smaller fruit of the size of a grape, but hollow; its taste is like that of grapes, but eating too many of them gives a splitting headache. A surprising thing is that when these fruits are dried in the sun they taste just like figs, and I used to eat them in place of figs, which are not to be found in India. They call this small fruit angur which in their language means grapes.

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‘Grapes themselves are very rare in India and are to be had only in certain districts, in the capital Dehli.

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‘The mahua bears fruit twice a year and from its kernels they make oil, which they use for lamps.

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‘Another of their fruits is one which they call kasira (kaseru; Scirpu grossus; syn. S. kysoor) and which they dig out of the ground; it is very sweet and resembles a chestnut. India has of the fruits of our country the pomegranate, which bears fruit twice a year. I have seen some in the islands of Dhiba al-Mahal which bore fruit continuously. The Indians call it anar. At Daulatabad, grapes and pomegranates were grown, and at Sagar on the Narmada, there were orchards of fruit-trees, and the lands were irrigated by water-wheels.

Cereals Which the People of India Sow and Use for Food

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After describing the fruit-trees, Ibn Battuta gives a detailed account of cereals which Indians sow and use for food. ‘The Indians sow twice a year,’ states Ibn Battuta. ‘When the rain falls in their country in the hot season they sow the autumn crop, and harvest it sixty days later. Among these autumn grains in their country are kudhrū (Paspalum scrobiculatum), a kind of millet, which is the commonest of the grains in their country; qal, which resembles the type of millet called anlī; and shāmakh, which is smaller in the grain than qal, and often grows without being sown. It is the food of the devotees and ascetics, and of the poor and needy. They go out to gather what has sprung up of this plant without cultivation; each of them holds a large basket in his left hand and has in his right a whip with which he beats the grain so that it falls into the basket. In this way they collect enough of it to supply them with food for the whole year. The seed of this shāmakh is very small; after gathering, it is put out in the sun, then pounded in wooden mortars; the husk flies off leaving its pith, a white substance, from which they make gruel. They cook this with buffalo’s milk and it is pleasanter, prepared in this way, than baked as bread; I used often to eat it in India and enjoyed it.

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Other grains are māsh (Vigna radiata), which is a kind of pea, and mung (V. mungo) which is a species of mash, differing from it in having elongated grains and in its clear green colour. They cook mung with rice and eat it with ghee; this dish they call khichri and they breakfast on it every day. It takes the place with them of harīrā in the lands of the Maghrib.

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Then there is lubiyā (Vigna unguiculata), a kind of bean, and mūt (Cyperus rotundus), which resembles kudhrū but has smaller grains. It is used as fodder for draught animals in that country and fattens them; the barley in their country has no strength in it, and fodder for the animals is furnished by the mūt or else by chickpeas, which they pound and soak with water before feeding it to them. In place of green fodder, too, they feed them with māsh leaves, but first each animal is given ghee to drink for ten days, three to four pounds a day, and is not ridden during this time, and after that they feed it with māsh leaves, as we have said, for a month or so.

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The cereals which we have mentioned are autumn crops. When they harvest these sixty days after sowing them, they sow the spring cereals, which are wheat, barley, chickpeas, and lentils. They are sown in the same ground where the autumn crops are sown for their land is generous and of good heart. As for rice, they sow it three times a year, and it is one of the principal cereals in their country. They sow also sesame and sugarcane along with the autumn grains that we have mentioned.¹

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¹ Gibb, H.A.R. The Travels of Ibn Battuta, pp. 609-612

Kerala—Pepper, Ginger, Sugarcane, Coconut and Pulses

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During the latter part of his stay at Dehli, Ibn Battuta lost the favour of Sultan Muhammad-bin-Tughlak as he paid visits to a Moslem Sufi faqeer, who courageously denounced the atrocities of the Sultan. Feeling apprehensive about his safety, he asked permission of the Sultan to travel to China. The Sultan accepted his request, appointed him his ambassador to the Emperor of China and provided him an escort to Quilon in Kerala, from where he intended to set sail for China. Near Aligarh he fell into the hands of Hindu brigands who kept him in confinement as a prisoner. He escaped with great difficulty and resumed his journey to the south. At the end of his journey from Delhi he entered the land of Mulaybar (Malabar), as it was then known. His observations indicate that even in the fourteenth century, Kerala was densely populated and intensively cultivated. Houses were scattered in the cultivated area as they are now. He states, 'The land of Mulaybar extends for two months' journey along the coast from Sandabur (Goa) to Kawlam (Quilon, in Kerala). The road over the whole distance runs beneath the shade of trees, and at every half-mile (0.8 km) there is a wooden shed with benches on which all travellers, whether Muslims or infidels, may sit.... On this road, which, as we have said, extends for a two months' march, there is not a foot of ground but is cultivated. Every man has his own orchard, with his house in the middle and a wooden palisade all around it. The road runs through the orchards, and when it comes to a palisade there are wooden steps to go up by and another flight of steps down into the next orchard.... I have never seen a safer road than this for they put to death anyone who steals a single nut, and if any fruit falls no one picks it up but the owner.... The first town in the land of Mulaybar that we entered was the town of Abu-Sarur (Barcelore), a small place on a large inlet and abounding in coco-palms. Two days' journey brought us to Fakanur (Bacanor, now Barkur), a large town on an inlet; here there is a large quantity of sugarcanes, which are unexcelled in the rest of that country....Three days after leaving Fakanur we reached Manjarur (Mangalore), a large town on the inlet called ad-Dumb, which is the largest inlet in the land of Mulaybar. This is the town at which most of the merchants from Fars and Yemen disembark, and pepper and ginger are exceedingly abundant there.'

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The first European to describe pepper was John of Marignola, who travelled by the land route to China in A.D. 1338 as emissary of Pope Benedict XII. He returned by the sea route, and landed at Quilon or Columbum, as he calls it. He thus describes a visit to a pepper garden. 'On Palm Sunday A.D. 1357 I entered Columbum, the most famous city in the whole of India, where all the pepper in the world grows. It grows on creepers, which are planted exactly like vines and first produce wild grapes of a green colour. Thereupon a kind of grape forms containing red wine, which I have squeezed out on to the plate with my own hand as a condiment. Thereafter they ripen and dry on the trees. And when the immoderate heat of the sun has dried them hard, they are struck down with staves and collected on linen clothes spread out beneath. This I have seen with my own eyes and felt with my own hands throughout fourteen months.

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Pepper is not burnt, as has been erroneously stated, nor does it grow in deserts, but in gardens.'²

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² Quoted by Paul Herman in *Conquest of Man*, p. 394

Betel Vines

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Ibn Battuta also saw betel vines in Kerala. He states, ‘Betel-trees are grown like vines on cane trellises or else trained up coco-palms. They have no fruit and are grown only for their leaves. The Indians have a high opinion of betel, and if a man visits a friend and the latter gives him five leaves of it, you would think he had given him the world, especially if he is a prince or notable. A gift of betel is a far greater honour than a gift of gold and silver. It is used in this way. First one takes areca-nuts, which are like nutmegs, crushes them into small bits and chews them. Then the betel leaves are taken, a little chalk is put on them, and they are chewed with the areca-nuts. They sweeten the breath and aid digestion, prevent the disagreeable effects of drinking water on an empty stomach, and stimulate the faculties.’

Coconut Palm in Maldives

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Ibn Battuta’s stay in Kerala was prolonged due to the fact that the ship in which he was to sail for China was wrecked by a storm. From Kerala he reached Maldive islands where he lived for a year and half. Apart from concubines he married four Muslim women. He mentions that from fish and coconuts the islanders gain incomparable erotic potency, and his own experience confirmed the prevalent notion. He gives a vivid description of the coconut-palm and its various products.

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‘The coco-palm is one of the strangest of trees, and looks exactly like a date-palm,’ writes Ibn Battuta. ‘The nut resembles a man’s head, for it has marks like eyes and a mouth, and the contents, when it is green, are like the brain. It has fibre like hair, out of which they make ropes, which they use instead of nails to bind their ships together and also as cables. Amongst its properties are that it strengthens the body, fattens, and adds redness to the face. If it is cut open when it is green, it gives a liquid, deliciously sweet and fresh. After drinking this one takes a piece of the rind as a spoon and scoops out the pulp inside the nut. This tastes like an egg that has been boiled but not quite cooked, and is nourishing. I lived on it for a year and a half when I was in the Maldive islands. One of its peculiarities is that oil, milk and honey are extracted from it. The honey is made in this fashion. They cut a stalk on which the fruit grows, leaving two fingers’ length, and on this they tie a small bowl, into which the sap drips. If this has been done in the morning, a servant climbs up again in the evening with two bowls, one filled with water. He pours into the other the sap that has collected, then washes the stalk, cuts off a small piece, and ties on another bowl. The same thing is repeated next morning until a good deal of the sap has been collected, when it is cooked until it thickens. It then makes an excellent honey, and the merchants of India, Yemen, and China buy it and take it to their own countries, where they manufacture sweetmeats from it. The milk is made by steeping the contents of the nut in water, which takes on the colour and taste of milk and is used along with food. To make the oil, the ripe nuts are peeled and the contents dried in the sun, then cooked in cauldrons and the oil extracted. They use it for lighting and dip bread in it, and the women put it on their hair.'³

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³ Gibb, H.A.R. The Travels of Ibn Battuta, pp. 114, 115

Bengal—A Hell Full of Good Things

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From Calicut in Kerala, Ibn Battuta reached Bengal. He was impressed by the prosperity of Bengal and the cheapness of commodities. He states, 'Bangala is a vast country, abounding in rice, and nowhere in the world have I seen any land where prices are lower than there; on the other hand it is a gloomy place, and the people of Khurasan call it "A hell full of good things" (*dozakh pur niamat*). I have seen fat fowls sold there at the rate of eight for a single *dirham*, young pigeons at fifteen to the *dirham*, and a fat ram sold for two *dirhams*. I saw too a piece of fine cotton cloth, of excellent quality, thirty cubits long, sold for two dinars, and a beautiful slave-girl for a single gold *dinar*, that is, two and a half gold dinars in Moroccan money.'

Account of Bengal by Mahaun, a Chinese

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Mahaun, a Chinaman, visited Bengal in A.D. 1406. He was attached as an interpreter to the suite of Cheng Ho, sent by the Chinese Emperor Yung-lo with a party of 30,000 soldiers in a fleet of 62 ships to the various kingdoms of the Western Ocean in order to show that China was rich and strong. Mahaun describes the language of the people as Bengāli and states that Persian also was spoken in Bengal. He states that 'not having any tea they offer their guests the betel-nut in its place.' He further records: 'The mulberry tree and silk worms are found there. Silk handkerchiefs and caps embroidered with gold, painted ware, basins, cups, steel, gurs, knives and scissors are all to be had there. They manufacture a white paper from the bark of a tree, which is smooth and glossy like a deer's skin.' People were Muhammadans with dark skin—some light-complexioned persons were also seen. They had shaved heads and white turbans, long loose robe with a broad coloured handkerchief tied round the waist. Their manufactures are: fine cotton fabrics of many varieties—six varieties described—silk industry and handkerchiefs. They have abundance of rice, wheat, sesamum, all kinds of pulses, millet, ginger, mustard, onions, hemp, squash, brinjals, and many kinds of vegetables. Their fruits are plantains, jack fruits, mangoes, and pomegranates. Sugarcane, white sugar, granulated sugar, various candied and preserved fruits are also common. Betel-nut was offered to the guests. Their amusements are : feasts and entertainments, music and dance, conjurers and display of a man fighting with a tiger given in the streets. The character of the people was that they were open and straightforward in their dealings.'⁴

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⁴ Gode, P. K. *Studies in Indian Cultural History*, Vol. III, pp. 61, 62

Horse Breeding in Turkistan and Horse Trade with India

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While describing the country of Turkistan, Ibn Battuta mentions how the horses were kept in Turkistan and describes horse trade with India. 'The horses in this country are very numerous and the price of them is negligible. A good one costs about a dinar of our money. The livelihood of the people depends on them, and they are as numerous as sheep in our country, or even more so. A single Turk will possess thousands of horses. They are exported to India in droves of six thousand or so, each merchant possessing one or two hundred of them or less or more. For each fifty they hire a keeper, who looks after their pasturage. He rides on one of them, carrying a long stick with a rope attached to it, and when he wishes to catch any horse he gets opposite it on the horse which he is riding, throws the rope over its neck and draws it towards him, mounts it and sets the other free to pasture. On reaching Sind the horses are fed with forage, because the vegetation of Sind will not take the place of barley, and the greater part of them die or are stolen. The owners pay a duty of seven silver dinars on entering Sind and a further duty at Multan. Formerly they were taxed a quarter of the value of their imports, but Sultan Muhammad abolished this tax and ordered that Muslim merchants should pay the legal tithe and infidel merchants a tenth. Nevertheless the merchants make a handsome profit, for the least that a horse fetches is a hundred dinars (that is twenty-five dinars in Moroccan money) and it often sells for twice or three times that amount. A good horse sells for five hundred or more. The Indians do not buy them as racehorses, for in battle they wear coats of mail and cover their horses with armour; what they prize in a horse is its strength and length of pace. Their racehorses are brought from Yemen, Oman and Fars, and they cost from a thousand to four thousand dinars each.'⁵

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⁵ Gibb, H.A.R. *Rehla of Ibn Battuta, Travels in Asia and Africa*, pp. 267, 145-146

Coinage

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Copper *jitals* were in use as currency, stated Ashraf. 'The *jitals* continued to be used until they were replaced by the *bahloli*, instituted by Sultan Bahlul Lodi. Like the copper *jital*, the silver *tanka* introduced by Sultan Iltutmish was of a mint standard approaching 175 grains. The *tanka* held its place until it was succeeded by the *rupia* of Sher Shah and Akbar and the rupee of the present day. Taking the wages of the slaves of Muhammad Tughlak and Firoz Tughlak, at 10 *tankas* per month was about the minimum wage for an employee of the Sultan. The soldier was paid at 19½ *tankas* per month. The cost of living works out at 5 *tankas* per month for the average family. The Sultans divided the contents of a *tanka* into 64 *jitals*.’

Weights

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‘The dealers of precious metals, the corn merchants, the dealers of scent, had their own standards of weight, which differed from one locality to another. The official weights under the Sultans of Delhi were fixed at an average of 28.78 lb avoirdupois (13.05 kg) to a maund.

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‘Under Jalal-ud-din Khalji, when there was a famine, corn was sold at one *jital* per seer. Under Muhammad Tughlak, in exceptionally severe conditions, the price of corn rose to 16 and 17 *jitals* per seer. As a result, people began to die of starvation. When Firoz Tughlak attacked Sind and scarcity followed as a result, the price of corn rose to 2 and 3 *tankas* per maund (or 3.2 and 4.8 *jitals* respectively per seer). On his subsequent attack on the same province the corn rose to 8 and 10 *jitals* per 5 seers and the pulses to 4 and 5 *tankas* per maund (or 6.4 and 8 *jitals* per seer respectively).

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‘A comparison of prices of foodgrains etc. between the reigns of Ala-ud-din, Muhammad Tughlak and Firoz Tughlak’, states Ashraf, ‘show that as a whole the prices of most of these articles went up under Muhammad Tughlak but again dropped to the previous level of Ala-ud-din under Firoz Tughlak. Sugar, for some reasons, does not follow this pattern.

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| Commodities | Ala-ud-din | Muhammad Tughlak | Firoz Tughlak |
| | (Prices in *jitals* per maund) | | |
| 1 Wheat | 7 | 12 | 8 |
| 2 Barley | 4 | 8 | 4 |
| 3 Paddy | 5 | 14 | .. |
| 4 Pulses | 5 | .. | 4 |
| 5 Lentils | 3 | 4 | 4 |
| 6 Sugar (white) | 100 | 80 | .. |
| 7 Sugar (soft) | 60 | 64 | 120,140 |
| 8 Sheep (mutton) | 10 | 64 | .. |
| 9 Ghi (clarified butter) | 16 | .. | 100 |