A History of Agriculture in India v2.c65.s8: The Country

v2.c65.s8.1

Describing the country, Abdur-Razzak states, ‘The Country is for the most part well cultivated and fertile, and about three hundred good seaports belong to it. There are more than 1,000 elephants, lofty as the hills and gigantic as demons. The army consists of eleven lacs of men. The city of Bijanagar is such that eye has not seen nor ear heard of any place resembling it upon the whole earth. It is so built that it has seven fortified walls, one within the other. Between the first, second, and third walls, there are cultivated fields, gardens, and houses. From the third to the seventh, fortress, shops and bazars are closely crowded together. The bazars are very broad and long, so that the sellers of flowers, notwithstanding that they place high stands before their shops, are yet able to sell flowers from both sides. Sweet-scented flowers are always procurable fresh in that city, and they are considered as even necessary sustenance, seeing that without them they could not exist. This country is so well populated that it is impossible in a reasonable space to convey an idea of it. In the king’s treasury there are chambers, with excavations in them, filled with molten gold, forming one mass. All the inhabitants of the country, whether high or low, even down to the artificers of the bazar, wear jewels and gilt ornaments in their ears and around their necks, arms, wrists, and fingers.