Timurid Testimonials
Part One
TIMUR'S ACCOUNT of HIS INVASION of INDIA and SACK of DELHI
(1398 - 1399 A.D.)
About the year 800 A.H. (1398 A.D.), there arose in my heart the desire to lead an expedition against the infidels and to become a Champion of the Faith, for it had reached my ears that the slayer of infidels is a Champion and that, if he is slain, he becomes a martyr ... In this matter I sought an omen from the Koran, and the verse to which I opened was this: 'O Prophet, make war upon infidels and unbelievers, and treat them with severity'. My officers told me that the inhabitants of Hindustan were infidels and unbelievers. In obedience to the mandate of Almighty God, I determined to make an expedition against them.
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
After spending fifteen days at Delhi, passing my time in pleasure and enjoyment, and in holding royal courts and giving great feasts, I reflected that I had come to Hindustan to war against infidels, and that my enterprise had been so blessed that wherever I had gone I had been victorious. I had triumphed over my adversaries, I had put to death hundreds of thousands of infidels and idolaters, I had dyed my proselyting sword with the blood of the enemies of the Faith, and now that I had gained this crowning victory, I felt that I ought not to indulge in ease, but rather to exert myself still further in warring against the infidels of Hindustan. Having made these reflections, on the twenty-second of Rabi'-al-akhir, 800 A.H. (Jan 1, 1399 A.D.), I again drew my sword to wage a religious war ...
[Mulfuzat-i Timuri, ('Autobiographical Memoirs of the Moghul Emperor Timur' ― "which he caused to be written down" in Chagatai-Turkish), ]
THE THUNDERBOLT OF CHINGGIS AND THE THUNDERBOLT OF TIMUR
"Greater Khorosan had not yet recovered from the devastation wrought by the Mongols when Amir Timur, unlike Chinggis ― who was not a Muslim... ― began his bloody campaigns while maintaining an outward appearance of scholarship, asceticism, and Islam, presenting as a protector of religion and the poor. From every corner of the conquered lands, he summoned scholars, architects, and skilled artisans to Samarkand to participate in the city's reconstruction ― albeit at the cost of widespread devastation elsewhere.
Despite his inherent violence and ferocity, Timur's upbringing in an environment rich in knowledge, art, and Sufism moderated his Chinggisid brutality ... To legitimise his conquests, Timur sought the permission and prayers of religious leaders and clerics before each campaign and visited the poor and dervishes after each victory."
[Najiburrahman Taraki, 2026, 'Social and Political Transformations in the Timurid Period, with a Focus on the Structure of Power under Shahkrukh Mirza', International Journal of Multicultural and Multireligious Understanding, 13.2, 450-465]
TIMUR in the POLITICAL TRADITION and HISTORIOGRAPHY of MUGHAL INDIA
"Timur's image in India, before the establishment of the Indian Timurid ('Mughal') dynasty in 1526, was naturally coloured by the experience of his invasion of 1397-99. This can be seen from the account of this event in Yahya Sihirindi's Tarika-e Mobarakshahi, which was completed in 1434 ... practically contemporaneous with ... certainly independent of ... Sharaf al-Din Yazdi's Zafar-nama, which was probably completed in 1424-25, and contains the most detailed version from the official Timurid point of view.
... the essential particulars are the same in both: the route of the invasion, the slaughter and rapine, and the return ... however, while Yazdi exults in his hero's brilliant successes and atrocities, Yahya's account is hostile Timur, though with a certain amount of restraint ... Timur is simply 'Amir Timur' in Yahya, not Sahab-e Qeran (Lord of the Conjunction) as in Yazdi ...
When Timur entered Delhi after defeating Mahmud Toghloq's forces, he granted an amnesty in return for protection money (mal-e amoni). But on the fourth day he ordered that all the people be enslaved; and so they were. Thus reports Yahya, who here inserts a pious prayer in Arabic for the victims' consolation ('To God we return, and everything happens by his will').
Yazdi, on the other hand, does not have any sympathy to waste on these wretches. He reports that Timur had granted protection to the people of Delhi on the 18th of December 1398, and the collectors had begun collecting the protection money. But large groups of Timur's soldiers began to enter the city and, like birds of prey, attacked its citizens.
The 'pagan Hindus' (Henduan-e gabr) having had the temerity to begin immolating their own women and themselves, the three cities of Delhi were put to sack by Timur's soldiers. 'Faithless Hindus, he adds, had gathered in the Congregation Mosque of Old Delhi and Timur's officers put them ruthlessly to slaughter there on the 29th of December ...
By now immense numbers of slaves had been obtained by ordinary soldiers and Timur and his nobles took the lion's share from amongst 'the several thousand craftsmen and men of skill' enslaved. No consolation needed to be extended to such people, for, says Yazdi, 'Delhi was laid waste (kharab shod) ... in punishment for its inhabitants' evil beliefs and vile deeds and conduct.'
This would hardly be a sentiment Indians could share ... Timur's invasion was thus seen as the last, and most calamitous, of the Mongol raids, which left only huge devastation and desolation in its trail. Timur did not even care to leave any one to administer or maintain order in Delhi ..."
[Irfan Habib, 1997, 'Timur in the Political Tradition and Historiography of Mughal India', Cahiers d'Asie centrale, 3/4, 297-310]
TIMUR'S DISINGENUOUS DEFENCE
By the will of God, and by no wish or direction of mine, all the three cities of Delhi, Siri, Jahan-panah, and Old Delhi, had been plundered. The official prayer of my sovereignty, which is an assurance of safety and protection, had been read in the city, and it was, therefore, my earnest wish that no evil might happen to the people of the place. It was ordained by God, however, that the city should be ruined and he accordingly inspired the infidel inhabitants with a spirit of resistance, so that they brought on themselves that fate which was inevitable.
TIMUR'S DETAILED DEFENCE
On the sixteenth of the month (December 26), certain incidents occurred which led to the sack of the city of Delhi and to the slaughter of many of the infidel inhabitants ...
One was this. A party of fierce Turkish soldiers had assembled at one of the gates of the city to look about them and enjoy themselves, and some of them had laid riotous hands upon the goods of the inhabitants ...
Another reason was that Jala Islam and other officials had entered Delhi with a party of soldiers to collect the contribution laid upon the city.
Another reason was that some thousand troops with orders for grain, oil, sugar, and flour, had gone into the city to collect these supplies.
Another reason was that ... I had sent some amirs with their regiments into Delhi and directed them ... to seize ... fugitives [great numbers of Hindus and infidel (who) had come into the city from all the country round] and bring them out.
For these various reasons a great number of fierce Turkish troops were in the city. When the soldiers proceeded to apprehend the Hindus and infidels who had fled to Delhi, many of them drew their swords and offered resistance. The flames of strife thus lighted spread through the entire city ... consuming all they reached. The savage Turks fell to killing and plundering ...
The amirs who were in charge of the gates prevented any more soldiers from entering Delhi, but the flames of war had risen too high for this precaution to be of any avail in extinguishing them. All day Thursday and throughout the night, nearly fifteen thousand Turks were engaged in slaying, plundering, and destroying. When Friday morning dawned, my entire army, no longer under control, went off to the city and thought of nothing but killing, plundering, and making prisoners. The sack was general throughout the whole day, and continued throughout the following day, Saturday the seventeenth (December 27) ...
Excepting the quarter of the Sayyids, the scholars, and the other Mussulmans, the whole city was sacked. The pen of fate had written down this destiny for the people of this city, and although I was desirous of sparing them, I could not succeed, for it was the will of God that this calamity should befall the city.
TIMUR'S PRECEDENT FOR MASS-MURDER OF PRISONERS
At this court [held Friday, December 13, two weeks prior to the prior to the sacking of Delhi], Amir Jahan Shah, Amir Sulaiman Shah, and other amirs of experience informed me that, from the time of entering Hindustan up to the present we had taken more than one hundred thousand infidels and Hindus prisoners, and that they were all in my camp ... I asked the amirs for advice about the prisoners, and they said that on the day of battle these one hundred thousand prisoners, could not be left with the baggage, and that it would be entirely opposed to the rules of war to set these idolaters and foes of Islam at liberty, so that no course remained but to make them all food for the sword.
When I heard these words, I found them to be in accordance with the rules of war, and I immediately directed the commanders to proclaim throughout the camp that every man who had infidel prisoners was to put them to death, and that whoever neglected to do so , should himself be executed and his property given to the informer. When this order became known to the Champions of Islam, they drew their swords and put their prisoners to death. One hundred thousand infidels, impious idolaters, were slain on that day. Maulana Nasir-ad-din Omar, a counsellor and man of learning, who had never killed a sparrow in all his life, now, in execution of my order, killed fifteen idolatrous Hindus, who were his captives.
[Three excerpts; As above; Mulfuzata-i Timuri; 'Memoirs of Timur']
Part Two
THE TIMURID LEGACY
(1403 - 1405)
For Timur, there were essentially two main (religious) takeaways from the sacking of Delhi.
In the first instance, he maintained his reverence toward Islamic 'holy' men and 'holy' buildings. This respect was presumably genuine:
On the following day, Sunday, it was brought to my knowledge that a great number of infidel Hindus had assembled in the Jami' Masjid of Old Delhi, where they had carried arms and provisions and had prepared to defend themselves ... whereupon I immediately ordered Amir Shah Malik and Ali Sultan Tawachi to take a party of men and clear the house of God of infidels and idolaters. They accordingly attacked these infidels and put them to death, after which Old Delhi was plundered ...
When my mind was no longer occupied with the destruction of the people of Delhi , I took a ride around the cities ... When I was tired of examining the city, I went to the chief mosque, where I found a congregation of Sayyids, lawyers, shaikhs, and other principal Musselmans, together with the inhabitants of their parts of the city, to whom they had been a protection and defence. I called them to my presence, consoled them, treated them with every respect, and bestowed upon them many presents and honours. I also appointed an officer to protect their quarter of the city, and guard them against annoyance, after which I remounted and returned to my quarters.
In the second case, Timur enslaved numbers of especially skilled people in his baggage train home to Samarkand. He might have been descended from a nomadic warrior class, but he was astute enough to value engineers, architects, and decorative artists. And he had particular construction projects in mind:
I ordered that all the artisans and clever mechanics who were masters of their respective crafts should be selected from among the prisoners and set aside, and accordingly some thousands of craftsmen were bidden to await my command. All these I distributed among the princes and the amirs who were present, or who were officially engaged in other parts of my dominion.
I had determined to build a Jami' Masjid in Samarkand, the seat of my empire, which should be without a rival in any country; and for this reason I ordered that all builders and stone-masons should be set apart for my own especial service.
These twin obsessions of Timur lead to something of a chicken-or-egg situation, an argument about who exactly influenced who in the Eastern Islamic world. The tourist high-lights of Uzbekistan in Central Asia and Rajasthan/Delhi/Gujerat/Punjab in North West India make for stunning photographs but misleadingly 'shrink' the actual historical periods and personalities it took to construct these magnificent buildings.
Many acknowledge "the important role that this dynasty of Turko-Mongolian origin ['The Timurids'] played in the cultural history of the Eastern Islamic world". They admire "The 'legacy of the Timurids, the impact of which was entirely out of proportion both to this dynasty's geographical scope and to the relatively short length of its political rule". But there are limits to this view.
"At the same time, it must be admitted that the Timurids did not create something radically different to their predecessors. Rather, it was in their refinement and seemingly inexhaustible preoccupation with form and the elaboration of existing standard traditions and modal systems that their contribution should be seen to lie. The Timurid period represents the point of culmination of previous developments, a glorious fin-de-siecle flowering of culture and the arts."
"But in the case of the Timurids, it was also something more: a self-consciousness of taste for technical refinement, even virtuosity ― ...'a taste for the intricate' ― that strove continuously to outdo even itself." So writes Maria Subtelny in her paper given at a 1997 conference called L'heritage timouride : Iran - Asie centrale - Inde, XVe-XVIIIe siecles. "This self-consciousness found expression in the codification of many areas of the arts. Standard manuals were written on poetic forms ..., on musical theory ..., and on calligraphy ... Even designs for architectural ornamentation were codified ― the so-called Tashkent and Topkaki scrolls of the geometrical gereh and muqarnas patterns."
This more nuanced interpretation of the "importance of the Timurid legacy in Central Asian and Mughal Indian cultural history" fits in well with the conqueror Timur's inspections of the three cities of Delhi and his conscription of thousands of its artisans for work in Samarkand. To a large extent, Timur and his Horde were looters, their ideas of monumental architecture stolen. It is not too much to suggest that because Timur had observed the Jami' Masjid of Old Delhi, so he had resolved to build a Jami' Masjid in Samarkand. The Timurids were compulsive copyists, driven to repeat and perfect what they had seen (and perhaps destroyed) elsewhere.
[Maria Eva Subtelny, 1997, 'The Timurid Legacy: A Reaffirmation and a Reassessment', Cahiers d'Asie centrale, 3/4, 9-19]
EYEWITNESS VIEW OF SAMARKAND CONSTRUCTION
When approaching Timur's capital of Samarkand in 1404, the embassy of Castille stopped at Kesh, which was the conqueror's birthplace. The ambassador, Ruy Gonzalez de Clavijo, was impressed.
There are throughout the city many fine houses and mosques, above all a magnificent mosque which Timur has ordered to be built but which as yet is not finished. In this mosque is seen the chapel in which is his father's burial place has been made, and beside this is a chapel now being built in which it is intended that Timur himself will be interred when the time comes ... In this same mosque too is seen the tomb of Prince Jahangir the eldest son of Timur [d. 1372]. The whole of this mosque with its chapels is very finely wrought in tiles that are of blue and gold, and you enter it through a great courtyard planted with trees around a water tank.
While still in Kesh, de Clavijo and his companions were taken to see a magnificent palace which was also still in the process of construction. de Clavijo was told the palace had been a work in progress for the last twenty years, despite the builders working on it continually, day after day. Both the mosque and the palace were said to be 'a work that Timur has begun and is yet perfecting'.
This palace ... had an entrance passage constructed to be of considerable length with a high portal before it, and in this entrance gallery to the right and to left there were archways of brickwork encased and patterned with blue tiles. These archways led each one into a small chamber that was open having no door, the flooring being laid in blue tiles ... At the end of this gallery stands another gateway, beyond which is a great courtyard paved with white flagstones and surrounded on the four sides by richly wrought arches, and in its centre is a very large water tank ... and beyond it you enter through a very high and spacious gateway the main buildings of the palace. This gateway is throughout beautifully adorned with very fine work in gold and blue tiles ... From this main portal of the gateway just described, you enter a great reception hall which is a room four square, where the walls are panelled with gold and blue tiles, and the ceiling is entirely of gold work. From this room we were taken into the galleries and in these likewise everywhere the walls were of gilt tiles. We saw indeed here so many apartments and separate chambers, all of which were adorned in tilework of blue and gold and many other colours.
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It is possible from de Clavijo's descriptions alone to recognise the architectural and decorative features that adorn cities like Tashkent and Samarkand to this day. Timur's style was awe-inspiring grandeur ― soaring monumental gateways, richly tiled walls, arches, floors and ceilings, and central water features. Complementing his shining surfaces and open and airy interiors, de Clavijo's readers also glimpse the expansive gardens and shaded parks that surrounded them.
We were shown in one [palace] that we visited a great banqueting hall which Timur was having built wherein to feast with the princesses, and this was gorgeously adorned, being very spacious, while beyond the same they were laying out a great orchard in which were planted many and divers fruit trees, with others to give shade. These stood around water tanks, besides which were laid out fine lawns of turf. This orchard was of such an extent that a very great company might conveniently assemble here, and in the summer heats enjoy the cool air beside that water in the shade of these trees.
Once in the tyrant's capital, however, the Spanish ambassador's gushing reports of gilt and glitter all but cease. Perhaps he was aware of similar feats performed by the Moors in the southern parts of his homeland. Perhaps he just grew bored by the repetition of one imperial style. There is only one reference to gold and blue tiles in buildings of Samarkand. Here he is less concerned with the builder's 'style' than he is with Timur as taskmaster.
1. The Mosque of Prince Muhammad Sultan
... we were shown over the chapel, which was the place of interment of the Prince and we found it square in plan and very loftily built. Both outside and in it was magnificently adorned in gold and blue tiles beautifully patterned, and there was other fine work in gypsum ... But recently Timur had come in from the Horde to view the building and he had found the chapel was not to his liking, holding that it was built too low. Immediately he ordered the walls to be demolished , and laid it on the architects that it should be rebuilt within ten days time, under threat of a terrible forfeit to the workmen. Without delay the rebuilding was set in hand, day and night the work went on, and Timur himself had already come into the city twice to see what progress had been made ... The chapel had now been completely rebuilt within the appointed ten days time, and it was a wonder how so great a building could have been put up and completed within so brief a space.
2. The Mosque of the Great Khanum
The Mosque which Timur had caused to be built in memory of the mother of his wife ... seemed to us the noblest of all those we visited in the city of Samarqand, but no sooner had it been completed than he began to find fault with its entrance gateway, which he now said was much too low and must forthwith be pulled down. Then the workmen began to dig pits to lay the new foundations, when in order that the piers might be rapidly rebuilt his Highness gave out that he himself would take change to direct the labour for the one pier of the new gateway while he laid it on two of the lords of his court ... to see to the foundations on the other part ... It was therefore in his litter that every morning he had himself brought to the place, and he would stay for best part of the day urging on the work. He would arrange for much meat to be cooked and brought, and then he would order them to throw portions of the same down to the workmen in the foundations, as though one should cast bones to dogs in a pit, and a wonder to all he even with his own hands did this. Thus he urged on their labour : and at times would have coins thrown to the masons when especially they worked to his satisfaction. Thus the building went on day and night ...
Part Three
THE CORE OF EMPIRE
(1370 - 1405)
'Central Asia sat astride the Silk Roads'
This brief sentence states the region's once pivotal role connecting Europe and the Middle East to China. "Until Portuguese seafarers navigated alternative routes to India and the 'spice islands' in the 1500s, this was the nexus, the narrow link, for East-West trade."
Dominating the Silk Roads at this point guaranteed a significant revenue flow. It also guaranteed jealous neighbours who wanted to redirect that revenue flow. One potential threat of this type was Tokhtamysh, a Mongol leader attempting to reunite the Golden Horde across the steppes north of the Caucasus and the Caspian Sea. To thwart the Tartar threat, Timur leveled numerous cities like Sarai, Azov and Astrakhan that supported Tokhtamysh, or could serve as 'entrepots' to divert Silk Roads revenues from the preferred route of Tashkent, Samarkand and Bukhara.
There were two interlocking elements to Timur's founding and maintenance. The most obvious lies in the brutal shocks of his military victories. Principal among these was "the disintegration of the Il-Khanid dynasty of Greater Iran", and "the sundering of the Golden Horde on the northern steppes". Vindictive symbols of these crushing victories include the mass-slaughter of Babylonian citizens on 27 Deulqa'dah 803 H (Every Timurid soldier was ordered to carry the decapitated head(s) of at least one of the population and add to the gathering pile of skulls, as a sign of their loyalty); the razing of the rebellious city of Khwarism and corresponding massacre of its inhabitants (followed by the planting of wheat in the ruins, as a sign of his contempt). "Timur inherited the logic of military expansion with a strategy of terror and power symbolism".
Equally important, though less obvious to Timur's immediate contemporaries, was the deliberately limited nature of his 'pacification of the Islamic world'. "Timur realised strategic positions or trade routes could convert otherwise unattractive lands into valuable real estate but was focused on the possible". His army was the best in Central Asia but it also required considerable reserves of food, weapons, and rewards, to maintain as a standing force. It is possible to view many Timurid ventures, not as imperial campaigns, but rather massive raids to reduce the power of potential enemies and provide his fighters with loot. "Timur might have been a great soldier, but in purely historical terms, he could be seen as the greatest bandit of all times".
The site of these raids, where he stripped and devastated, but left no one to manage the remains, were the 'periphery of empire' ― Syria, Asia Minor, Georgia, Hindustan ― 'emptied borderlands'. Whereas the core of his empire, Central Asia and Persia, functioned as the administrative centre, benefiting from "East-West merchandising along the still-prosperous Silk Roads", and of course the immense wealth stolen from the victims of his peripheral raids.
Timur wrecked elsewhere, but in Transoxiana, Khwarizim and Khorasan (Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, Iran), he built.
[Salman Najmudin et al, 2025, 'The Historical Impact of the Mongol Invasion on Islamic Civilisation: A Study of the Ilkhan Dynasty, Timur Lenk, and Their Socio-Cultural Legacy, Jurnal Iman dan Spiritualitas, 5.4, 613-628
JP Dunn & SP Bartos, 'Amir Timur: Paragon of Medieval Statecraft or Central Asian Psychopath?', Education About Asia, 18.3, Winter 2013]
THE MAUSOLEUM OF KHOJA AHMED YASAWI
"The Mausoleum of Khoja ['master'] Ahmed Yasawi, in the town of Yasi, now Turkestan, was built at the time of Timur (Tamerlane), from 1389 till 1405, remaining unfinished in some parts. In this building, the Persian master builders experimented architectural and structural solutions under the supervision of the emperor. These solutions were then adopted in the construction of Samarkand, the capital of the Timurid empire."
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At first it was a suburban area of Shavgar in the region of Syr Daria, the crossroads of agricultural and nomadic cultures ... It was also one of the few places that do not seem to have been destroyed by the Mongols [Chinggis Khan] in the 13th century. Pilgrimage to the tomb of Ahmed Yasawi was another factor that contributed to its development.
In the 1370s Timur (Tamerlane, 1328-1405) became the new ruler of Central Asia ... His capital was in Samarkand. Timur's policies involved the construction of monumental public and cult buildings (mosques, mausoleums, madrasahs) in regions such as Syr Daria, where towns were vital outposts on the northern frontier of his possessions ...
Timur's wish was to contribute to the diffusion of Islam, but even more so to fulfil specific political objectives. Considering that the Sufi orders determined the support of nomadic tribes in the steppes, the construction of this remarkable sanctuary aimed to gain the support of the Sufis and of the large nomad community, who otherwise might have presented a risk for his ruling ...
The earlier mausoleum was already a pilgrimage place, but the new construction increased its religious importance so that it became one of the most significant sacred places for Moslems."
"The Mausoleum of Khoja Ahmed Yasawi is an outstanding example of Islamic religious building, designed and constructed under the supervision of Timur (Tamerlane) at the end of the 14th century. The building became a prototype for the contemporaneous construction of other major buildings in the Timurid period, particularly in the capital of Samarkand, being a pilot project for the design of spatial arrangements the construction of vaults and dome structures ...
The Timurid Empire extended from Mesopotamia to Western India and from the Caucasus to the Arabian Sea, including the present-day Uzbekistan, Iran, and Afghanistan. The capital cities of the empire, Samarkand and Bukhara, comprised [sic] some of the principal buildings and ensembles, in particular the Bibi Khanum Mosque, which is comparable with the Mausoleum of Yasawi in its size and architecture ...
There are also important works of this period in Iran (Yazd, Mashad and Tabriz, as well as in Herat in present-day Afghanistan) ... The master builders from the conquered cities and lands such as Shiraz, Isfahan, Yazd, Tabriz, south Caspian, and Damascus, as well as stone cutters from India were involved in the construction of the masterpieces ...
The significance of the Mausoleum of Yasawi in this context lies in its being a prototype, where the architectural and artistic solutions where experimented under the control of the emperor itself. The Mausoleum has also better preserved its integrity and authenticity than most of the other buildings, such as those in Samarkand, which have been partly rebuilt or modified."
[World Heritage Listing No 1103, 'The Mausoleum of Khoja Ahmed Yasawi', ICOMOS, (International Commission on Monuments of Significance), March 2003, pp 62-65]
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