APPENDIX.

Owing to the kind permission of the Government of Bombay I have been permitted to reproduce the description of Bijapur and the plans of the city as they appear in Vol. XXIII of the Bombay Gazetteer. The description of Hyderabad I propose to reserve for the second portion of this history which will consist for the greater part of the history of modern Hyderabad under the present dynasty founded in the first quarter of the last century.

Bija'pur,' during the sixteenth and the greater part of the seventeenth centuries (1490-1686) the capital of the Adil Sháh dynasty and the mistress of the Deccan, is in north latitude 16o 50' and east longitude 75° 48', about 1950 feet above the sea, on the north slope of the ridge which forms the water-shed of the Kistna and Bhima rivers. It is a station on the Hudgi-Gadag or East Deccan railway sixty miles south of Sholápur. Its surroundings Its surroundings have nothing striking or picturesque. On all sides for long distances stretch waving treeless downs, the uplands covered with a shallow stony soil, bare except during the south-west rains (June-October), and separated by dips or hollows of comparatively rich soil. To the north the country is peculiarly desolate, nothing but ridge after ridge, scarcely a village as far as the eye can see. To the very walls the country is the

1 Contributed by Mr. H. F. Silcock, C. S.

2 The levels taken in different parts of the city are 1932 feet at the Ásar Mehel, 1940 at the Boli Gumbaz, 1960 at the plinth of the Two Sisters, 1972 at the mámlatdár's office in the Macca Gate, and over 2000 feet near the Idgah. Mr. E. K. Reinold, C. E.

same, except that outside of the city the monotony of the rolling plain is relieved by tombs and other buildings. From the north the first glimpse of Bijapur is about fifteen miles distant, where the dome of the Boli Gumbaz rises above the intervening uplands, and, as the city is neared, fills the eye from every point, looming large against the southern horizon. At five miles the whole city breaks suddenly into view, and far on every side the country is covered with buildings of varied shapes and in different stages of decay. The numbers of tombs, mosques, palaces and towers which lie scattered in every direction, give the scene a strangely impressive grandeur. To the right, the white domes of Pir Amin's tomb gleam in the sunlight, a brilliant contrast to the dark gray ruins in the foreground. In front lie the city's massive walls and bastions, with here and there a stately building towering over the fortifications, while, on the left, the colossal proportions of the Boli or Gol Gumbaz dwarf its surroundings. Still further to the left, the plain, the old battlefield, is dotted with tombs, among which is conspicuous the massive dark gray mausoleum of Ain-ul-Mulk. Close round the city the land is surprisingly barren. The ground in front is bare of trees and all vegetation, and is broken into large irregular hollows, the quarries from which the city was hewn. On the west miles of ruins of the old town of Sháhápur (1510-1636) prevent cultivation. Close to the walls on the south are traces of tillage, but none of it shows from a distance. The only object is the great city stretching far and near in a waste whose desolate glimpses of noble buildings, some fairly preserved others in ruins, make the more striking.

South of Bijapur the country changes. On the southern side of the ridge which overlooks the city there is considerable cultivation. The same treeless ridges remain, but between the ridges are fairly rich hollows, and, within eight miles of the walls, is the valley of the Don now as of old

the granary of Bijápur. The slope of a barren ridge, surrounded on three sides by a treeless cropless plain, seems a strange site for a capital. The desert to the north where no invading army could find food or fodder was no doubt a valuable defence to Bijápur on the side most open to attack. But the crest of the ridge to the south, commanding the approaches on both sides, seems at first a better site for a fortress. The reason for the choice of the present site seems to have been that the crest of the ridge is waterless while within the walls of Bijapur the supply of water is abundant. The under rock teems with splendid springs of which, to judge by the remains of wells and gardens, full advantage was taken. Later on the local supply was increased by artificial means, and the Torvi conduit and the Begam Lake made the city almost independent of its local resources.1

Bijapur within the walls covers about 1600 acres or two and a half square miles. The suburbs even now spread over a large area, and in the city's prime stretched for miles. The walls, which are still in fair order, are about six and a quarter miles round and form an irregular ellipse of which the major axis from the Macca Gate in the west to the Allápur Gate in the east is about two and three-quarters and the minor axis from the Bahmani Gate in the north to the Fateh Gate in the south is about one and three-quarters miles.

The city walls are surrounded by a deep moat forty to fifty feet broad. They are massive and strong, and, not counting ten at the gates, are strengthened with ninety-six bastions of various designs and different degrees of strength. In height the walls vary from thirty to fifty feet, and have an average thickness of twenty feet which in places they greatly exceed. The general plan of construction is much the same in the different sections, though the design and 1 The Torvi water works are described at page 403.

finish vary. They seem to consist of two massive stone walls twenty to thirty feet high and twenty to thirty feet apart, with the space between filled with earth, well rammed, and covered with a masonry platform. This platform which runs all round the walls, was protected on the inside by a battlemented curtainwall about ten feet high running from bastion to bastion and loopholed for both artillery and small arms. On this platform there was ample room for the movements of the garrison, who, from their superior station, could with ease command the ground outside. The construction of the walls was undertaken by Ali Adil Sháh I. (1557-1580),

1 Major Moor (Little's Detachment, 310, 311) describes the walls in May 1792 as, A thick stone building about twenty feet high with a ditch and rampart. Capacious towers of large hewn stone were at every hundred yards much neglected and many fallen in the ditch. The curtain was of great height perhaps forty feet from the berme of the ditch entirely built of huge stones strongly cemented and frequently ornamented with sculptured representations of lions and tigers. The towers were very numerous and of vast size built of the same materials and some with top ornaments like a cornice and otherwise in the same style with the curtain. Captain Sydenham (Asiatic Researches, XIII, 435) describes the walls in 1811 as a rampart flanked by 109 towers of different dimensions, a ditch and covert way surrounding it, and a citadel in the interior. These works were very strong and were still in fair repair, their outer and inner faces being of hewn stone laid in mortar. The parapets which were nine feet high and three feet thick were composed entirely of stone and mortar. The towers were in general semicircular with a radius of about thirty-six feet. The curtains, which appeared to rise from the bottom of the ditch, varied from thirty to forty feet in height, and were about twenty-four feet thick. The ditch was in many places filled and was so covered with vegetation that not a trace of it appeared. In other parts it seemed to have been formed through rock, forty to fifty feet broad and about eighteen feet deep. A faced counterscarp showed in many places and the remains of a line of masonry running parallel about seventy yards in front pointed out the boundary of the covert way. In 1792 Major Moor found this covert way almost perfect. He says it was one hundred and fifty and in places two hundred yards broad. (Little's Detachment, 311). At present hardly a sign of the covert way remains. The Honourable Mountstuart Elphinstone (Colebrooke's Life, II. 70) describes the walls in 1819: The ditch and the rampart enclose a circle of six miles circumference. The rampart is of earth supported by strong walls and large stones. It is twenty-four feet thick at top, and has Indian battlements in tolerable order and large towers at moderate distances. We mounted a very lofty tower separate from the wall. From this height we saw the plan of the town, now scattered with ruins and in some places full of trees. The most conspicuous object next to the great dome is the citadel. On the whole I find Bijápur much above my expectations and far beyond anything I have ever seen in the Deccan. There is something solemn in this scene and one thinks with a melancholy interest on its former possessors. The proofs of their power remain while their weaknesses and crimes are forgotten and our admiration of their grandeur is heightened by our compassion for their fall.