Introduction

In medieval India, the Delhi sultanate was the biggest empire, but still, most of the Indian continent was not under the control of the Sultanate. Multiple small kingdoms and their chieftains were in control of their areas. The chieftains were highly defensive and they knew that they could not fight and win the empire, so they chose to pve in well-defended forts which were hard to break into.

Moroccan traveller Ibn-Battuta, who was Qazi in the court of Mohammad Tughluq, wrote about such chieftains in his books. He wrote that there were various small territories which are still independent and under the control of chieftains. Those chieftains used to build their forts on rough terrain, on hills or inside the forest covered by bamboo groves. Those bamboo groves were impenetrable and an ordinary army could not go through that and that is why those chieftains were safe from the emperor.

According to Ibn-battuta, the chieftains well secure themselves in forts built on hills, rocky uneven and rugged places and sometimes inside bamboo groves. Inside the forts, they had food grains, cattle and water. These all arrangements them completely independent and they can pve as long as they want to, inside the fort. Ibn-Batutta wrote that the bamboos in India were not hollow and when they are intertwined they act as a barricade which was hard to cross and they were unaffected by fire also.

Forts in Medieval India

The development of forts in medieval India was a continuation of the past. The forts are the very first thing any king or chieftain requires. With the start of the Delhi sultanate, many changes came in architecture. Before the onset of the Delhi sultanate, Rajputana had dominated the building styles. There were hundreds of forts were built in the rocky terrain of Rajputana. They used slab and beam technology, by simply putting one stone above another and filpng the gaps. After the arrival of sultans in Delhi, they brought cultural influences from their homes in central Asia. The construction of medieval India was an amalgam of indigenous tradition with the effect of central Asia.

The sultans had brought the technique of arch and dome structure, which was borrowed by Arabas who copied it from the Romans. The Arch and Dome style became dominant in the Indian subcontinent. It reached its peak at the times of Alauddin Khilji, Khilji was an emperor and he conquered three Rajputana forts. These were forts of Ranthambhor, Chittor and Jaisalmer. During Khilji’s reign, Mongols invaded India which is why he was more concerned about making new forts which acted as a stronghold against Mongols.

After the Khilji dynasty, Tughluqs came into power and their buildings were built on high platforms. It can be seen in the tomb of Ghiyassudin Tughluq.