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GHAZNI
Ghazni is celebrated in Indo-Afghan history as the seat of the
Ghaznivid dynasty which furnished the first Muhammadan ruler of a
united and aggressive Afghanistan. The dynasty dates from Alptagin,
a Turkish slave who had risen to high office under the Samanids ; but
its real founder was Sabuktagin, a former slave of Alptagin and the
husband of his daughter. Under Sabuktagin's son, the famous Mahmud
of Ghazni, who reigned from 998 to 103o, and made many expeditions
into India, the dominion of the Ghaznivids stretched from Lahore to
Samarkand and Ispahan, and Ghazni was adorned with splendid
buildings and a university. After Mahmfid's death the usual process
of decline set in; and Ghazni was destroyed in 1153 by Ala-ud-din
Husain, of the Afghan house of Ghor (hence styled Jahdn soz, the
`world incendiary'), who spared only the tombs of Sultan Mahmud and
two of his descendants. From this time Ghazni lost its pristine im-
portance, and in the subsequent historic vicissitudes of Afghanistan it
was generally connected with Kabul.
In the first Afghan War Ghazni was stormed by the British troops
in July, 1839, and occupied till December, 1841, when, concomitantly
with the disasters in Kabul, the garrison was forced to surrender. In
1842 it was again occupied by General Nott, who, after dismantling
the fort, carried off the celebrated gates r, which Mahmud is said to
have removed from the Somnath temple in Gujarat in 1024, and which
still closed the entrance to his tomb. Ghazni was twice visited by a
British force in r88o : namely, in April by Sir Donald Stewart, on his
march from Kandahar to Kabul ; and in August by Lord Roberts, on
his march from Kabul to Kandahar. On the former occasion an
Afghan force was defeated in the vicinity of the town. Ghazni is now
a decayed town of no military strength, and contains only about 1,ooo
inhabited houses. It is situated on the left bank of the Ghazni river,
on the level ground between the river and the termination of a spur
which here runs east and west from the Gul Koh range. It may be
described as an irregular square, having a total circuit of about i 4 miles.
It is surrounded by a wall, about 30 feet high, built on the top of a
mound in part natural and in part artificial, and flanked by towers at
irregular intervals. The city is composed of dirty, irregular streets of
houses several storeys high. The inhabitants are Afghans, Hazaras,
and a, few Hindu traders. The chief trade is in corn, fruit, madder,
and the sheep's wool and camel's-hair cloth brought from the adjoining
Hazara country. Postins are its sole manufacture. The climate of
Ghazni is very cold, snow often lying on the ground from November
to February. During the summer and autumn fevers of a typhoid
type are very prevalent and fatal. Three miles to the north-east of
r These are now preserved in the fort at Agra. The wood, however, is dcodar, not
sandal; and it is certain that they cannot have come from Somnath.
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