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jRe/port of the Archaeological Survey. iii 



sent ruins are the~remains of seven cities, which were built at different 

 times by seven of the old Kings of Delhi. 



2. A few other forts are recorded to have been built by the Em- 

 perors Balban, Khizr, and Mubarak ; but there are no remains of them 

 now existing, and even the sites of them are doubtful. It seems even 

 probable that there were no remains of these three cities so far back 

 as A. D. 161.1, in the reign of Jahangir, when the English merchant, 

 William Finch, travelling from Agra to Delhi, entered the Mogul 

 Capital from the south, for he states that on his left hand he saw the 

 ruins of old Delhi, called " the 7 Castles and 52 gates" a name by 

 which these ruins are still known in the present day. With regard 

 to the work of the Emperor Ghids-uddin- Balban, who reigned from 

 A. D. 1266 to 1288, I think that too great importance has been 

 attached to its name of Kila or fort. The Kila Marzghan, which 

 Syad Ahmed places at Ghidsjpur, near the tomb of Nizdm-uddiio 

 Auliya, was built as an asylum, ( f^y° niarjd) or place of refuge for 

 debtors. Now this asylum for debtors was still existing in A. D. 

 1335 to 1340, when Ibn Batuta was one of the Magistrates of Delhi. 

 He describes it as the Ddr-ul-aman (^i/lj!^) or "House of safety," 

 and states that he visited the tomb of Balban, which was inside this 

 hcuse. From this, as well as from its name of Ddr-ul-aman, I infer 

 that the building was a walled enclosure of moderate size, perhaps not 

 much larger than that which now surrounds the tomb of Tughlak 

 Shah. This inference is rendered almost certain by Ibn Batuta's 

 description of Delhi, # which he says " now consists of four cities 

 which becoming contiguous, have formed one." ]STow three of the 

 four cities here alluded to are certainly those of Mai Pithora, Jahdn- 

 pandh, and Siri, (of which the continuous walls can be easily traced 

 even at the present day,) and the fourth city must have been Tugh- 

 lakabad* The date of the building of Jahan-panah is not recorded * 

 but as Ibn Batuta was employed on the insane expedition against 

 China in 1337, and as Delhi was very shortly afterwards abandoned 

 by Muhammad Tughlak for Deogir, it is certain that Jahan-panah 

 which was built by this Emperor, must have been one of the four 

 contiguous cities described by Ibn Batuta. I feel quite satisfied 

 therefore, that the Kila-Marzghan, called also Ddr-ul-aman, or " House 

 of refuge,'' was not a fortress, or large fortified city, but only a small 

 # Travels, p. 111. 



A 2 



