Ruler · 971 to 1030
Mahmud of Ghazni
From Ghazni he led seventeen campaigns into India and built an empire from Iran to Punjab. He was among the first rulers widely called sultan, and his court drew the scholar al-Biruni and the poet Ferdowsi.
At a glance
- Lived
- 971 to 1030
- Role
- Ruler
- Era
- Three caliphs at once
- Chapter
- 4. Al-Andalus and the Subcontinent
Battles
- 1025Raid on Somnath
Temple taken and plundered. The best known of Mahmud's seventeen campaigns into India.
Mahmud of Ghazni's world
1000: Three caliphs at once
From 929 to 1031 three rulers called themselves caliph: the Abbasid in Baghdad, the Fatimid in Cairo and the Umayyad in Cordoba. In the east, Mahmud of Ghazni led seventeen campaigns into India between 1001 and 1027.
People of the same era
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