Rebel Sultans : Bijapur and Golconda. The Sultanates of Deccan

Hello everyone, I'm Simone and welcome to my channel. In this video we are going to complete the description of the five sultanates of Deccan, which emerged from the collapse of the Bahmani kingdom and played a central role in the history of medieval India. We have covered so far the ones of Ahmedanagar, Bidar and Berar. Let's then proceed to the last two, namely the ones of Bijapur and Golconda. Golconda and Bijapur, among all five sultanates of the Deccan, covering the southern domains of old Bahmani kingdom were the last two to fall under the advance of the Mughal power that came from the north. Let's analyze the two sultanates more in detail. Bijapur's sultanate was located in the modern-day Skarnataka, in the western area of the Deccan region of southern India and was ruled by the Adil Shahi. This dynasty was founded by Yusuf Adil Shah, the man of Iranian origin appointed by the Bahmani sultanate as governor of Bijapur district. When the Bahmani breakup occurred in the last decade of the 15th century, Yusuf Adil Shah declared the independence of the province under his control and founded the sultanate that officially existed from 1489 to 1686, when Aurangzeb annexed it to the Mughal empire. Yusuf Adil Shah was a Shia Muslim and transferred the creed to the rest of the dynasty, although some of its rulers accepted the Sunni Islam, including Ibrahim Adil Shah II, the fifth sultan of the Adil Shah dynasty, the greatest and most famous sultan of Bijapur. Under the leadership of the Adil Shah dynasty, the sultanate went through an expansion process in the region. It involved mostly the southern borders, where the Bijapuri forces got control of the Raichur Doab after the defeat of the Vijayanagar empire at the Battle of Talikota, and in the east, where in 1619 Ibrahim Adil Shah II conquered the Sultanate of Bidar from its last ruler Amid III of the Barichahi dynasty. On the coast, however, Bijapuri control was eroded by the progressive Portuguese expansion, which took control of Goa and the surrounding territory in 1510. On that occasion, despite the defenses set up by Ismail Adil Shah and his Egyptian Mamluk allies, the possession of Goa was ultimately lost to the rising European colonial power on 10 December 1510. The city of Bijapur, officially known as Vijayapura, meaning the city of victory, which was already a provincial capital during the Bahmani period, remained the capital of the following sultanate throughout its existence. The active contribution of Adil Shah's sultans turned this modest Bahmani provincial city into a cosmopolitan metropolis. Thanks to their intense work, the city became a crossroad of ideas, analytic-economic, political, cultural and artistic center in the entire subcontinent. The sultans provided the city of Bijapur with palaces, mosques, mausoleums and an extensive water supply infrastructure. This architectural development produced some of the most exquisite examples of Deccan sultanate and Indo-Islamic architectural styles. In its essence, the architecture of Bijapur represented a wonderful convergence of Persian, Ottoman, Turkish and Deccan styles. The court of the Adil Shah benefited from the liberal patronage of the sultans. Soon, many scholars, poets, painters, artists, musicians and Sufis flowed into Bijapur from different parts of the world. The first and minor threat to the political stability of the sultanate was posed by the rise of the Marathas, originated by the revolt of Shivaji, the Bijapuri authority in the western territories. The greatest threat was, however, represented by the rapid expansion of the Mughal Empire into Deccan. The death of Ibrahim Adil Shah II in 1627 coincided with the end of Bijapuri greatness. In 1631, shortly after the rise of his successor Muhammad Ali Shah, the Mughals, led by the emperor Shah Jahan, tried to capture Bijapur, but they failed. In the tumultuous Deccani politics, the Bijapuri sultan Muhammad Adil Shah sided with the Mughals in the latter's conquest of Ahmedanagar in 1636. In recognition of his help, Shah Jahan formally recognized Muhammad's sovereignty, which avoided future possible aggressions of his sultanate by the Mughals for the next 20 years. In 1656, Muhammad Ali Shah died and was succeeded by Ali Adil Shah II. Shah Jahan, anxious to annex Bijapur to his empire, questioned Ali's legitimacy to the throne and requested his son Oranjeb, at the time Mughal governor of the Deccan, to conquer the sultanate of Bijapur. Oranjeb besieged the fort of Bijapur, but before he could capture it, he had to rise the siege and rush to the north for the war of succession to the Mughal throne. He quickly signed a treaty with the sultanate of Bijapur that, under the payment of war indemnities and the transfer of the forts of Bidar and Kalyani to the Mughal control, allowed the sultanate to survive. However, the decline, once initiated, was unstoppable. The situation of the sultanate of Bijapur became more and more unsustainable with the death of Ali Adil Shah that occurred in 1672. His four-year-old son, Sikandar Adil Shah, succeeded him. The Mughals took advantage of it and, at the emperor Oranjeb himself, reached the Deccan in 1682 and besieged the fort of Bijapur in July 1686. The fort surrendered in September of the same year and Bijapur was annexed to the Mughal Empire, marking the end of the independence of this sultanate. Let's now discover the last of the five sultanates of Deccan, Golconda. It was located in the modern days Karnataka, Talengana and Andhra Pradesh. It lasted from 1518 to 1687 and was ruled by the Qutb Shahi dynasty. This was established in 1518 by Quli Qutb-ul-Mulk and ruled Golconda for 171 years, until the Mughal emperor Oranjeb conquered the sultanate in 1687. Quli Qutb-ul-Mulk was a Shia Turkman who migrated from Iran to India where he entered the service of the Bahmani army. Through his father's family, he was a descendant of Kara Yusuf Ibn Muhammad Barani, the ruler of the Karakoyonlu, a Shia Muslim Turkoman tribal federation that ruled over a territory corresponding to present-day Azerbaijan, Georgia, Armenia, northwestern Iran, eastern Turkey and northeastern Iraq from the second half of the 14th century till 1468. In India, in the Bahmanid army, Quli Qutb-ul-Mulk attained a high military rank. In 1495, thanks to the services rendered to the Bahmani dynasty, the ruler Muhammad Shah Bahmani rewarded him with the title of Subedar of Talengana. With the disintegration of the Bahmani kingdom in the early 16th century, Quli Qutb-ul-Mulk assumed independence in 1518 and took the title of Shah, founding the Qutb-ul-Shahi dynasty. His reign got over in 1543, when his own son Jamshid murdered him and became the ruler. At the same time, he blinded his older brother to prevent that he could claim the throne, forcing the other brother Ibrahim Qoli to flee to Vijayanagar to save his life. Jamshid died in 1550 and was succeeded by his son Subhan. He reigned only for a year, as the nobility of Ogolkonda brought back Ibrahim Qoli from his exile in Vijayanagar and proclaimed him sultan. The seven years he spent at the Vijayanagari court were decisive for him and for his kingdom. He lived in fact as a honored guest of Ramaraya, the powerful emperor of Vijayanagar. During his time there, Ibrahim became very close with the imperial family and nobility. In Vijayanagar, Ibrahim married Bagiradi, a noble South Indian Hindu woman. The effects of this union were visible in his attitude towards his Hindu subjects. In fact, when Ibrahim returned to Ogolkonda and took over the throne in 1550, he decided to employ Hindus alongside Muslims for administrative, diplomatic and military purposes within his sultanate. By then, his court was a cosmopolitan and multi-religious center of arts, and Telugu literature and poetry was patronized along the Arabic, Turkish and Persian ones. The memory and the political closeness to the Vijayanagari court did not prevent Ibrahim from taking part in the coalition that, in 1565, defeated the forces of Vijayanagar in the Battle of Talikota. He died in 1580 and was succeeded by his son, Muhammad Qoli Qutb Shah, who was born of his Hindu wife Bagirati. During his reign, relations between Hindus and Muslims became stronger. His name is, however, linked to the city of Hyderabad, founded by him in 1591 to extend the capital beyond the fortified city of Golconda. Hyderabad continued the fortunes of Golconda deriving from the trade of diamonds and precious stones extracted from the numerous mines in the region, which made the two cities hubs of diamond and precious stones trading. The world's largest diamonds were discovered during the sultanate period. The Golconda region can be said to have produced some of the world's most famous diamonds, including the Koh-i-Noor and the White Regent, considered the most beautiful and the purest diamond in the world. Just as in the courts of other sultanates of the Deccan, also the cosmopolitan one of Golconda represented an exquisite fusion between the foreign and the local features. The Qutb Shahi dynasty did not forget its Persianite-Shia culture, and it took it even further by integrating it with the main traits of the regional culture of the Deccan, such as Talegu language and culture. The sultanate architecture produced numerous examples of Indo-Islamic style, a combination of Indian and Persian architectural styles similar to those emerged in the other Deccan sultanates. Some examples are the Golconda fort, the tombs of the Qutb Shahis, Char Minar and Mecca Masjid. The decline of the sultanate began in 1630s, following the same fate of Bijapur. In 1636 Shah Jahan forced the Qutb Shahis to recognize Mughal sovereignty as part of the Mughal expansion in the Deccan. In 1686, at the time of the Mughal conquest of Bijapur, Golconda was ruled by Abdul Hassan Qutb Shah, although was de facto administered by two Hindu ministers, Madana and Akanna. It wasn't long before Oranjeb turned his attention to Golconda. He besieged the fort of Golconda in January 1687 and captured it by September of the same year. Sultan Abdul Hassan was imprisoned and sent to Daulat Abad where was given a lifetime pension. Golconda was then integrated to the Mughal empire. Okay people, that is the end of the video. I hope you enjoyed this brief explanation of the five sultanates of Deccan. Obviously it was not possible to cover in such short videos all the beautiful historical details concerning this wonderful period of Indian history. I hope my small contribution would serve the scope to keep the passion for Indian history alive and away from any political or cinematographic alteration that would bastardize its beauty in the eyes of the general public.