Indian Islamic inscriptions date from the last decade of the 12th century AD
when Muhammad Ghori conquered Delhi and established his kingdom there.
Certain movable objects like arms, seals, signets, vases, utensils and tombs
account for majority of inscriptions, next followed by forts.
The language of the records of the early period of the Delhi Sultanate is Arabic.
Majority of epigraphical records is in Persian in view of the fact that Persian
had been the state or official language right from the beginning of the Muslim
rule. Persian played an important role in the educational and cultural life of the
various regions of the sub-continent in varying degrees depending upon local
factors.
Apart from Arabic, Persian and Urdu inscriptions, there are bilingual.
inscriptions, i.e. Arabic with regional languages like Gujarati, Marathi, Bengali,
Tamil and Malayalam and Persian with the provincial languages like Kannada,
Telugu, Oriya, Tamil, Gujarati and Marathi.
Coin issued by - Iltutmish
Weight: 3.39 gm., Diameter: 15-16 mmHorseman left, holding lance / Four line Arabic legend: al-sultan al-a'zam iltutmish al-sultan
Coin issued by – Ghiyas ud-din Balban
Weight: 10.96 gm., Diameter: 27 mm
Legend with the name of the sultan and his titles /
Legend with the name of Caliph al-Must'asim
in the margin
STYLE OF ART AND ARCHITECTUREThe Sultanate introduced two new architectural ideas, the dome and the pointed arch. The dome was an important decorative structure in Islamic buildings, and soon was implemented in other structures as well. The pointed or true arch that was introduced during this period, was completely different from the type of arches that were being constructed within the country earlier. The earlier Indian style of creating arches was to first put up two pillars. The pillars would then be cut at intervals accommodate 'plug in' projections. There would be a sequence of squares that would gradually decrease in size creating an arch. The new artisans introduced the true arch. This was achieved by making the middle stone a key stone and to have the other stones distribute the load of on the two pillars.
Qutab Minar, is the tallest minar in India, originally
an ancient Islamic Monument, inscribed with
Arabic inscriptions, though the iron pillar has
some Brahmi inscriptions, and is a UNESCO World
Heritage Site Located in Delhi, the Qutub Minar is
made of red sandstone and marble. The stairs of the
tower has 379 steps, is 72.5 metres (237.8 ft) high,
and has a base diameter of 14.3 metres, which
narrows to 2.7 metres at the top storey. Construction
was started in 1192 by Qutub-ud-in-Aibak and was
completed by Iltutmish.