Probably It Was A Common Saying That There Were 12 Kings In
India, And The Fact Of His Having Himself Described So Many, Which He Knew
Did Not Nearly Embrace The Whole, May Have Made Polo Convert This Into 13.
Jordanus Says:
"In this Greater India are 12 idolatrous kings and more;"
but his Greater India is much more extensive than Polo's. Those which he
names are Molebar (probably the kingdom of the Zamorin of Calicut),
Singuyli (Cranganor), Columbum (Quilon), Molephatan (on the east
coast, uncertain, see above pp.
333, 391), and Sylen (Ceylon), Java,
three or four kings, Telenc (Polo's Mutfili), Maratha (Deogir),
Batigala (in Canara), and in Champa (apparently put for all
Indo-China) many kings. According to Firishta there were about a dozen
important principalities in India at the time of the Mahomedan conquest
of which he mentions eleven, viz.: (1) Kanauj, (2) Mirat (or Delhi),
(3) Mahavan (Mathra), (4) Lahore, (5) Malwa, (6) Guzerat, (7)
Ajmir, (8) Gwalior, (9) Kalinjar, (10) Multan, (11) Ujjain.
(Ritter, V. 535.) This omits Bengal, Orissa, and all the Deccan. Twelve
is a round number which constantly occurs in such statements. Ibn Batuta
tells us there were 12 princes in Malabar alone. Chinghiz, in
Sanang-Setzen, speaks of his vow to subdue the twelve kings of the human
race (91). Certain figures in a temple at Anhilwara in Guzerat are said by
local tradition to be the effigies of the twelve great kings of Europe.
(Todd's Travels, p. 107.) The King of Arakan used to take the title of
"Lord of the 12 provinces of Bengal" (Reinaud, Inde, p. 139.)
The Masalak-al-Absar of Shihabuddin Dimishki, written some forty years
after Polo's book, gives a list of the provinces (twice twelve in number)
into which India was then considered to be divided. It runs - (1) Delhi,
(2) Deogir, (3) Multan, (4) Kehran (Kohram, in Sirhind Division of
Province of Delhi?), (5) Saman (Samana, N.W. of Delhi?), (6) Siwastan
(Sehwan), (7) Ujah (Uchh), (8) Hasi (Hansi), (9) Sarsati (Sirsa),
(10) Ma'bar, (11) Tiling, (12) Gujerat, (13) Badaun, (14) Audh,
(15) Kanauj, (16) Laknaoti (Upper Bengal), (17) Bahar, (18) Karrah
(in the Doab), (19) Malawa, (Malwa), (20) Lahaur, (21) Kalanur (in
the Bari Doab, above Lahore), (22) Jajnagar (according to Elphinstone,
Tipura in Bengal), (23) Tilinj (a repetition or error), (24) Dursamand
(Dwara Samudra, the kingdom of the Bellals in Mysore). Neither Malabar nor
Orissa is accounted for. (See Not. et Ext. XIII. 170). Another list,
given by the historian Zia-uddin Barni some years later, embraces again
only twelve provinces. These are (1) Delhi, (2) Gujerat, (3) Malwah, (4)
Deogir, (5) Tiling, (6) Kampilah (in the Doab, between Koil and
Farakhabad), (7) Dur Samandar, (8) Ma'bar, (9) Tirhut, (10) Lakhnaoti,
(11) Satganw, (12) Sunarganw (these two last forming the Western and
Eastern portions of Lower Bengal).[1]
[1] E. Thomas, Chronicles of the Pathan Kings of Delhi, p. 203.
CHAPTER XXXV.
TREATING OF THE GREAT PROVINCE OF ABASH WHICH IS MIDDLE INDIA, AND IS ON
THE MAINLAND.
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