Page:The Seven Cities of Delhi.djvu/106

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In Old Delhi the Tuar kings, Anang Pal and his successors, reigned undisturbed, as we may suppose, for a century, during which time they were able to build the city walls, and con- struct certain masonry dams and tanks, about eight miles to the south-east : it is true that the reputed dates of these works would make their construction date from about the middle of the eighth century, but this can be explained by a mistake in the era from which the dates are counted. In a.d. 1151 there was an irruption of Chohan Rajputs, who conquered Delhi, but an arrangement was come to, by which the Tuar should marry a Chohan princess, and their off- spring be King of Delhi. We have evidence of this Chohan conqueror in an inscription on the pillar of Asoka, which stands in the Kotlla of Firoze Shah: this inscription is dated a.d. 1164, and records the power of Visala Deva, whose kingdom extended from the Himalaya mountains to the Vindhya Range, bordering the Nerbudda River. This king probably was the grandfather of Prithwi Raja, who built the citadel of Lalkot, in Old Delhi, and who, after once defeating the Mahomedan invaders, in his turn met with adverse fortune, being killed by them in 1193 on the battlefield of Tilauri. And so Old Delhi passed into Mahomedan hands, and became the