Q1.
Al-Masūdī, a 10th-century Arab historian and traveller from Baghdad, gave high praise to a Rāṣhṭrakūṭa ruler: “His troops and elephants are innumerable. … There is none among the rulers of Sindh and Hind who in his territory respects the Muslims [as he does]. In his kingdom, Islam is honoured and protected. And, for them, mosques and congregational mosques, which are always full, have been built for offering prayers five times.” What does this tell us about the Rāṣhṭrakūṭas?
Answer
It tells us the Rāṣhṭrakūṭas were both very powerful and deliberately tolerant — and that their tolerance extended to a religion newly arrived from outside India. Read the quotation in three parts.
- “His troops and elephants are innumerable.” This is a foreign visitor, not a court poet, confirming Rāṣhṭrakūṭa military strength. It matches the chapter’s own statement that they were “one of the most dominant powers for nearly two centuries, their empire spanning much of the subcontinent”.
- “There is none among the rulers of Sindh and Hind who in his territory respects the Muslims [as he does].” Al-Masūdī is comparing Indian rulers with one another, and putting this king first. Note the date: the 10th century, only two centuries after the Arab conquest of Sindh. Even so, Muslim traders on the Rāṣhṭrakūṭa coast were protected.
- “Mosques … which are always full, have been built.” Not merely permitted — built, and in use every day. That is active state support for a community’s worship.
What we can conclude. The chapter has already told us the Rāṣhṭrakūṭas “equally patronised Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain schools of thought”. Al-Masūdī shows that this policy was not limited to India’s older traditions: it was extended to Islam as well. Their tolerance was a settled way of governing, not a personal preference of one king. Amoghavarṣha I is the same pattern — “strongly drawn to Jainism; however, he also patronised Hindu temples.”
Why a strong king would do this: the Rāṣhṭrakūṭa empire lived on trade as well as land. Arab merchants brought the west-coast shipping described later in the chapter. A ruler who protects a merchant community keeps its ships, its goods and its taxes. Good governance and good business pointed the same way here — and Al-Masūdī’s praise is itself proof it worked, since he wrote it after being treated well.
Tip on using sources: a foreign observer praising a distant king is usually worth more than a court inscription praising its own patron. Compare this with Ravikīrti’s inscription at Aihole on page 77, which the chapter says “is not free from exaggerations”.