THE EAST IN MEDIEVAL TIMES 311

Mahmud is also remembered for his association with the
great scholar Al-Biruni and the great Persian poet Firdausi.
The former was learned in * astronomy, mathematics, chro-
nology, mathematical geography, physics, chemistry, and
mineralogy', and his great work on India is described as
*a magic island of quiet impartial research in the midst
of a world of clashing swords, burning towns, and plundered
temples.' Firdausi was the author of the greatest of Per-
sian epics, the Shah-namah.

We have not the space here to recount, except very briefly,
the rest of Muslim history in India, nor is more necessary
for our purposes. Another Muhammad followed. He de-
feated and killed the famous Prithvi Raj Chauhan, and also
paved the way for the foundation of the Slave 'dynasty/
The greatest of these were Iltutmish and Balban and a
queen (rare in Muslim history), Razia. Then came the
Khaljis of whom the most notable was Allauddin (1296—
1316). Under him Muslim arms reached the farthest cor-
ners of India. Though extremely tyrannical, he was also
a reformer. He tried to control the markets and prices as
well as the consumption of liquor. The next dynasty was
that of the Tughlaks of whom the remarkable and quixotic
Muhammad (1325—51) is well known for his currency ex-
periments and changing his capital from Delhi to Deogiri
with disastrous consequences. "He was perfect in the hu-
manities of his day," writes a historian, "a master of
style, supremely eloquent in an age of rhetoric, a philoso-
pher, trained in logic and Greek metaphysics, with whom
scholars feared to argue, a mathematician and a lover of
science." At the same time, according to the contemporary
witness Ibn Battuta,

' This king of all men is the one who most loves to dispense
gifts and to shed blood. His gateway is never free from a beggar