page_title: Alauddin Khalji's conquest of Ranthambore
section_title: Hammira's last stand
hierarchical_section_title: Alauddin Khalji's conquest of Ranthambore / Hammira's last stand
caption_attribution_description: English: very beutiful hammir palace with garden in ranthambor fort.
context_page_description: In 1301 Alauddin Khalji, the ruler of the Delhi Sultanate in India, conquered the neighbouring kingdom of Ranastambhapura.
  Hammira, the Chahamana king of Ranthambore, had granted asylum to some Mongol rebels from Delhi in 1299. He refused requests to either kill these rebels or hand them over to Alauddin, resulting in an invasion from Delhi. Hammira lost his general Bhimasimha to an army led by Alauddin's general Ulugh Khan, and his brother Bhoja defected to Alauddin some days later. After recovering from these initial reverses, Hammira's generals defeated Ulugh Khan's army at a mountain pass near Ranthambore. Alauddin then dispatched his general Nusrat Khan to reinforce Ulugh Khan's army, but Nusrat Khan was killed while besieging the fort.
  Alauddin then himself took control of the operations at Ranthambore. He ordered the construction of a mound to scale its walls. After a long siege, the defenders suffered from a famine and defections. Facing a desperate situation, in July 1301, Hammira and his loyal companions came out of the fort, and fought to death. His wives, daughters and other female relatives committed Jauhar.
context_section_description: The construction of the pasheb, which started in March–April (Rajab), seems to have finished around the beginning of the rainy season in July. By this time, the defenders had exhausted their provisions. According to Amir Khusrau, the fort had become a "desert of thorns" due to scarcity of water and green leaves: the people were willing to purchase "one grain of corn for two grains of gold", but still could not get it. The Rajput bardic chronicles claim that the scarcity of food resulted from a conspiracy by Sarjan Shah, a Buddhist merchant (bania) belonging to the Sharaoji sect. Sarjan Shah's father had been killed by Hammira. To avenge his father's death, he polluted the provisions stored in the fort with animal hides, thus rendering them unusable for the Hindus.
  Having been betrayed by his trusted generals, and under the famine-like circumstances in the fort, Hammira realized that Alauddin would capture the fort sooner or later. Hammira decided to fight to death with his loyal men, while the ladies of the fort prepared for suicide by jauhar (mass self-immolation to avoid falling into the enemy hands). According to the Hammira Mahakavya, Hammira offered to escort the Mongol refugees to a safe place. However, the Mongol leader Muhammad Shah refused the offer: he killed his wife and children, and declared that he would join Hammira's last stand. Hammira asked his brother Virama to be his successor, but Virama too decided to accompany Hammira in his last fight.
  Hammira had all his valuables thrown into the Padmasara lake, and appointed his minister Jaja (also Jajala or Jajadeva) as his successor. Like other loyalists, Jaja had also been offered a safe passage out of the fort, but decided to stay behind. He supervised the organization of the jauhar, in which Hammira's queens, daughters and other female relatives committed suicide.  This jauhar has been described by Alauddin's courtier Amir Khusrau, which makes it the first jauhar to be described in a Persian language text.
  Hammira and his loyal companions marched to the top of the pasheb mound, where they fought to death with Alauddin's army. Some Rajput-era bards claim that Hammira severed his own head and offered it to the god Mahadeva when faced with a certain defeat.
caption: Hammira's palace at the Ranthambore Fort
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