The word 'fort' comes from the Latin word fortis, which means 'strong' or 'valiant'. 'Fort' is used to describe a fortified building or a group of buildings, like a small town or a village. In Hindi, we use words like kot and garh, while the Persian word qila has perhaps become the more popular and colloquial term among the lot. Forts are usually associated with the defence mechanism of a governing body to safeguard a site or people. Forts can house garrisons, a king's palace, or even an entire city. In many cases, there have been strong fortifications around tombs, religious sites, water structures, or even in one case an empty ground reserved for an emergency.
Given this wide range of inclusions, it becomes difficult to tell which constructions qualify to be called a proper fort and which do not. In a few archival maps, various idgahs (open ground for mass gatherings during Islamic festivals) and a few sarais are also shown as forts. Barracks/posts like that of Patparganj have also been depicted as proper forts. Most of these do not exist beyond the names of the localities. Lal Kot and Qila-i-Rai Pithora have been clubbed together as the latter was created as an extension to the former and there has been a long debate on their demarcation. At the same time, Nai ka Kot and Adilabad, which were built as related structures, have been kept under separate heads, as at present time they stand far from each other and have their independent history.
For this book, only the buildings that have been recognised as forts by the Archaeological Survey of India or the State Archaeological Department have been considered. Further, the list was sorted based on the present state of the structure, its accessibility, past and present context, cleanliness, historic value, size and the percentage of the outer wall intact. The top 10 forts from an assorted list have been included in this book. While the major forts like Red Fort, Purana Qila, Tughlaqabad, Adilabad, Nai ka Kot, Najafgarh, etc. have been covered, smaller fortifications like Kotla Isa Khan, Kotla Mubarakpur and the lost walls of Qila Qadm Sharif, Naraina Fort and Kalka Garhi unfortunately have not made to the cut. I hope for an opportunity in the future to unearth them.
Throughout this book, one will find repeated references to few books written during the Sultanate, Mughal or the British times. As a reader, one must be aware of these masterpieces. The oldest reference is to Tarikh-i-Firoz Shahi, which as the name suggests, is a historical biography of Firoz Shah Tughlaq. However, it offers much more than that. There are two authors, who have written a book each with same title. Zia-ud-Din Barani, the first author was a child during the times of Alauddin Khalji. He lived for first few years of Firoz Shah Tughlaq's reign and documented the first six years of his time at the throne. Barani mentions that his father and uncle were employed by the Khalji emperor. Perhaps this gave him an edge over others in his chronicling. There are mixed views about his narrative as he was sometimes considered to be biased towards his employer. Shams-i-Siraj Afif is the other author, who was contemporary to Feroz Shah Tughlaq and wrote his account under the same title, 'Tarikh-i-Firoz Shahi'.
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