Show notes
- Mahmud of Ghazni made an immense effort to conquer Gujarat, according to Zakariya ibn Muhammad, another thirteenth-century Muslim historian, because he hoped that if he was able to destroy Gujarat utterly, its inhabitants would be shocked and demoralized into submission, and would convert to Islam en masse.
- The people of Gujarat, however, did not submit but resisted, and fifty thousand were killed.
- Entering one Hindu temple in Gujarat, Mahmud was overcome with anger at seeing the idols; raising his battle-axe, he hit one with full force, breaking it into pieces. The pieces were carried to Ghazni and placed at the threshold of the mosque as a sign of the victory of Islam over the idols and the superiority of Allah to them.