Afsharid
Nader Shah's Sack of Delhi
The looted Mughal capital, 1739 CE
1152 AH / 1739 CE
Educational historical reconstructionWhere
Delhi, after the sack by Nader Shah, northern India
28.6517, 77.2319 · View on OpenStreetMap
Background
In 1739 Nader Shah, the soldier of fortune who had driven the Afghans out of Iran, restored and then seized the throne of Persia and founded the Afsharid dynasty, turned his armies upon India. The Mughal empire, still vast in name but decayed and misgoverned under Muhammad Shah, could not stop him: he crushed the Mughal army at Karnal, north of the capital, in February 1739, and entered Delhi, where the emperor submitted. A few days later a rumour of Nader's death set off a riot in which a number of his soldiers were killed; in answer Nader gave the order, on the morning of 22 March 1739, for a general massacre, the qatl-i amm, in which the people of the city were cut down through the day. The contemporary Persian and Indo-Persian historians, Mirza Mahdi Khan Astarabadi in the Tarikh-i Nadiri among them, and the eyewitness accounts of Delhi, describe streets and quarters filled with the slain; the toll is variously given, often at tens of thousands. The killing stopped when the emperor's men begged for mercy, and the city was then systematically plundered of its accumulated wealth. Nader carried off an immense treasure to Persia, among it the jewelled Peacock Throne of the Mughals, the Takht-i Tawus, and the famous great diamonds, the stone later known as the Koh-i-Noor and the Darya-i Nur among them, so much wealth that he is said to have remitted taxes in Persia for years afterward. The blow laid bare how far the Mughal empire had fallen, and it hastened the breakup of imperial India into the regional powers, the rise of the Marathas and the Sikhs and the others, and the colonial conquest that would follow. This scene depicts the aftermath rather than the killing: the looted bazaar of the Mughal capital under the red gateway of the Red Fort and the dome of the Jama Masjid, smashed and emptied chests and scattered goods strewn across the street, a column of Nader's cavalry riding out with a baggage animal heaped with plunder, and among them a veiled woman and a child of the city's surviving people. In keeping with a sober treatment the slain are not shown; the wreckage and the carried-off spoil carry the event, and the suffering of Delhi's people is named plainly rather than depicted.
What you see
A great red sandstone fortress gateway with a tall pointed arch rises over the wrecked street, and white-domed chhatri pavilions stand beside it; this is the imperial citadel of a Mughal capital, the Red Fort of Shahjahanabad. The form is the broad arch and the pierced red stone of Mughal Delhi, not a Persian or a Deccan style.
Smashed wooden chests lie open and emptied along the lane, baskets are overturned, brass and copper vessels are tipped into the dirt, and rolls of carpet and cloth are dragged half-unrolled across the ground; the rich bazaar has been stripped of everything that could be carried.
Soldiers in dark coats and tall caps are gathered over the heaped plunder, sorting and loading the goods, and baggage animals stand among them laden with bundled spoil. These are the Persian soldiers of Nader Shah, taking the city's treasure away.
This is Delhi after its sack by Nader Shah of Persia, who had crushed the Mughal army at Karnal, entered the capital, and after a riot in which his soldiers were killed loosed a day of general massacre, then stripped the city of its wealth. The killing is past; the scene is the looted aftermath, with no bodies shown.
Among the horsemen a veiled woman and a child go on foot through the wreckage, survivors of the city's people in their ruined home. The blow laid bare how far the once-mighty Mughal empire had decayed and hastened its breakup into the regional powers and the colonial conquest that followed.
Behind the arcaded two-storey market houses, with their carved jharokha balconies and the torn awnings hanging off the shuttered shopfronts, a mosque dome and a tall slender minaret break the skyline; the great congregational mosque of the Mughal capital, the Jama Masjid, stands over the bazaar.
The city sits on the flat northern plains of India near the Yamuna; the conqueror came from Persia by the old north-western invasion road and returned along it, his baggage train carrying off the spoils, among them the jewelled Peacock Throne and the famous great diamonds.
Nader Shah's invasion and the sack of Delhi in 1739 are recorded by his court historian Mirza Mahdi Khan Astarabadi in the Tarikh-i Nadiri and by the Indo-Persian chroniclers of the late Mughal empire. The depiction is the sober aftermath of plunder, not the massacre itself.
Further reading & cross-references
Mirza Mahdi Khan Astarabadi, Tarikh-i Nadiri (court history of Nader Shah): Nader's court historian; the near-contemporary Persian narrative of the Indian campaign, the battle of Karnal, the entry into Delhi, the massacre, and the plunder. A victor's record, used with that awareness.
Indo-Persian and Mughal histories and eyewitness accounts of the sack of Delhi: The Mughal-side chronicles and eyewitness narratives of the qatl-i amm and the stripping of the capital; used for the riot, the day of massacre, and the suffering of the city.
Modern histories of Nader Shah and the decline of the Mughals (academic): Used for the chronology, the carrying-off of the Peacock Throne and the Koh-i-Noor and Darya-i Nur diamonds, the casualty estimates, and the consequences for India. Non-confessional cross-reference.
Topography and architecture of Mughal Shahjahanabad (Red Fort, Chandni Chowk, Jama Masjid): Confirms the depicted setting: the red sandstone Red Fort gateway, the arcaded bazaar street, and the congregational mosque of Shah Jahan's capital, all standing in 1739.
Literary topos of the sacked city (aftermath framing): The depiction follows the sober aftermath convention, the looted street and the withdrawing plunderers, rather than a graphic massacre.
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