Delhi Sultanate was the Muslim empire that ruled over the Indian subcontinent. Although it shares its name with the ‘Empire of Delhi’ it is different in many aspects. Five different dynasties — the Slave, Khalji, Tughlaq, Sayyids and Lodis — ruled under the Delhi Sultanate.
Five dynasties ruled over the Delhi Sultanate sequentially:
- The Mamluk dynasty (1206–1290)
- The Khalji dynasty (1290–1320)
- The Tughlaq dynasty (1320–1414)
- The Sayyid dynasty (1414–1451), and
- The Lodi dynasty (1451–1526)
It covered large swathes of territory in modern-day India, Pakistan, Bangladesh as well as some parts of southern Nepal.
As a successor to the Ghurid dynasty, the Delhi Sultanate was originally one among a number of principalities ruled by the Turkic slave-generals of Muhammad Ghori, including Yildiz, Aibek and Qubacha, that had inherited and divided the Ghurid territories amongst themselves.
After a long period of infighting, the Mamluks were overthrown in the Khalji revolution which marked the transfer of power from the Turks to a heterogeneous Indo-Muslim nobility.
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