In Reality a Man: Sultan Iltutmish, His Daughter, Raziya, and Gender Ambiguity in
Thirteenth Century Northern India.
By: Alyssa Gabbay
Gabbay, A. (January 01, 2011). In Reality a Man: Sultan Iltutmish, His Daughter, Raziya, and
Gender Ambiguity in Thirteenth Century Northern India. Journal of Persianate Studies, 4, 1, 45-
63.
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Abstract:
Ruler of the Delhi Sultanate in northern India from 1236 to 1240, Raziya is a striking example of
a woman who rose to power in a pre-modern Islamic society. It was Raziya's father's recognition
and cultivation of her wisdom and ruling capacities, as well as his apparent naming of her as his
successor, that paved the way for her accession to the throne. This article offers an explanation of
how Raziya was able to rule in an environment in which the birth of daughters normally gave
rise to disappointment and women had few avenues for authority. It will argue that despite
medieval Muslim India's assigning to women a status separate from and inferior to that of men, a
metaphorical space existed in which women could identify or be identified as men. As in many
non-Muslim societies, such identification could become a means for a daughter to enter into
male sociopolitical spheres.
Raziya | female sovereignty | cross dressing | Delhi Sultanate | daughters | India | Keywords:
Islamic society
Article:
Among the most striking examples of Muslim daughters who succeeded their fathers to positions
of power is that of Raziya, a thirteenth-century sultan of the Delhi Sultanate in India who
acceded to the throne thanks largely to her own superior abilities, and to her father’s recognition
of them. Although Raziya’s reign lasted less than four years, she left an important legacy of
female rule in South Asia. Most notable for the purposes of this study is her personification of a
certain paradigm of female successor: the Warrior Daughter who transcends gender distinctions
and becomes, essentially, a man once she ascends the throne. Like her forebears in Sasanian Iran,
Bōrān and Āzarmidokht—both of whom will be discussed in this article—Raziya assumed the
trappings of masculinity in order to rule effectively, discarding female attire and donning the
tunic and headdress of a man. This article will argue that her identification as a male, which
brings to mind the performative aspects of gender that is part of contemporary gender theory,
exploited a metaphorical space in which elite daughters could exercise greater agency within a
society that normally severely restricted their actions (Butler, 140). It will investigate the
elements contributing to the creation of that space and its limits, and reveal how Raziya’s
example, like those of cross-dressing women in the West, challenges “previous understandings
of medieval definitions of gender” by showing that the boundaries between the sexes were far
more permeable than often portrayed (Hotchkiss, 12). Finally, it will suggest that neither
Raziya’s gender nor her attempts to conceal it were deciding factors in her eventual deposition,
though they do play a major part in how she is culturally remembered.
An Overview of Raziya’s Reign
Peter Jackson notes that sources for Raziya’s reign are relatively limited. Only one historian who
was contemporary with her rule, the Ghurid Menhāj-e Serāj (d. ca. 1260), recorded the events of
the period, and he is rather elliptical (Jackson, 182 -83). The remainder of the medieval sources,
written sometimes a century or more after the events, produced greatly embellished versions of
the story. A few events do emerge with relative clarity from Menhāj’s account. As he notes,
Raziya was the eldest daughter of Iltutmish, a Delhi sultan of the thirteenth century who was of
Turkish stock (Menhāj, I, 456; tr. I, 635). Iltutmish intended for his eldest son, Nāser al-Din
Mahmud Shah, to succeed him. But after that son died prematurely of illness in 629/1229, the
sultan was obliged to make other plans.
According to Menhāj, after returning from an expedition to Gwalior in 630/1233, the sultan
designated as his successor Raziya, the daughter of his chief wife, Terken (Torkān) Khātun. The
historian explains that Raziya “exercised authority, and possessed great grandeur . . .” and
because her father “used to notice in her indications of sovereignty and high spirit, although she
was a daughter, and [consequently] veiled from public gaze . . . he commanded [his secretary] to
write out a decree, naming his daughter as his heir-apparent, and she was made his heir
[accordingly] . . .” (Menhāj, I, 457-59; tr. I, 638).2 This designation was carried out over the
complaints of his attendants, who maintained that he should not name his daughter as successor
when he had “grown-up sons who [were] eligible for sovereignty” (Menhāj, I, 458; tr. I, 638).
Menhāj records the sultan as responding that his sons were “engrossed in the pleasures of youth,
and none of them possesses the capability of managing the affairs of the country”; whereas
Raziya, his daughter, was the most worthy, as would be proven after his death (Menhāj, I, 458;
tr. I, 639).
At a different point in the narrative, however, Menhāj conveys an expectation prevalent among
the people that Raziya’s half-brother, later known as Rokn al-Din Firuz Shah, would succeed his
father. Firuz Shah had been granted the eqtāʿ of Lahore upon Iltutmish’s return from Gwalior,
the same time that the sultan apparently designated Raziya his successor. Upon Iltutmish’s return
to the capital from his final military expedition, the ailing sultan brought Firuz Shah with him,
“for the people had their eyes upon him, since, after [the late] Malik Nāsir-ud-Dīn, Mahmūd
Shah, he was the eldest of [Iltutmish’s] sons” (Menhāj, I, 454-55; tr. I, 631). In fact, the day after
the sultan’s death, on 21 Shaʿbān 633—corresponding to April 30, 1236—the “[m]aliks and
grandees of the kingdom, by agreement,” seated Firuz Shah on the throne (ibid).3 His brief,
tumultuous reign was dominated by his mother, Shah Terken, who ruled the kingdom while
Firuz Shah occupied himself in “buffoonery, sensuality, and diversion” (Menhāj, I, 457; tr. I,
636).
Shah Terken’s use of her newfound power to settle old scores led to widespread revolt among
nobles and officials in the kingdom, many of whom broke out into open rebellion. Amid the
turmoil, Shah Terken attempted to put Raziya to death, upon which the people of Delhi rose up,
attacked the palace and seized Shah Terken. After considerable upheaval, the Delhi forces and
members of Iltutmish’s personal slave group enthroned Raziya, who ordered Firuz Shah
imprisoned. He was executed on 18 Rabiʿ I 634/ 19 November 1236.4
Under Raziya, Menhāj observes, “all things returned to their usual rules and customs . . .” and,
after initial rebellions by some provincial governors and emirs who refused to acknowledge her,
“the kingdom became pacified, and the power of the state widely extended” (Menhāj, I, 457; tr.
I, 639, 641). The historian writes that from Lakhnawati to Diwal and Damrilah—that is, from
western Bengal to lower Sind—“all the Maliks and Amīrs manifested their obedience and
submission” (Menhāj, I, 459; tr. I, 639). Even if the power of the state was extended during her
reign, however, evidence also exists of retrenchment from Hindu strongholds such as Rantabhur
and Gwalior— events that may have displeased Iltutmish’s slave officers, who had taken great
pride in the sultan’s conquests of those regions (Jackson, 188).
Two highly provocative statements occur about midway through Menhāj’s account. He writes
that the malek (emir in some versions) Jamāl al-Din Yāqut, the Habashi (Abyssinian), “who was
Lord of the Stables, acquired favor in attendance upon the Sultān,” and that this favor caused the
Turkish emirs and other officials to become envious (Menhāj, I, 460; tr. I, 642-43). The historian
then writes, nearly in the same breath, that the sultan put aside female dress, and “issued from
[her] seclusion, and donned the tunic, and assumed the head-dress [of a man], and appeared
among the people; and, when she rode out on an elephant, at the time of mounting it, all people
used, openly, to see her” (Menhāj, I, 460; tr. I, 643).
Subsequent to Raziya’s discarding of female attire, an act no doubt undertaken to enhance her air
of authority and military power, many of the leaders who had previously supported the sultan
began to rise up against her. She succeeded in crushing the first internal rebellion, instigated by
ʿEzz al-Din Kabir Khan, the eqtāʿ-holder of Lahore, but failed to do so with the second,
instigated by Ekhtiār al-Din Altunapa, commander of the crown fortress of Tabarhindh and
secretly abetted by emirs of the court.5 As Menhāj writes, when Raziya pursued Altunapa to
Tabarhindh (identified with Bhatinda in Punjab, northwest of Delhi), the Turkish emirs “rose
against her, and put to death [her supporter], Amīr [Jamāl al-Din Yāqut], the Habashī, seized
Sultān Raziyyat and put her in durance, and sent her to the fortress” of Tabarhindh (Menhāj, I,
461; tr. I, 645). In the meantime, they enthroned in her place her brother, thenceforth known as
Moʿezz al-Din Bahrām Shah. They likely hoped to exert more power during his reign by
insisting on the appointment of a viceroy to the sultan, Aytegin, Raziya’s amir-e hājeb (military
chamberlain) and a former member of Iltutmish’s personal slave troop.
Here the story takes another surprising twist. After Aytegin overstepped his bounds and was
subsequently murdered on the new sultan’s orders, Altunapa—who had no doubt hoped to derive
favors from his now-deceased ally—came to see the expediency of marrying Raziya, his
prisoner, and attempting to retake the sultanate, a plan to which Raziya agreed. Together they
marched an army towards Delhi, aiming to dethrone Bahrām Shah (Menhāj, I, 462; tr. I, 647).
But the new sultan led out a force to rout his sister and Altunapa and succeeded. The troops
accompanying the couple abandoned them, and both Raziya and her husband were killed by
Hindus on 25 Rabiʿ I 638/14 October 1240.
As valuable as it is, Menhāj’s account leaves much to be desired. His laconicism creates ample
opportunity for misunderstanding and for later elaboration by less circumspect historians, as does
his tendency to narrate the same events slightly differently in separate tabaqāt (Jackson, 183).
One matter that remains shrouded in ambiguity, given the markers also pointing to Firuz Shah, is
whether Iltutmish actually designated Raziya as his successor. Jackson notes that since Menhāj
was not in Delhi at the time of the sultan’s return from Gwalior, he could not have witnessed the
appointment; “in these circumstances, we have to consider the possibility that the story is
apocryphal and was put about by those who made her sultān” (idem, 184). Still, whether Raziya
was actually appointed by her father is perhaps not the burning issue here. She clearly manifested
leadership qualities that were observed both by the sultan and those around him—qualities that
lent credence to the decision to seat her on the throne, no matter from whom it came.
Even greater confusion is engendered by Menhāj’s cryptic descriptions of the jealousy aroused
among Turkish emirs by Raziya’s preference for Jamāl al-Din Yāqut, and the sultan’s subsequent
discarding of female attire. The proximity of the two statements makes it tempting to link them,
and their gendered nature proves a trap into which many a medieval (and modern) historian falls.
As will be seen, the fantastic, amorous speculation to which they gave rise in the middle Islamic
period produced an even more luridly romantic scenario in the modern period: the transformation
of this “warlike” sultan into a beleaguered heroine whose reputation stands in need of rescuing
(Menhāj, I, 457;
tr. I, 637).
Precedents for Female Rule
Precedents among Turks, Mongol-type peoples, and even Persians likely played a role in paving
the way to Raziya’s accession to the throne. Jackson observes that many of the Turkish slave
officers who brought her to power originated from the Pontic and Caspian steppes, where women
were afforded significantly more latitude than they enjoyed in non-nomadic societies (Jackson,
189). Other gholāms were of “Khitan or Qara-Khitan stock—Mongol-type peoples of the eastern
steppes” who founded dynasties in Turkestan (idem, 189-90). Upon the death of Gur Khān, a
Khitan leader, his daughter Koyunk Khātun ruled Turkestan for several years in the twelfth
century. A. B. M. Habibullah further notes that one of the feudatory rulers of Khwārazm “was
succeeded early in the same century by his only child, a daughter, who even after her marriage to
the founder of the Khwārizmshāhī dynasty, retained her sovereign power and title” (Habibullah,
752).
Similarly, Maria Szuppe observes that “Turko-Mongol nomadic cultural tradition, as compared
with Irano-Islamic customs of settled people, gave a much larger place to women’s social and
political activities and to family blood ties on both paternal and maternal sides.” Female
members of ruling Mongol and Ilkhan families were “entitled to a share of booty and had the
right to participate in the quriltay, the all-Mongol assembly. Not only did they become regents of
their minor sons, but also under certain circumstances they could themselves lay claim to the
throne. Even after Islamization progressed among the Turko-Mongol tribes, women retained
much of their social position” (Szuppe, 141). Szuppe further notes that traditional Turkic patterns
of succession gave all male members of the family—“including those descending from the
female line”—the right to the throne (idem, 147). In the absence of a fit male scion, appointing a
daughter to rule was not a radical move.
Ancient Persian precedent may also have influenced those who enthroned Raziya, albeit less
directly. Habibullah suggests that for Persians (and “therefore, the Turks who were fast
assimilating the Persian political traditions”)
the acceptance of a female sovereign was rendered unavoidable by their monarchical
theory, according to which Divinity was believed to reside in the person of the king.
Since none but persons of royal blood had any right to assume royal titles, and since this
divinity could not be transferred except through direct descent, it is not difficult to see
that the possibility of a daughter succeeding her father could not be excluded.
(Habibullah, 753-54)
Such examples would have been transmitted via the Shāhnāma, with which Turkish officers and
other powerful figures in the sultanate would likely have been acquainted. The accounts of
Homāy, the legendary Kayānid ruler who was appointed by her father, Ardashir Bahman, and
who reigned successfully for thirty-odd years, and of Bōrān and Āzarmidokht, two royal sisters
who ascended to the Sasanian throne one after the other, provided precedents of ruling daughters
in Iran. Although Ferdowsi includes in his account of Bōrān’s brief rule an obligatory statement
that “when a woman becomes king, matters go badly,” he presents her and her sister as effective
and just rulers (Ferdowsi, IX, 305:1).
Many of these examples derive from pre-Islamic times. But Islamic mores did not necessarily
militate against a daughter’s succeeding her father, at least not on legal grounds. Habibullah