This illustrated study investigates the Indo-Islamic fighting men of South Asia from\n\nthe 7th century AD to the Mughal conquest of the 16th century.\nFrom 1206, much of what is now India as well as parts of Pakistan, Bangladesh and\nNepal were ruled by a succession of Islamic dynasties that had their origins in the\nGhurid forces that conquered parts of northern India in the 12th century. Although it was\nnever complete, the Islamic domination of this huge region also had a profound impact\nupon Islamic civilization as a whole, not least in military terms, being felt as far west as\nAfrica. Within South Asia, the war-torn medieval centuries laid the foundations for the\nsubsequent even more brilliant Mughal Empire.\nFeaturing eight plates of superb artwork alongside carefully chosen photographs and\nillustrations, this study complements the same author's Medieval Indian Armies (1):\nHindu, Buddhist and Jain. It describes and illustrates the Indo-Islamic forces operating\nin South Asia, from the Umayyad Caliphate’s frontier in north­western India and\nAfghanistan in the late 7th century through to the Delhi Sultanate, the Sultanate of\nBengal and the Bahmani Sultanate in the 15th and 16th centuries.\nDavid Nicolle explains how, with respect to arms, armour, fortification and transport both\non land and at sea, the widely successful Muslim armies learned a great deal from their\nmore numerous Hindu, Jain and Buddhist opponents. This was especially evident in\ndevelopments such as the use of war-elephants and the adoption of lighter, often textilebased forms of protection such as ‘soft armour’ made of cotton. On the other side, there\nwould be widespread adoption of more potent weapons such as the composite bow,\nand considerably more sophisticated systems of cavalry warfare, among the nonIslamic forces of the Indian sub-continent. Fully illustrated, this absorbing account casts\nlight on many centuries of warfare in South Asia.