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Updated: May 24, 2025
From that time forward the history of Chitor is but a tale of sack and slaughter, relieved in its murkiest days by flashes of brilliant heroism and self-sacrificing devotion while the chivalrous Rajputs struggled vainly against the successive waves of the Mohammedan invasions, which in a fierce flood for centuries swept over India, and deluged it with blood.
"A few more steps brought us to the door of the armoury. This is small and badly arranged, which seems a pity, as there were some lovely things. Chain armour and inlaid suits lay about the floor in heaps; and we were shown the saddle used by Akbar during the last siege of Chitor. The most remarkable things, however, were the Rajput shields, of which there were some beautiful specimens.
Once more was the Johur commanded, while 8000 Rajputs ate the last "beera" together, and put on their saffron robes. The gates were thrown open, "and few survived to stain the yellow mantle by inglorious surrender." Thus in the blood-red cloud of battle sank for ever the Sun of Chitor; for from this, the third and last "saka," the ruined city never rose.
And there, where Kings and Princes had held audience watched by their womenfolk through fretted screens was neither roof nor walls; only a group of marble pillars, as it were assembled in ghostly conference. The stark silence and emptiness not of yesterday, but of centuries smote him with a personal pang. From end to end of the rock it brooded; a haunting presence, tutelary goddess of Chitor.
Descending at a foot's pace, the chill of emptiness and of oncoming twilight seemed to close like icy fingers on Roy's heart; though the death of Amber was as nothing to the death of Chitor the warrior-queen, ravished and violently slain by Akbar's legions. Amber had, as it were, died peacefully in her sleep.
Defeating the Emperor Mahmoud, Hamir entered Chitor in triumph, and once again the standard of the Sun floated over its blood-stained rocks. The Emperor Mahmoud himself was led captive into Chitor, and kept prisoner there for three months until he regained his liberty by surrendering Ajmere, Rinthumbore, Nagore, and Sooe Sopoor, with fifty lacs of rupees and a hundred elephants.
His grandfather had written of him to the Maharana of Udaipur a cousin in the third degree: and he had leave to go in and out, during his stay, at what hour he pleased. He would remain on the rock till dawn; and from the ninth storey of Khumba Rána's Tower he would see the sun rise over Chitor....
"Say on," she said in her voice of music. He unfurled a scroll that he had crushed in his strong right hand, and read aloud: "'Thus says Allah-u-Din, Shadow of God, Wonder of the Age, Viceregent of Kings. We have heard that in the Treasury of Chitor is a jewel, the like of which is not in the Four Seas the work of the hand of the Only God, to whom be praise!
For he loved the veiled spirit of night as most men love the unveiled face of morning; and in no way, perhaps, was he more clearly of the East. In a land where the sun slays his thousands, the moon comes triumphantly to her own: and Roy decided, there and then, that in the glamour of her light he would take his first look at Chitor.
The Queen was clothed in a gold robe of rejoicing, her bodice latticed with diamonds and great gems, and upon her bosom the necklace of table emeralds, alight with green fire, which is the jewel of the Queens of Chitor. So she stood radiant as a vision of Shri, and it appeared that rays encircled her person.
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