A historian is surveying the fortress walls of Vijayanagara. She counts several lines of walls, one inside another. The stone blocks are wedge shaped and no mortar has been used anywhere. Square and rectangular bastions project outwards from the walls, and gateways open onto old roads. The walls tell her how the city was defended, but not what the spaces between the walls once held. For that she turns to the account of a Persian ambassador who saw the city in the fifteenth century.
What did this ambassador report about the area between the first, second and third walls?
Answer & explanation
Correct answer: option 1
The correct answer is Option (1) → Cultivated fields, gardens and houses
Option (1) Cultivated fields, gardens and houses — Correct. The ambassador was <strong>Abdur Razzaq</strong>. He noted <strong>cultivated fields, gardens and houses</strong> between the first three walls. The most significant point of this fortification is that it <strong>enclosed agricultural tracts</strong>.
Option (2) Temples, bazaars and merchants' houses — Incorrect. Temples and bazaars stood in the sacred centre and the urban core. Abdur Razzaq described farmland and houses between the outer walls.
Option (3) Barracks for soldiers and elephant stables — Incorrect. The walls had armed defenders, yet Abdur Razzaq described farmland there. He saw fields, gardens and houses.
Option (4) Tanks, wells and bathing places — Incorrect. Tanks and wells belonged to the city's water system. Abdur Razzaq reported farmland and houses between the first three walls.
NCERT (2026-27): “3.2 Fortifications and roads … “What was most significant about this fortification is that it enclosed agricultural tracts. Abdur Razzaq noted that “ between the first, second and the third walls there are cultivated fields, gardens and houses”. …” |