44 FRONTIER WITH THE HOUSE OF GOLD
from the city of Navasarika in southern Gujarat, where the Calukya
prince Pulakesiraja defeated the Muslim armies. A copper plate
grant records the Calukya king Vallabha bestowing great titles on Pu-
lakesiraja for this feat.^58
Sind until the Thirteenth Century
As Baladhuri's narrative progresses through the Umayyad regimes and
into the 'Abbasid era, disruption and distress are central themes: com-
manders or governors are killed, cities are founded and abandoned, trea-
ties end in bloodshed. The frontier of Sind retains a markedly chaotic
flavor in these accounts, especially when Baladhuri discusses the Arab
governors who refuse to submit to Damascus or Baghdad. The ·names
of Kharajites and 'Ayyar who populate Baladhuri's narratives indicate
the real contestations over political power and revenue on the Indic
frontier between these groups and the 'Abbasid regime. Baladhuri notes
that by the time of the caliph Mu'tasim (r. 813-833), the 'Abbasid state
had sent a long list of governors to Sind. It also had a large influx of
hadith scholars and jurists who made their way to the port cities in
Sind. And though pottery and coins gathered from Samarra, Fustat,
Daybul, and Mansura show that a cross-regional trade existed, the po-
litical climate between Baghdad and Sind remained contentious.^59
Baladhuri notes that the earliest city state was established during
the time of Ma'mun (809-813), when Fazal bin Mahan captured the
Gujarat port city of Sindan (near Bombay) and sent an elephant as a
gift to the caliph in Baghdad.^60 Baladhuri reports on only two genera-
tions of the Mahaniya who ruled the city and carried out expeditions
against the coastal pirate colonies. The second polity to emerge was
the Habari polity at the city of Mansura. After the death of Mut-
awakkil in 847, 'Amr bin Abdulaziz Habari declared himself ruler of
Mansura and pledged allegiance to the new 'Abbasid caliph.^61 He col-
lected taxes and organized the flow of trade through the channels of
the Indus. The third and final main principality emerged in the city of
Multan around 892.
In 915, when the geographer Mas'udi traveled to Mansura and
Multan, he noted that both cities were governed by descendants of 'Ali
bin Abu Talib, who were denominationally Shi'a, but that the Friday