Editing Mathura (section)

====High Middle Ages====
The city was sacked and many of its temples destroyed by [[Mahmud of Ghazni]] in 1018 CE.<ref name=EB1911/> The capture of Mathura by [[Mahmud of Ghazni|Maḥmūd Ibn Sebüktegīn]] is described by the historian al-Utbi (Abu Nasr Muhammad ibn Muhammad al Jabbaru-l 'Utbi) in his work [[Tarikh Yamini]] as follows:

{{Blockquote|The wall of the city was constructed of hard stone, and two gates opened upon the river flowing under the city, which were erected upon strong and lofty foundations, to protect them against the floods of the river and rains. On both sides of the city there were a thousand houses, to which idol temples were attached, all strengthened from top to bottom by rivets of iron, and all made of masonry work; and opposite to them were other buildings, supported on broad wooden pillars, to give them strength.}}

{{Blockquote|In the middle of the city there was a temple larger and firmer than the rest, which can neither be described nor painted. The Sultan thus wrote respecting it :— " If any should wish to construct a building equal to this, he would not be able to do it without expending an hundred thousand thousand red dinars, and it would occupy two hundred years, even though the most experienced and able workmen were employed." Among the idols there were five made of red gold, each five yards high, fixed in the air without support. In the eyes of one of these idols there were two rubies, of such value, that if any one were to sell such as are like them, he would obtain fifty thousand dinars. On another, there was a sapphire purer than water, and more sparkling than crystal; the weight was four hundred and fifty miskals. The two feet of another idol weighed four thousand four hundred miskals, and the entire quantity of gold yielded by the bodies of these idols, was ninety-eight thousand three hundred miskals. The idols of silver amounted to two hundred, but they could not be weighed without breaking them to pieces and putting them into scales. The Sultan gave orders that all the temples should be burnt with naphtha and fire, and levelled with the ground.<ref>{{cite book |author= Sir Henry Miers Elliot & John Dowson |date= 1867|title=The History of India, as told by its own Historians Volume 2 |url=https://archive.org/details/historyofindiaas02elli/page/n61/mode/2up |pages=44–45}}</ref>}}

The temple at Katra was sacked by [[Mahmud of Ghazni|Maḥmūd Ibn Sebüktegīn]]. A temple was built to replace it in 1150 CE. The Mathura ''prasasti'' (Eulogistic Inscription) dated [[Vikram Samvat|Samvat (V.S.)]] 1207 (1150 CE), said to have been found in 1889 CE at the Keshava mound by [[Alois Anton Führer|Anton Fuhrer]], German Indologist who worked with the Archaeological Survey of India, recorded the foundations of a temple dedicated to [[Vishnu]] at the Katra site:

{{Blockquote|Jajja, who carried the burden of the varga, together with a committee of trustees (goshtijana), built a large temple of Vishnu, brilliantly white and touching the clouds.}}

Jajja was a vassal of the [[Gahadavala dynasty|Gahadavalas]] in charge of Mathura, and the committee mentioned in the ''prasasti'' could have been of an earlier [[Vaishnavism|Vaishnava]] temple.<ref>{{cite book |author=Meenakshi Jain |date=2019 |title=Flight of Deities and Rebirth of Temples: Episodes from Indian History |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lAQNxQEACAAJ |publisher=Aryan Books International |page=67 |isbn=978-8173056192}}</ref> The temple built by Jajja at Katra was destroyed by the forces of [[Qutb al-Din Aibak|Qutubuddin Aibak]], though [[Firuz Shah Tughlaq|Feroz Tughlaq]] (r. 1351–88 CE) was also said to have attacked it.<ref>{{cite book |author=Meenakshi Jain |date=2019 |title=Flight of Deities and Rebirth of Temples: Episodes from Indian History |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lAQNxQEACAAJ |publisher=Aryan Books International |page=68 |isbn=978-8173056192}}</ref> It was repaired and survived till the reign of [[Sikandar Lodi]] (r. 1489–1517 CE).

In the twelfth century, Bhatta Lakshmidhara, chief minister of the [[Gahadavala dynasty|Gahadavala]] king [[Govindachandra (Gahadavala dynasty)|Govindachandra]] (r. 1114–1155 CE), wrote the earliest surviving collection of verses in praise of the sacred sites of Mathura in his work Krtyakalpataru, which has been described as "the first re-statement of the theory of ''Tirtha-yatra'' (pilgrimage)".<ref>{{cite book |author=K.V. Rangaswami Aiyangar |date=1942 |title=Krtyakalpataru of Bhatta Lakshmidhara, Vol.8 |url=https://archive.org/details/dli.ernet.11502/page/n89/mode/2up |publisher=Oriental Institute, Baroda |page=lxxxvii–lxxxviii}}</ref> In his Krtyakalpataru, Bhatta Lakshmidhara devoted an entire section (9) to Mathura.<ref>{{cite book |author=K.V. Rangaswami Aiyangar |date=1942 |title=Krtyakalpataru of Bhatta Lakshmidhara, Vol.8 |url=https://archive.org/details/dli.ernet.11502/page/n279/mode/2up |publisher=Oriental Institute, Baroda |page=१८६-१९४ (186–194)}}</ref>

Later on the city was sacked again by Sikandar Lodi, who ruled the [[Sultanate of Delhi]] from 1489 to 1517 CE.<ref>[http://persian.packhum.org/persian/main?url=pf%3Ffile%3D03601021%26ct%3D94 Sultan Sikandar Lodi] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304113007/http://persian.packhum.org/persian/main?url=pf%3Ffile%3D03601021%26ct%3D94 |date=4 March 2016 }} ''The Muntakhabu-'rūkh'' by [[Al-Badauni|Al-Badāoni]] (16th-century historian), [[Packard Humanities Institute]].</ref><ref>[https://dsal.uchicago.edu/reference/gazetteer/pager.html?objectid=DS405.1.I34_V02_404.gif Lodi Kings: Chart] [[The Imperial Gazetteer of India]], 1909, v. 2, ''p. 369.''.</ref> Sikandar Lodi earned the epithet of 'Butt Shikan', the 'Destroyer of Idols'. [[Firishta|Ferishta]] recorded that Sikandar Lodi was a staunch Muslim, with a passion for vandalising heathen temples:

{{Blockquote|He was firmly attached to the Mahomedan religion, and made a point of destroying all Hindu temples. In the city of Mathura he caused masjids and bazaars to be built opposite the bathing-stairs leading to the river, and ordered that no Hindus should be allowed to bathe there. He forbade the barbers to shave the beards and heads of the inhabitants, in order to prevent the Hindus following their usual practices at such pilgrimages.<ref>{{cite book |author=John Briggs |date=1908 |title=History of the rise of the Mahomedan power in India till the year A.D. 1612 Volume 1|url=https://archive.org/details/historyofriseofm01feri_0/page/586/mode/2up |page=586}}</ref>}}

In Tarikh-i Daudi, of 'Abdu-lla (written during the time of [[Jahangir]]) said of Sikandar Lodi:

{{Blockquote|He was so zealous a Musulman that he utterly destroyed divers places of worship of the infidels, and left not a vestige remaining of them. He entirely ruined the shrines of Mathura, the mine of heathenism, and turned their principal Hindu places of worship into caravanserais and colleges. Their stone images were given to the butchers to serve them as meat-weights, and all the Hindus in Mathura were strictly prohibited from shaving their heads and beards, and performing their ablutions. He thus put an end to all the idolatrous rites of the infidels there; and no Hindu, if he wished to have his head or beard shaved, could get a barber to do it. Every city thus conformed as he desired to the customs of Islam.<ref>{{cite book |author=Sir H.M. Elliot & John Dowson |date=1873 |title=History of India, as told by its own Historians: the Muhammadan period Vol.4 |url=https://archive.org/details/dli.csl.5329/page/n453/mode/2up |page=447}}</ref>}}

[[Vallabha]]charya and [[Chaitanya Mahaprabhu]] arrived in the Braj region, in search of sacred places that had been destroyed or lost. In ''Shrikrsnashrayah'', that make up the ''Sodashagrantha'', [[Vallabha]] said of his age:

{{Blockquote|The Malechchhas (non-Hindus in this context) have surrounded all the holy places with the result that they have become infected with evil. Besides, the holy people are full of sorrow. At such a time [[Krishna]] alone is my way.<ref>{{cite book|author=Richard Barz |title=Bhakti Sect Of Vallabhacarya |url=https://archive.org/details/bhaktisectofvallabhacaryarichardbarzmrmlms_202003_574_W/page/n23/mode/2up |year=1992 |publisher=Motilal UK Books of India |isbn=978-8121505765 |pages=16}}</ref>}}