Muhammad of Ghor (redirected from Mu'izz-Ud-Din Muhammad Ibn Sam)

Muhammad of Ghor, d. 1206, Afghan conqueror of N India. A brother of the sultan of Ghor, he was made governor of Ghazni in 1173 and from there launched a series of invasions of India. By 1186 he had conquered the Muslim principalities in the Punjab. He was severely defeated by the Rajputs under Prithvi Raj in 1191, but the following year he routed their army, and Delhi was captured. Muhammad's generals then overran Bihar and Bengal. He succeeded his brother as sultan in 1202 but was murdered in 1206. After his death his empire in N India fell apart and passed to his generals, one of whom founded the Delhi Sultanate.

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Muhammad of Ghor 

(Muhammad of Ghur, Muhammad Ghori). Date of birth unknown; died 1206. Descendant of the ruling family of Ghor, a region of western Afghanistan; conqueror of northern India.

In 1173, Muhammad of Ghor was named ruler of the eastern part of the Ghorid state, centered in Ghazni, by Sultan Ghiyas-ud-din, his elder brother. Commencing his campaigns against India in 1175, Muhammad of Ghor had destroyed the Ghaznavid state in Punjab by 1186; in 1192, near Tara, he decisively defeated the troops of the Rajput kings of northern India. Over the next decade, Muhammad of Ghor took possession of almost the entire Ganges valley. From his brother’s death in 1203 he was sultan of the whole Ghorid state, which by then included most of the territory of Afghanistan and northern India. After Muhammad of Ghor was killed in 1206, his Indian possessions became part of the Sultanate of Delhi.