It was merely 1,500 years ago that Lahore and its entire surrounding lands were ruled by a fierce barbarian Hun called Toramana, also known as Toramana Shahi Jauvia, the king of the Alchon Huns, who shattered the Gupta empire.

Among the seven known destroyers of old Lahore, probably Toramana–the Hun was the worst who actually flattened the city only to realise much later the immense trading value of its port and hence, like tyrants before him, set about rebuilding the basics of the city and its fort. For a long time, research was afoot about just who was Prakasaditya, with many assuming that that he was a Gupta ruler. In his research, Pankaj Tandon, who studied, in detail, the coins of that era, discovered that he was Toramana–the Hun. These coins can be seen in the Lahore Museum.

For some time now, we have been writing about foreign invaders who ruled over us and lately there has been an increasing interest in just how Buddhism, the sole religion of Lahore for 700 years, was erased suddenly from the city.

Another research of interest is based on ancient manuscripts by A. Cunningham on the ruler of Lahore and Multan in the 5th and early 6th century AD. It is clear that the term ‘Maharaja-dhi-raja’ or the ‘great king of kings’ applied to Toramana, the ruler of the land that is today Pakistan and beyond.

Many descriptions exist of this ‘great’ ruler and the most widely used is the White Alchon Huns of Central Asian steppes. In terms of historical timescale, the Huns conquered Punjab much after Alexander and Porus clashed in 326BC in the Battle of the Hydaspes (Jhelum River) and the coming of the Turko-Afghan invader Mahmud in 1021AD. So Toramana, the Hun, came in between to conquer our land and city.

The defeat of the Huns by Skandagupta has been ascribed to the power of the Rajputs who some sources identify with the Huns. My interest in Toramana came about not merely by the fact that he destroyed Lahore but it was triggered as one studied the Ramayana, the Mahabharata and the Puranas, where mention of the ‘white Huns’ were aplenty. We know that these books were written in Punjab and are, probably, not as ancient as is made out to be.

The successor of Toramana, his son Mihiragula, was finally defeated as he expanded eastwards by a collation of armies, led by Yashodharman in central India. This defeat led to the Rajput elements splitting over religious beliefs, for the white Huns were ancient animists and totemists. The power of the priestly Brahmins soon held sway, for through them the Huns were able to collect large revenues. Even today in India they are the richest, for the Hindus to reach the Almighty ‘believers’ have to pay the Brahmin first. All priests of every religion in one way or another follow this pastime, call it rule to wealth.

But back to the Alchon Huns. History teaches us that once the local rulers continuously fought for power, all they achieved was to weaken themselves. This prepared the ground, as in olden days, for fierce nomads to rush in. Unconventional forces have this attribute of being virtually ‘invisible’ and speed and surprise is their main weapon. That’s why both the Roman Empire in Europe and the Gupta Empire in the sub-continent were destroyed by nomadic barbarians.

The first of the two Alchon Huns was Toramana who continued his conquests and faced considerable resistance from the ruler of Lahore. He decided to flatten the city. This was achieved by killing off all males and all females below the age of 40 were handed over to the soldiers to ‘relax’ as one document tells us. We also have a description by the Chinese pilgrim Song Yun who wrote that the Huns after enjoying what the young women were ordered to behead them and ‘move on’.

But then Toramana had conquered the entire land from Kashmir to Multan and from the Indus to the vicinity of Delhi. Once he had made Sialkot his capital, he realised that without the port of Lahore for trade to commence, he had to rebuild the city. A mud fort was once again built along with three areas of the old walled city. My guess is, and mind you it is a guess only, that the three mounds from Lohari onwards north were the places where the first houses came up. That seems a logical setting but then archaeological research should determine the true facts.

Those days Toramana had sculptures built to celebrate his ‘greatness’, starting from Peshawar eastwards. Samples of the most of them can today be seen in the Lahore Museum.

The ancient river port of Lahore on the Ravi was rebuilt. One description of the Huns by Gibbons says: “They were different from other human species, for they had very broad shoulders, flat noses and black eyes, but no beards that add to manliness. They seem the off-springs of witches”.

Once the son of Toramana, named Mihiragula, took over, he immediately asked the Buddhist priests to teach him their religion. The man they sent did not impress the ruler and immediately threw him in front of elephants and crushed him to his delight. Then a campaign began to eliminate all the Buddhists and in this effort the Hindu Brahmins assisted him with logical explanations of why they were a ‘curse’ on him. They reasoned that: “how could a religion have no god, no theology, imagine no priests and no promise of the future, with no spirits to help when bad times came” (Baden-Powell 95). But we see that when priests take over the essence of beliefs, nothing but destruction follows. That is still the case.

Every tyrant invariably meets his match and Mihiragula confronted the combined forces led by Yasodharman of Mandasor. Once the Huns were shattered, the local Rajputs absorbed the Huns left. For the first time, the Hindu Brahmins gave a physical shape to their deities, a pastime, and very paying at that, still continues.

Mihiragula fled to Kashmir where he was imprisoned but managed to entice the mother of the ruler who got him released. In return, he murdered the king and all his sons and tried to take over. But then, so claims Hugh Kennedy Trevaskis in his book ‘The Land of Five Rivers’, a Hindu Brahmin poisoned him. Thus ended the rule of the Alchon Huns over the land of Punjab and the city of Lahore.

Once the Huns were eliminated, from their ashes emerged, what scholars call, ‘The New Hinduism’. The peaceful belief of Gautama Buddha, who stayed in Mohallah Maullian in Lohari Gateway for three months, that made humans believe in themselves. The invasions from the West continued and still do in one form or another.

New priests from beyond the mountains have emerged, with support within our beautiful land. It is bizarre to see once poverty-stricken local priests now running around with armed guards and classy vehicles. The Huns in a new guise seem to be returning.

Published in Dawn, December 25th, 2022