THE 1312 AND 14tH CENTURIES 25 
occasionally a reference to Chitor as a province, but there is 
little trace of effective jurisdiction in this region. This 
enumeration brings us down to the line of the Narbada. 
Alauddin carried the Moslem flag across this river, and for a 
time there was a large and important province at Deogir or 
Daulatabad, and others extending as far as the South-East 
Coast, but this extension was not retained for long. There 
were thus in all from 20 to 30 provinces, the numbers varying 
from time to time as the kingdom grew or shrunk; 
and the phrase ‘‘the twenty provinces,” used by Ziya 
Barni (p. 50) in recording the resources of the kingdom 
under Balban, may be taken as a more or less precise 
description. 
We have then the kingdom divided into provinces, while 
the villages were grouped in parganas, and the question 
naturally arises whether there was any intermediate ad- 
ministrative unit corresponding to the district of later times. 
I have failed to find materials for a decisive answer to this 
question. In a few passages we read of “divisions” (shigg), 
in terms which suggest that these were in fact districts; 
but the passages are not decisive, and leave room for doubt 
whether these divisions, if they existed, were normal or 
exceptional, or whether the word is not a mere synonym. 
My impression is that during the fourteenth century the 
word shigq was coming into use as a synonym for the terms 
which I have rendered ‘ province”; but a full discussion of 
the question would carry us too far, and, since it is not really 
important for the present purpose, I shall leave the matter 
open. 
We have no actual description of a province at this period, 
but it would, I think, be a mistake to picture an area with 
strictly defined boundaries, and with uniform adminis- 
trative pressure over all its parts. At the provincial capital 
was the Governor with the troops maintained by him, and 
there may have been smaller centres of authority, though 
this is doubtful ; in some villages, his officials might be dealing 
directly with the peasants, in others there would be resident 
grantees or assignees, in others—as I think the majority— 
there would be Chiefs to whom the Governor looked for the 
revenue. If Chiefs rebelled, that is to say, did not pay the