[24] It is
sufficiently clear that the unfinished minar was commenced upon too
large a scale, and with too small a diminution of the circumference
from the base upwards. It is two-fifths larger than the finished
tower in circumference, and much more perpendicular. Finding these
errors when they had got some thirty feet from the foundation, the
founder, Shams-ud-din (Iltutmish), began to work anew, and had he
lived a little longer, there is no doubt that he would have raised
the second tower in its proper place, upon the same scale as the one
completed. His death was followed by several successive revolutions;
five sovereigns succeeded each other on the throne of Delhi in ten
years.[25] As usual on such occasions, works of peace were suspended,
and succeeding sovereigns sought renown in military enterprise rather
than in building churches. This church was entire, with the exception
of the second minar, when Tamerlane invaded India.[26] He took back a
model of it with him to Samarkand, together with all the masons he
could find at Delhi, and is said to have built a church upon the same
plan at that place, before he set out for the invasion of Syria.
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