The First Battle of Panipat (1526)

Babur, a descendant of Timur, had built a power base in Kabul after losing his homeland, Fergana. In 1526 he marched into India, and on 21 April 1526 he met the army of Sultan Ibrahim Lodi of Delhi on the plain of Panipat near Delhi. Lodi's army and war elephants far outnumbered Babur's forces.

Babur set up a barrier of carts chained together in front of his army and filled the gaps with guns and musketeers. He wrote that he had learned this method from the Ottomans, and his guns were commanded by the Ottoman master Mustafa Rumi and by Ustad Ali Quli. On the wings he used the old Turco-Mongol tulughma, the flanking sweep of mounted archers.

The battle was over by midday and Ibrahim Lodi was killed. Babur took Delhi and Agra and founded the Mughal Empire, which would last until 1857. He described the battle in detail in his memoirs, the "Baburnama", written in Chagatai Turkic.