[3] Ujariyaon is said to have been the site of an earlier Bhar village, which was conquered by a Muslim army led by two brothers named Abdullah and "the Turkoman", who were subjects of the Delhi Sultanate.

[1] The victorious Abdullah married the slain raja's daughter and settled down in the village, which he named Shahpur, but just a few days later he and his followers were massacred by the former king's brother while praying during the Id festival.

[1] Her son Ghias-ud-Din was then an infant; when he grew up, he went into service in the imperial army and led a campaign against Shahpur (which conveniently happened to fall on the day of Holi).

[1] It was on the high ground overlooking the khadir land regularly inundated by the Gomti during floods, and during heavy rains was only accessible from the north.

[1] The upland area on which it lay was "a stretch of sandy, unproductive soil", broken up by ravines, that supposedly marks a former bank of the Gomti.