Ranjit Singh Dies

June 27, 1839

The one-eyed lion of the Punjab, who had built a Sikh empire from Kashmir to Peshawar, died in Lahore aged fifty-eight. Four of his wives and several slave girls burned themselves on his pyre - the last great royal sati. Without him the Khalsa court fell into murderous court politics, and the British watched from across the Sutlej with interest.