One of the few historical documents to record the evolution of the surname outside of Bhat records is the District Gazetteer, a comprehensive catalogue of Indian subcontinent geography and culture created by the British Viceroy during England's imperialist ventures in the early 20th century. While some academicians maintain that the accuracy of District Gazetteers is suspect, most consider them a valuable record of Indian history outside of parochial tradition. According to the Gazetteer, the surname 'Tyagi' is equivalent to an earlier form of the word, 'Taga'. If these records are accurate, the Tagas held about five percent of the land in the state at the time--ostensibly inherited from the bhiksha of Janmejay thousands of years prior to this. The majority of this land has been historically maintained in coparcenary tenure. The records indicate that Tagas also played a considerable part in the resistance to the IslamicCrusades, most notably those of the sanguine Muslim general Timur the Lame. According to Gazetteer records, Umra Taga served as Deputy General of the Sarv Khap coalition army and Rampyari Taga served as a delegate and deputy on its counsel. The major goal of the resistance was to defend the holy city of Haridwar from desecration by Timur, as he massacred, pillaged, and raped the indigenous Hindu populace during his army's trek. Timur's ultimate goal, incidentally, was to ultimately invade the city of Delhi during the city's internal battle for ascension. Sadly, four-hundred years later, Tagas in Uttar Pradesh clashed again with Islamic imperialists, and many were forcibly converted to Islam by Aurangzeb, a descendant of Timur and sixth ruler of the Mughal dynasty. Perhaps most interesting, however, is that the Tagas of the early 20th century Gazetteer records maintained that they had originally arrived in the district from the region now known as East and West Bengal. It is of note that the British authors who compiled the Gazetteer were uncertain as to the veracity of this claim.