A History of Persian Language & Literature At The Mughal Court: Vol 2 - Muhammad Abdul Ghani

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A

HISTORY OF

PERSIAN LANGUAGE & LITERATUREAT THE MUGHAL COURTWITH A BRIEF SURVEY OP THE GROWTH

OF URDU LANGUAGE

[BABUR TO AKBAR]

PART I I . -H U M A YU N

BY

M U H A M M A D ' A B D U ' L G H A N L M . A . . M . L I T T . (CANTAB.) ,

Professor, Morris College, Nagpur, C.P.; Chairman, Board of

Studies in Arabic and Persian, Nagpur University : Sometime

Fellow, M.A.-O. College, Aligarh.

ALLAHABAD:

T H E INDIAN PRESS, LTD.

1930









Humayun

Humayun with young Prince Akbar

Facsimile of the Title Page of Jawahir-

ul -' ulum HumayunI

Facsimile of fol. lb

" " " 3b . . . . . .

„ „ 813b

Sher Shah

Tomb of Sher Shah

Malik Muhammad Ja'islHumayun's remains being carried to the

burial ground: the young Prince

Akbar aooompanying the cortege

The famous water-carrier, king, etc.,

appearing for his reward before Hural-

ynn

Tomb of Humayun

LIST OP ILLUSTRATIONS

Page

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98

ib

ib

ib

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128

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196

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CONTENTS

CHAPTER I

Humayun's accession to tho throne

Congratulatory poems

Popu la ri ty of chronograms : a no teworth y

feature of his reign in the history of Per

sian poetry in India

His birth and education

Wa ning influence of T u r k ! at his court ,

and his l i k i n g for Persian in con trast to

his father'sT u r k i rare ly employed in his privat e con

versation

CHAPTER II

His taste for Persian poet ry „ .

Specimens of his ghazal, rubal, and

masnawi

His apprecia tion of Persian poets

Estimate of his poetic taste : finer than

that of an average poet

His poetic insight : Corrects Hai ra t i and

JahiHis knowledge of Arabic

His taste for Mathematics, History, Geogra

phy, and Astronomy

Page

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26

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viii

His tutors in As tr onom y, and his interest

and activi ties in this branch of scienceMaterials col lec ted for an Observatory ...

Turkish Admiral's evidence

CHAPTER

POETS AND SCHOLARS OF HIS REIGN WITH A SHORT

DESCRIPTION OF EACH

1. Shaikh Amanullah Panipati ... 36

2. Shaikh Gada i Dehlevi 38

3. Mir Waisi 41

4. Shaikh 'Abdul Wahid Bilgrami 43

5. Maulana Jalali Hindi 44

6. Maulana bin i Ashraf al Husaini ... 457. Maulana Nadiri Samarqandi 47

8. Mir 'Abdul Lat i f Qazwlnl 52

9. Maulana Ilyas 53

10. Maulana Qasim Ka hi 55

11. Maulana Junubi ... 62

12. Shah Tahir Dakhani 66

13. Shaikh ' Abd u l Waji d Kanghi Shir azi ... 70

14. Yu su f bin i Muhammad Hirawi 73

15. Khwaja Ayyub ... 75

16. Maulana Muhammad Faz il Samarqandi ... 78

17. Jauhar 100

18. Ba Yazid 102

19. Maulana Za mi ri Bil gr am i 10420. Khwaja Husain Mervi 105

21. An unknown poet, author of an epic poem :

Humayun Kama... 109

8.

9.

10.

Page

2933

34



ix

CHAPTER IV

Frogress of Urdu in Humayun's reign ...

A parrot uttering an Urdu phrase

A definite advanee made by Urdu under

Hindu-Muslim cultivation of each

other's literature

Faked Hindi letters of Rajas to Sher

Shah, and their supposed replies in Por-sian from the lattor

Growth of Muslim poets of Hindi language,

and Hindu writers of Persian prose

and poetry

CHAPTER V

Sher Shah : his name and parentage

His li terary attainment, and patronage of

letters

A young student of Arabic rewarded by

Sher Shah for correct answers to ques

tions on Arabio grammar ...

His taste for Persian and Hindi poetry ...His death

Badauni's and Farishta's estimate of Sher

Shah

Malik Muhammad Ja ' is i : a poet of epoeh-

making significance

CHAPTER VI

Humayun's death

Elegiac poems

1.

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7.

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134



X

His wit and humour

Points in his charac ter—part ly responsiblefor political crisis in his administration,

and his forced flight to Persia

CHAPTER VII

Reception of Hurnayun by Shah Tahmasp

Sir John Malcolm's great tributeMis-judgment of Sir John

Jauhar's eventful narra tive, a most trust

worthy record in existence

Hu mayu n approached by Shah Tahmasp

to accept tho Shi'a faith ...

Humayun's life saved th rough the nobleintervent ion of Shah Tahmasp's daughter

CHAPTER (vII)

Exodus of poets and scholars from Persia

to India

Part played by the Mughal, as comparedwith the Safawi, in the uplift of Persian

prose and poetry

Causes of the dearth of notable poets in

Persia under the Safawi kings, as put

forward by Persian chroniclers

Weakness of their contention

Real causes of the lul l

Dullness of poetic market in Persia lasted

for three centuries

3.

4.

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Main causes which were at the7.

Page

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173



X I

C H A P T E R I X

Wave of pess imism in the la t te r part, ofHumayun's life, due to the influence of

the rel igious atmosphere obtained i n

India

His Sufistie tendencies re se mb ling those

of an ardent recluse

His t ak ing auguries from diwan i Hafiz,and his fa it h in th ei r bear ing f ru i t : a

prac ti ce preva len t among the people of

Hindustan, and ardently followed by his

successors in India

His reading omens in the phenomena of

Nature, and his belief in their symbolic

truthInvention of tabl i'adl, a mode of g iv ing

just ice, wh ic h was subsequently adopt

ed by his grandson , Jaha ng ir , in tho

form of zanjir i adl

His general character

His chivalry

1.

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A

HISTORY OF PERSIANLANGUAGE & LITERATURE

AT THE MUGHAL COURTPART II—HUMAYUN

CHAPTER I

After Babur's death, which took place at Agra,his eldest son Humayun ascended the throne in

937 A. H. The court poets composedcongratulatory poems of which thefollowing chronogram was cleverlydevised mourning in one and thesame breath for Babur's death and

exulting at Humayun's accession to the throne :

H u m a y u n'saccession to thethrone.

Congratulatorypoems.

1 Mirza 'Alaud daula Qazwini, Nafa is ul Ma'asir (abridged),

B . M . MSS., Or. 1761, fol. 27a.



HUMAYUN] 2 [CHAPTER I

The king of kings Shah Babur who had,Two hundred slaves like Jamshid and

"Kai-khusrau";Muhammad Humayun sat in his place,When the rol l of the latter's life was cut

short by death;If they ask the date, 0 heart, say," Humayun is the heir to his kingdom."

The practice of composing chronograms onmemorable occasions was rapidly gaining popularity

among the writers of the Indiancourts. Even poets who had migrated from Persia, Turkistan, andTrans-Caspian Provinces, were tak

ing a fancy for same and introducing subtleties in their compositionswith artful devices in the use of words and their

meanings.Another chronogram that was composed and

presented to him was the following :

Popularity ofclirohograms anoteworthy feature of his reignin the history ofPersian poetry in

India.

Muhammad Humayun, the fortunate King,

Who is the best of kings in their line ;When on the throne of Empire he sat,

Badaunl, Vol. I, p. 344.




The date of Humayun's gaining victory,Wisdom sought and found in ' nuh i Shahr i

Safar bud ' (it was the 9th of Safar).This chronogram is most ingeniously devised

since its very words tell the date and the month,while the year is to be found in the numerical valueof its letters. Such niceties in the art of compositiondate from the reign of Humayun, and were developed

in the reigns of Akbar, Jahangir, Shahjahan, andAurangzeb.He was born at Cabul of Babur's first wife,

Maham Begum, in 913 A. H., which is synchronouswith Babur's adoption of the titleof Padishah. The date of his birthwas found by many poets in their

metrical compositions, of which the following is fromthe pen of Babur's trusted noble Khwaja Kalan:

it is the year of the birth of Humayun Shah,May God increase thy rank and dignity;I have carried off one ' alif from his

chronogram, 2

So that I may apply with it collyrium to the

two eyes of the evil.1 Naqsh ' A l l , Tazki ra i Bagh i Ma 'an l (abridged and bound

wi t h Naf a'i s ul Ma 'a si r) , B. M . MSS.. Or. 1761, fol. 151b.1 This means that the chronogram is short by 1.

His birth andeducation.




( I n his early youth he was trained under the fos

ter ing care of his fa ther 's learned secretaries Khwaj a

Kalan and Shaikh Zainuddln . His

father also paid personal attention

to his education and used to correct

in his letters mistakes of spell ingand diction every now and then.

( While qui te young he developed a taste for Mathe

matics and Astronomy in the association of Shaikh

Ab ul Qasim A s t ra bad i , Mulla Nu ru dd ln , ' and the

celebrated ast ronomer Maulana Ilyas. He seemed

to have li tt le l ik ing for Turki , and employed it on

few occasions on ly . The rapidly dwindl ing influenceof T u r k i at his cour t is clearly noticeable. While

Babur had tried al l his l ife to raise the status of

Turk i , Humayun, in inverse ratio, neglected i t from

deference to the feelings of the Persians at his court,

as well as his own liking for Persian.

1 Memoirs of Babur, Vo l. I I , p. 624.

2 By Yazid,Tarikhi Humayun, 1.0. MSS. No 223, fol. 24b.

3 Akbar Nama,Vol. I, p. 223.

4 Badaunl, Vol. I l l , p. 131.

Waning influence of Tur ki athis Court , and hisli ki ng for Persianin contrast to hisfather's.

[Sultan Humayun Khan]

[Shah Firuz Qadr]

[Padishah Saf-Shikan]

[Khush Bad]

Short phrases also, as was customary wi t h poets

on such occasions, were ingeniously constructed

g iv ing the date of his b i r th , to indicate his futuregreatness and k in g ly career. Some of these are as

fol lows :




The occasions on which he appreciated Turk!

verses were also few :'' After my presentation I offered the Em-

peror a small gif t and a chronogram upon theconquest of India - also two ghazals, all of whichpleased the Padishah greatly."2

" About the same time Agra fell into the

hands of the Padishah. I immediately wrote achronogram for the occasion which found muchfavour. The incident furnished the materialfor a ' ghazal' w i th which the sovereign was sodelighted that he called me a second Mir 'A l iShir."3

1 Nafa'is ul Ma'asir, B.M. MSS., Or. 1761, fol. 40a.

2 A. Vambery, Travels and Adventures of Sldl ' A l i Re'Is,p. 47, London, 1899.

3 Ibid., pp. 49-50.

The only instances of his Turk! composition that

could be discovered are the following:

(i) A few letters that he wrote to hisfather.

(ii) Occasional verses that he composed, ofwhich, however, no trace could be found,except of one which is preserved in his nameas follows :




Even in his pr ivat e conversations he used Turk l

ra re ly . On two occasions he spoke it merely w i t h

the object th at his other courtiersmight not understand him. One

such occasion was at the blinding of

Kamran. When ' A l i Dost, a trus t-

ed servant of Humayun, came to give him certain

news about it with a view to take his further instruc-

tions in the matter, Humayun was surrounded bypeople, and th is was apparently why the se rvant

chose to communicate the object ' of his vi si t in

Tu r k i . saying :

What is wrong with thee, do it thyself.The other occasion was when on account of the

scarcity of water and the monopoly of the available

well by Tardi Beg, the entire menial staff had conspired

against him and made thei r complaint to Humayun.

Humayun thereupon rode up to Tardi Beg and spoke

to him in Turk l merely to avoid his being understood

1 Jauhar, Tazkirat ul Waqi'at, B. M. MSS., Add. 16,711 fol.

123b.2 Ibid,

Turkl rarely employed in his private conversation.

Nobody does this work,

whereupon Humayun abusing him said :



HUMAYUNJ 8 [CHAPTER I

Ibid., fol. 51b.

by others, thereby to keep the prestige of the Khan

in the eyes of those present intact:

Since wate r was not bei ng had in sufficient

qu an ti ty the men ial staff of His Majesty

coming before him gave vent that Tardi Beg

supplied wa te r to his own horses and camels

. . ., the K i n g should stop h im, otherwise

we would fight w i th him. At the most we

migh t be ki lled or get wate r. Wh en His

Majesty kn ew tha t it wo ul d lead to evi l, hemounted his horse and rode up to the top of

the well , and said in Tu rk ! language, " the

servants are discontented. Stop your men

drawing water for an hour."

A simi lar instance occurred w he n a servant

wished to say th at a cer ta in Mu gh al captive hadused unwor thy language in respect of Humayun' s

person, and should on that account be beheaded :



A Mughal on whose face there was a deep

wo un d fe ll into the hands of Mi rz a Qu ll Ch il li .

Having arrested h im he brough t hi m to the

court of His Majesty and said in Turkl langu

age th at t he captive was tha t person who

used unworthy language in respect of the

Padishah. His Majesty replied that the

wretch had received his reward.

One instance of his vo lu nt ar il y employ ing T u r k lwhile speaking to a Turk is as follows :

Tw o persons "of Rum were in the market .

They saluted His Majesty. His Majesty re

plied, ' min dan du a dih,' i.e., f rom me to the

k ing of Rum convey greetings. They rejo in

ed, ' kuz ou chant ,' i.e., heartily or with great

pleasure.1 Ibid., fol. 56a.2 Ibid.,fol. 82a.

P. 2

9H U M A Y U N ] [CHAPTER I



CHAPTER II

While for Turk i he seems to have had an. aversion,for Persian he had a special l iking. He encouraged

it at his court and himself employedit on all public and private occasions.He also compiled a ' d iwan ' l using

Humayun as his pen-name. His best poetry is to befound in his ' ghazal. '

Some specimens are as follows:' Ghazal.

His taste forPersian poe try .

10



HUMAYUN] 11 [CHAPTER I I

W i t h a beau tiful maid my lot has fal len,

Within my heart a fire has fallen ;

My house is l i t wi t h the face of the loved,From the beauteous moon (beloved) a ray has

fallen;

In ev ' ry way my heart , 0 li fe , draws me,

Since my heart to a rav isher of heart has

fallen ;The object of my heart I ' l l seize now,

While to my hand dizzy delight has fallen ;

Sense and w i t in me seek not beloved,

While Humayun in ecstasy has fallen.

Ibid.

The ar row of his ty ranny pierced my

bewildered heart,My wounded heart has tasted the sweetness

of the pang of his love ;



IIUMAYUN] 12 [CHAPTER I I

If for the ki ll ing of lovers he shows aninclination,

It is not strange from the demands of hisgenerosity and sincere feeling ;

Who has the courage' to go near the shrineof his glory ?

When Gabriel—the trusted—is not theconfidant thereunto ;

In his love the joy of my heart grows toogreat,Pain and grief for him are better than the

joys of earth and heaven;If to inquire after lovers he may put a step,A thousand dignified souls be sacrificed at

every step of his.



HUMAYUN] 13 [CHAPTBR II

The praise of thy ruby is on my tongue,• A fire is within my soul;

Whoever might happen to be in the assemblyof the abandonnes,

Is beside himself by my cry and lament ;Whatever they say in the praise of his

beauty,All is contained in my expression and

comment.

1 Ibid.

Happy the recollection when the greaterpart of my life I had sat in thy thought,

And in search of thy cypress-like stature

my feet were sore ;



HUMAYUN] 14 [CHAPTER II

Ibid., fol. 4a.

0 heart, show no restlessness before the rival,Divulge not to any physician the condition of

thy heart;

Thy work that has fallen with that practiser oftyranny,Is a hard tale and a curious affair.

Do not find fault with me that I called thy

lock ' disorderly,'

Since in commenting on thy curly lock Iwas broken-hearted;

Last night when thou looked at me andinquired after my condition,

I felt much crushed and dazed by thybeaming eyes;

In explanation of his bud, my lip did neverutter a word,

I had kept it always shut in that tale ;By God out of wits like Humayun in union

with the beloved,

In relating my tale to my friend I had

gone beside myself.



0 God with Thy plentiful grace select mefor Thy nearness,

Make me acquainted with the secrets of Thy

chosen people ;1 Farishta, Vol. I, p. 446.

NOTE.—The word in the last hemistich seems

to be a misprint for which is more appropriate

and is in accordance with the rules of prosody as

saving a needless repetition of the word which

occurs twice in the quatrain. But as the first readingis found in some other works also besides Farishta,

the same is retained here in the text.2 Akbar Nama, Vol . 1, p. 435 (Newal Kishore edition, 1284

A. H.).

[CHAPTER I I15H U M A Y U N )

We are from our hearts slaves to the

sons of 'Ali,

We are ever happy in the memory of 'Ali ;Since the mystic's secret is revealedthrough 'Ali,

We always recalled the memory of ' Ali.



O heart, reap success from the presence ofthe beloved,

Burn your heart in all sincerity in his service :Every night sit jubilant in the thought of

thy friend,Every day celebrate a new year's day inunion with him.

1 Farishta, Vol I, p. 446.

2 Akbar Nama, Vol. I, p, 368.

0 thou whose tyranny is well-known allthe world over,

The day on which I do not experienceseverity from thee is severe ;

Whatever grief reaches the heart from theoppression of the sky,

[CHAPTER I I16HUMAYUN]

Through my tyrannic wisdom my heart was" rent,

Call me Thy mad lover, and free me from allcares.



1 Nafa' is ul Ma' as ir , B M. MSS. , Or. 1761, fol 40a.2 Akbar Nama, Vol. I, p. 278

Cf. Karnran's blunt reply to Humayun's generous appeal

He alone holds fast the bride of kingdom,

Who kisses the lip of the sharp sword.

[Fariwhta, Vol . I, p. 351.]

F. 3

HUMAYUN] 17 [CHAPTER TI

I care not for, so long as I have the grief

of thy love in me.

0 thou f rom whose memory my hear tgains joy,

Without t hy memory my soul no jo y can know ;

The day that in thy memory a hundred

cries I raise,

Come to thee of me, the grief-stricken,

remembrance ?

Once in his appeal to Kamran for peace, hesubscribed the fol lo win g verses purp or ti ng th a t for

every drop of blood spilt , Ka mr an would be answer

able before God on the day of judgment:




1 Ibid.

The blood of that people hangs on thy neck,

The hand of that band is on thy skirt;

Be tt er is tha t thou decidest on peace,And showeth the manner of kindliness and

generosity.

An instance of his composing masnawi is to be

found in one o f his le tt ers which he addressed to

Bairam Khan on the occasion of the

conquest of Qandhar :' Masnawi,'




Again a victory showed its face from

Invisibility,

That the hearts of friends cheered to see i t ;Thanks be to God that we are again happy,And we smile on the faces of companions and

friends ;We saw our enemies with the object of their

heart achieved,

We plucked the fruit of the garden of victory ;To-day is the Bairam's New Year's day ;The heart of friends is without a grief to-day;

. The heart of the dear one be ever happy,Grief may not go near to his heart, nor to

his native to wn;A l l the requisite material for comfort is ready,

My heart is anxious for union with thee ;When would it be that I see the beauty of

the loved one,When would I pluck the flower of the garden

of union with him ;When should my ear become happy in

listening to thy speech,And my eye lighted through seeing thy face ;In the sanctuary of thy presence happy

together,We sit cheerful and without a grief ;After this we turn our care to the affairs of

India,

Resolved to subdue the kingdom of Sindh ;Every door that is shut wi l l be opened,Whate'er we wished, more than that shall

we gain ;



HUMAYUN ] 20 [CHAP T E R I I

0 thou, who art the consoler of the grievedheart,

Like thine own pure disposition thou art well-balanced ;

Without thy recollection I am not for a

moment,How art thee in the recollection of a grievedone like me ?

1 Ib id. Cf. Ba ir am Khan 's reply :

O thou, who ar t m person the shadow of the Incomparable,

Thou ar t more than whatever I praise thee w i t h ;

Since thou knowest how I pass my time without thee,

Why dost thou ask how I fare in thy separation ?

And to what we desire from ' time ' and' earth,'

The trusty (amin: Gabriel wil l say ' amen ' ;0 God, make it our lot,

Both the worlds be subdued to us.

He had also subscribed as a post-script thefollowing quatrain of his ready composition on themargin :





H U M A Y U N ] 22 [CHAPTER I I

1 A. Vambery, Travels and Adventures of Sidi ' A l i Re'ls,

p. 54.2 Akbar Nama, Vol. I, p. 316.3 Ibid., p. 363.

Truly great is he who became contented withhis dairy bread,

Better is his affair than all the kings of theearth.

'By God,' cried the monarch, ' this is truly sublime.''

On one occasion Humayun quoted Nizami in aletter to Prince Akbar, reprimanding him for hisplaying truant:

Don't sit idly, 'Tis not the time for play,'Tis time for acquiring skill and doing work.

He had also inscribed in his own handwritingthe following verse of Shaikh Azari on a niche of thearch of his palace :

I have heard that on this golden vault there is,An inscription which is the end of the work

of all Mahmuds.



HUMAYUN WITH HIS PET HA WK , AND TH E

YOUNG PRINCE AKBAR.

[Exhibit : 1911 Exhibition, Allahabad.]





HTJMAYUN] 23 [CHAPTER I I

F r om h is o w n verses w hi ch include almost al l

principal"1 kinds of poetry except 'qasida'and, qit'a,'

his posi tion as a poet of the Pers ianlanguage is clear ly established. In his

and 'ghazal' wh il e beh ind no

one, he stands ahead of many of h is

contemporaries . The chief fea ture of

his s ty le is th e clearness of expression w h ich

pervades all his wr i t ings , and his words are always

few, simple, and compact.

Estimate ofhis poetic taste:(finer) than thatof an averagepoet.

1 One instance of same as found in some Persian works like

the Atashkada, p. 39 (edited by Bland, London, 1844), andthe Majma'ul, Fusaha, p. 62, is as follows. This he is saidto have wri tten to Shah Tahmasp after his arrival in

Persia:




Once du ring his flight to Persia, Mull a Ha ira t i ,

a poet of Trans-Caspian Province,

presented him with a 'ghazal' of whichthe opening lines ran thus :

Sometimes the he ar t burns w i t h the love of

the beautiful, sometimes the liver,

Love every second burns me with a fresh scar;

Like the moth I have my affair w i t h a candle

lamp,

Th at if I go fu rthe r, my w i n g and feather

burn.

Hu ma yu n im pro vin g on the last hemisti ch pu t it

as follows:

1 Bo th were notable poets of Persian language and rece ived

favours fro m Humnayun. The lat ter having entered into

his service at Cabul accompanied him to India, and remained

here t i l l his death which occurred in 956 A . H . For a fulleraccount of his lif e and verses refe r Ba daum , Vol . I, pp.

477 480.

2 Ba Yaz id, Ta r lkh I Hu mnyn n, I. 0. MSS. No. 223, fo l.

12b.

His poetic insight : correctsHairati andJahi.1




I am the poet of the King Humayun, and am

the dust of his court,The star of the banner of my poetry taunt s

the moon;

Alas for him who picks a quar re l w i t h the

band of poets,

Whoever quarrels wi t h us quarre ls w i t h

calamity.

Hum ay un at once remarked :

1 BadaQnl, Vol. I, p. 477.2 Ibid.

P. 4

On another occasion he improv ed on Jah i Ya t m i -

yan of Bukhara, who had entered his service at

Cabu l. The fo rmer had composed a sati re onMu ham mad Khan Shapur and was asked by Hu ma yu n

to read i t before the assembly in wh ich Muh am ma d

Khan also was present. When the poet rec ited the

fo ll owin g verses:

Why dost thou not say so, "whoever qua rre lswi th us quarrels wi th God "1




He has been often referred to by Jauhar andMirza ' Ala'uddaula Qazwini as reading the Qur'an

and also quoting from memory severalverses from same on various occasions.Once on gaining victory over the

Afghans he recited the verse :

Praise be to Him Who brought us to life.

On another occasion he quoted from the Tradi

tions as follows :

He who dug a pit for his brother, verilyhimself fell into it.

Some more instances are to be found in the worksof contemporary authors like Ba-Yazid and Jauhar.They show to a certain extent his knowledge in

Arabic as well as his taste for religious literature.From his very childhood he evinced a taste forMathematics, History, Geography, and Astronomy,

and took regular lessons on thesebranches of Science from ShaikhAbul Qasim Astrabadi, and MaulanaIlyas :

1 Nafa'isul Ma'asir, B.M. MSS., Or. 1761, fol. 37a.2 Jauhar, Tazkira t ul Waqi 'a t, B.M. MSS., Add . 16, 711. fol.

78b.

His knowledge of Arabic.

His taste forMathemat ics,History, Geography, a n dAstronomy.



And in this very year the royal mandate inthe name of Shaikh Abul Qasim Astrabadlwho knew the science of Mathematics well,

had been issued. And His Majesty hadresolved to become his pupil and take lessonsfrom him, and at last His Majesty accordingto his resolution, acted. And the abovenamedscientist, having entered into His Majesty'sservice in the link of soldiers, was installedin a good ' jagir ' in India.

Abul Fazl and Farishta write thus :

[CHAPTER I I27HUMAYUN]

1 Ba Yazid, Tarikh i Humayun, 1. 0. MSS., 223, fol. 24b2 Akbar Nama, Vol. I, p. 368.



HUM AYU N ] 28 [CHAPTER I I

A n d in the science of Mathematics he li ft ed

up the banner of ski l l . His social intercourse

was based w i t h the learned and the accom

plished ; and at all times in his assembly

scientific problems were discussed.

In history he appears to have been conversant

w i th the Musl im periods of d ifferent countries

specially Indi a, Centra l Asia , and Ar ab ia . Once

he related a histor ical anecdote of Mahmu d of

Ghazni 's army to serve as a lesson to his own men

purport ing that honesty is the key to success."

Also, he transcribed in his own handwritinghis father's autobiography ' Waqi'at i Baburi '

from the beginning to the end. This would have

And in the branches of Mathematics His

Majesty ranked high and he always associat

ed with scientists and those distinguishedin Mathematics had the boon of at ten di ng

at th e foot of the sublime throne.



certa inly given hi m an insigh t into the social and

political relations of the contemporary Central

Asian States. He also developed a taste for Geography and had globes constructed for his use :

So the globes of the earth and the water had

been setu p, and the divisions of the habit

able quarter into seven regions accomplished.

His tut ors in Ast ronomy were Mul la Nuruddin,

and Maulana Ilyas. The keen interest which he

took in this branch of science is signif icant as compared wi th his lather's as

well as w i i h that of his successors in

Ind ia . Babur and pre-Babur Mughals,

(wi th the exception of 'Ulugh Beg")

down to his own time , apparently had li tt le fa i th or

2 Ak ba r Nama, Vol. I, p. 361.

2 Son of Shah Rukh and grandson of Timur , had been appointed

as governor of Mawara un Nakr du ring his father's li fe

time . He was a devoted student of Astronomy, Mathema

tics, and Philosophy, and a pat ron of those interested in

scientific subjects. During his governorship he got bu il t at

Samarkand an Observatory which was called after hisname. He also ma rked the position of stars and recorded

his observations in a separate volume known as ' Zij i-

' Ulugh Beg ' (or 'U lu gh Beg' s Almanac). Daulat Shah

has given a glorious account of ' Ulugh Beg's scientific

29 [CHAPTER I IHUMAYUN]

His tutors inA s A s t r o n o m y ,and his interestand activitiesin this branchof science.




A n d of all the invent ions of His Majesty was

a tent wh ich was div ided, acco rding to the

number of the zodiacs of the sky, in to twe lve

divisions. Every zodiac was divided into cages,

from the holes of which the rays of the stars of

Fortune shone br igh t . A n d another tent

like the ' falakul aflak ' for the sky of skies)

enveloped the sides of this tent.

activities and his great achievements in the theoretical and

applied Astronomy, According to him there has appeared

no monarch like ' Ulugh Beg, in the whole history of Islam.

vide Tazkiratush Shu'ara—Edited by Prof. B r o w n e -

Account of 'Ulugh Beg, pp. 361—6]. For a description of a

Calendar based on 'Ulugh Beg's system, vide Carre deVaux's article ' Un Calendrier Turque ' in Essays presented

to Professor E. G. Browne, edited by T. W, Arnold and

R. A. Nicholson.1 Akbar Nama, Vol. I, p. 361.

knowledge in th ings astro logical. He got bui l t a

'Khargah ' (a tent) wh ic h was div ide d into tw el ve

halls of audience, each of wh ich was named af ter oneof the twelve constellations of stars. The fu rn i

ture and paint ings of these hal ls, as also the dresses

of the servants, bore emblematic symbol of the

planets :

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And of the inventions of his Majesty was apleasure carpet, and that spherical carpet

was divided into the circles of the sky andthe globes of the Elements. The first circle

1 Ibid,

31 [CHAPTER TIHUMAYUN]

Also, he got ready a carpet which had nine astronomical circles marked on it, each of which was

named after a particular star, and assigned to hiscourtiers according to their ranks :




(which was at tr ibut ed to ' falak i atlas ') was

white in colour ; and the second was blue ;

and the third in appropriateness with Saturnwas black ; and the four th (whic h is the

resort of Jupite r) was of sandal colour ; and

the fifth (w hi ch is rel ated to Ma rs ) was of

ruby colour ; and the sixth (which is the abode

of the Sun) golden ; and the seventh (which is

the rest ing place of Venus) b r igh t green ; andthe eigh th (which is the place of Mercury)

is of li ly colour ; and the n in th circle (w hich

is the hal t of the Moon) is whi te . A n d af te r

the circle of the moon the spheres of the fire

and the air were ar ranged in order. His

Majesty for himself adopted the golden circle,

and there seated himsel f on the throne, andevery group of people, fro m among those

assigned to the seven planets, was ordered

by his Majesty to sit in a circle (whic h was

constructed ju st opposite to that planet) for

instance, the Indian 'Umara were ordered to

si t in the circ le of Sa tu rn , and the learnedin that of Jupiter.

1 Ibid.



HUMAYUN] 33 [CHAPTER TI

And among the excellent, inventions of hisMajesty was the dress for each day in accord

ance with the colour attributed to the planetof that day which is its patron, so that onSunday his Majesty robed himself in yellowwhich is attributed to the Sun, and onMonday in green which is attributed to theMoon, and so on.

He was also preparing to build an observatoryfor which necessary apparatus and tho site had

been provided, but owing to his suddendeath, the same could not be accomplished :

' Ibid., p. 368-

5

M a t e r i a l sready for anobservatory.

And his Majesty was firmly resolved to buildan observatory and had set up in order manyof the instruments for same and had fixed in

his mind a few sites as well.A l l this taste he acquired in Indian atmosphere

evidently under the influence of Hindu astrologywhich came into contact with Persian astrology forthe first time under the patronage of a Mughalemperor. Like the Pandits he believed in theefficacy of the stars and their potentiality in producing good or bad results in consequence of which





CHAPTER I I I

There were many foreign and Indian poetsattached to his court. The following is a selected

list of scholars including historiansand poets of Persian and Hindi, whoreceived his patronage or actually

entered his service in India :

Poets a n dscholars of hisreign.

1.2.3.

4.5.6.7.8.8.9.

10.11.12.13.14.15.

16.17.18.

35

Shaikh Amanullah PanipatlShaikh Gada'I DehlevIMir Waisl

Shaikh Abdul Wahid BilgramiMaulana Jalali HindiMaulana bin i Ashraf al HusainIMaulana Nadirt SamarqandlMir 'Abdul Latlf QazwinIMaulana Ilyas

Maulana Qasim KahlMaulana JunublShah Tahir DakhanIShaikh Abul Wajid Farighl ShiraziYusuf bin i Muhammad HirawiKhwaja Ayyub, son of Khwaja Abul

BarakatMaulana Muhammad Fazil SamarqandiJauharBa Yazid



HUMAYUN") 36 [CHAPTER III

19. Maulana Zamirl Bilgrami

20. Khwaja Husain Mervi

21. An unknown poet: author of an epicpoem.

A short description of each is given below :A learned Sufi and theologian—resident of

Panlpat—was one of Humayun's chief poets, andwrote several qasaid in praise of him.

His style is comparatively simple andhis poetry sweet and full of pathos.

Some specimens of his composition are as follows:

1 ' All Qull Walih Daghistani, Rivaz ush Shu'ara, B.M. MSS.Add. 16, 729, fol. 44b.

S h a i k h

A m a n u l l a hPanipati,

Always in fond desire for that wine-colouredruby,

I have a heart like the wine-jug full ofblood;

Thou like Laila resideth in the seclusionof daintiness,



HUMAYUN] 37 [CHAPTER III

I roam the world like Majnun ;

Though the soul leaves the body with a

hundredfold remorse,Fro m my heart thy love w i l l not de pa rt ;

Amanl is happy in the assembly of pleasure,

In the reign of the ki ng of the w or ld ,

Humayun.

On Mirza Hindal 's death, wh ich occurred in a

night att ack led by Kamran 's troops againstHumayun's camp wh ic h was situated near Surkhab,

Amanl wrote the following chronogram, and pre

sented it to his Majesty :

Shah Hindal, the cypress of the garden of

daintiness,

When he wen t away fro m th is garden of to i l ;The lamenting dove uttered the date,

'A cypress we nt away from the royal garden. '

Besides th is , he composed other chronograms as

wel l , and was chiefly noted in his day fo r his sk i l l

in same. He has been mentioned in thi s connection

by Ba Yazld who styles him as Amcinl, Manija andquotes one of his most beauti ful chronograms wh ich

> BadfiQnl, Vol. I, p. 454.



HUMAYUN"] 38 [CHAPTER III

Sultan Chaghta'l was the flower of the

garden of excellence,

A l l of a sudden Death led h im on the way

to Paradise ;In the season of flowers he resolved to go

from this garden,

The heart like the bud drowned in blood in

his grief;

The date of his departure I sought from the

grief-stricken nightingale,It went into lamentation and said,

i a flower

went out of the garden.'

He was one of the greatest scholars of Humayun's

re ign, and was the son of the famous poet Shaikh

Jamali Kambuh of Sultan Sikandar

Lodi 's court. He spent much of his

early life in acquiring knowledge

and in lecturing to students of moral philosophy

Tarikh i Humayun, I.O. MSS., 223, fol. 22a.

S h a i k hGada'l Deh-

levi.

he had comppsed on the death of Sultan Chaghta' l ,

a young Mughal chief who was a favour it e of

Humayun:



H U M A Y U N " ! 39 [ C H A P T E R H I

[Ibid., p. 93.1

and logic in Gujarat. In the year of Humayun'sdeath, he repaired to the court of Akbar at the

invitation of Bairam Khan, and was raisedthrough the latter's special favour to the high rankof ' sadarat." This installation of the Shaikh waschiefly due to his past loyal services to Bairam Khanduring his stay in Gujarat where he had gone on aspecial mission in the reign of Humayun. His

alliance with Bairam Khan which gave him ampleshelter and scope for showing favours to his ownfollowers and disciples by appointing them to responsible posts, led him subsequently to interferewith the politics of the State, and he became azealous member of a political party against Akbar.Abul Fazl as a loyal supporter of Akbar's interests

condemns the Shaikh as a mischief-maker and arebel.

2 His power and influence came to an end

with the fall of Bairam Khan. As a scholar hestill remained prominent. So great was the fameof his learning that scholars from Mawara un Nahr,

Iraq, and Khurasan, used to come to India for an

1 Akbar Nama, Vol. I I , p. 21.

2 Cf. the statement:



HUMAYUN] 40 [CHAPTER H I

Sometimes the soul was the abode of love,

sometimes the heart,I carry thy love from place to place ;Be not remiss to the need of one, grief-

stricken,For he forgets not thee for a moment;

[ Badaunl, Vol. I l l , p. 76.]1 ibid.

interview with him.1 He is the first notable

example in the reign of Humayun to combine the

knowledge of Arabic and Persian with that of Hindi.In Persian he wrote chiefly ' ghazal' of which aspecimen is given below :





HUMAYUN] 42 CHAPTER I I I

I hope so much that my penitence,May serve before thee as an excuse for my

sin.

One instance of his qit 'a writing is to be foundin the following chronogram which he composed onthe death of Mirza Kamran at Mecca :

1 Badaunl, Vol. 1, p. 452.

The king Kamran, the renowned monarch,Who through rule...raised his head to Saturn;Became a sojourner in the harem for four

years,Freed his heart completely from the prison

of this world;After the realization of the fourth haj,In the ihram of haj entrusted his soul to the

Beloved;



H U M A Y U N ] 43 ("CHAPTER III

When one night he appeared in Waisi's dream,He showed kindness and called him near;

Then said, " if they ask thee about my decease,Say, the blessed king remained in Ka'ba."

His poetry, as seen from the above, is simple andmelodious, and was but slightly affected by the current poetic tendencies at the court.

Like Shaikh Gada'i he too was a Hindi-Persian

poet, and a scholar of varied accomplishments. Onaccount of constant reading and writing his sight became weak. Badauniinterviewed him at Qannauj in 977 A. H . ,

when the Shaikh on account of his old age had confined himself to his native place. His chief works

are the following:1. A commentary on Nuzhat ul Anvah' which

Badauni praises as authentic.2. Sanabil—a treatise on the technical terms

of Suflsm.

In his last days he was much devoted to Suflsm,

and wrote several works on that subject. He alsocomposed Hindi verses and sang them in Hindi tune.In Persian composition he paid more attention to'ghazal

9 and wrote elegant verses in same. Thechief feature of his poetry, as is commonly observfdin contemporary writers, is the frequent use of figuresof speech with an attempt to create niceties in them.

Once he wrote a 'ghazal' with a flexible turn of phrase1 A work on Sufism by a celebrated scholar Fakhrus Sa'adat,

wr it ten in the early part of the eighth century A.H. atHerat.

Shaikh 'Abdul Wahid Bi l-graml. •



HUMAYUM] 44 [CHAPTER I I I

0 thou, whose thought has made its seat onthe throne of my heart,

Never in my heart is there place for otherthan thee.

Another beautiful verse quoted by Badanni is asfollows :

1 Badaunl, Vol. I l l , p. 66.

[Note the play on the Hindf word Raja( )and its

ingenious fusion into the Persian compound/ )which

may equally be read as( )making it a Persian-Hindi

compound with a welcome shift in meaning.

and fancy in praise of his dear friend named Raja.The opening line is worth noticing :

A poet of Humayun's court- chiefly known forhis lyric poetry and enigma-writing both in Hindi

and Persian. Two of his ' ghazals,'of which the opening lines are as

follows, are specially noteworthy asserving to illustrate the tendency of average poetstowards introducing original and creative ideas withflexible shif ts:

Maulana Ja-lall Hindi.



(Ibid., foll. 3a-8b.]

HUMAYUN] 45 [CHAPTER H I

The devotee got intoxicated from the cup ofthe wine of thy ruby (lip),

The lover saw thy face and became a fire-worshipper.

Thy promise of union, 0 moon, has fallen onthe Id,

Oh, on what a distant date this promise hasfallen!

He flourished in India under Babur and Humayun,and was among the li terat i of their courts. He

was a student of natural science inwhich he seemed to take great interest.His work entitled ' Jawahir nama i

Humayuni" which he dedicated jo in tlyto the father and the son is a dissertation on the

1 Daghistani, Riyaz ush Shu'ara, B.M. MSS., Add. 16,729, fol.

109b.2 Ibid.3 Or., 1717, B.M. MSS.4 Cf. the statement:

MuhammadIbn i Ashrafal Husainl arRustamdan.




use and formation of precious stones and othermineral. It is divided into 22 chapters as

follows :

Preface Foil. la- 4b A short discourse on the divi

sions of natural objects.

Chapter I „ 4b—11a. On ' lulu ' (pearl).

I I „ 11a—15b. On 'ya'qut' (saphire)

III „ 15b—19a. On ' ia ' T (ruby)

„ iv ,, 19a 21bOn ' z a m u r r a d ' (emerald) and

' zabarjad ' (topaz)

v , , 21b-22b. On ' zabarjad ' (topaz)

„ V I ,, 22b-26b. On ' almas1 (diamond)

„ VII „ 26b—27b. On * ainnl hur (cat's eye)

„ VI I I ,, 27b—31b. On ' f'iruza ' (turquoise)

„ IX ,, 31b-42b. On 'pa-zahr' l

x „ 42b -43b. On 'aqiq- (cornelian)

„ X I „ 43b—45a. On ' other ' stones of the samefamily.

„ XII „ 45a 45b. On ' Jaza ' (a kind of stone)

„ XI I I , , 45b-48b. On ' maqnatls' (magnet)

,, XIV „ 48b—49a. On ' sundbdda ' (a stone used

for polishing metal >

„ xv ,, 49a -50a. On 'dahana' a mineral)

„ XVI „ 50a — 53a. On ' lajward ' (lapiz lazuli)

„ XVII „ 53a—55b. On bus ud wa marjan (corals

and pearls)

„ X V I I I „ 55b-57b. On ' yashab ' (jasper)

„ XIX „ 57b-58b. On k billtir' (crystal)

„ XX ,, 58b—59a. On kan' (mine)

„ xxi ,, 59 a- 69a. On miscellaneous kinds of

stones

, , XXII ,, 69a-77b. On metals

1 A charmed stone said to be found in the head of serpents

and is reputed as an antidote for all kinds of poison.



HUMYUN 47 [CHAPTER III

Maulana Nadiri Samarqandi was amongthe rarities of the age, and was a highly

learned and accomplished scholar.As a poet of Persian language he built up areputation and wrote all kinds of poetry including'ghazal' ruba'i and ' qaslda.' A specimen of eachis given below:

Ghazal :

It was undertaken in the reign of Babur sometime after his conquest of Hindustan,1 and finished

under the patronage of Humayun and presented tohim.

He was a learned scholar of Arabic andPersian. He came to Agra fromSamarqand and was given a placeamong the elite of the court. Badaunl's

remark about his scholarship is as follows :

M a u l a n aNadirl Samarqandi.



HUMATUN] 48 [CHAPTER III

1

Ib id ., p. 472.2 Ibid., p. 473.

NOTE.—The second hemistich of the first line may also be

translated as ' I swear by my life when did I get

rest there ' ?

How charming is the gait and the form ofthe beloved,

I would become a slave to that form and gait;The beloved did not look on us with pity,Perhaps he cherished a regard for the rivals ;Go towards the tavern 0 Nadirl!Yield your head and turban to the thought of

wine.

His composition was not without subtletieswhich had been largely introduced in India underthe patronage of the Mughal court. The followingverse which he composed in praise of one Nizam,4 withwhom he is said to have been in love, is illustrativeof the popular taste and the atmospheric tendenciesin the art of composition :

I the broken-hearted utter the praise of theone named Nizam,

For my weak heart did not keep order (nizam)without union wit h him.





HUMAYUN"] 50 [CHAPTER III

In this life am melancholy, I, the humbleand the indigent,

My place of rest shall be the lane of annihilation.

One of his 'qasa'id,' in which he delineated onHumayun's taste for Mathematics and his prepossessions for science, is as follows. It is as well illustrative of the general style and the standard obtained

in the art of 'qasida' writing :

' Ibid. p. 473.



HUMAYUN] 51 [CHAPTER I I I




He was appointed by Humayun as tutor to theyoung prince Akbar at Cabul, after Mulla Pir

Muhammad.2 On Humayun's secondentry into Hindustan he was invitedby the latter to come to Agra, and on

his arrival in 963 A . H . , just after Humayun's death,

was received by Akbar with marks of greatest favourand kindness. ' His father Qazi Yahya was well-read in history and enjoyed the fame of a historianin his lifetime. He is said to have known by heartthe various Muslim dynasties that ruled in CentralAsia, Turkey, and Hindustan. Hairatl, a poet of

Trans-Caspian Province, eulogises his wonderfulmemory and historical insight in the followingcomplimentary verse :

1 Ibid., p. 475.

2 Farishta, Vol. I, p. 466.

3 Akbar Nama, Vol. I I , p. 19.

4 Badaunl, Vol. IU, p. 97.

He died in 966 A . H . , and the following chrono

gram was written by Mr. AmanI Kabl i:

Mir 'AbdulLatif Qazwini.




The tale of history ought to be heard from

him,

None in the present day has seen any onelike him.

Mir 'Abdul Latif himself, like his father, wasdeeply interested in history, and it was probably dueto his command of the subject that he received hisappointment as tutor to the young prince. It is

noteworthy that his younger brother Mir 'Ala 'ud-daula Qazwinl, who was trained and brought upunder the fostering care of his elder brother, wasequally a fine historian, and wrote the famous work'Nafa'is ul Ma'asir' from which both Badaunl andAbul Fazl have derived their material for the literaryphase of Humayun's reign.

He was a student of Mathematics and Astronomy,and was unrivalled in his day for his knowledge in

those two branches of science. Heacted as tutor to Humayun, and taughthim lessons on Astronomy. It was

due mostly to the tra ining received under him that

Humayun subsequently developed a considerabletaste for that science. Badaunl tells us that he wasproficient in the subject and thoroughly capable oferecting an Observatory.' Once when he happenedto visit Ardabil in the latter part of his li fe , he wrotea letter to Shah Isma'il II (whom Shah Tahmasp

[Ibid., p. 131.]

M a u l a n aIlyas.




had in his l ifet ime imprisoned in the for t of

' Qahqaha'), saying tha t f rom the confluence of

stars it transpires th a t he (Shah Ism a ' il I I ) wouldsucceed to the th ron e and that his other opponents

would soon be vanquished. In tha t le tt er he also

directed Shah Ism a 'i l to vi sit h i m at Ardabil on his

release f rom the prison so that he might put him

under the r i gh t stars wh ich would lead to his fu tu re

gl ory and uni nte rrupt ed retention of power. Bu tthe la tter , wh il e passing Ardabi l in procession, on

being released by his party in consequence of the

revolution which followed the death of his arch

r iva l Haidar Mirza, fo rgot to see the Maulana, and

havi ng gone some distance subsequently recollect

ed the prediction and suddenly tu rn ed back

and called at the Maulana's house. The Maulanalocked the door from inside but the Shah managed

to get in by cl im bi ng over the wa l l . Thereupon

the Maulana covered his face and refused to see

him saying that the hour appointed was gone and

the opportunity lost, since the planets had just moved

from th ei r position. The Shah then was obl iged to

leave, and though proclaimed k ing at Qazwin, yet

strange to say tha t after a year's successful re ig n,

he met his tragic death in a confectioner's house in

985 A . H . It was surmised that he was poisoned at

ni gh t when under the int oxica tion of opium, in

consequence of the cruelties which he had infl ic ted

on his house and the court.'

1 Sir John Malcolm, History of Persia, Vol. I, p. 517, London,1816.



HTTHAYN 55 P G 1 9 3 1 5

He was a dist inguished scholar and a fa vo ur it e

poet of Hu ma yu n. As the la tt er he wrot e al l ki nd sof po et ry , and compi led a separate

'diwan' consisting of 'qasida,' 'masna-

wl,' and 'ghazal.' He stands a

con trast w i t h his fe llow-poets in easiness of sty le

and use of simple an d plain language. The sweetness

in he re nt in his poe try is h a rd ly approached by any

one of hi s contemporaries . He composed several'qasa'id' and 'qit'at' in praise of Humayun . The

fo llowi ng chronogram wh ich he wrote on the

emperor' s death is reproduced by Jauhar as one of

the finest ever w r i t t e n :

M a u l a n aQasim Kah i.

The same is reproduced by Badauni , and quoted byProf. Browne. It is noteworthy that the last line which

is the chronogram of Humayun's death gives the

year 962. But the death actually took place in 963 A H . ,

and the chronogram is therefore short by 1 year.

1 Tazkira t ul Wa qi 'at, B M. MSS., Add. 16,711, fol. 144a.N O T E . — M i r z a ' Ala'uddaula Qazwini, author of Nafa'is

ul Ma'asir, quotes only three verses of which only one is

common. The other two are as follows :



Humayun, the king, is that sun,

Whose all -embracing bounty fe ll common to

al l ;

The st ructure of his power , when it at tained

its height,The foundation of his l ife fell f rom i ts base ;

L ik e the wo rl d- il lu mi na ti ng sun fro m its

height,

Down below at the time of evening prayer he

f e l l ;

The wor ld became dar k in the eyes of the

people,On the work of the high and the low confu

sion fell ;

For the date thereof Kahi wrote,

Humayun, the king, from the terrace fell.

Of al l the chronograms composed by other poets,

this is decidedly the most nat ural and standsunbeaten in the simpli ci ty of style, accuracy of

de ta il , and beauty of language. Anot he r equally

simple and suggestive chronogram which he wrote

HU MA YU N] 56 [CHAPTER HI



HUMAYUN 57 [CHAPTER I I I

Kam ra n was such th at for the place of k ing ,

There was none so worthy as he;

He went from Cabul to Ka'ba, and there,

Entru sted the soul to the True One, and the

body to the earth ;

Kahi wrote the chronogram thus :

'The king Kamran died in Ka'ba, '

Abu l Faz l calls h im Mi ya n Kale and counts him

among the foremost poets of Akbar 's court. Badaunl,

too, though points ou t his certain fau lts as a poet,

th inks h im un ri va ll ed in his day in the essentialfeatures of poetry and in the composition of chrono

grams. He had also associated for some t im e w i t h

Jam! at Hera t, and acquired there a competent

knowledge of the commentary of the Qur'an and

myst ic ism. In the company of Kamran he had gone

to Mecca and performed his pi lg rimage . For al l thisBadaunl th inks h im an atheist and finds h im gu il ty

' Badaun i, Vol. I, p. 452.

8

on Kamran's death, which took place at Mecca, is as

fo l lows:




of gross religious and moral offences. ! It is amusing,

however, to note that his composed poems were

universally popular and sung even in Badaunl's timein the assemblies of the Sufis.2 The opening linesof some of his odes are as follows. They are unsurpassed in poetic grace and are to be classed amongthe best productions:

My relentless love has slain a whole worldwith his daintiness,

Still he, the cherisher of my temper, iscarrying on his amorous playfulness.



HU MA YU N] 59 [CHAPTER III

It is not the narcissus that has displayeditself over my grave,

It is my vigilant eye that has in the longexpectation of thee turned white.

1 Ibid.

2 Ibid.3 Ibid.

The bird since it has started flapping itswings over Majnun's head,It has kindled the fire of his love for Laila

ever more.

Since from the reflection of his cheek themirror becomes full of flower,

If therefore a parrot look into that mirror,she would become a nightingale.

The rain of distress poured on my grief-wornbody,

What calamities did the 3ky not bring down

on my head !



H U M A Y U N ] (60 [ C H A P T E R I I I

Thy fiery face has become l ik e a lotus through

the ashes smeared on thy face,

Or the veil through the fire of thy face got

burnt into ashes.

In a long 'qasida' 2 he dw el t on Humayun' s taste

for As tr onom y and the uses of cert ain instrument s

li ke the 'astrolabe,' and 'compass' etc., which

Humayun had collected fo r his con templated obser

vatory.

Ibid.N O T E I t is still the custom of a Hindu Yogi to go about wi th

his face smeared with dust, or'ashes.

It may also be observed tha t the similes employed here are

drawn purely from Ind ian life and surroundings , and the

verse is in every aspect Indian in its conception w i th the

creative genius of a poet pla ying its part under favourable

and encouraging circumstances.2 This is the second notable instance to come across aft er

Nadir l ' s qasida where the genius of a poet took a scientific

tu rn and was spent in describing apparatuses instead of the

usual praises of the court. This was done ev iden tl y to arrest

Humayun's attent ion and to commend the ir poetry to his

notice. They knew tha t to gain his fu ll appreciation of thei r

verses it was necessary to compose them according to theroyal taste . This shows the extent of the influence th at the

individual taste of a Mughal sovereign in India could

exercise over the l i tera t i of his court , as also his power to

direct and mould the popular taste of the country as a whole.

The fo ll ow in g, w hi ch is fu ll of roman tic similes

and metaphors, isinpraise of a handsome Yogi youth:





HUMAYUN] G2 (CHAPTER III

Like a shadow we accompany thee whereverthou shouldst go,

May be that by degrees thou shouldst become

kind'to us;

0 sage of love, seek the society of one like

Joseph,

It is not strange that like Zulaikha thoushouldst become young;

O, Kahi, thou art the nightingale which

adorns the garden of Cabul,

Thou art not a crow and a kite to go to

Hindustan.

Soon after his a r r ival in Indi a, there was a markedchange in his tone which was gradually softened into

the praises for the court and its literati.

He ranked among the foremost poets of Ba-

dakhshan, and entered Huma yu n' s service when the

la tte r conquered that province. In

commemoration of this victory he

composed the fo ll ow in g chronogramand presented it to the emperor :

1 Ibid., p. 173.

M a u l a n aJunubi.



0 emperor, thy face is tulip and wild rose,and thy lip is life,

I see thy lip a bud of resplendent hue thathas just begun to smile ;

I say not the down on thy cheek verdure andhyacinth, nor thy cheek a rose,

1 Ibid., P. 470.2 Ibid., p. 469.

Thou art the king of kings of the age,

Thy work ever ended in victory and tr iumph ;Thou didst seize Badakhshan, and the date

was found in," Muhammad Humayun is the king of land

and sea."•

He also wrote several 'qasa'id" in praise of hismaster in the metre and style of Njzami, and

Anwari. The one quoted by Badauni, as being mostfamous and widely read, runs thus :

H U M A Y U N ] 63 [CHAPTER Ill



HUMAYUN] (64 CHAPTER I I I

Thy form shall prove to be 'the turmoil of the

age' when thou dost move.

The tendency to create subtle ties in the use of

figures of speech and exhaust s k il l at the a r t f u l

devices, wh ich is a s t r i k in g feature of the later

Mu gh al age, i s also visible in his wr i t ings . In a

'mfsnawi' which he composed in eulogy of his master

he made use of al l such subtleties to the discomfiture

of his contemporaries. Fr om its very first linequoted below, the d r i f t and character of the whole

poem can be gauged :



H U M A Y U N ] Go [CHAPTER I I I

Since I noticed the attention of my heart-

ravisher towards elephants,I spent in th e path of th e elephants the cash

of my life;

I throw dust over my head like an elephant

wherever I go,

1 A' in i Akba rl Vol. I. p. 244.

The above poem is a very good example of the Persian figureof speech known as wherein the channels of

thought and metaphor are suggested purely from the

luxuries of an Indian court.

F. 9

The emperor of religion and the king of the

age,

Became vic tor ious th rough auspicious fo rtun e.

Hi s other poems in cl ud in g ' ruba'iyat ' and

'qasa'id' are to be fo un d in th e biographies of Persian

poets. Some selections have been giv en by Badaunl

and A b u l Faz l. The fo ll ow in g fro m the latte r is

reproduced as a clever composition in praise of

A k b a r , ind uc in g h i m to bestow on t he poet yetanother elephant loaded with gold :




1 Badauni —Vol. I, p. 183.Cf. Anwari's qasida:

The litter of the sun when it enters the night-chamber of the Ram,

The tulip lights up the candle-lamp, and thenarcissus the torch;

The mountain is now relieved of the headacheof December and January,

He combined the knowledge of Astronomy withPoetry. In the latter he confined his attention

chiefly to 'qaslda' -writing, and followed Nizam i Astrabadl, and Anwari in

general style. He entered Humayun's service in thefirst part of his reign, and presented to him thefollowing 'qaslda' which he had composed in themetre of Anwari :

Shah TahirDakhanl.

If I do not find on my head my elephant-driver ;

The elephant-br aver king is that JalaluddinMuhammad Akbar,

Who bestows on his poets elephants loadedwith gold.



H U M A Y U N ] G7 [CHAPTER III

We are notorious for our guilt of love, and the

devotee for his hypocrisy,Both are notorious, but see the difference

between him and ourselves.

1 Ibid., p. 487.

2 Ibid.

3 Ibid.

The spring cloud washes the sandal powder

from off its face.

Some of his 'qasaid' are most remarkable, and arecomposed in close imitat ion of those of the leadingPersian poets like Salman, Zahir, Anwari , andKhaqani. A few, of which the opening lines arequoted below, are specially noteworthy :

In the grief-inhabited world, life's joy left theunhappy heart,

So much to grief were we given that life's

joy was forgotten.




Again Tis time, through the sky's demands,That the rose spread a carpet before the

palace-garden's gate.He is called 'Dakhani' because he had devoted

himself in his later years entirely to Deccan, androse to considerable influence and fortune there. Heoriginally belonged to 'Iraq wherefrom he came toAgra and stayed there for some time in the begin

ning. Since he was an orthodox Shi'a and a zealousadvocate of his religion, he often discussed with theSunn? court religious questions which eventuallyled to a friction between himself and his Sunniassociates. He called himself a relation of ShahTahmasp, and might be that he was purposely sentto Humayun's court by the Shah to convert

the emperor into Shl'a. From Agra he went to his

1 Ibid.2 Ibid., p. 484.

He who fixes his heart on the object of theworld,

Is not wise before the men of wisdom.

Don't come out, for thy fame w il l spread,We shall be killed and thou wilt be slandered.




elder brother Shah Ja'far in Deccan and took serviceunder Burhan Nizam Shah I, ruler of Ahmadnagar,

who soon raised him to the rank of Deputy (Vakil).He is an epoch-making personage and opens a newchapter in the history of the Deccan by introducingthe Shl'a faith in that country and converting theShah into a zealous Shi'a. Badauni relates the incident which led to the conversion of the Shah as

follows :

1 I b i d . , p. 483.

N O T E . A doubt is expressed by Professor Browne , in his recent

wo rk 'Persian Li ter atu re in Modern Times, A . D . 1500-

1924.' p. 169, fn . 3, as to the correctness of the ep ithe t

"Bahri w i t h which the Niz am Shahs of Ahm adn aga r

were known. Cf.—" I doubt if 'Bahvi is a correc t read ing : it should

perhaps be 'Burhan,' the proper name of the second

of the Nizam Shahs of Ahmadnagar who reigned, etc."

As to its correctness as a t i t le or surname of the Niz am Shahs

of Ahmadnagar , there is not the least doubt. The

historian Far ish ta who, on his ar ri va l in Ind ia,

had at first settled at Ahmadnagar, due to his father 's

appo intmen t as tu to r to Mu rt uz a Nizam Shah,says th at Niz am ul Mulk I , (whose real name, on

his conversion to Is la m, had been changed f rom

Mali k Na ' ib to Ma li k Hasan) was for a ti me called

'Bahar lu' aft er the name of his Brahman father




And to Nizam Shah Bahrl, who had a chronic

and incurable disease, th rough Shah Ja ' far ' s

rec ita tion of charm, re lie f appeared. A n dhaving attributed this to Shah Ja'far's

supernatura l powers, the k ing , th ro ugh his

ins tig ation, renounced the Sunnl fa i th wh ich

he had on the manner of MahdiwI sect, and

became a zealous bigot.

He died in 952 A . H . , and the date was found inthe ingenious phrase and he was the

fol lower of the house of ' A l l . He was an excellent

poet, and is the author of several poetical works

consisting mostly of 'masnawl and 'qasa'id in praise

of Humayun and Nizam Shah Bahr l.

He came to Agra from Shiraz, and took his roleas one of Humayun 's cour t poets. He had a Sufistic

turn of mi nd and lived a simple and

unostentatious li fe. Badauni testifies

to his fame as a poet and his tendency

toSufism. He possessed a sweet tongue and his poet ry

[Farishta, Vol. I I , p. 534.]

Shaikh AbulWajid FarighlShlrazl.

'Bahar .' This appellation was changed by Sul tan Muhammad Shah into 'Bahrl' with which the dynasty became

subsequently known in the Deccan. The Sultan had also

entrusted to his care his favour ite hawk together w i t h other

hunt ing animals due to the sugges tivity of the word 'Ba hr i '

(a hawk or a falcon). Cf. the st at emen t:




was ful l of pathos and the pang of spiritual love.

He wrote chiefly 'ghazal' on separation from his

ideal beloved and in complaint of the latter's inattentions. Some specimens are as follows :

God be praised that I was freed from thelove of a quarrelsome drunkard,

Who fe ll into every street like his own

intoxicated eye;

Like a wine-cup for a draught of wine, he

put his lip to the lip of every one,

Like a jug of wine, for a cup of wine, he was

going in every direction.

1 Badauni, Vol. I, p. 475.2 Ibid.

Since great is the torture that that ty rant

shows,

A little mercy from him appears as much.



The string of union do not break, 0 companionsof breath,

In scattering there is distress, do not breakaway from each other.

1 Ibid., p. 476.

2 Ibid.

HUMAYUN! 72 [CHAPTER III

It is long time since my heart had the boonof union with thee,

It was so short that it was as if it were not.In short, the days of life were spent in

separation,

The wealth of union who knew how great itwas ?The rivals, last night, were before thee, and

Farighi,

From afar was like a rue on the fire of despair.



HUMAYUN") 73 [CHAPTER IIIl

When thou drawest the arrow from my chest,leave the arrow-head,

Give me heart so that like a brave man I maygive my life in thy path.

He breathed his last in 940A.H., at Agra, and

was buried by the side of his late friend ShaikhZainuddln whose death had occurred just a fewmonths before him.2

He lived at the Mughal court as personal physician to Babur and Humayun, and also as chief

Munshi to the latter. He is the author

of several works of diverse utility andnature including poetical, medicinal,and epistolary. In poetry he wrote chiefly 'qasida'on subjects connected w ith public health and hygiene, under the pen-name ' Yusufi.' Some of hisworks are the following :

1

Ibid.2 This is to be noted that both these poets on their arrival in India

were in a very miserable condition. Shaikh Abul Waji d who

came from Shlraz had nothing with him besides one old fur

coat on his body, and so did the other. Cf. the statement:

Yusuf bin iM u h a m m a dHirwal .

[I bid ., p. 477.] From this extreme poverty they rose tofortune under the Mughal patronage. Shaikh Zainuddln was

appointed as 'Sa dr' by Babur and Abul Waj id occupied a

seat among the court poets of Humayan.

F. 10



HUMAYUN] 74 ["CHAPTER III

Riyaz ul Insha1: a treatise on the pro

perties of simple and compound medicinal

herbs and prescriptions, undertakenin 946 A. H . , and on finish dedicated toHumayun.

Jami'ul Fawa'id 2 : a work on general medi

cine treating of their uses, benefits,and injuries, with certain guiding

rules.Qasula fi hifz i Sihat : a poem on the mainprinciples of hygiene, dedicated to Baburin 937 A. H. , when he was not keepinggood health.

Badai'ul Insha: a treatise on the art ofliterary composition, giving proper titles

and forms of addresses in accordancewith the rank and profession of theaddressee. It was written in 940 A. H.,

3

for the benefit of his own son, Rafi'uddinHusain, as well as other youths in general. It has been lithographed at Lahore,

Delhi, and Lucknow.1 A d d . 17955, B . M . MSS., fo ll . 79b, and 174a.

2 Add. 23, 560, B.M. MSS. foll. 262a—264b.

N O T E . — T h i s is only an extr act from the preceding wo rk .3 The date of its composition is obtained by doubling the to ta l

of the numer ical value of the le tters of its t it le , as hin ted

by the author in the following verse :

i.

ii.

in.

IV.



HUMAYXTN"] 75 [CHAPTER III

He was the son of the famous scholar and poetof Babur's time Khwaja Abul Barakat (still alive

and patronised by Humayun). Thefather and the son both were capable

poets and wrote all kinds of poetry including 'ghazal''masnawl,' 'ruba'l,' and 'qasida.' The father used'Faraqi' as his pen-name. The following ' qasida 'which he wrote after the manner and style of

Salman Sawaji is one of his worthiest productions :

1 Badauni, Vol. I, p. 488,

K h w a j aAyyub.

The fever of grief and the headache ofseparation have I : ov'r head,

To the lip has come life, and the loved hathnot come : ov'r head ;

Since the fire of the heart caught light in mybody like a candle-lamp,

My skirt was torn, and the rent of the collarappeared : ov'r head.

He combined with the sober poetic vein a considerable amount of humour and also wrote satires,

for which he had a pungent gift, on eminent theologians in a graceful and felicitous style. Some of



H U M A Y U N ] 76 [CHAPTER III

his verses from a pleasantly humorous poem writtenas a satire upon the Qazi of Nishapur are reproduced

below :

Against the law of the Prophet, he wroteanother law,

Of which naught is found writ in the early

books;Honey he forbade, and wine he permitted,Since one was the grape's juice, the other

the bee's vomit;To a woman who 'fore the Qazi of her

husband complained,That he did not give to her joy complete ;He replied, " I f his strength is so weak,' Tis allowed in his place a coolie to seek,"

* Ibid.




0 branch of the rose, thou art drawn straightlike an erect stature,

1 Cf. the statement:

[Farishta, Vol. I. p. 356.]2 Badauni, Vol. I, p. 489.

Farishta pays him a high tribute of praise anddeclares that he came to Deccan after Humayun's

death.'His son Khwaja Ayyub, in his poetical composi

tion sometimes uses 'Ayyub' and sometimes 'Faraqi'(the pen-name of his father) as his nom de guerre.A specimen of his ode is as follows :




Round over thy lip thou hast drawn a line of

emerald;

Thy stature has come out like 'alif,' may itsshadow increase,

And from thy eyebrows thou hast drawn a

mad 9 over that 'alif' ;

Thou hast cast a dice of acceptance on the

words of others,

On the words of lovers thou hast drawn thepen of rejection ;

0 Faraqi, do not despair the boon of his

union,

Since thou hast suffered endless tyranny and

oppression of the beloved.

Maulana Mu ha mmad bi n i ' Ali bi n i Muhammadal Misklni al Qazi as Samarqandi, a man of consider

able learning remained unnoticed by the

Mugh al historians, author of a d is ti n

guished Persian work entitled 'Jawahir ul Ulum ' (or

the pearls of Sciences) no t published. It is a volu

minous work covering 814 foll. (1,628 pages), of large

foolscap size, closely wr i t t en in neat elegant Arabic

character. It is divided int o several chapters and

subdivisions, and trea ts of one hundred and twenty

different subjects which are discussed under those

headings w i t h admirable bre vi ty and simpleness of

sty le. Some discussions are on hi st ory, astronomy,

mathematics, medicine, logic, philosophy, ethics, andMu sl im jur isprudence. The copyist is one Nur

Muhamm ad' s son, 'Ab du rr ah ma n of Lahore. The

date of compilation is contained in it s ve ry name

Maulnns Muhammad Fazl.



HIMAYUN] 79 [CHAPTER III

which is inserted both in the Introduction and at theend, and works out into 946 A . H ' . The work is

called 'Humayunr after the name of the emperor,to whom, as it appears from the Preface, this copywas formally presented. The author also incidentallyhints at several works of his prior to this one, andsays as a reason for wr i t ing this book, that fromhis very boyhood t i l l his mature age, he was busy in

acquiring knowledge under the best teachers of theage, and having studied some rare works like 'Nafa'isul Funun fi ' Ar'd'is id 'Uyun,' 'Sittin ul Asar,' and'Hada iq id Anwar,' he thought of putting togethertheir contents as well as those of his previous works,in a smaller compilation. The work is therefore asort of Encyclopedia which is a singular undertaking

in that age and stands by itself.The title page bears the seals of Shah Jahan,

Sulaiman Jah, Sultan 'Alam, and Shah 'Alam, withseveral autographs of the librarians and privateowners. These, with the inscription of SulaimanJah's seal", suggest that the book remained in the



HU MA YU N] 80 [CHAPT ER III

lib rar ies of the ki ngs of Delh i and Oudh. Since th e

w ork is of pecu liar interes t, it wou ld be of some value

fo r a student of li t er a ry hi story to observe the styleof its language, and the tone of the author's Preface

and his address to th e k in g , together w i t h the sub

jects discussed, which in those days formed the

main basis of learning and considered important

from a scholar's standpoint.

The first 3 folios are reproduced from theor ig inal as fol lows : fo l. 1 b.




F. 11



HU M AY UN ] 82 [CHAPTER in



HUMAYUN] 83 CHAPTER III



HU MA YU N] 8 4 [CHAPTER H I



H U M Y U N ] 8 5 [ CH AP TE R I I I






HUMAYUN] 87 [CHAPTER. I I I








H U M A T U N ] 90 [CHAPTER I I I




















F. 13

H U M A Y U N ] 9 7 [ CH AP TE R I I I




In the abovequoted preface of the author severalpoints are of special interest, of which the followingdeserve notice :

1. The work was the greatest and most important literary undertaking in Humayun'sreign.

2. The author's idea of .writing an Encyclopaediain that age, with the object of presentingit to a Mughal emperor in India, and notto any other Eastern monarch of a neighbouring country, is significant, and throws

ample ligh t on the li terary taste of, andpatronage shown by, the Mughal rulers.

3. The then prevailing system of writingchapters and headings in red ink, with



F A C S I M I L E O F T H E T I T L E P A G E O F

" J A W A H I R U L ' U L U M H U M A Y U N I . "

[Author's family possession.]





FA CS IM IL E OF FOLIO IN.





FA CS IM IL E OF FOLIO 3B,





FACSIMILE OF FOLLO 813B. [Last page of MS.]






the number of page indicated on the topof each in black ink, is somewhat pecu

liar , though at the same time verysimple (vide facs. of fol. 3b).

4. The exceptional command and patience ofa copyist to write out such a voluminouswork in absolutely one hand and onestyle from the beginning to the end,

with distinctive accuracy, elegance, andneatness, is an important feature of thetime, and shows the height of excellenceachieved in the art of calligraphy. Also,their mode of crossing and correctingmistakes by enclosing the rejected portionwith V inserted in the beginning, and ?!

at the end, is indicated in facs. fol. lb.5. The subjects discussed in the work, consti

tuted ~ (current sciences), whichwere commonly taught in the educationalinstitutions in those days, and formedthe main basis of learning.

6. Arabic characters were generally employedin wri t ing books of Persian language,and specially in literary and scientificbooks. Even the poetical works of standard poets were all written in nasfch (Arabiccharacters); while Persian characters(nasta'liq) were more commonly used in

works of less important character, andlight literature such as State documents,foreign correspondence, firmans, andofficial and private letters.



HTJMAYUN] 100 [CHAPTER III

And in al l circumstances and at all timeshe had stayed in the service of his Majesty ;so it occurred to his mind that he shouldrecord, as a memorandum and a boon and ablessing, the events and anecdotes, accordingto his own intellectual capacity.

He entered Humayun's service as an ewer-bearer at a very young age, and attended him

faithful ly during his reverses and flightfrom Hindustan. Though not a very

learned man, he is the author of a very importantwork which is of special historical value as being a

fa ithful and unbroken record of Humayun's privateli fe during his exile. It was undertaken long afterHumayun's death in the year 995 A . H . 2

1 Ibid., fol. 2a.2

Tazkirat ul Waqi'at, B.M. MSS. Add. 16, 711, fol. 2b. Acopy of this work (inferior to the B.M. Codex) is also

in the I.O. Library.

For a critical estimate of Jauhar see Raverty's article in

the J. R. A. S.

The reason of composition is given by the author

in the following words :

Jauhar.




A summary of its contents is given below :I. Humayun's fight with Sultan Bahadur Guja

rat!, and the conquest of Gujarat.I I . His contests with Sher Shah, and temporary

victory and occupation of Bengal.I I I . Subsequent attack by Sher Shah and

Humayun's defeat; his pluck while crossing the river ; help given by a water-

carrier who was afterwards made to siton the royal throne at Agra for half aday (du sa'at),' in reward for his signalservice.





Since Jalaluddln Muhammad Akbar Padishah

of Jamshld's dignity said, "Every one fromamong the servants of the court who possessan aptitude for history may write i t , nay,from the reign of Humayun Padishah, if anyone has any events in his recollection, they(he) may insert them therein (history), and

conclude it in my Majesty's name." Andthis royal mandate was conveyed to humbleBa Yazid by Nawab Shaikh ul Masha'ikhShaikh Abul Fazl, son of Shaikh Mubarak.

The work is almost similar to Jauhar's indiction and style and is ful l of many interesting in

cidents of Humayun's and Akbar's private lives.It was undertaken at Lahore in the year 999 A . H . ,when the author was feeling the infirmity of oldage.

1 A most important piece of information con

tained in the work is the list of scholars and sundrynotable officers who accompanied Humayun from

HU MA YU N] 103 [CHAPTER I I I




Persia, Cabul, and other territories, on his way backto Hindustan.!

His real name was Shaikh Nizam. He enteredHumayun's service on his second entry into Hindustan.

He is said to be an excellent poet ofHumayun's court, and wrote several'masnawis' and 'qasa'id' of which some

he dedicated to the emperor. He died at an ad

vanced age in 1003 A.H. , and the chronogram of hisdeath was found by one Nawab Mubarak Khan ofDelhi in the words' ' (ah ah Nizam). It is ahappy coincidence that a poet of the same name alsolived at the court of Shah Tahmasp Safawl, and wasreckoned among the leading poets of his day. Besides his numerous 'qasa'id' in praise of the Shah, a

custom which very curiously prevailed both in Indiaand Persia, and was a common feature of the twocourts, he wrote several 'masnawls' of which thefollowing were well-known :

(i) Wamiq wa'azra.

(ii) Naz wa Niyaz.

(Hi) Afsana i Bahar wa Khizan.(iv) Laila wa Majnun (also called '' sar

guzasht i Majnun'".(v) Jannat ul Akhyar.

(vi) Sikandar Nama.

He also left two ' diwans ' entitled ' saha'if i

'amal'and'Iqd ila'all,' consisting mostly of 'qasa'id'in praise of the Shah ; and 'ghazal' and 'ruba'i' in

1 Ibid., fols. 72b-76a.

Maulana Za-mlrl Bilgrami.



H U M A Y U N ] 105 [CHAPTER H I

praise of his beloved, and on the transitoriness of

thi s wor ld and i ts vanit ies. He died in Persia t h i r t y

years before his namesake in India.He was a descendant of Shaikh Ruknuddin

'Ala 'uddaula Samnanl, and a pupi l of Maulana 'Isam-

uddin in logic and philosophy, and of

the famous Tradi tional is t Shaikh Ibn i

Hajar I I , in traditions and theology.

As a poet of Persian language he compiled a ' diwan,'and is mentioned by Abu l Fazl and Badauni (both

of wh om derived the ir mate rial from Nafa'is ul Ma-

asir ),as one of the poets of Akbar 's reign. Ba Yazid,

however, mentions the Khwa ja under Humayun, as

one of his constant associates.' Some specimens of

his poetry, wh ich is fu l l of subtleties peculiar to

India, are as follows :

0 thou, without thee, from my eye-lash thewater flowed,

And from the eye, the thought and the sleep

departed.

K h w a i j aHusain Mervi.




I am such that the dominion of speech is myproperty,

The banker of Wisdom is the tester of mystring of pearls ;

The preface of Existence is a leaf from mybook,

The secrets of both the worlds are on thepoint of my pen.

He wrote a versified translation of the famous

Hindi work 'Sanghasan Battisi' entrusted to his care1 Ibid.

2 Ibid.3 Ibid.

In association with us thou hast cast a knot,like a bud, in thy eye-brow,

In company with others thou hast opened thelip like a smiling pistachio.

Thou hast shown thyself to us in the form

that was not thine,

Alas, the manner in which thou hast shown

thyself thou wast not.



H U M A Y U N ] 107 [CHAPTE R in

by Ak bar. It remained unfinished wh en he le ft

Ind ia in 980 A . H . , for Cabul, where he died soon

after. His poetic powers and erud it ion may we l lbe ju dg ed by the fact that Faizi was his pu pi l and

was br ou gh t up and tr ained by h im. When the

Khwaja took leave for Cabul, Fa iz i found the date

of this event in the words ' ' which are used

fo r no less respectable a person than one's fa ther

or guard ian. One of his marvel lous compositions isa 'qasida' which he wro te and presented to Akbar on

the occasion of Jahangir' s b i r t h in 977 A . H . It was

considered as a masterpiece of surpassing ski ll ever

designed by a nyone before h im. The author hi m

self seemed proud of its produc tion , and challenged

his colleagues (i n the 13th verse) saying that no one

f rom among the cour t poets could br ing as a presentan yt hi ng better th an tha t. It is so arranged th roug h

out thatthe first hemistich of every line gives the year

of Akbar's accession to the throne, while the second

does that of Jahangi r's b i r t h . This shows the prog

ress made in the a r t of chronogram so ardent ly

taken up under the Mugha] patronage :

1 Akbar Nama, Vol. I, p. 348.

NOTE.—The same with a high tribute of praise has been pro

duced by Jahangir, w i t h slight variants , in his Tuzuk,

p. 3, ' Al lga rh , 1864. Cf. his rema rk :






The wo rk is different fr om Khw andamir's Hu

mayun Nama, already noticed under Babur . It was

not wr it te n du ri ng Humay tin's life time,

but after his death by an unknown poetof his or his successor's cour t. This is

evident from the fact that Humayun

is nowhere mentioned by name but by his pos

thumous title ' jannat ashyanl' whi le A kb a r is men

tioned as the ru l i ng monarch. It is wr i t t e n after

the style and met re of Firdausl 's Shah Nama com

mencing with the verse:

1 Or. 1797, B.M. MSS., fol. 9a.

An unkno wnpoet, authorof an epic

poem-.Huma yun Nama.

H U M A Y U N ] 109 [CHAPTER H I

Ei gh t folios in the be gi nn in g and many at the

end af ter 65b are mi ss ing. The author has at

tempted to follow Firdausi closely and to ident ifyhimsel f w i t h h im in the subjec t-matte r. This is




perhaps the first instance in the li terary history ofthe Mughals in India that the idea of wri t ing an

epic poem on the lines of Firdausl's Shah Namaand to idolise his hero, struck to a poet of Humayun'scourt. It is a valuable historical narrative of Humayun's and his predecessors' battles and conquestswhich are described in a language sufficientlyworthy of the theme. A summary of its contents is

as follows:

I. Timur' s successors up to Humayun.I I . Babur's expedition to India, and his vic

tory over Sultan Ibrahim Lodi at Panipat.I I I . Babur's illness. News carried to Huma

yun and his hurrying to Agra . Babur's

declaration of his successor in Humayun,and his death.

I V . Humayun's coronation followed by ageneral feast. Great rejoicing in thecountry. Rich gifts given, and robes ofhonour conferred.

V. His battles with Sultan Bahadur Gujarat!and Sher Shah. The latter 's counterattack and Humayun's defeat and flightacross Sindh. Bir th of Akbar at'Umarkot.

V I . His activities in Turkistan, Qandhar, andCabul. His fight with Kamran. Defeat

and pardon of the latter.V I I . Humayun's taste for astrology and his

prophecy regarding Akbar's futuregreatness.



H U M A Y U N ] 111 [CHAPTER I I I

V I I I . Hi s second exp edi tion to Hindus tan. His

battles with the Afghans and Sikandar.

Humayun's victory and accession to thethrone.

The author has at places i mit at ed Fi rdausi so

closely in loftiness of expression, beauty of language

an d dain tiness of similes tha t it is sometimes hard to

di sti ngui sh wh ich is w h ic h . He mus t be a grea t

poet indeed from among the very best poets ofHu ma yu n 's or A k ba r ' s r e ign . ' Some of his lines

by way of sample are quoted below fr om the B. M.

codex :—

Line s on Hu ma yu n' s communication and fightw i t h Sultan Bahadur Gujarat ! : —

1 Shibli on the alleged authority of Badauni states that

Nazir i , the famous lyric poet of A kbar's reign, had under

taken to wri te an epic poem entitled " Sh a hN a m a i

HumayQnl, " which remained unfinished, at the sugges

tion of Bairam Khan. [Shi 'r-u l-'Ajam, Vol. I l l , p. 4.|

I was unable to discover the reference in BadaQnl, under

both N azlr l and Bairam Khan. Shibll has evidentlyconfused Nazlr l , with Manzarl, a less important poet,

who, according to Badauno had undertaken the task.

[Vide Vol. I l l , pp. 340-41] Bad&uni has also quoted one

verse as sample which I could not find in the B. M. codex.



HUMAYUN I 112 [CHAPTER I I I



1 Or. 1797, B.M. MSS., fol. 25a.

F, 15




HU MA YU N] 114 [CHA PTER III



CH A PT E R I V

The greater part of Humayun's reign was unsettledand chequered wi th misfortunes and exiles. The

extent of progress made by Urdu in hisreign is hardly ascertainable due to thescantiness of material, but there

could be no doubt that the samewas progressing steadily in the whole of UpperHindustan, including the Punjab and the Gujarat.The appearance of Hindi-Persian poets in increasingnumbers is a good testimony of the gradual hold ofHindi over Persian, and their mutual growth andfree play wi th each other. An evidence of same

is to be found in the talk of a parrot which wascaptured by Humayun in his fight wi th SultanBahadur Gujarati. When Humayun led an attackon Malwa in 942 A . H . , Sultan Bahadur, betterknown as Bahadur Shah, at the advice of his faithless General Rumi Khan, unwisely took refuge inthe fort outside the city, instead of meeting his

enemy face to face in battle. The siege lasted forseveral weeks t i l l at last Humayun's officers, who hadsecretly won over Ruml Khan to their side, began tointercept the supplies of food sent to Bahadur ShShwhich weakened the position of the besieged a greatdeal. In addition to this treachery, Rumi Khan

one night caused his men to set fire to the royalmagazine, and th is was followed by an attack fromHumayun's troops who eventually entered the fortunmolested. Thus Bahadur Shah was overcome

116

Progress ofUrdu in Huma-yun's reign.



HUMAYUN] 116 [CHAPTER IV

and fled to Gujarat for his life. He had a favourite bird—a tuti which repeated what it heard

like a human being. When it was brought toHumayun in the open court, Rumi Khan also wasinvited by the king to be present. On Rumi Khan'sentering the court, Humayun courteously said,

(welcome Rumi Khan). The birdhearing his name screamed aloud

(Tut Rumi Khan, sinner, untrue to salt,tu t sinner, untrue to salt). A l l amaz

ed, and Humayun said :—

What can I do Rum! Khan, alas, it is abird, otherwise I would have pulledits tongue from its mouth.

The speech of the bird is a curious combination of Hindi , Persian and Arabic words, sys

tematically arranged and put in a sentence. * Thisis perhaps the best example of Urdu that couldbe traced in the reign of Humayun, and serves toshow how people were accustomed to talk in theirhomes and on private occasions. Of the many

1 Mir'ati Sikandari MSS., dated 1087 A.H., fol. 107a.2

Ibid., fol. 108b.3 Ibid.

4 Phit and Papl are Hindi, and natnak Persian, compounded

with haram, Arabic. Also ef. a similar instance of a parrot

speaking Persian cited under Babur. [Supra, p. 76.]

A parrot uttering an Urduphrase.




poets cited under Humayun, Badaunl has referredto some who composed both in Hindi

and Persian. On the same authoritywe learn that their hybr id compositionhad found complete favour with thegentry and on several occasions sungbefore Humayun. Thus the already

existing relations between Hindi and Persian had

drawn closer and more friendly under Humayunthan under Babur. Both the Hindus and theMuslims now appear to have publicly givenup tkeir prejudices not only in the cult ivationbut also in the use of each other's literature.The Muslims though from the very beginningshowed no such bias in the acquisition of Hindi lan

guage, yet they had not taken to do it so freely asthey did now. The Hindus too in their tu rn, owingto their unavoidable social and political relationswith the Muslims, were doing the same. TheRajput Princes and the Hindu Rajas, for holdingnecessary communications wi th the Muslim conquerors, kept at their courts a special staffwell-equipped to deal with the original Persiandocuments. In certain cases where the paperswere of a confidential nature, the Rajas themselves used to attend to them. Similarly theMuslims behaved and kept a competent staff

ready at hand to cope with Hindi cor

respondence. A good instance of theRajas' writ ing to Sher Shah fictitiousletters in Hindi with their forged replies in Persian, which were purposely

A definiteadvance madeby Urdu, underHindu-Muslimcultivation ofeach other'sliterature.

Faked Hindi

letters of Rajasto Sher Shah,and their supposed repliesi n P e r s i a nfrom the latter.






Majesty's forces." And in accordance withthese letters they also wrote from the

tongue of Sher Shah stating "God willing,after our victory and subjection of Maldeo,I wi l l hold you in honour and esteem, andwi l l reinstate you in all your ancestral possessions." Thereafter they made those falseletters fall through clever devices into thehands of Maldeo. And Maldeo who alwaysentertained fear and anxiety in his heartagainst his Zammdars and Umara got terrified on perusing those letters and Kunhaiyaand other nobles, however much they counselled him, it proved of no avail.

As a result of this harmony and interalliance,Muslim poets of Hindi language onthe one hand, and Hindu writers ofPersian on the other, sprang up inever so large numbers under thepatronage of the later Mughal emperors.

During Humayun's absence from India the samefeature prevailed in the reign of Sher Shah, and thenumber of such poets as composed both in Hindi andPersian kept mul tip ly ing. The Muslim interest inHindi literature under Sher Shah is evidently moremarked than be7ore, due perhaps to his own predi

lections for Hindi. The appearance of a renownedpoet of Hindi language, Malik Muhammad Ja'isi, whois described under Sher Shah marks a new era inthe history of Muslim lore in India. It is a notable

Growth ofMuslim poetsof Hindi lan-g u a g e andHindu writersof P e r s i anp ro se a n dpoetry.



H U M A Y U N ] 120 [CHAPTER IV

departure from the old customary traditions of mixingHindi wi th Persian, for his poems were composed

in terse Hindi almost to the exclusion of Persianvocabulary.





S H EK S H A U SKATF.D ON H I S THRONF.

[From an album of Puthan kings.]



CHAPTER V

A portion of the period of Humayun's rule iscovered by Sher Shah who held undisputed sway

of Hindustan for five years during

Humayun's exile. His real name wasFarld, and his title ' Sher Khan' whichwas conferred upon h im by Sultan

Muhammad, ruler of Behar, due to the extraordinary valour shown by Farld in killing- a tiger. Onhis defeating- Humayun and ascending the throne atDelhi, he changed 'Sher Khan ' into 'Sher Shah.' His

grandfather, Ibrahim Sur, had come down to Indiafrom Afghanistan in the reign of Sultan BahlolLodl, and served under him in various capacities.After Ibrahim 's death, his son Hasan Sur took service under Jamal Khan, an influential noble ofSikandar Lodi 's court, and received as ' jagir ' theimportant ' parganas ' of Sahsram and Khawaspurwhich remained for long a bone of contentionbetween Farld and his brothers.

In his early youth he had left his home, throughdomestic unpleasantness, for Jaunpur, where he

busied himself in the pursuit of knowledge, and acquired a taste for history

and literature. He studied Arabicgrammar up to ' Kafiya ' and sundryworks of Persian poets like Sa'di and Nizami :

121

F. 16

His literarya t t a i n m e n tand patronageof letters.

Sher Shah :his name andparentage.



Far ld due to the unkindness of his fa th er

and the enmi ty of his brothers, h av ing

separated from them, and resigned his

service under Jamal Khan, passed sometime at Jaunpur in ga th er in g knowledge

and the acquirement of perfections, t i l l the

ti me he read ' Kaftya ' with commentaries

and ot her compendiums. A n d he also read

the Gulistan, Bustan, and Sikandar Nama

and othe r wo rk s besides, and hav ing approach

ed monasteries and schools, he busied h imself in the puri fic ati on of morals in the

society of the learned and the grea t Shaikhs

of that locality.

1 Badauni, Vol. I , 357.Also, refer Qanungo's life of Sher Shah.

2 Tazkira i Bagh i Ma'ani (bound with Nafai's ul Ma'asir),

B.M.MSS.,Or. 1761, fol. 126a.

I I U M A Y U N ] 122 [CHAPTER V



H U M A Y U N I 123 [CHAP TER V

A n d in the branch of hi story as wel l he be

came conversant.

L ike his predecessor, Sultan Sikandar LodI , he

patronised the students of Ar ab ic and Persian li ter a

ture, and attached great importance to

educational merit in all public services.

In his official and pr iv at e li fe he had

scholars and poets constant ly at tend

ing h i m ' and was fond of listening toth ei r li te ra ry discussions and pa rt ic i

pa t ing in same. Once a Qazi of his cour t, who was

acconjpanied by a young student, came to see h im.

The keen int ere st evinced by the la tt er in the you th

and the patronage shown to him is described as

follows :

A young student of Arabicrewarded bySher Shab forcorrect an -swers to ques

tions on A r a bic grammar.



HUTMAYUN] 124 [CHAPTER v

A youth accompanied the QazI. Sher Shah

asked the Qazi, " I presume that this comrade

of yours bears some rel atio nsh ip w i t h you, bu tdoes he possess any mer i t also " ? The Qazl

repl ied , " The youth is a student, and reads

' Kafityu.' Sher Shah, since he ha d ret a in

ed in h is reco llectio n the ' Kafiya ' w i t h its

correct commentaries, asked that student,

" Is 'Umar 'munsurif 'or ' ghair munsarif '?"The student rep lied , ' ghair munsarif.'

Sher Shah said, " W i t h what ar g u m en t? "

The student Rave an in te ll ig en t answer w i t h

his arguments based on logical reasoning.

Sher Shah ordered tha t 500 ' bigah ' of land

and 500 rupees cash be giv en to h i m . The

student sa id, " I possess one more m e r i t . "Sher Shah asked, " W h a t is t ha t V The

student replied, " I ret ain i n m y memor y

the Div in e book. " Sher Shah ordered th a t



HUMAYUN 125 [CHAPTER v

500 ' bigah ' and 500 rupees more be added

to his share. Simultaneously w i t h th at , he

asked the studen t, " Did you get the meansof l iv ing and the cash money accord ing to

your meri ts ?" The s tudent replied, " Yes,

I got them, but I have not ye t received the

generosity of the k i n g . " Sher Shah ordered

that 500 ' bigah' of land and 500 rupees cash

more be added.He had a good taste for poet ry and composed

verses both in Pers ian and H i nd i under the pen-

name ' Farid.' The fo ll ow in g Persian

verse of his ow n composition was his

monogra m which he got inscribed on

his seal.

His taste forPersian andHi nd i poetry.

God keep thee king for ever,

Live in peace Sher Shah, son of Hasan Sur.

On one occasion when Humayun's army in a contest w i t h Sher Shah was completely rou ted and many

of the soldiers and notable officers were drowned in

Farishta, Vol. I, p. 429.

NO TE .— Th e author of T a r l k h i Da 'u di puts the first hemi

stich as follows:

God, the ki ng , (or, God, the Ete rnal K i ng) , may r ema in

over him always.

[I bid. , B . M . MSS., Or. 197, fo l. 77a.]



HUMAYUN] 126 [CHAPTER v

1 Tazkira i Bagh i Ma'ani (bound with Nafais ul Ma'asir)

B.M. MSS., Or. 1761, fol. 130a.2Tarlkh i Da'udi, B.M. MSS., Or. 197, fol. 77a.

the river while crossing same, Sher Shah composed avery opportune quatrain as follows :

0 God, Mighty and Rich art Thou,

Thou art the Mighty Supporter of the poor ;Thou givest royalty to Farld, son of Hasan,Thou givest the army of Humayun to the fish.

In his composition he followed the current Indian

style which was on the lines of flowery Persian.

And Persian verses he composed after themanner of the people of Hindustan.

He also composed verses in Hindi and was a patron of Hindi poetry. The chief Hindi and Persianpoets of his court were respectively Malik MuhairimadJai'si (the author of Padumawat), and Shaikh ' AbdulHai, son of Shaikh Jamali Kambuh.

There is a Persian-Arabic verse of his asfollows:




With us what did Mullu do ? the slave, the

cursed,The Prophet has said, " There is no good in

slaves."

He evinced good taste and fine poetic humour on

many occasions. Once on being told that his beardhad grown white, he replied that it was true, sincehe wore the crown towards the evening of his life.

He died while storming the fort of Kalinjar in952 A . H . , through the bursting of an enemy rocket

which caused a fire in the magazine. The

date of his death was found in the mostsuggestive phrase in the following chrono

gram composed by one of his court poets.

His death.

1 Badauni, Vol. I, p. 365.

N O T E . — S h e r ShSh had composed this verse on the occasion

when Mu ll u Kh an , rule r of Ma lw a pla ying false, had

one nigh t surr ept itiously disappeared fr om Sher Shah's

camp, although the la tter had shown him great favour

and taken him into confidence.

Far ish ta at tr ibute s the second hemistich to Shaikh ' Abdu l

H a i who had composed it offhand to ma tc h w i t h Sher

Shah's fi rs t hemistich . [Fa rishta , Vol . I, p. 425.]

The same is corroborated by Ni za mu dd in Ahmad :

Tabaqat i Akbari, p. 231.12 Farishta, Vol. I, p. 429.




Sher Shah is he through whose terror,The lion and the goat drank water together ;He went away from the world ; old Wisdom

uttered,The year of his death, "from the fire he died."

Historians are unanimously agreed that SherShah was a just, wise, and capable monarch, and his

reign was distinguished for peace andtranquil li ty . Badaunl congratulateshimself on his bir th having takenplace in the reign of a just monarch

like Sher Shah' in the following wordswhich shower a most glowing tr ibute of praise thatcould ever be paid to any Muslim king :

B a d a Q n l ' sand Farishta'sestimate ofSher Shah.

And God be praised that in the regime ofsuch a king as said by the Prophet (maypeace be upon him), " I was born in the reignof a just monarch," the birth of the author

1 This encomium of Badauni is significant since he had no word

of praise for his own sovereign, Akbar, by whom he

was patronised.2 Badauni, Vol. I, p. 363.



TOMB OF SHEK SHAH AT SAHSRAM

DT. SHAHABAD, BENGAL.





HUMAYUN] 129 [CHAPTER, V


E. 17

of this ' Muntakhab' took place on the 17thof the month of Rabi'us Sani in the year

947 A.H.Farishta holds the same view of Sher Shah's

just and peaceful administration and says that heperformed many deeds of public good in buildingCaravansaras for the Hindus and the Muslims alikeon the main roads from Bengal to the Indus (a dis

tance of 1500 kos), and from Agra to Mandu (a distance of 300 kos), requisitioning them with plentifulsupplies of food and provision, and making theseroutes perfectly safe for journey :



HUMAYUN] 130 [CHAPTER V,

baked br ick. He appointed a ' mu'azzin,'a reader of the Qur'an, and an Imam, and

fixed gratuities for each of them. And inevery Sarai he fixed one gate for cookedfood and rations for the Muslims, andanother similar gate for the Hindus. Andin his reign such was the public securitythat travellers in jungle and desert, where-

ever they reached, went to sleep withoutapprehension for their property. It is saidthat if an old woman with a tray full of goldslept at nights in a desert there was no needfor a watch at all. Often he devotedhimself to public service and duly attended tothe affairs of his army and the welfare of his

subjects, and persevered in the path of equityand justice.

He is a most important poet of the court ofSher Shah. He combined the Sanskrit and Persian

scholarship with poetic attainments,and was regarded as a Sufi. He was

patronised by Sher Shah whom heeulogised in his memorable Hindipoem, the ' Padumavati' which was

a notable undertaking by a Muslim. It was

1 A woman of rem arkabl e bea uty, daugh ter of the Raja of

Ceylon, seized by the Raja of Chit taur , and af te rw ar ds

fe ll in possession of Sultan 'Al a' ud di n Kh i l j i . Her storyis also wr i t t e n in Persian poetry by one Husain Gbaznawi.

Anot he r by Rai Gobind Mu ns hi . Als o in U r du verse by

the joint efforts of M i r Zi ya 'udd in ' Ib ra t, and Ghula m

' A l l ' Ishrat.

MaliX.,. Muhammad Ja'isi

a poet ofepoch-makingsignificance.







HUMAYUN] 131 [CHAPTER V

written in 947 A . H . , in terse Hindi language occasionally mixed wi th Persian and easy Hindi words.

The most curious thing was that he adopted Persiancharacters for his text , an event of epoch-makingsignificance in the history of both Hindi and Persianliteratures in India :

"Malik Muhammad is, we believe, the oldestpoet of Hindustan of whom we have any

uncontested remains. The preservation ofPadumavati is due mainly to the happyaccident of Malik Muhammad's religiousreputation. Although profoundly affected bythe teaching of Kabir, and familiar ly acquainted with Hindu lore and with the Hindu Yogaphilosophy, he was from the first revered as

a saint by his Muhammadan co-religionists.He wrote his poem in what was evidentlythe actual vernacular of his time, tingedslightly with an admixture of a few Persianwords and idioms due to his Musalman pred i c t i o n s . It is also due to his religion tha t he

originally wrote it in the Persian character,and hence discarded all the favourite devicesof Pandits who tr ied to make their languagecorrect by spelling vernacular words in theSanskrit fashion. He spelled each wordrigorously as it was pronounced. His work ishence a valuable witness to the actual condi

tion of the vernacular language of the 16thcentury."1

G. H. Grierson and Mahamahopadhyaya Sudha KaranDvividi Padumavati, Vol . I, Introduction, Calcutta, 1911,




He was a disciple of two prominent Sufis, SayyidAshraf Jahangir and Sayyid hi'uddin. 1 whose

praises he sang in his poems calling them as hismasters and steersmen. He also poured unqualifiedpraise on Sher Shah for his just and peaceful reign,and for his literary patronage. He is one of the.three great Muslim poets of Hindi

2 who flourished in

India in the 16th century A . D . , and helped towards

the formation and growth of modern Urdu the linguafranca of India.

1 These two in their lifetimes had considerable influence

over the people of Upper Hindustan, and belonged tothe Chishtiya Nizamiya order.

2 The other two being Ka bi r of the reign of Sultan Sikandar

Lodi (already described under Babur) , and Rahim of

the reign of Akbar (to be discussed hereafter).



CHAPTER VI

He met his tr ag ic death at Delhi in 063 A . H . , by

an accidental fa l l fr om the ter race of his li br ary

where he often ret ire d in the after

noons to amuse himself with books.Th at even ing also according to his

wo nt , hav ing examined his bookshelves, he wa lk ed

on t o . the terrace to enjoy fresh air . Just when

he was descending the staircase the ' mu'azzin' gave

a cal l to prayers, on he ar ing wh ich he we nt down

on his knees in holy reverence. When the ' azan '

was over, he rose supporting himself on a staffwh ich un fo rtun at ely slipped upon the marb le, and

he fel l down headlong several steps. He received

great injuries in his head and arm, and was removed

to his palace insensible. On the fif th day he

expired.1 Thus ended the l ife of one of the most

1 Badaun i and A b u l Fazl have probably used the T u r k i work

' Mir'at id Mamalik' of Sidi ' A l l Rels who was

then personally present at the court and describes the

event w i t h almost the same accuracy of de ta il as do

Badauni and Abul Fazl, with the following notable

differences :

(?) Sidi 'Ali Rels omits to say from what part or section

of the castle Hu ma yu n f e l l ; while Badauni and A b u lFazl make it qui te clear by st at ing th at the fa ll

occurred fro m the bu ild ing kno wn as lKitab Khana '

(l ibrary).

133

Humayun's

death.



HUMAYUN] 134 [CHAPTER VI

humane monarchs of the Mughal dynasty, a loverof science and literature, and a character nobler

than any to be found in the long line of the Mughalkings.

The court poets wrote chronograms1 each

trying to excel the other in poetic grace and plain-tiveness. Of the numerous chronograms the best was of Maulana Qasim

Kahi quoted by Jauhar and reproducedon p. 55 supra. Elegiac poems were also written

E l e g i a cpoems.



HUMAYUN's REMAINS BEING CARRIED TO TUK BURIAL GROUND

THE YOUNG PRINCE AKBAR ACCOMPANYING THE CORTEGE.

[Acquired at Lucknow.]








The wind of autumn has to blow in this roseand the garden;

Thou hearest with thine own ears that acertain one passed away,

In the ears of others thy news also has to go.

Humayun, unlike his father, was a monarchmore of li terary tendencies than of administrative

bent1 and possessed a keen sense

of humour hardly surpassed by any

His wit and

humour.

Since Ka mr a n M i r z i saw a large cr owd wi th banners hethought it was his Majesty and at tacked at once, and

entered the fo rt of Taliqnn. Hi s Majes ty enquired

about the l ib ra ry . They replied that it was qui te safe.

(Ta zki rat ul Wa qi 'a t B . M . MSS., A d d . 16,711. fol. 99a.)

Also ef., his delight at rec eiv ing books presented to

him by a Persian noble at Zankan near Tabriz :

He was so fond of study that he took his books w i t h hi m

everywhere in his travels. Eve n in his flight under ad

verse circumstances he di d not suffer to leave behind

his li br ar y of which he took grea t care du ri ng al l his

journeys to and from Persia, across the deserts and in

the th ic k of battles against his foes. Cf . his inqu is it ive-ness about the same af te r his pa rt y was at ta ck ed by

Kamran.



H U M A Y U N ] 137 [CHAPTER VI

A n d they br ough t Qarja Khan wi th sword

hung ro un d his neck. When he reached the

torch which was near the Audience Hall,

And Husain Quli Mirz a, brother of Ahmad Sultan, who

had come from Mashad to see his mother and brothers to

obtain leave for Mecca, interviewed his Majesty , and

presented some books which he possessed. Out of these

books his Majesty took some which pleased him and

gave back the rest.

(Tarikh- i-Humayun, J. O. MSS., 223, fol. 3b.)

Also of., his death by a fall from the terrace of hislibrary to which he repaired in the afternoons for his

mental recreation.1 Ib id ., fol l 36b and 37a.

F. 18

other mo na rc h of his line . In his display and

appreciation of w i t he may be compared to his

ancestor Timur; in his love for science to UlughBeg ; and in his poetic in sig ht to Jahangir. A few

instances of same are quoted below :




Shaikh ' A l i Beg asked Bihbud Chubdar to goand congratulate his Majesty. The aforesaidBihbud started off. The eye of his Majestyfell on this rider and he asked, " Who is thisrider that cometh " ? People by mere guessreplied that he might be ' Bihbud ' Chubdar.

His Majesty took this to be a good omen andsaid, "God be pleased, it would be 'bihbud' "

(i.e., it would turn out good).

1 Tazkirat ul Waqi'at, B.M. MSS., Add. 16,711, fol. 48b.

Humayun ordered that as Qarja Khan wasgrey-haired and we had also perjured his

blood, the sword should be removed from hisneck. After this Husain Quli Sultan, the seal-bearer, recitedsthis verse :

The lamp which is lit by God,Whoever puffs at it his beard burns.

And since Qarja Khan had a long beard this

verse came opportune. His Majesty enjoyedthis wit in the extreme.

Another instance of his ready wit is to be foundin the following:



0 thou who art the enemy of the city ofChitaur,

How (chitaur) wilt thou capture the un

believers ?

A king has reached over thy head,

Sit ting, art thou taking Chitaur ?

I, who am the enemy of Chitaur,

Will capture the infidels by force ;

Whoever stands in defence of Chitaur,

Thou may'st see how I capture him also.

It may be observed that Bahadur's reply is only

a repetition of Humayun's wit, and carries no originality

or improvement upon the latter,


Cf., Bahadur Shah's reply :


On one occasion Humayun composed a ' qit'a ' inwhich he very beautifully played on the word

(chitaur), and sent it on to Sultan Bahadur Gujarat!:




He was a monarch of great humanity andpossessed of very noble traits of

character.1 He was disposed tospend his time more in literaryand peaceful concerns than aggression and military tactics on thebattlefield.

His gentlest behaviour towards his brothers2

through whose undisguised host ility he suffered1 Cf. Shah Tahmasp's rema rk about H um ay un 's character

on his in ter ceding f or the pardon and release of two

of his enemies who had poisoned the Shah's mind against

him, and were eventually convicted for the offence :

Points in his

character partly responsiblef o r po li ti ca lcrisis I n h i sadministration,and his forcedfl ight to Persia.

When the le tter reached and the Shah read i t , he became

astonished and said, " What, clemen t disposit ion does

Mu ha mm ad H umayun Padishah possess ! These people

were seeking his in ju ry , but he intercedes for the m.

[Jauhar, B.M. MSS., Add. 16,711, fol. 79a.]

Also ef. his reply to the counsel of one of his officers to

take possession of Raja Maldeo's te rr it ory where

Hum ayun 's part y was then t ak in g shelter and had

procured plentiful supply of grain and water :

If they were to gi ve me the kingshi p of the whole wo rl d,

I w i l l not commit so foul a deed or be gui l ty of suchingratitude. [Ibid.]

. his reply to the counsel of his Generalissimo im po rt un at -

ing him to k i l l Kam ra n who was in intr igue w i t h Sher

Shah, and seeking to dispossess Humayun of his kingdom ;




exile and reverses in his fights wi th Sher Shah, isa glorious chapter in history and a splendid trait in

his character. One sublime example of his tender,grateful, and generous nature, is to be found in themunificent reward that he gave to a poor water-carrierwho had helped h im with a sheep-skin when hishorse had slipped from underneath him in crossingthe Ganges at Chausa.l It is a romantic and almost

For this perishable wo rl d I w i l l not render my b rot her

from life to lifeless, and such unworthy act will not

emanate from me. [Ibid., fol. 34b]

Cf. the protests of his brothers against th is measure, andits ext rem e inadvisa bili ty due to the grave r isk s involve d

in compe ll ing his nobles to bow publ ic ly to a menial at a

ti me when danger from Sher Shah was th reaten ing :

To be br ief, his Majesty made the slave wate r-carr ie r siton the throne, and gave order that all the ' Umara should

make obeisance to that slave wa te r- ca rr ie r, and the slave

mi ght bestow on any one whatever he l ik ed and confer

' mansab.' T i l l two days his Majesty gave royalty to that




unheard-of instance in modern history that amonarch ever rewarded the services of any of his

truest, bravest, or loyalist officers, much less amenial of the rank of a water-carrier, with seatinghim on the royal throne.

menial. Mirza Hindal was not present in that assembly,

and Mlrza Kamran too did not attend, and sent word

to his Majesty saying, " To the slave gifts and other

kinds of concessions should be granted. What need is therethat he should sit on the throne at a time when Sher Khan

has approached near ? What is this work that your

Majesty is doing? "

[Gulbadan Begam, Humayun Nama, p, 44.]



T H E FAMOUS WATER-CARRIER, king, WHO HAD HELPED

HUMAY UN WI T H A SHEEP'-SKIN, WHILE CROSSING THE

RIVER AT CHAUSA, APPEARING FOR HIS REWARD

BEFORE TH E EMPEROR, WHO IS SEEN ISSUIN G

ORDERS TO HIS SECRETARY.

[Secured thruugh Mr. S. M. Azim Ansari. B.A., Lum

student, 'Aligarh.]





CHAPTER V I I

A great tribute of praise is paid by some Persian

and English historians to Shah Tahmasp for hisvery noble and generous receptionof Humayun. Sir John Malcolm, thegreat historian and authority on

Persian affairs, writes thus:" The reign of Shah Tahmasp owes much ofits celebrity to the truly royal and hospi

table reception he gave to theEmperor Hoomayoon, whenthat monarch was forced to fly

from India and take shelter in his dominions.The Persians have in all ages boasted oftheir hospitality and the vanity of every

individual is concerned in supporting thepretensions of his country to a superiorityover others in the exercise of this nationalvi r tue; . . . and we know no example of a distressed monarch being so royally welcomed,so generously treated, and so effectuallyrelieved. A l l means of the kingdom werecalled forth to do honour to the royal guest;and they were as liberally furnished to replacehim upon his throne. Tahmasp merited the

143

Reception ofHumayun byShah Tahmasp.

Sir JohnM a I c o I m'sgreat tribute.





H U M A Y U N ] 145 [ C H A P T ER V I I

1 Ibid., fol. 71b.

F. 19

J a u h a r ' se v e n t f u lnarrative, amost trustworthy recordin existence.

Early in the morning the Shah (Tahmasp)having marched, arrived and halted at Sul-taniya. His Majesty (Humayun) had goneto greet him, but seeing no attention paid to

himself was grieved at heart, and began toaccuse himself, saying, " Would that I hadnot not come ! " And for the entertainment ofhis Majesty they had collected some firewood.The Shah sent a verbal message, saying, " Ifyou enter into our religion we will extend our

support, otherwise with all your co-religionists we shall burn you alive in this pile of



HUMAYUN] 146 [CHAPTER V I I

w o o d . " His Majes ty ret urn ed the meg-

sage, " we are firm in our religion ; we came ;

and we do not en te rt a in muc h desire evenfor ki ng sh ip . A n d wha te ve r ther e is, it is

w i t h the w i l l of God - t h e Great, and the

H i gh . We have bound our hear t to H i m . "

Sho rtly afte rwar ds Hu ma yu n was

approached through a special messen

ger of the Shah to accept the Shi'a faithunder a similar threat:

Qazi Jahan, the V a k i l of the Shah, came to

his Ma je sty an d said, " You are not alone.

On yo ur account about seven hu nd re d people

will be put to death."

Apart from this, Shah Tahmasp was all the

time actually thinking to take Humayun's life whichwas saved only th roug h a happy ac

cident. The Shah revealed his secret

to his son Bahram Mirza, who out

of compassion divu lged it to his sister

through whose tender pleadings the

si tuat ion was changed, and to whose

t ru ly noble sp ir it Humayun owes his li fe and al l his

subsequent career :

1 Ibid., fol. 72a.

H u m a y u napproached byShah Tahmasp

to accept theShi'a faith.

Humayun'slife s a v e dthrough thenoble mter-v e n nti on ofS h u h Tah-masp's daughter.



1 Ibid., foll. 76a-76b.

To be brief, one day the Shah ta lked w i t hBahra m Mirza of the k i l l i n g of Hum ayu n.

H U MA Y U N ] 147 [CHAPTER vII



HUMAYUN] 148 [CHAPTER V I I

From this speech the Mirza being overcomewith grief wept, and divulged this affair to

his sister saying, " Humayun Padishah fromthe progeny of Timur Padishah has come onfoot with all hopes, and some period haselapsed since we have eaten the salt together.At this time the Shah ordered a wrongthing. ' ' When this chaste lady heard this

speech she burst into tears. In the meantimethe Shah entered her house. Bahram Mirzasaluted him and went out. And the Shahhalted and asked what was the reason for hercrying. She said, "I weep on my day."The Shah again said, " Wish our welfare."She said, " I am always busy in my prayer

for your Majesty, but you have on al l thefour sides enemies. And it is heard thatMuhammad Humayun Padishah has a sonand brothers. What good should come tohand by torturing him ? If you do not takepity on his affairs and exalt and help him,

you should bid him farewell, so that whatever place he knows of he may go to . " TheShah listened to this speech and got pacifiedin that moment, and said, " A l l the 'Umaraexpressed their unwise policies, but there isnothing better than what thou sayest."



CHAPTER VIII

During Humayun's reign, poets and scholars

from all parts of Persia, Turkistan, Bukhara, andSamarqand, continued to emigrate toIndia in larger numbers than before.Besides those already mentioned, therewere many, like Maulana 'Abdul BaqiSadr Turkistani, Mir 'Abdul Hai

Bukhari, Khwaja Hijri Jami, Maulana Bazmi,

Mulla Muhammad Salih, and Mulla Jan Muhammad,who accompanied Humayun on his second entryinto Hindustan.' The two popular poets JahiYatmiyan of Bukhara and Hairat I of Mawara unNahr had entered Humaytin's service at Cabul, andreceived his favours. Similarly Khwaja Ayyub

from Mawara un Nahr, Maulana Nadir! from Samarqand, and Maulana Junubi from Badakhshan, all journeyed from their homes to Agra, and receivedmansabs.

A large majority of scholars, like Mir' Abdul Latif Qazwini, Maulana Abul Qasim

1 Ba Yazid, Tarikh i Humayun, I.O., MSS., 223, foll. 72b-76a.

149

Exodus ofp o e t s andscholars fromP e r s i a t oIndia.



HUMAYUN] 150 [CHAPTER V I I I

Astrabgdi, Shaikh Abul Wajid Farighi Shlrazi,and Shauqi Tabrizi, came actually from

the Persian towns and the Safawicourt itself which, de facto, did not riseto the height of the munificence ofthe Indian courts in their patronageof Persian prose and poetry.' Thelast-named, Shauqi Tabrizi, who was

Poets under the Sa fa wi , were on an average, paid from

20 to 30 ' tomans ' for thei r ' qasaid ' and eulogies of the

court. There is one instance discovered of a panegyris t

of Shah 'Abbas, the Great—Shani Ta kl u -who was once

weighed in gold for his beautiful poetry, and on his retire

ment from the Shah's service got a stipend of 20 ' tumans '

a month (a sum equal to sixty rupees). Ag ainst thissolitary instance of Persian munificence, a good many

brighter ones of Indian courts may be quoted •. Cf.—

(i) Zuhn ri receiving several elephants loaded wi th gold

and silver and other ri ch presents for his Saqi Nama

in praise of Burhan Nizam Shah of Ahmadnagar.

[Sar-Kush, Ka li ma t ush Shu 'ara— account of Zuhur l. ]

(ii ) ' Urfi receiv ing fr om the Khan i Kh an an 100,000

rupees in re ward for a ' qasida.' | Ib id. , Account of

Khan i Khanan.]

(iii ) Ha yat i Kas hi was weighed in gold by Jahang ir for

his verses on the style of Khusrau 'a Tughlaq Nama.

So also, Sa' i da i Gi la ni . [Tuzuk i Jahang ir i. p. 240.)

(iv ) A bu Talib Ka l i m, Sa'ida i Gil ani , and Bafiya, all

weighed in gold by Shah Jahan.

(v ) Ma ulv i 'A bd ul Ha ki m Sialko ti weighed twice ingold,

(v i ) Abdu l Ha mi d Laho ri , author of Shah Jahan Nama,

was simi lar ly weighed in gold , in addit ion to receiving

a large sum in cash, on complet ion of his his tory.

Part played

by the Mughal as compared w i t ht h e S a f a w iin the uplifto f Persianp r o s e andpoetry.



HUMAYUN] 151 [CH APTE R V I I I

an organ of the poetical assemblies arranged bySam Mirza, at the Safawi court, had left the Prince's

service only to enter Humayun's. ' Similarly ShaikhAbui Wajid Farighi who came from Shirgz, was apauper, and had not wi th him even a pair of spareclothes to put on except the one ragged old garmentwhich he had on his body.2 A good many poetsand scholars came after Shah Tahmasp, in the reign

of Shah 'Abbas, the Great. The one notable exampleis that of Masih Rukna i Kashl, who is reckonedamong the best poets of Persia in his day, and wasthe chief poet of the court of Shah 'Abbas. TheShah not only failed to extend the patronage hedeserved, but on one occasion even thought thefavour he was showing him was too much for a poet,

in consequence of which he left the court and cameaway to India1 in the reign of Akbar . This is theage when the liberalities of the Deccan and the

(v ii ) Qudsi, a most notable instance in the history of Mughal

patronage, received in reward for a qas'ila from a

rich noble of Shah Jahan's court, all his estate inlanded and movable property, with heaps of gold and

si lver; and his mouth was filled seven times wit h

precious jewels by Shah Jahan himself,

(viii) N a z i n receiving from Khan i Khanan 100,000 rupees

cash ; and 30,000 gold mohars from Jahangir.1 Oriental Biographical Dictionary, p. 382. Cf. the state

ment : " H e lef t the service of Sam Mir za . . . and went

with the Emperor Humayun."2 Badauni, Vol. I, p. 476. Cf. the statement:

3 Lu t f 'A li Beg Azar, Atashkada, p. 339.




Mughal kings in jealous rivalry with each otherwere att ract ing, more than they did ever

before, the Persian poets and scholars from theremote corners of Persia, and the Western and CentralAsia. Not only the Mughal kings but their 'Umaratoo, extended an equal patronage to these li terateemigrants, who in their turn sang praises of theirbenefactors in their beautiful poems which resounded

in Persia and served as an impetus to others whoyet lagged behind. This is one of the main reasonswhy the li te rary activities at the Indian courts inthe field of Persian literature outweigh those ofthe Persians in Persia. The elegant poetry writ tenin this and the later periods, and the useful literature produced ' in the shape of histories, trans

lations from Sanskrit and Hindi works, biographies of poets, and dictionaries of Persian language and idiom, stand a contrast and a marvel toPersia.

Various explanations are offered by Persianwriters for the non-appearance of any great poets

in Persia under the Safawi rule. Asa matter of fact both the 16th and the17th centuries were notably poor inthe number and the quality of poetsproduced in Persia. The chief reasonfor this lull, as pointed out by IskandarMunshi—the celebrated historian of

Shah 'Abbas, the Great, was the change in themental ity of the Shah and of the people from thepanegyric to the religious poetry or Muharrammournings which constitute strophes in praise of the

Causes of thedearth of notable poets inPersia underthe Safawlas

Cut forwardby Persian

historians.



H U M A Y U N ] 153 [CHAP TER VIII

Martyrs: Imam Hasan, and Imam Husain.1 The

same v i ew is endorsed by subsequent Persian and

English chroniclers.2 It is also declared tha t thepanegyrists were not tolerated by the Persian kings,

and consequently no poets of no te appeared at th ei r

c o u r t ; and even if they di d, they were discouraged

and no r eward was held ou t to th em for th ei r

eulogies. The Safawis, we are to ld , ma in ta ined

tha t th e person of th e Imam s and not tha t of

the ki ng s was w o r th y of the encomiums of the

poets.

W h i l e all th is may be admi tt ed as a dis tracti on,

it cannot at the same t ime be any real reason for the

following considerations: First , that

the panegyris ts di d exis t under each

of the Safawi kings, and received rewa rds fo r th ei r encomiums on the

person of the Shah ; and second, that the ' marsiyas '

(or th e M u ha r ra m mourn ings) did not and could not

in th e least stop other kinds of poe try. The produc

ti on of the fo rm er as compared w i t h the la tt er is

on ly a drop in the ocean. The poet Qasimi , for

instance, was a pa negy rist of Shah I sma ' i l , and wasrewarded no less for his ' Qasa'id ' than for his other

poems, of w h ic h , however, none was in praise of

1 The latter is best known by his revered tit le of " Sayyid

ush Shuhada" whose martyrdom at Kerbala is a

memorable event in the history of Islam and is thesubject of universal mourning.

2 Cf. Browne, Persian Literature in Modern Times, pp.

172-3.

F. 20

Weakness oftheir conten

tion.



HUMAYUN] 154 [CHAPTER V l I I

the Imams.' The highest reward which he got wasfor his poem entitled 'Shah Nama i Shah Isma'il

writ ten in imitation of Firdausi' s Shah Nama inextravagant praise of the Shah. After Shah Isma'il'sdeath, he stayed for some time at the court of ShahTahmasp, and possibly by the latter 's desire wrote asimilar poem entitled 'Shah Nama i Shah Tahmasp' inhis praise. In the latter part of his life he repaired to

India, being attracted by the liberalities of the Mughalcourt, and was graciously received by Akbar.

Among the court poets of Shah Tahmasp, besidesQasimi (who came over to India), there were many,of whom Shauqi Tabnzi (who followed suit), Zamiri,'Abdi, and Muhtasham Kashi, were conspicuous.Muhtasham poured unqualified praise on the Shah,which not only was admitted but justly rewarded bythe latter. The Persian biographer, L ut f 'Al i BegAzar, describes him as a panegyrist of the Shah, anda prominent figure among the poets of the Safawicourt:

1 Cf. his poems :

(i) Shah Nama i Shah Isma'il.

(ii) Kar Nama, a poem on the game of Chaugan, written

at the request of the Shah himself,(iii) Laila wa Majnun, dedicated to the Shah.

(iv) Khusrau wa Shirin, dedicated to Sam Mirza.

ITuhfa i Sami, U, L. C, Or. 648, fol, 28a.]2 Atashkada, p. 331.




He is the head of the eloquent poets of that

per iod , and a panegyris t of Shah Tahmasp

Safawi.

Some specimens, showing the na ture of praises

showered by h im fr om ti me to time on the person of

the Shah, are reproduced be low:

The king—conquerorof the world Tahmasp,

is such that from the fear of his battle,The body of the fierce elephant diminishes,

and the heart of the ferocious lion

shivers ;

If the emperor of China comes w i t h the

intent to bow at his threshold,

From the scowl of the porter of that

threshold, he trembles.

1 ibid.

2 Ibid.

NOTE.—This is in poor imitation of Anwari's famous 'qasida'in praise of Sultan Sanjar, beginning :




Till body be the monopoly of the hand of

the soul,That hand be the hand of the king ;Shah Tahmasp is such that in his army,

Like Sanjar there are thousand Khans ;He is such that from the dread of his justice,

The thief is the herald of a Karavan ;And he is such that through the fear of his

chastisement,The lawless wolf is the dog of a shepherd ;

When thou givest motion to the rein of thysteed,

Paralysis overtakes the body of man andgenii;




Thy delay for a moment in battle,Is a respite to a hundred thousand lives;

I am such a candle, enlightener of meaning,That Anwar l seeks light therefrom.

Side by side wi th this he also wrote his famous'Haft-band' in praise of the Imams. Zamiri is anotherwho began his career as a poet in Shah Tahmasp'sreign, and produced volumes of secular poetry in

which respect no other poet in the whole of Persiacould compete with him.

1 'Abdi is yet another who

carried the palm in his lavishness of praise on ShahTahmasp. Besides the usual ' qasa'id,' he wrotea long panegyric on the Shah, entitled ' Bustan i Khi-

yal' 2 (the garden of imagination), also called 'Haftkhi- zana.' A specimen from same will easily reveal thetendency of the Shah's taste as also that of the poetsat his cour t:




In praise of the Sultan of Saltans, Khaqan

of Khaqans, Shah Tahmasp as Safawi, al

Musai, al Husaini, may God perpetuate his

kingdom: —

The emperor of Jamshid's d igni ty of

Darius's throne,

Who bestows crow n as wel l as takes

away kingdom;

Of the Prophet Muhammad's lineage (may

peace of God be upon him), of 'Ali's

grandeur,Tha t the back of mo un ta in shivers like

sea for fear of him ;

The decorator of the crown of chief ship,

The upli fte r of the banner of ' A l i ;

Of exalted head, of proud neck, and bes-

tower of crown,

That the stars are his soldiery, and the

sun is his steed ;

Of the cour t of the sky , of th e army of

stars,






From that 'mansab' I br ou ght to my hand

a bread,

I caused no discomfiture (discredit) to thename of my dear ones ;

Albe i t my profession of a poet lay in h id ing ,

It was not due to any sense of shame or

disgus t ar is ing f ro m my connection

with that ;

'Qasa'id' made their head from my pen,L ik e fresh dates fr om a dry palm-t ree ;

I wrot e fr om my qu ai nt -w ri ti ng pen,

Well - tempered gl i t ter ing ghazals ;

From the styles of poetry I followed,

What style was more fascinating in the

ma rk et of poetry.

Still more reassuring are the lines addressed

to Shah Tahmasp, in which th e author emphati cally

declares, as his own reason fo r the praise of the

Shah, that the panegyri c poe try in Persia was s t i l l ,

as it had ever been before, the order of the day :

1 Ibid., fol. 9b.



Every one who had lustre from the praiseof a king,

Became the possessor of world like the

blessed sun ;

Any one whose poetry was not based on

praise,

His worth was not much recognised in the

world ;Again, from the poets of yore,

The best chapter which proceeded was that

of praise ;

All commenced their records from the name

of the renowned,

From the praise of kings they warmed theirassemblies ;

To me also it becomes agreeable, t hat my

poetic collection,F. 21

H U M A Y U N ] 161 [CHAPTER vIII



H U M A Y U N ] 1G2 [CHAPTER V I I I

Which is held more precious than my life ;May take embellishment from the name of a

king like thee,My poetry from thy praise attain perfection ;If Sa'di from the name of Bu Bakr Sa'd,Plaited the hair of poetry, the bride ;Now ' Abdi from the name of Shah Tahmasp,Pitches the royal tent of speech above

the sky.

These outpourings are followed by a fulsome andlong drawn out panegyric which would defy anypoet. Some by way of specimen are quoted below :••-•



Alam 'Ara i Abbasi, MSS. dated 1156 A . H . , fol 132a.

HU M A YU N ] 163 [CHAPTE R VIII

Sim il ar ly Shah 'Abbas, the Grea t, had his

panegyrists, one of whom, Shani Taklu, his favourite

poet, was weighed in gold for the following beautiful

verse, and received his weight for his reward.

Whether an enemy drinks a cup of wine, or

does a friend,

Both do so at the arc of his tipsy eye-brow.

At th is , othe r poets showed jealousy, and wr ot e

versified complaints to the Shah, indirectly challeng

in g th e me ri ts of th ei r luck y comrade. Th e one

w r i t t e n by Mul la L u t f i , another pan egyrist of the

Shah's court, is well-worth quoting :




0 king, thou hast illumined the world withthy generosity,

Thou hast captured the kingdom of the heartof a whole world ;

The poet who had become equal to the dustof the path (i.e., whose merits were

as low as dust),Thou hast picked him up, and made him

equal with gold.

Stil l more prominent was Hakim Ruknuddin, popularly known as Hakim Rukna i Kashi, who composedunder the pen-name 'Masih' which suggests withhis profession as a physician.2 He was a competentpoet and wrote over one lac (100,000) of versesaccording to the estimate of Persian biographers.

On one occasion he noticed clear inattention1 Ibid., fol. 134b.2 Cf., Shifa'i, another court-physician and poet of Shah' Abbas,

the Great. His real 'name was Sharafuddin, and Shifai

was his pen-name which, like 'Masih' is appropriately

suggestive with his profession. This taste for fine phraseo

logy and choosing homogeneous words was (as is already

shown on p. 64, supra), also prevalent at the Persian court,and was de facto brought to India from Persia itself, where,

through slackness of poetical m ark et , it did not develop

so fully as it did in India under the liberal patronage of

the Mughals.





HUMAYUN] 166 [ CH AP TE R V I I I

Come, o cup-bearer, give me that water of

nectar,

Give me from the stream of the Khan i •

Khanan ;

Alexander sought for it but did not get,

For it was in India and he went in the regionof darkness.

In the face of such strong evidences there remains

little doubt that the real cause of this lull in

the activities of poets in Persia is not

in what is so easily explained by a cer

tain class of writers. It surely lies in

some other quarter. A Persian poet of the reign

of Shah Tahmasp witt ily points out the reason of

this lack, as resulting from the Shah's attention being

paid to cal ligraphy, painting, and riding, in the

following verse :

Bayaz-i-Mirza Asad Beg Turkman, MSS., dated, Agra, 8thSafar, 1146 A. H. , fol. 76a. [My attention was first drawn

to this work by Prof. A. Qavi, Fani, M.A., of Lucknow Uni

versity, who also very kindly permitted the use of his copy

which I believe is rare. J

Real causesof the lull.

Saqi Nama which he wrote in grateful acknowledg

ment of his master's liberal patronage are worthy

of notice :



HUMAYUN} 167 [CHAPTER VIII

Without trouble they have made a goodprogress,

The scribe, the painter, the Qazwini, and the

ass.

Another sober and somewhat stronger evidenceof the lack of patronage to poets in Persia is to befound in the verse of Lisani Shirazi, who was a contemporary of Shah 'Isma'il and Shah Tahmasp. Onone occasion when he happened to go to Tabriz, hecomposed a ' qasida ' in praise of Amir Najm, I I ,wherein he complained as follows :

My wine is pure, but the possessors ofsympathy are devoid of taste,

My gold is unalloyed, but the banker ofspeech (judge) is bl ind.

1 Prof. Browne (quoting from Ahsanut Tawarikh), Persian

Literature in Modern Times, A.D. 1500—1924, p. 97.

Cf. his remark :

According to the Ahsanut Tawarikh, Shah Tahmasp was

in his youth much interested in calligraphy and painting ;

he also liked riding on Egyptian asses, which conse-

quently became fashionable, and were adorned with

golden trappings and gold-embroidered saddle-cloths.2 Bayaz-i-Mirzu Asad Beg, fol. 57b. ut supra.



HUMAYUN] 1G8 [ CH AP TE R V I I I

The above view finds further support in the

utterance of another poet Kausari of the court of Shah

' Abbas, the Great. While extoll ing in the usualmanner the virtues of the Shah1 in the masnawi

entitled (Farhad wa Shirin), the poet

describes the dull atmosphere obtained in Persia, as

compared with India, in the following plain and

unmistakable language :

[B.M. MSS., Or. 342, fol. 12a. ]2 Ibid., foll. 11a and 12a.

1 I am grateful to my friend, Dr. A. M. Nizamiddin(Nizam scholar), for having copied these lines for meon my request from the B. M. codex. J



1 His complaint is of special value as proceeding from one who

was a favourite of Shah ' A bbas, and a wri te r of elegies on

the Imams. Cf.:

F. 22

HUM AYU N] 169 [CHAPTER V I I I

Complaint 1 for th e in at te nt io n of the people ofIran towards the possessors of meaning (i.e., poets) :






Ha ve for th is reason made thei r abode in

India ;

Kausari, I am now de ter mined th at my verses,Which are signs descended from the ninth

heaven ;

Like a drop towards the ocean I should send,

I should send my commodity to India ;

That there is no t among" the learned of

the age,

A customer of speech except the Khan i

Khanan ;

For discourse there is not a weighe r of

subtle points except he,

For the world there is none like him a

ready treasure ;

In the universe there is none from amongthe possessors of art,

Who is not profited by the hand of his

generosity.

Th is dullness of poetic mar ket in Persia lasted

for near ly three centuries, and was a con tras t w i t h

India which, through its better appreciation and patronage, attracted all

the topmost poets w i t h on ly a fe w

exceptions lik e Muh tasham Ka sh i and

H a k im Sh if a' i. It was in fact w i t h the appearance of

Qajar dynasty, of whic h F at h "Al i Shah was the most

conspicuous figure, that the market of poetry in Per

sia again became br isk. He extended his patronageto poets and h imse lf wr ote poetry under the pen-

name ' Khaqan.' This was the age when th e Per

sian nobles and princes likewise extended the i r

Dullness ofpoetic marketin Persia lasted for threecenturies.



HUMAYUN] 172 [ CH AP TE R V I I I

patronage to poets.' The result of th is apprec iat ion

was th at the fi re of poetic genius of the na ti on ,

which had for so long burn t low in poets undersullen despondency, sparkled out once more and lit up

the horizon of th at coun try . Simultaneously w i t h

it, emigration to India considerably diminished.2 The

most notable poet that Persia in this new era pro

duced was Qa'ani, who is j us tl y regarded both in

India and Persia as the last great poet of Persianlanguage.3

c f . -(i) Prince Hasan ' A l i Mir za " Shuja ' us Saltanat,"

Governor of Khurasn—patronised Qa'ani, Farughi,

and others.

(ii) H aj i Mir za Aqasi, " Naib us Saltanat " PrimeMinister of Mu ha mmad Shah—also a patron of poets.

(iii) Mi rz a Taqi Kh an , bette r kn own as "Amir i Kab'ir "

eulogised by Qa'ani in numerous " qasa'id " for his

munificent liberalities to poets.2 Cf. other causes :

(i) Gradual replacement of Persian by Urdu, and its offi

cial recognit ion as the cour t language under the

English.

(ii) Patronage shown by the Mu gh al princes and other

nobles to Urdu poets.3 The one prominent figure in modern Persian poet ry, which

begins roughly fr om the la tt er h al f of the 16th cen tury

A . D . , is the epoch-making Qa'ani the Shelley of Persia,

as we may cal l him. No other poet is to be found in the

whole range of Persian verse so ri ch in the vividness ofimagery, the exquisite mastery over style, and above

al l, in the glow and verve of idiom and naturalness of

simile and metaphor, as he. Qa'sni's descriptions are

some of the most consummate that exist in the Persian




The chief causes, which appear more likely tobe at the root, were : (i) the attention of the Safawi

to political, social, and above al l, religious reform (which , being of a drastic and fanatical nature, led to a general persecution of the litera ti in Persia),

on the one hand ; and (ii) the patronage shown bythe Mughal in India, on the other. The Mughal

language. Every line of his displays that fulness of detailand eye for close observation which characterise his wri t ings. His descriptive poems stand out not only in hisown composition but in the Persian verse as a whole.His poetry is confined chiefly to Qasida, Khamsa, Qit'aand Muta'iba, on topics of love, natural scenery, andpraises and satires of kings and dignitaries. A few linesfrom his Khamsa may be quoted here by way of specimen, which specially appeal to every student of Nature,a parallel of which is hard to find in the East among poetsof Persian language, but is frequently met with in theWest in English poets like Tennyson, Shelley, and Wordsworth :

Main causeswhich were atthe root.




Court offered a home not only to poets but to scholars of all shades of opinion, including professional

men like physicians, calligraphists, and painters. Alarge number of them, who in Persia refused toaccept the Shia faith forced upon them, had to go

The eye of narcissus in the garden shone again as

br ig ht as qui cksilver,

The forelock of hyacinth in the jungle became again

full of curl ;

The frozen water like silver once more melted into

quicksilver,

The sp ring breeze leapt , and the gal l-b ladder of .

autumn turned into water,

In the dead of night it took its flight stealthily from

the garden.

Again, the banner of Spring cloud appeared on thesummit of the mountain,

The flood hurled down the stones from the top of the

hills ;

Again, the young birds rushed in glee from every nook,

The dove, the grouse, the quail, the partridge, and the

nightingale,

The parrot , the peacock, the duck, the dive r, the goose,

and the crane.

The li fe- li ke picture depi cted in conf ormi ty w i t h Natu re, the

fiery poetical glow of language, and the int roduction

of or ig inal and quaint ideas even in such a common and

world-wide subject as the appearance of the gar den, dur

ing the dominion and sway of the ve rnal epoch, are qu al i

ties which had almost disappeared fr om the Pers ian com

position in the 18th century. Al ong w i t h the exquisitebeau ty of diction in the above descrip tive ske tch , Qa'an i' s

presentation is absolutely free f ro m unna tura l exaggera

tions so common w i t h poets in his day. Hi s graphic

sketch of Nature and her work in gs is such as mi gh t be




into exile. Some went to Turkey, and theCentral Asian Provinces, but many came to India ,

to which they ever afterwards kept on emigrating,

given by any English poet without hesitation. For ex

ample compare one stanza from the Adonais of Shelley :

The airs and streams renew their joyous tone ;

The ants, the bees, the swallows reappear ;

Fresh leaves and flowers deck the dead season's bier ;

The amorous birds now pair in every brake,

And build their mossy homes in field and brere ;

And the green lizard and the golden snake,

Like unimprisoned flames, out of their trance awake.

Qa'ani's poetry wit h its wonderful ease and flow does not

appear to belong to the era in which he lived, but exhibitsa taste which prevailed in the early and the middle ages.

His fidelity to nature combined wi th the charm of Rud ak i

and Zahir, the pathos of Nizamr, and the vivacity and

animation of Far ru kh i and Manuchahr, preponderates in

his composition, and in this respect he appears to be a poet

more of the 12th and 13th centuries than of the 19th when

he actually lived. Even in his figurative indulgence, which

is a characteristic of the 17th and 18th century poets, his

supremacy over his colleagues is mar ked in so far as he

has kept aloof from the vices rampant in their composition.

His artistic display of the language, and his metaphor and

simile have a charm and a reality which do not exist in the

work of modern poets, and were long displaced by frivolous

attempts at word and meaning, and the inordinate

figurative touches which had disfigured the fair face ofPersian poetry in the later age. In Qa'ani , therefore, we

have a revival of the middle and early poetry, and he may

be justly said to represent Farrukhi, Manuchahri, and

Zahir in the 19th century.



H U M A Y U N ] 176 [CHAPTER V I I I

being attracted by its superior literary support. It is by this process and the force of

Qa'ani's elegies are also famous for their originality of form,

and style of address. They are a deviation from the old

established path in a more conspicuous form than is

exhibited in his panegyric poetry. Some specimen lines

from his elegy on Imam Husain are quoted below :

What rains ? The blood ; who rains ? The eye ; how ? Day

and night; why ?Out of grief ; what grief ? The grief for the Sultan of

Kerbala,What was his name ? Husain ; from whose parentage

was he? From that of ' A l i ,

Who was his mother ? Fatima; who was his grandfather ? The Prophet Muhammad,

What happened to him ? He suffered martyrdom ;

where ? In the desert of Marya,When ? On the 10th of Muharrum ; secretly ? Nay, publicly.



HUMAYUN] 17T [CHAPTER VIII

such circumstances, fur the r strengthened by the

ties of poli tical and social inter -relations u n i t ing the

Was he ki ll ed at night ? Nay, in the day ; wh at hour ?

At the hour of noon,

Was his head cut off from the front ? Nay, from behind.

Was he ki ll ed w i t h his th ir s t quenched ? No ; did none

give him wa ter ? Yes, they di d,

Who did ? Shimr ; fro m wh at stream ? From the stream

of death.

Did he fall a martyr to oppression ? Aye ; had he (committed) any fault ? None,

What was his mission ? Guidance; and who was his friend ?

GOD.

" Qa ' a n i , " says Browne , " i s by general consent the most

notable poet produced by Persia in the 19th century. He

is one of the most melodious of al l the Persian poets, and

his command of the language is wonderful, bu t he lacks

high aims and noble principles."

The la tt er re ma rk of the learned cri tic is mainly due to the

allegation that Qa'ani was of short temper , and his pen

did not desist from disparaging those whom he had once

praised in his qasa'id. In support of this contention Browne

quotes one instance of H a j i Mir za Aqasi , who, dur in g

his supreme Governorship of Khurasan , was extolled for

his piety and jus tice by Qa'ani. But when the Mirza fe ll

f ro m power, having incurr ed the displeasure of the em

peror Muhammad Shah, and his Min ist eri al rank and

au th ori ty passed on to another noble " Lisan ul Mulk "

Mi rz a Taqi Kh an , better known as "Amir i Kabir."

Qa'ani , for reasons not ye t fu ll y disclosed, discredited the

former and praised the latter thus :

F. 23




It is pleasing tonight, 0 dear, that we dr in k wine in memory

of Jamshid,

Because the empire of Persia has become firm like a chainof mountains ;

Through the efforts of our reputed Min ist er, the greatest

Amir and the giver of justice,

(Fr om whom) the doors and gates of castles and fortresses

are kept wide open ;

In place of a cursed tyrant, sat a just and God-fearing person.

That the pious believers take pride in him.

Qa 'ani purged the Persian poetry from tha t irksome hyperbole

and laboured and pedantic style which the lat er poets,

during the last two centuries before him had commonly

adopted as thei r motto. His verses are f u l l of pathos and

spontaneous and na tu ra l tendencies as opposed to a terse and

affected style formed by clever devices, subt leties of figures

of speech, and rhym ed diction . His dist inc tive featu re of

writing, and the reforms he introduced in the art of versification, are summed up as follows :

(i) Abst ent ion from fatuous and abortive exaggeration in

his flight of thought as could be seen in the following

lines reproduced here by way of sample :

two countries that the court of the Mughal eventuallybecame completely Persianised, and in fact every-




th ing , language, custom, f ash ion , food and dress,

was adopted after the Persian style and taste.

(ii) Remarka ble fel ic ity of expression and naturalness of his

simile and metaphor, as contained in the following lines:




It is a fact, historically true, tha t the Persianlanguage had not gained so complete a hold on the

(iii) His pun and figures of speech are more spontaneous, grace

fu l , and dignified in character, than those of his contem

poraries who are content merely w i t h the ornate dic tion

and display of words at the sacrifice of good taste. A

few instances are quoted below :

(i v) Cont inu ity and fulness in his description, w i t h fa it hf ul

representation of the subject, whi ch is won derfu lly

attractive and appealing to heart:



HU MA YU N] 181 [CHAPTER VIII

Mughal court, nor on the people of Hindustan, before

(v) His productive, ri ch , and luxu rian t style , w i t h his wonder

ful command of the language, is more than what could be

achieved by any Persian poet dur in g the last two centuries



HUM AYU N] 182 [CHAPTER V I I I

the advent of Babur, which is synchronous w i t h the

before hi m. This is ev ident from the sweetness inherentin his poetry, and his uses of verbs w i th thei r auxilia ries in

distinctive and varied meanings, which have acquired the

bear ing and stamp of idiom. For instance, he uses the

ve rb in so many flexible ways and w i t h such clever

turns that one cannot but admire his ijtihad. The

following lines deserve special notice :

(vi) He was a genius, and proficient in three languages,

Turkish, French, and Arabic and made a free use of their

vocabulary in his poetical composition, more than any

other poet of Persia ever did before.

(vi i) He uses many redundant words w i t h the air of a

Mujtahid. Not only st ray instances of same are to bemet with in his poetry here and there, as is the case with

other poets, but that he picks up a wo rd and makes it a

regula r ef., his long qas'ida beginning with :

He also invented and introduced stammering poems,depicting in words the hal ting articula tions , stops and

rapid repet itions of a habitua l stammerer. It was a bold

step for him to take in the 19th century, wh ich no other

poet. ventured before him



HUMAYUN] 183 [CHAPTER vIII

Safawi persecution, as it did afterwards.

(v ii i) The sweetness and melody inherent in his qasida ismost remarkab le , and presents a new phase in the ar t of

qasida-writing, whic h orig ina lly belonged to ghazal.

(ix) He widened the scope of Persian poet ry by allowing

and admitting obsolete words and new sets of

compounds and construct ions tin his composition, a step

which bef itted him as an or a recognised leader of

poets.(x) He is a grea t force in the field of 19th century Persian

li te ra tu re . His sty le characterised by freshness of

expression, rejuvenation of thought, and naturalness of

simile, is unique in the life and literature of Qajar

Persia. Nay, the service rendered by hi m to Persian

poe try as a whole, is most remarkable , and stands by

itself.

(xi) He re vi ve d the poetry of the early and the middle age,

and combined in his qusida the meri ts of Rudaki

Fa rr uk hi , Manuch ahri, An wa r l , and Zahir, adding to

them a charm al l his own. He thus raised the standard

and di gn it y of Persian poetry, whi ch had fal len so low in

Persia since af ter the coming away of Abu Ta li b Ka l i m

to Indi a, and is regarded as the lust gnat poet of

Persian language, a position justified by his prolificand many-sided genius,

(x ii) In prose, his wo rk wr i t ten aft er the manner

and style of Sa'di's Gulistan, is a reflection and a blot on

his good name, and does him no credit as a prose-writer.

It is fu l l of scurrilous anecdotes, and reveals his easy life

and freedom of thought which he loved so we ll .



CHAPTER IX

He was by nature tender-hearted and was inclined more and more, as he advanced in years, towards

Sufism and renunciation His growingdesire for the company of the devout,and his aversion to this material world,had manifested themselves too clearlyon several occasions. His frequent visitsto the tombs of saints, and his associa

tion with the Sufis of the time, and taking auguriesfrom the Diwan of Hafiz on important matters of

state, domestic, and personal, was for the most partunder the influence of the Indian atmosphere duringhis stay in Hindustan, which was already a mostnoted country in the East for spiritual progress andthe religious activities of its people. The Persianmysticism, since its very advent in India, had founda warm reception by the religious-minded populace ;and this joint working of Muslim thought with theHindu zeal for devotional practices, aiming at thepurification of the soul, had created a spir itual atmosphere, the effects of which no foreigner, howeverstiff-hearted and indifferent he might be, couldescape. Jauhar, Gulbadan Begum, and other contem

porary and later historians, have quoted instancesof his pessimistic views. The one recorded by AbulFazl is reproduced as follows :

1S4

Wave of pessimism in the

latt er par t ofhis li fe due tothe influence ofreligious atmosphere obtained in India.



1 Akbar Nama, Vol. I, p. 435. (Maharaja Patiala edition,

Lucknow, 1284 A,H.)

F. 24

HUM AY UN] 185 [CHAPTER IX



HUMAYUN] 186 [CHAPTER IX

And often times passed on the holy tongue of thelate king (whose abode is in Paradise), the talk oftravel to the next world ; and against his old pleasing habit, this ta lk which is opposed to the orderlygovernment of this world, and which he did not like

to be mentioned in his sublime assembly before, hewas pleased with its mention in these days. Verily,since on the heart of the secret-knowing king, theeffects of such thoughts had already cast their shadows, therefrom the king did one day praise andvouchsafe for the truthful utterance of the late con

queror, Firdaus-Makani (Babur), saying, that Fir-daiis-Makanl once in his assembly mentioned that acertain servant of his said one day, " Wheneverthe sleeping Yard of the Cemetery of Ghaznl comesinto my sight, I am inclined to die." And after this,the king added, " When I see Delhi and its tombsI recollect the speech of the late king—how nice andtrue he said !" And near about the time when hewas to turn his face towards the eternal kingdom,he addressed to some of his attendants, " Today,after the morning prayers, something happened,and the angel of inspiration put this quatrain on mytongue :—

0 God, wi th Thy plentiful grace select mefor Thy nearness,

Make me acquainted with the secrets ofThy chosen people ;






journey until his reaching Delhi and the con

quest of Hindustan, having abstained from

all animal food, sought victory through spiritual attentions, evinced the greatest pleasuretoday.

Along with his abstinence from the animal food, healso used to take auguries from the Diwan of Hafiz,

1

The pract ice of consult ing omens fr om the diwan of H afizwas prevalent in Persia also. The belief of the Persians

in ta fawul was so gr ea t that they gave the names of

Lisan'-ul-Ghaib (Invi sible tongue), and Tarjuman-ul-

Asrar ( Interp reter of mysteries), to Hafiz's diwan. ' Like

the Mughal emperors in India, the Persian royal house

also, in spite of thei r disbelief in the Sunnl tariqat and

in Sufis , used to take auguries f rom the diwan on impor

ta nt private and official matt ers . The Latifa i Ghai-biyya (a book wr i t t en by a Persian noble and poet of the

town of Darab, pr int ed at Tihran in 1304 A . H . ) mentions

several instances of such auguries drawn from Hafiz

by the Persian kings . Cf.—

(i) Shah Ism a 'i l I, the promulga tor of the Shi'a fa ith

in Persia, who even went to the length of des troying

the tombs of Suf is , decided to consult Ha fiz ' s diwanabout the destruction of the lat ter 's tomb. The result

of this augury was the following verse :

(ii ) Shah Tahmasp one day lost his r ing, and consulted

Hafiz which opened at the following verse ;



H U M A Y U N ] 189 [CHA PTER IX

believing in thei r efficacy, jus t as the anc ient

Romans used to consult Vergil,

when they were in doubt as tothe proper course of action to be

pursued by them. Whil e ye t in Cabul,

after his re turn from Persia, he

consulted the diwan about his suc

cess in his impending at tack on

Hindus tan , to rega in his lost k ing dom from Sher Shah. A detailed

account of th is augury and his per

sonal, f a i th in its efficacy, is g iven in? the fo llow

ing extract :

His taking

auguries fromdiwan-i-Hafizand his beliefin their bearin g fr ui t : apractice prevalent amongthe people ofH i n d u s t a n ,and ardently

followed byhis successorsin India.

(iii ) Simi larl y, Shah Abbas I I , like Humayu n, once took

an augury from Hafiz's diwan regarding the conquest

of Azarbaija n, of which the capital is Tab riz. Th e

fol lowing verse was the remarkab le response :

Ibid., p. 409.

NOTE.—The difference in the Persian and the Indian method

of ta ki ng auguries may be noted:—In India, the popular

method is to open the diwan, after reciting fatiha

with or without durud, and invoking its blessings on

the departed soul of Hfafiz. The first verse of the

open page on the ri gh t is general ly ta ken as Hafiz' s

response to the query. If the answer is not clear,the 7th line of the same page is the nex t best verse

to be counted upon. Bu t if neither gives sati sfac tion ,

six fu rt he r pages are tu rned , and the fir st verse of

the 7th page is accepted as final.



H U M A Y U N ] 192 [CHAPTER IX

One day, when he was out fo r hun t ing in Cabul,

he expressed to his nobles the an xi et y of his mind

to regain his lost throne, and consultedthem as to the advi sabi li ty of leading

an attack on India with the meagre men

and mate rial he could collect. Those who

had lived in Indi a in the heyday of his

for tune, and enjoyed the comfor t and

wea l th of the coun try, offered to consult the ol d method of divination, viz., to send a courier ahead, who

should go and re tu rn aft er t ak ing down the names

of the first three persons he meets. The k ing readily

consented to this and sent three horsemen, instead of

one, al l in the d irec tion of Hindus tan but separate

fr om one another, who were to re turn immedia tely

after meet ing t he fi rs t person each, and report tohi m the ir names in di vi du al ly . The firs t bro ugh t the

news tha t he met a trader named fortune. The

other said tha t he met a tr avel le r by name, object

of the heart. The t h i r d reported that he came across

a peasant whose name was auspiciousness. The

conclusion drawn was that the k ing should immediately start upon his campaign, unm ind fu l of the

nu mbe r of his army, as success was sure to a t tend

on h im. He therefore pu t himself to th is task at

once and in vi te d recrui ts who read ily responded

to his call under the said belief. Thus in the month

of Safar in 962 A . H . , he marched f rom Cabul, and

was jo ined by many ve te ran soldiers on his way toHindustan.

His keen sense of giving justice to the poor

against the high-handedness of the officials had led

His readingomens in thephenomena of Nature, andhis belief intheir symbolictruth.




to the invention of tabl-i-'adl (or d rum of justice ),

which he had ordered to be placed in

the outside corridor of the royal palace.A n y one fr om the highest to the hu m

blest in li fe could approach him wi t h

out fear of molesta tion, and use that

drum to draw the attention of the king

in person, towards the ty ra nny shown

to h im by any official, enemy, robber ,

or noble of the cour t. This mode of g iv ing jus tice

was apprecia ted and copied by his successors in

India, the most notable among whom was his grand

son, Jahangir . He had a gold chain measur ing 30

zira' 1 in length , wi th 60 bells, one end of which was

ti ed to th e parapet of the roya l dome of his fo r t at

Agra, and the other to a mile-stone fixed on the bankof the Jamuna.2 Humayun's drum of Justice is

Invention of tabl-i-'adl, amode of giving justicewhich waslater adoptedby his grandson, Jahangir,in the form of zanjir-i-'adl.

1 A Persian yard.

2 Cf. Jahlngir's own statement :

[Tuzuk i Jahangiri]

F. 25.



A n d fr om amongst the inventions of his

Majesty was the drum of Justice to the effect

tha t if any seeker of redress had en mit y w i t h

any one, he would strike the drum with the

st ick once ; and if he was oppressed for not

supplying fodder, he would do this act twice ;

and if his art icles of subsistence were seized

by some ty ran t , or car ried off by some th ie f,

he would make the drum sound th ri ce ; and

if agains t some one he had a cl ai m for shedding blood (murder of his kinsmen), he would

cause the drum to sound loud four times.

Hi s generosity and benevolence were grea t ; and

his clemency for his brothers, who proved a constant

source of trouble and a menace to th e

peaceful go ve rnme nt of his empire ,was extraordinary, and carried beyond

1 Ak bar Nam a, Vol. I, pp. 434-35. (M aharnja Patiala edi

tion, Lucknow, 1284 A.H.)

HUMAYUN ] 1 94 [CH APT ER IX

described w i t h its details of procedure by A b u l Faz l

as follows :-

His general

character.



We are firm in our rel igion. We came ; and

we do no t even enter ta in much desire for

kingsh ip . A n d whatever there is, it i s w i t hthe w i l l of God, the Great and the H i gh . We

have bound our heart to Him.

In ba tt le he was val ia nt, and in peace his for

g iv ing na ture never yielded to any s tr ic t measures

wh ich the times demanded, not so mu ch th ro ugh

weakness of mind as th ro ugh gentleness and nobil i ty of spirit .

1 Jauhar, B. M. MSS., Add. 16, 711, fol. 71b.

H U M A Y U N ] 195 [CHAPTE R IX

the limits of prudence and justice which he

owed to the State. He was a lover of lea rn in g

and a pat ro n of poets and prose-wri ters of hisday. He inhe ri ted f rom his father the poetic genius

which is displayed in his masnawi, ruba'i, and other

me tr ic al compositions. He was unostentatiously

religious and his faith in providence was remarkable.

In his days of fo rt un e as wel l as in distress he did

no t lose th e balance of mind, and remained happy inhis submission to the w i l l of God. In exile , ;whe n he

was persuaded to embrace the Shi 'a fa i th , in re tu rn

fo r the promised Persian help to reinstate h im on

his lost th rone of Hindus tan, he had ut tered the

following :




During his flight through the sandy desert ofSindh, when his men were almost dying with th irs t

and every one ran mad for water, newsarrived of Sher Shah's troops' near

approach. Humayun, at this juncture, orderedall his men, who were in a fit condition, to hal t

and engage the enemy in battle ; while the restwhose condition was sore were directed to move for

ward to a safe distance with women and children 115in number. He kept the command of the fightingforce directly in his own hands, and rode in front like

a warrior giving heart to his tired, unwill ing, and

ill-equipped men. The enemy, however, did not

appear on the scene, and Humayun rode back to the

female section to communicate the good news of theenemy's non-appearance.

Even in his fall he. was great, and showed thesame elevation of character as he did when he wore

a crown.

His chivalry.



T O M B

O F

H U M A Y U N , O L D

D E L H I .





INDEX

'Abdi, 154, 157, 102.'Abdurrahim, 41, 165.'Abdurrahman, 78.'Abdul Latif , 5-3.Abul Fazl, 27, 39, 53,

57, 65, 105, 184, 187,194.

Abul Qasim Astrabadi,5, 26, 27.

Akbar, 4, 22, 39, 41, 57,65, 102, 103, 105, 107,109, 110, 111, 151,165.

Al Husaini, 158.

' Ali Dost, 7.'Al i , 158 .'Al i Shir , 6 .Al-Musawi, 158.Amain, 37.Amani Kabl i , 52 .Amir Najm, 167.

Anwari, 63, 66, 67, 157.Ayyub, 77.Azar, 154.'Azra, 104.

Babur, 1, 4, 29, 45, 47,73, 75, 110, 182.

Hadauni , 13, 53, 57, 58,63, 65, 69, 70, 105,117, 128.

Bahadur Gujarati, 3.Buiram Khan, 18, 19, 39.Bahadur Shah, 115.Bahrain Mirza, 102, 146,

147, 148.Ba-Yazid, 26, 35, 37

103, 105.Bihbud Chubdar, 138.Bu-Bakr Sa'd, 162.

Faizi, 107.Farid, 121, 122, 125,

126.Farhad-wa Shirin, 168.Farishta, 27, 77, 129.Faraqi, 75, 77, 78.Fat h ' A l i Shah, 171.Firdaus-Makani, 186.Firdausi, 109, 111.

197

A B



198 INDEX

G

Gabriel, 12, 20.General Bumi Khan, 115.Gulbadan Begaim, 184.

H

Hafiz, 184, 188, 191.TTaidar Mirza, 54.Hairati of Mawara un

Nahr, 149.Hai rati, 52.H a k i m Rukn a i Kash i,

164.

Hakim Sadra of Shiraz,1G5.

Hakim Shifa ' i , 171.Hasan Sur, 121.Hasan, 126.Humayun, 1, 4, 5, 7, 10,

11, 14, 21, 22, 36, 37,38, 39, 40, 41, 44, 45,47, 50, 52, 63, 56, 60,62, 66, 68, 70, 73, 77,79, 98, 99, 101, 102,103, 105, 109, 110,111, 113, 115, 117,125, 126, 137, 139,143, 144, 145, 146,147, 148, 149, 161,187. ' 191, 193, 196.

Huasin Quli Sultan, 138.

I

Ibrahim Sur, 121.Imam Hasan, 153.Imam Husain, 153.Imams, 153, 157.

Iskandar Munshi, 152.

J

Jahi Yatmiyan, 149.

Jahangir, 4, 107, 137,165, 193.

Jalaluddin Muhammad

Akbar Padishah, 103.Jamal Khan, 121, 122Jami, 57.Jamshid, 2, 58.

Jauhar, 26, 35, 55, 102.134, 144, 184.

Jannat Ashyani, 109.

K

Kabir, 131.Kai-Khusrau, 2.Kahi, 56, 57, 62.Kamran, 17, 37, 57, 110.



INDEX 199

Kausari, 168, 171.Khai r -ul -Mul uk, 3 .

Khan-i-Khanan, 41, 165,166, 171.

Khaqan, 67, 171.Khwaja, 105, 107.Khwaja Abul Barakat,

75.Khwaja Ayyub, son of

Khwaja Abul Barakat,35, 149.

Khwaja Kalfm, 4, 5.Khwaja Husain Mervi,

36, 135.Khwaja Mu'azzam Khan,

61.

Khwaja Hijr i Jami, 149.Khwandamir, 109.Kunhaiya, 119.

L

Laila, 36, 59.Laila wa Majnun, 104.Lisani Shirazi, 167.Lutf 'Ali Beg, 154.

M

Mahmud, 22, 28.Majnun, 37, 59.Mamja, 37.

Maldeo, 119.

Malik Muhammad Ja'isi,

119, 126, 131.Maslh, 164.Masihuz-Zaman, 165.Maulana Ilyas, 5, 26, 29,

35.Maulana Jalali Hindi,

35.

Maulana bin-i-Ashraf alHusaini, 35.

Maulana Nadiri Samar-qandi, 35, 47, 149.

Maulana Qasim Kahi ,

36, 134.Maulana Junubl, 35,

149.Maulana Muhammad

Fazil Samarqandi, 35.Maulana Zamiri Bil-

grami, 36.Maulana Muhammad

b in - i - 'Al i b in - i -Muham-

mad al-Misklni-al-Qazi,78.

Maulana 'Isam-uddin,105.

Maulana 'Abdul BaqiSadr Turkistani, 149.

Maulana Bazmi, 149.

Maulana Abul QasimAstrabadi, 149.

Mir Husein Dehlevi, 21.Mir Waisi, 35.





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A History of Persian Language & Literature At The Mughal Court: Vol 2 - Muhammad Abdul Ghani

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