The Bābur-nāma in English (Memoirs of Bābur) (part 4 of 6)

The Bābur-nāma in English (Memoirs of Bābur) (part 4 of 6)

Darwīsh-i-muḥammad Sārbān, Dost Lord-of-the-gate, Nūr Beg and several braves also went across the river. I made a man gallop off to the Sulṯāns to say, "Gather well together those who [Sidenote: Fol. 374.] cross, go close to the opposing army, take it in the flank, and get to grips." Accordingly the Sulṯāns collected those who crossed, formed up into 3 or 4 divisions, and started for the foe. As they draw near, the enemy-commander, without breaking his array, flings his foot-soldiers to the front and so comes on. Kūkī comes up with a troop from `Askarī's force and gets to grips on his side; the Sulṯāns get to grips on theirs; they get the upper hand, unhorse man after man, and make the enemy scurry off. Kūkī's men bring down a Pagan of repute named Basant Rāō and cut off his head; 10 or 15 of his people fall on Kūkī's, and are instantly cut to pieces. Tūkhta-būghā Sl. gallops along the enemy's front and gets his sword well in. Mughūl `Abdu'l-wahhāb and his younger brother gets theirs in well too. Mughūl though he did not know how to swim, had crossed the river holding to his horse's mane.

I sent for my own boats which were behind;[2622] the Farmāīsh coming up first, I went over in it to visit the Bengalīs' encamping-grounds. I then went into the Gunjāīsh. "Is there a crossing-place higher up?" I asked. Mīr Muḥammad the raftsman represented that the Sarū was better to cross higher up;[2623] accordingly the army-folk[2624] were ordered to cross at the higher place he named.

While those led by Muḥammad Sl. Mīrzā were crossing the [Sidenote: Fol. 374b.] river,[2625] the boat in which Yakka Khwāja was, sank and he went to God's mercy. His retainers and lands were bestowed on his younger brother Qāsim Khwāja.

The Sulṯāns arrived while I was making ablution for the Mid-day Prayer; I praised and thanked them and led them to expect guerdon and kindness. `Askarī also came; this was the first affair he had seen; one well-omened for him!

As the camp had not yet crossed the river, I took my rest in the boat Gunjāīsh, near an island.

(ccc. Various incidents of the days following the battle.)

(May 6th) During the day of Friday (Sha`bān 27th) we landed at a village named Kūndīh[2626] in the Nirhun pargana of Kharīd on the north side of the Sarū.[2627]

(May 8th) On Sunday (29th) Kūkī was sent to Ḥājīpūr for news.

Shāh Muḥammad (son) of Ma`rūf to whom in last year's campaign (934 AH.) I had shown great favour and had given the Sāran-country, had done well on several occasions, twice fighting and overcoming his father Ma`rūf.[2628] At the time when Sl. Maḥmūd Lūdī perfidiously took possession of Bihār and was opposed by Shaikh Bāyazīd and Bīban, Shāh Muḥammad had no help for it, he had to join them; but even then, when people were saying wild words about him, he had written dutifully to me. When `Askarī crossed at the Haldī-passage, Shāh [Sidenote: Fol. 375.] Muḥammad had come at once with a troop, seen him and with him gone against the Bengalīs. He now came to this ground and waited on me.

During these days news came repeatedly that Bīban and Shaikh Bāyazīd were meaning to cross the Sarū-river.

In these days of respite came the surprising news from Sanbal (Saṃbhal) where `Alī-i-yūsuf had stayed in order to bring the place into some sort of order, that he and a physician who was by way of being a friend of his, had gone to God's mercy on one and the same day. `Abdu'l-lāh (kitābdār) was ordered to go and maintain order in Sanbal.

(May 13th) On Friday the 5th of the month Ramẓān, `Abdu'l-lāh was given leave for Sanbal.[2629]

(ddd. News from the westward.)

In these same days came a dutiful letter from Chīn-tīmūr Sl. saying that on account of the journey of the family from Kābul, several of the begs who had been appointed to reinforce him, had not been able to join him;[2630] also that he had gone out with Muḥammadī and other begs and braves, not less than 100 kurohs (200m.), attacked the Balūchīs and given them a good beating.[2631] Orders were sent through `Abdu'l-lāh (kitābdār) for the Sulṯān that he and Sl. Muḥammad Dūldāī, Muḥammadī, and some of the begs and braves of that country-side should assemble in Āgra and there remain ready to move to wherever an enemy appeared.

(eee. Settlement with the Nūḥānī Afghāns.)

(May 16th) On Monday the 8th of the month, Daryā Khān's [Sidenote: Fol. 375b.] grandson Jalāl Khān to whom Shaikh Jamālī had gone, came in with his chief amīrs and waited on me.[2632] Yaḥyā Nūḥānī also came, who had already sent his younger brother in sign of submission and had received a royal letter accepting his service. Not to make vain the hope with which some 7 or 8,000 Nūḥānī Afghāns had come in to me, I bestowed 50 laks from Bīhār on Maḥmūd Khān Nūḥānī, after reserving one krūr for Government uses (khalṣa), and gave the remainder of the Bihār revenues in trust for the above-mentioned Jalāl Khān who for his part agreed to pay one krūr of tribute. Mullā Ghulām yasāwal was sent to collect this tribute.[2633] Muḥammad-i-zamān Mīrzā received the Jūnapūr-country.[2634]

(fff. Peace made with Naṣrat Shāh.)

(May 19th) On the eve of Thursday (11th) that retainer of Khalīfa's, Ghulām-i-`alī by name, who in company with a retainer of the Shāh-zāda of Mungīr named Abū'l-fatḥ,[2635] had gone earlier than Ismā`īl Mītā, to convey those three articles (faṣl soz), now returned, again in company with Abū'l-fatḥ, bringing letters for Khalīfa written by the Shāh-zāda and by Ḥusain Khān Laskar(?) Wazīr, who, in these letters, gave assent to those three conditions, took upon themselves to act for Naṣrat Shāh and interjected a word for peace. As the object of this campaign was to put down the rebel Afghāns of whom some had taken their heads and gone off, some had come in submissive and accepting my service, and the remaining few were in the hands of the Bengalī [Sidenote: Fol. 376.] (Naṣrat Shāh) who had taken them in charge, and as, moreover, the Rains were near, we in our turn wrote and despatched words for peace on the conditions mentioned.

(ggg. Submissions and guerdon.)

(May 21st) On Saturday (13th) Ismā`īl Jālwānī, `Alāūl Khān Nūḥānī, Auliya Khān Ashrāqī(?) and 5 and 6 amīrs came in and waited on me.

Today guerdon was bestowed on Aīsān-tīmūr Sl. and Tūkhta-būghā Sl., of swords and daggers with belts, cuirasses, dresses of honour, and tīpūchāq horses; also they were made to kneel, Aīsān-tīmūr Sl. for the grant of 36 laks from the Nārnūl pargana, Tūkhta-bughā Sl. for 30 laks from that of Shamsābād.

(hhh. Pursuit of Bāyazīd and Bīban.)

(May 23rd) On Monday the 15th of the month (Ramẓān), we marched from our ground belonging to Kūndbah (or Kūndīh) on the Sarū-river, with easy mind about Bihār and Bengal, and resolute to crush the traitors Bīban and Shaikh Bāyazīd.

(May 25th) On Wednesday (17th) after making two night-halts by the way, we dismounted at a passage across the Sarū, called Chaupāra-Chaturmūk of Sikandarpūr.[2636] From today people were busy in crossing the river.

As news began to come again and again that the traitors, after crossing Sarū and Gogar,[2637] were going toward Luknū,[2638] the following leaders were appointed to bar (their) crossing[2639]:—The Turk and Hind amīrs Jalālu'd-dīn Sharqī, `Alī Khān Farmūlī; Tardīka (or, Tardī yakka), Nizām Khān of Bīāna, together with Tūlmīsh Aūzbeg, Qurbān of Chīrk and Daryā Khān (of Bhīra's [Sidenote: Fol. 376b.] son) Ḥasan Khān. They were given leave to go on the night of Thursday.[2640]

(iii. Damage done to the Bābur-nāma writings.)

That same night when 1 watch (pās), 5 garīs had passed (cir. 10.55 p.m.) and the tarāwīḥ-prayers were over,[2641] such a storm burst, in the inside of a moment, from the up-piled clouds of the Rainy-season, and such a stiff gale rose, that few tents were left standing. I was in the Audience-tent, about to write (kitābat qīlā dūr aīdīm); before I could collect papers and sections,[2642] the tent came down, with its porch, right on my head. The tūnglūq went to pieces.[2643] God preserved me! no harm befell me! Sections and book[2644] were drenched under water and gathered together with much difficulty. We laid them in the folds of a woollen throne-carpet,[2645] put this on the throne and on it piled blankets. The storm quieted down in about 2 garīs (45m.); the bedding-tent was set up, a lamp lighted, and, after much trouble, a fire kindled. We, without sleep, were busy till shoot of day drying folios and sections.

(jjj. Pursuit of Bīban and Bāyazīd resumed.)

(May 26th) I crossed the water on Thursday morning (Ramān 18th).

(May 27th) On Friday (19th) I rode out to visit Sikandarpūr and Kharīd.[2646] Today came matters written by `Abdu`l-lāh (kitābdār) and Bāqī about the taking of Luknūr.[2647]

(May 28th) On Saturday (20th) Kūkī was sent ahead, with a troop, to join Bāqī.[2648]

(May 29th) That nothing falling to be done before my arrival might be neglected, leave to join Bāqī was given on Sunday (21st) to Sl. Junaid Barlās, Khalīfa's (son) Ḥasan, Mullā Apāq's [Sidenote: Fol. 377.] retainers, and the elder and younger brethren of Mumin Ātāka.

Today at the Other Prayer a special dress of honour and a tīpūchāq horse were bestowed on Shāh Muḥammad (son) of Ma`rūf Farmūlī, and leave to go was given. As had been done last year (934 AH.), an allowance from Sāran and Kūndla[2649] was bestowed on him for the maintenance of quiver-wearers. Today too an allowance of 72 laks[2650] from Sarwār and a tīpūchāq horse were bestowed on Ismā`īl Jalwānī, and his leave was given.

About the boats Gunjāīsh and Arāīsh it was settled with Bengalīs that they should take them to Ghāzīpūr by way of Tīr-mūhānī.[2651] The boats Asāīsh and Farmāīsh were ordered taken up the Sarū with the camp.

(May 30th) On Monday (Ramẓān 22nd) we marched from the Chaupāra-Chaturmūk passage along the Sarū, with mind at ease about Bihār and Sarwār,[2652] and after doing as much as 10 kurohs [Sidenote: Fol. 377b.] (20m.) dismounted on the Sarū in a village called Kilirah (?) dependent on Fatḥpūr.[2653]

(kkk. A surmised survival of the record of 934. A.H.[2654])

*After spending several days pleasantly in that place where there are gardens, running-waters, well-designed buildings, trees, particularly mango-trees, and various birds of coloured plumage, I ordered the march to be towards Ghāzīpūr.

Ismā`īl Khān Jalwānī and `Alāūl Khān Nūḥānī had it represented to me that they would come to Āgra after seeing their native land (watn). On this the command was, "I will give an order in a month."*[2655]

(lll. The westward march resumed.)

(May 31st) Those who marched early (Tuesday, Ramẓān 23rd), having lost their way, went to the great lake of Fatḥpūr (?).[2656] People were sent galloping off to fetch back such as were near and Kīchīk Khwāja was ordered to spend the night on the lakeshore and to bring the rest on next morning to join the camp. We marched at dawn; I got into the Asāīsh half-way and had it towed to our ground higher up.

(mmm. Details of the capture of a fort by Bīban and Bāyazīd.)

On the way up, Khalīfa brought Shāh Muḥammad dīwāna's son who had come from Bāqī bringing this reliable news about Luknūr[2657]:—They (i.e. Bīban and Bāyazīd) hurled their assault on Saturday the 13th of the month Ramẓān (May 21st) but could do nothing by fighting; while the fighting was going on, a collection of wood-chips, hay, and thorns in the fort took fire, so that inside the walls it became as hot as an oven (tanūrdīk tafsān); the garrison could not move round the rampart; the fort was lost. When the enemy heard, two or three days later, of our return (westwards), he fled towards Dalmau.[2658]

Today after doing as much as 10 kurohs (20m.), we dismounted beside a village called Jalisir,[2659] on the Sarū-bank, in the Sagrī pargāna.

(June 1st) We stayed on the same ground through Wednesday (24th), in order to rest our cattle.

(nnn. Dispositions against Bīban and Bāyazīd.)

Some said they had heard that Bīban and Bāyazīd had crossed Gang, and thought of withdrawing themselves to their kinsfolk [Sidenote: Fol. 378.]

(nisbahsīlār) by way of....[2660] Here-upon the begs were summoned for a consultation and it was settled that Muḥammad-i-zamān Mīrzā and Sl. Junaid Barlās who in place of Jūnpūr had been given Chunār with several parganas, Maḥmud Khān Nūḥānī, Qāẓī Jīā, and Tāj Khān Sarāng-khānī should block the enemy's road at Chunār.[2661]

(June 2nd) Marching early in the morning of Thursday (25th), we left the Sarū-river, did 11 kurohs (22 m.), crossed the Parsarū (Sarjū) and dismounted on its bank.

Here the begs were summoned, discussion was had, and the leaders named below were appointed to go detached from the army, in rapid pursuit of Bīban and Bāyazīd towards Dalmūṯ (Dalmau):—Aīsān-tīmūr Sl., Muḥammad Sl. M., Tūkhta-būghā Sl., Qāsim-i-ḥusain Sl., Bī-khūb (Nī-khūb) Sl., Muz̤affar-i-ḥusain Sl., Qāsim Khwāja, Ja`far Khwāja, Zahid Khwāja, Jānī Beg, `Askarī's retainer Kīchīk Khwāja, and, of Hind amīrs, `Ālam Khān of Kālpī, Malik-dād Kararānī, and Rāo (Rāwūī) Sarwāni.

(ooo. The march continued.)

When I went at night to make ablution in the Parsarū, people were catching a mass of fish that had gathered round a lamp on the surface of the water. I like others took fish in my hands.[2662]

(June 3rd) On Friday (26th) we dismounted on a very slender stream, the head-water of a branch of the Parsarū. In order not to be disturbed by the comings and goings of the army-folk, [Sidenote: Fol. 378b.] I had it dammed higher up and had a place, 10 by 10, made for ablution. The night of the 27th[2663] was spent on this ground.

(June 4th) At the dawn of the same day (Saturday 27th) we left that water, crossed the Tūs and dismounted on its bank.[2664]

(June 5th) On Sunday (28th) we dismounted on the bank of the same water.

(June 6th) On Monday the 29th of the month (Ramẓān), our station was on the bank of the same Tūs-water. Though tonight the sky was not quite clear, a few people saw the Moon, and so testifying to the Qāẓī, fixed the end of the month (Ramẓān).

(June 7th) On Tuesday (Shawwāl 1st) we made the Prayer of the Festival, at dawn rode on, did 10 kurohs (20 m.), and dismounted on the bank of the Gūī (Gūmtī), a kuroh (2 m.) from Māīng.[2665] The sin of ma`jūn was committed (irtikāb qīlīldī) near the Mid-day Prayer; I had sent this little couplet of invitation to Shaikh Zain, Mullā Shihāb and Khwānd-amīr:—

(Turkī) Shaikh and Mullā Shihāb and Khwānd-amir, Come all three, or two, or one.

Darwīsh-i-muḥammad (Sārbān), Yūnas-i-`alī and `Abdu'l-lāh (`asas)[2666] were also there. At the Other Prayer the wrestlers set to.

(June 8th) On Wednesday (2nd) we stayed on the same ground. Near breakfast-time ma`jūn was eaten. Today Malik Sharq came in who had been to get Tāj Khān out of Chunār.[2667] When the wrestlers set to today, the Champion of Aūd who had come earlier, grappled with and threw a Hindūstānī wrestler who had [Sidenote: Fol. 379.] come in the interval.

Today Yaḥyā Nuḥāni was granted an allowance of 15 laks from Parsarūr,[2668] made to put on a dress of honour, and given his leave.

(June 9th) Next day (Thursday 3rd) we did 11 kurohs (22 m.), crossed the Gūī-water (Gūmtī), and dismounted on its bank.

(ppp. Concerning the pursuit of Bīban and Bāyazīd.)

News came in about the sulṯāns and begs of the advance that they had reached Dalmūd (Dalmau), but were said not yet to have crossed the water (Ganges). Angered by this (delay), I sent orders, "Cross the water at once; follow the track of the rebels; cross Jūn (Jumna) also; join `Ālam Khān to yourselves; be energetic and get to grips with the adversary."

(qqq. The march continued.)

(June 10th) After leaving this water (Gūmtī, Friday 4th) we made two night-halts and reached Dalmūd (Dalmau), where most of the army-folk crossed Gang, there and then, by a ford. While the camp was being got over, ma`jūn was eaten on an island (ārāl) below the ford.

(June 13th) After crossing, we waited one day (Monday 7th) for all the army-folk to get across. Today Bāqī Tāshkīndī came in with the army of Aūd (Ajodhya) and waited on me.

(June 14th) Leaving the Gang-water (Ganges, Tuesday 8th), we made one night-halt, then dismounted (June 15th-Shawwāl 9th) beside Kūrarah (Kūra Khāṣ) on the Arind-water. The distance from Dalmūd (Dalmau) to Kūrarah came out at 22 kurohs (44 m.).[2669]

(June 16th) On Thursday (10th) we marched early from that ground and dismounted opposite the Ādampūr pargana.[2670]

To enable us to cross (Jūn) in pursuit of our adversaries, a few [Sidenote: Fol. 379b.] raftsmen had been sent forward to collect at Kālpī what boats were to be had; some boats arrived the night we dismounted, moreover a ford was found through the Jūn-river.

As the encamping-place was full of dust, we settled ourselves on an island and there stayed the several days we were on that ground.

(rrr. Concerning Bīban and Bāyazīd.)

Not getting reliable news about the enemy, we sent Bāqī shaghāwal with a few braves of the interior[2671] to get information about him.

(June 17th) Next day (Friday 11th) at the Other Prayer, one of Bāqī Beg's retainers came in. Bāqī had beaten scouts of Bīban and Bāyazīd, killed one of their good men, Mubārak Khān Jalwānī, and some others, sent in several heads, and one man alive.

(June 18th) At dawn (Saturday 12th) Paymaster Shāh Ḥusain came in, told the story of the beating of the scouts, and gave various news.

Tonight, that is to say, the night of Sunday the 13th of the month,[2672] the river Jūn came down in flood, so that by the dawn, the whole of the island on which I was settled, was under water. I moved to another an arrow's-flight down-stream, there had a tent set up and settled down.

(June 20th) On Monday (14th) Jalāl Tāshkīndī came from the begs and sulṯāns of the advance. Shaikh Bāyazīd and Bīban, on hearing of their expedition, had fled to the pargana of Mahūba.[2673] [Sidenote: Fol. 380.]

As the Rains had set in and as after 5 or 6 months of active service, horses and cattle in the army were worn out, the sulṯāns and begs of the expedition were ordered to remain where they were till they received fresh supplies from Āgra and those parts. At the Other Prayer of the same day, leave was given to Bāqī and the army of Aūd (Ajodhya). Also an allowance of 30 lāks[2674] from Amrohā was assigned to Mūsa (son) of Ma`rūf Farmūlī, who had waited on me at the time the returning army was crossing the Sarū-water,[2675] a special head-to-foot and saddled horse were bestowed on him, and he was given his leave.

(sss. Bābur returns to Āgra.)

(June 21st) With an easy mind about these parts, we set out for Āgra, raid-fashion,[2676] when 3 pās 1 garī of Tuesday night were past.[2677] In the morning (Tuesday 15th) we did 16 kurohs (32 m.), near mid-day made our nooning in the pargana of Balādar, one of the dependencies of Kālpī, there gave our horses barley, at the Evening Prayer rode on, did 13 kurohs (26 m.) in the night, at the 3rd night-watch (mid-night, Shawwāl 15-16th) dismounted at Bahādur Khān Sarwānī's tomb at Sūgandpūr, a pargana of Kālpī, slept a little, went through the Morning Prayer and hurried on. After doing 16 kurohs (32 m.), we reached Etāwa at the fall of day, where Mahdī Khwāja came out to meet us.[2678] Riding [Sidenote: Fol. 380b.] on after the 1st night-watch (9 p.m.), we slept a little on the way, did 16 kurohs (32 m.), took our nooning at Fatḥpūr of Rāprī, rode on soon after the Mid-day Prayer (Thursday Shawwāl 17th), did 17 kurohs (34 m.), and in the 2nd night-watch[2679] dismounted in the Garden-of-eight-paradises at Āgra.

(June 24th) At the dawn of Friday (18th) Pay-master Sl. Muḥammad came with several more to wait on me. Towards the Mid-day Prayer, having crossed Jūn, I waited on Khwāja `Abdu'l-ḥaqq, went into the Fort and saw the begīms my paternal-aunts.

(ttt. Indian-grown fruits.)

A Balkhī melon-grower had been set to raise melons; he now brought a few first-rate small ones; on one or two bush-vines (būta-tāk) I had had planted in the Garden-of-eight-paradises very good grapes had grown; Shaikh Gūran sent me a basket of grapes which too were not bad. To have grapes and melons grown in this way in Hindūstān filled my measure of content.

(uuu. Arrival of Māhīm Begīm.)

(June 26th) Māhīm arrived while yet two watches of Sunday night (Shawwāl 20th)[2680] remained. By a singular agreement of things they had left Kābul on the very day, the 10th of the 1st Jumāda (Jan. 21st 1529) on which I rode out to the army.[2681]

(Here the record of 11 days is wanting.)

(July 7th) On Thursday the 1st of Ẕū'l-qa`da the offerings made by Humāyūn and Māhīm were set out while I sat in the large Hall of Audience.

Today also wages were given to 150 porters (kahār) and they were started off under a servant of Faghfūr Dīwān to fetch melons, grapes, and other fruits from Kabul. [Sidenote: Fol. 381.]

(vvv. Concerning Saṃbhal.)

(July 9th) On Saturday the 3rd of the month, Hindū Beg who had come as escort from Kābul and must have been sent to Saṃbhal on account of the death of `Alī-i-yūsuf, came and waited on me.[2682] Khalīfa's (son) Ḥusāmu'd-dīn came also today from Alwār and waited on me.

(July 10th) On Sunday morning (4th) came `Abdu'l-lāh (kitābdār), who from Tīr-mūhānī[2683] had been sent to Saṃbhal on account of the death of `Alī-i-yūsuf.

(Here the record of 7 days is wanting.)

(www. Sedition in Lāhor.)

People from Kābul were saying that Shaikh Sharaf of Qarā-bāgh, either incited by `Abdu'l-`azīz or out of liking for him, had written an attestation which attributed to me oppression I had not done, and outrage that had not happened; that he had extorted the signatures of the Prayer-leaders (imāmlār) of Lāhor to this accusation, and had sent copies of it to the various towns; that `Abdu'l-`azīz himself had failed to give ear to several royal orders, had spoken unseemly words, and done acts which ought to have been left undone. On account of these matters Qaṃbar-i-`alī Arghūn was started off on Sunday the 11th of the month (Ẕū'l-qa`da), to arrest Shaikh Sharaf, the Lāhor imāms with their associates, and `Abdu'l-`azīz, and to bring them all to Court.

(xxx. Varia.)

(July 22nd) On Thursday the 15th of the month Chīn-tīmūr Sl. came in from Tijāra and waited on me. Today Champion [Sidenote: Fol. 381b.] Ṣādiq and the great champion-wrestler of Aūd wrestled. Ṣādiq gave a half-throw[2684]; he was much vexed.

(July 28th) On Monday the 19th of the month (Ẕū'l-qa`da) the Qīzīl-bāsh envoy Murād the life-guardsman was made to put on an inlaid dagger with belt, and a befitting dress of honour, was presented with 2 laks of tankas and given leave to go.

(Here the record of 15 days is wanting.)

(yyy. Sedition in Gūālīār.)

(August 11th) Sayyid Mashhadī who had come from Gūālīār in these days, represented that Raḥīm-dād was stirring up sedition.[2685] On account of this, Khalīfa's servant Shāh Muḥammad the seal-bearer was sent to convey to Raḥīm-dād matters written with commingling of good counsel. He went; and in a few days came back bringing Raḥīm-dād's son, but, though the son came, Raḥīm-dād himself had no thought of coming. On Wednesday the 5th of Ẕū'l-ḥijja, Nūr Beg was sent to Gūālīār to allay Raḥīm-dād's fears, came back in a few days, and laid requests from Raḥīm-dād before us. Orders in accordance with those requests had been written and were on the point of despatch when one of Raḥīm-dād's servants arriving, represented that he had come to effect the escape of the son and that Raḥīm-dād himself had no thought of coming in. I was for riding out at once to Gūālīār, but Khalīfa set it forth to me, "Let me write one more letter commingled with good counsel; he may even yet come peacefully." On this mission Khusrau's (son?) Shihābu'd-dīn was despatched.

(August 12th) On Thursday the 6th of the month mentioned (Ẕū'l-ḥijja) Mahdī Khwāja came in from Etāwa.[2686] [Sidenote: Fol. 382.]

(August 16th) On the Festival-day[2687] (Monday 10th) Hindū Beg was presented with a special head-to-foot, an inlaid dagger with belt; also a pargana worth 7 laks[2688] was bestowed on Ḥasan-i-`alī, well-known among the Turkmāns[2689] for a Chaghatāī.[2690]

936 AH.-SEP. 5TH 1529 TO AUGUST 25TH 1530 AD.

(a. Raḥīm-dād's affairs.)

(Sep. 7th) On Wednesday the 3rd of Muḥarram, Shaikh Muḥammad Ghaus̤[2691] came in from Gūālīār with Khusrau's (son) Shihābu'd-dīn to plead for Raḥīm-dād. As Shaikh Muḥammad Ghaūṣ was a pious and excellent person, Raḥīm-dād's faults were forgiven for his sake. Shaikh Gūran and Nūr Beg were sent off for Gūālīār, so that the place having been made over to their charge....[2692]

TRANSLATOR'S NOTE ON 936 TO 937 AH.-1529 TO 1530 AD.

It is difficult to find material for filling the lacuna of some 15 months, which occurs in Bābur's diary after the broken passage of Muḥarram 3rd 936 AH. (Sept. 7th 1529 AD.) and down to the date of his death on Jumāda 1. 6th 937 AH. (Dec. 26th 153O AD.). The known original sources are few, their historical matter scant, their contents mainly biographical. Gleanings may yet be made, however, in unexpected places, such gleanings as are provided by Aḥmad-i-yādgār's interpolation of Tīmūrid history amongst his lives of Afghān Sulṯāns.

The earliest original source which helps to fill the gap of 936 AH. is Ḥaidar Mīrzā's Tārīkh-i-rashīdī, finished as to its Second Part which contains Bābur's biography, in 948 AH. (1541 AD.), 12 years therefore after the year of the gap 936 AH. It gives valuable information about the affairs of Badakhshān, based on its author's personal experience at 30 years of age, and was Abū'l-faẓl's authority for the Akbar-nāma.

The next in date of the original sources is Gul-badan Begīm's Humāyūn-nāma, a chronicle of family affairs, which she wrote in obedience to her nephew Akbar's command, given in about 995 AH. (1587 AD.), some 57 years after her Father's death, that whatever any person knew of his father (Humāyūn) and grandfather (Bābur) should be written down for Abū'l-faẓl's use. It embodies family memories and traditions, and presumably gives the recollections of several ladies of the royal circle.[2693]

The Akbar-nāma derives much of its narrative for 936-937 AH. from Ḥaidar Mīrzā and Gul-badan Begīm, but its accounts of Bābur's self-surrender and of his dying address to his chiefs presuppose the help of information from a contemporary witness. It is noticeable that the Akbar-nāma records no public events as occurring in Hindūstān during 936-937 AH., nothing of the sequel of rebellion by Raḥīm-dād[2694] and `Abdu'l-`azīz, nothing of the untiring Bīban and Bāyazīd. That something could have been told is shown by what Aḥmad-i-yādgār has preserved (vide post); but 50 years had passed since Bābur's death and, manifestly, interest in filling the lacunæ in his diary was then less keen than it is over 300 years later. What in the Akbar-nāma concerns Bābur is likely to have been written somewhat early in the cir. 15 years of its author's labours on it,[2695] but, even so, the elder women of the royal circle had had rest after the miseries Humāyūn had wrought, the forgiveness of family affection would veil his past, and certainly has provided Abū'l-faẓl with an over-mellowed estimate of him, one ill-assorting with what is justified by his Bābur-nāma record.

The contribution made towards filling the gap of 936-937 AH. in the body of Niẕāmu-'d-dīn Aḥmad's T̤abaqāt-i-akbarī is limited to a curious and doubtfully acceptable anecdote about a plan for the supersession of Humāyūn as Pādshāh, and about the part played by Khwāja Muqīm Harāwī in its abandonment. A further contribution is made, however, in Book VII which contains the history of the Muḥammadan Kings of Kashmīr, namely, that Bābur despatched an expedition into that country. As no such expedition is recorded or referred to in surviving Bābur-nāma writings, it is likely to have been sent in 936 AH. during Bābur's tour to and from Lāhor. If it were made with the aim of extending Tīmūrid authority in the Himālayan borderlands, a hint of similar policy elsewhere may be given by the ceremonious visit of the Rāja of Kahlūr to Bābur, mentioned by Aḥmad-i-yādgār (vide post).[2696] The T̤.-i-A. was written within the term of Abū'l-faẓl's work on the Akbar-nāma, being begun later, and ended about 9 years earlier, in 1002 AH.-1593 AD. It appears to have been Abū'-l-faẓl's authority for his account of the campaign carried on in Kashmīr by Bābur's chiefs (Āyīn-i-akbarī vol. ii, part i, Jarrett's trs. p. 389).

An important contribution, seeming to be authentic, is found interpolated in Aḥmad-i-yādgār's Tārīkh-i-salāṯīn-i-afāghana, one which outlines a journey made by Bābur to Lāhor in 936 AH. and gives circumstantial details of a punitive expedition sent by him from Sihrind at the complaint of the Qāẓī of Samāna against a certain Mundāhir Rājpūt. The whole contribution dovetails into matters found elsewhere. Its precision of detail bespeaks a closely-contemporary written source.[2697] As its fullest passage concerns the Samāna Qāẓī's affair, its basis of record may have been found in Samāna. Some considerations about the date of Aḥmad-i-yādgār's own book and what Niamatu'l-lāh says of Haibat Khān of Samāna, his own generous helper in the Tārīkhi-Khan-i-jahān Lūdī, point towards Haibat Khān as providing the details of the Qāẓī's wrongs and avenging. The indication is strengthened by the circumstance that what precedes and what follows the account of the punitive expedition is outlined only.[2698] Aḥmad-i-yādgār interpolates an account of Humāyūn also, which is a frank plagiarism from the T̤abaqāt-i-akbarī. He tells too a story purporting to explain why Bābur "selected" Humāyūn to succeed him, one parallel with Niẕāmu'd-dīn Aḥmad's about what led Khalīfa to abandon his plan of setting the Mīrzā aside. Its sole value lies in its testimony to a belief, held by its first narrator whoever he was, that choice was exercised in the matter by Bābur. Reasons for thinking Niẕāmu'd-dīn's story, as it stands, highly improbable, will be found later in this note.

Muḥammad Qāsim Hindū Shāh Firishta's Tārīkh-i-firishta contains an interesting account of Bābur but contributes towards filling the gap in the events of 936-937 AH. little that is not in the earlier sources. In M. Jules Mohl's opinion it was under revision as late as 1623 AD. (1032-3 AH.).

(a. Humāyūn and Badakhshān.)

An occurrence which had important results, was the arrival of Humāyūn in Āgra, unsummoned by his Father, from the outpost station of Badakhshān. It will have occurred early in 936 AH. (autumn 1529 AD.), because he was in Kābul in the first ten days of the last month of 935 AH. (vide post). Curiously enough his half-sister Gul-badan does not mention his coming, whether through avoidance of the topic or from inadvertence; the omission may be due however to the loss of a folio from the only known MS. of her book (that now owned by the British Museum), and this is the more likely that Abū'l-faẓl writes, at some length, about the arrival and its motive, what the Begīm might have provided, this especially by his attribution of filial affection as Humāyūn's reason for coming to Āgra.

Ḥaidar Mīrzā is the authority for the Akbar-nāma account of Humāyūn's departure from Qila`-i-ẕafar and its political and military sequel. He explains the departure by saying that when Bābur had subdued Hindūstān, his sons Humāyūn and Kāmrān were grown-up; and that wishing to have one of them at hand in case of his own death, he summoned Humāyūn, leaving Kāmrān in Qandahār. No doubt these were the contemporary impressions conveyed to Ḥaidar, and strengthened by the accomplished fact before he wrote some 12 years later; nevertheless there are two clear indications that there was no royal order for Humāyūn to leave Qila`-i-ẕafar, viz. that no-one had been appointed to relieve him even when he reached Āgra, and that Abū'l-faẓl mentions no summons but attributes the Mīrzā's departure from his post to an overwhelming desire to see his Father. What appears probable is that Māhīm wrote to her son urging his coming to Āgra, and that this was represented as Bābur's wish. However little weight may be due to the rumour, preserved in anecdotes recorded long after 935 AH., that any-one, Bābur or Khalīfa, inclined against Humāyūn's succession, that rumour she would set herself to falsify by reconciliation.[2699]

When the Mīrzā's intention to leave Qila`-i-ẕafar became known there, the chiefs represented that they should not be able to withstand the Aūzbeg on their frontier without him (his troops implied).[2700] With this he agreed, said that still he must go, and that he would send a Mīrzā in his place as soon as possible. He then rode, in one day, to Kābul, an item of rapid travel preserved by Abū'l-faẓl.

Humāyūn's departure caused such anxiety in Qila`-i-ẕafar that some (if not all) of the Badakhshī chiefs hurried off an invitation to Sa`īd Khān Chaghatāī, the then ruler in Kāshghar in whose service Ḥaidar Mīrzā was, to come at once and occupy the fort. They said that Faqīr-i-`alī who had been left in charge, was not strong enough to cope with the Aūzbeg, begged Sa`īd to come, and strengthened their petition by reminding him of his hereditary right to Badakhshān, derived from Shāh Begīm Badakhshī. Their urgency convincing the Khān that risk threatened the country, he started from Kāshghar in Muḥarram 936 AH. (Sept-Oct. 1529 AD.). On reaching Sārīgh-chūpān which by the annexation of Abā-bakr Mīrzā Dūghlāt was now his own most western territory[2701] but which formerly was one of the upper districts of Badakhshān, he waited while Ḥaidar went on towards Qila`-i-ẕafar only to learn on his road, that Hind-āl (æt. 10) had been sent from Kābul by Humāyūn and had entered the fort 12 days before.

The Kāshgharīs were thus placed in the difficulty that the fort was occupied by Bābur's representative, and that the snows would prevent their return home across the mountains till winter was past. Winter-quarters were needed and asked for by Ḥaidar, certain districts being specified in which to await the re-opening of the Pāmīr routes. He failed in his request, "They did not trust us," he writes, "indeed suspected us of deceit." His own account of Sa`īd's earlier invasion of Badakhshān (925 AH.-1519 AD.) during Khān Mīrzā's rule, serves to explain Badakhshī distrust of Kāshgharīs. Failing in his negotiations, he scoured and pillaged the country round the fort, and when a few days later the Khān arrived, his men took what Ḥaidar's had left.

Sa`īd Khān is recorded to have besieged the fort for three months, but nothing serious seems to have been attempted since no mention of fighting is made, none of assault or sally, and towards the end of the winter he was waited on by those who had invited his presence, with apology for not having admitted him into the fort, which they said they would have done but for the arrival of Hind-āl Mīrzā. To this the Khān replied that for him to oppose Bābur Pādshāh was impossible; he reminded the chiefs that he was there by request, that it would be as hurtful for the Pādshāh as for himself to have the Aūzbeg in Badakhshān and, finally, he gave it as his opinion that, as matters stood, every man should go home. His view of the general duty may include that of Badakhshī auxiliaries such as Sulṯān Wais of Kūl-āb who had reinforced the garrison. So saying, he himself set out for Kāshghar, and at the beginning of Spring reached Yārkand.

b. Humāyūn's further action.

Humāyūn will have reached Kābul before Ẕū'l-ḥijja 10th 935 AH. (Aug. 26th 1529 AD.) because it is on record that he met Kāmrān on the Kābul 'Īd-gāh, and both will have been there to keep the `Īdu'l-kabīr, the Great Festival of Gifts, which is held on that day. Kāmrān had come from Qandahār, whether to keep the Feast, or because he had heard of Humāyūn's intended movement from Badakhshān, or because changes were foreseen and he coveted Kābul, as the Bābur-nāma and later records allow to be inferred. He asked Humāyūn, says Abū'l-faẓl, why he was there and was told of his brother's impending journey to Āgra under overwhelming desire to see their Father.[2702] Presumably the two Mīrzās discussed the position in which Badakhshān had been left; in the end Hind-āl was sent to Qila'-i-ẕafar, notwithstanding that he was under orders for Hindūstān.

Humāyūn may have stayed some weeks in Kābul, how many those familiar with the seasons and the routes between Yārkand and Qila`-i-ẕafar, might be able to surmise if the date of Hind-āl's start northward for which Humāyūn is likely to have waited, were found by dovetailing the Muḥarram of Sa`īd's start, the approximate length of his journey to Sārīgh-chūpān, and Ḥaidar's reception of news that Hind-āl had been 12 days in the fort.

Humāyūn's arrival in Āgra is said by Abū'l-faẓl to have been cheering to the royal family in their sadness for the death of Alwar (end of 935 AH.) and to have given pleasure to his Father. But the time is all too near the date of Bābur's letter (f.348) to Humāyūn, that of a dissatisfied parent, to allow the supposition that his desertion of his post would fail to displease.

That it was a desertion and not an act of obedience seems clear from the circumstance that the post had yet to be filled. Khalīfa is said to have been asked to take it and to have refused;[2703] Humāyūn to have been sounded as to return and to have expressed unwillingness. Bābur then did what was an honourable sequel to his acceptance in 926 AH. of the charge of the fatherless child Sulaimān, by sending him, now about 16, to take charge where his father Khān Mīrzā had ruled, and by still keeping him under his own protection.

Sulaimān's start from Āgra will not have been delayed, and (accepting Aḥmad-i-yādgār's record,) Bābur himself will have gone as far as Lāhor either with him or shortly after him, an expedition supporting Sulaimān, and menacing Sa`īd in his winter leaguer round Qila`-i-ẕafar. Meantime Humāyūn was ordered to his fief of Saṃbhal.

After Sulaimān's appointment Bābur wrote to Sa`īd a letter of which Ḥaidar gives the gist:—It expresses surprise at Sa`īd's doings in Badakhshān, says that Hind-āl has been recalled and Sulaimān sent, that if Sa`īd regard hereditary right, he will leave "Sulaimān Shāh Mīrzā"[2704] in possession, who is as a son to them both,[2705] that this would be well, that otherwise he (Bābur) will make over responsibility to the heir (Sulaimān);[2706] and, "The rest you know."[2707]

c. Bābur visits Lāhor.

If Aḥmad-i-yādgār's account of a journey made by Bābur to Lāhor and the Panj-āb be accepted, the lacuna of 936 AH. is appropriately filled. He places the expedition in the 3rd year of Bābur's rule in Hindūstān, which, counting from the first reading of the khuṯba for Bābur in Dihlī (f. 286), began on Rajab 15th 935 AH. (March 26th 1529 AD.). But as Bābur's diary-record for 935 AH. is complete down to end of the year, (minor lacunæ excepted), the time of his leaving Āgra for Lāhor is relegated to 936 AH. He must have left early in the year, (1) to allow time, before the occurrence of the known events preceding his own death, for the long expedition Aḥmad-i-yādgār calls one of a year, and (2) because an early start after Humāyūn's arrival and Sulaimān's departure would suit the position of affairs and the dates mentioned or implied by Ḥaidar's and by Aḥmad-i-yādgār's narratives.

Two reasons of policy are discernible, in the known events of the time, to recommend a journey in force towards the North-west; first, the sedition of `Abdu'l-`azīz in Lāhor (f. 381), and secondly, the invasion of Badakhshān by Sa`īd Khān with its resulting need of supporting Sulaimān by a menace of armed intervention.[2708]

In Sihrind the Rāja of Kahlūr, a place which may be one of the Simla hill-states, waited on Bābur, made offering of 7 falcons and 3 mans[2709] of gold, and was confirmed in his fief.[2710]

In Lāhor Kāmrān is said to have received his Father, in a garden of his own creation, and to have introduced the local chiefs as though he were the Governor of Lāhor some writers describe him as then being. The best sources, however, leave him still posted in Qandahār. He had been appointed to Multān (f. 359) when `Askarī was summoned to Āgra (f. 339), but whether he actually went there is not assured; some months later (Ẕū'l-ḥijja 10th 935 AH.) he is described by Abū'l-faẓl as coming to Kābul from Qandahār. He took both Multān[2711] and Lāhor by force from his (half-)brother Humāyūn in 935 AH. (1531 AD.) the year after their Father's death. That he should wait upon his Father in Lāhor would be natural, Hind-āl did so, coming from Kābul. Hind-āl will have come to Lāhor after making over charge of Qila`-i-ẕafar to Sulaimān, and he went back at the end of the cold season, going perhaps just before his Father started from Lāhor on his return journey, the gifts he received before leaving being 2 elephants, 4 horses, belts and jewelled daggers.[2712]

Bābur is said to have left Lāhor on Rajab 4th (936 AH.)-(March 4th, 1530 AD.). From Aḥmad-i-yādgār's outline of Bābur's doings in Lāhor, he, or his original, must be taken as ill-informed or indifferent about them. His interest becomes greater when he writes of Samāna.

d. Punishment of the Mundāhirs.

When Bābur, on his return journey, reached Sihrind, he received a complaint from the Qāẓī of Samāna against one Mohan Mundāhir (or Mundhār)[2713] Rājpūt who had attacked his estates, burning and plundering, and killed his son. Here-upon `Alī-qulī of Hamadān[2714] was sent with 3000 horse to avenge the Qāzī's wrongs, and reached Mohan's village, in the Kaithal pargana, early in the morning when the cold was such that the archers "could not pull their bows."[2715] A marriage had been celebrated over-night; the villagers, issuing from warm houses, shot such flights of arrows that the royal troops could make no stand; many were killed and nothing was effected; they retired into the jungle, lit fires, warmed themselves(?), renewed the attack and were again repulsed. On hearing of their failure, Bābur sent off, perhaps again from Sihrind, Tarsam Bahādur and Naurang Beg with 6000 horse and many elephants. This force reached the village at night and when marriage festivities were in progress. Towards morning it was formed into three divisions,[2716] one of which was ordered to go to the west of the village and show itself. This having been done, the villagers advanced towards it, in the pride of their recent success. The royal troops, as ordered beforehand, turned their backs and fled, the Mundāhirs pursuing them some two miles. Meantime Tarsam Bahādur had attacked and fired the village, killing many of its inhabitants. The pursuers on the west saw the flames of their burning homes, ran back and were intercepted on their way. About 1000 men, women and children were made prisoner; there was also great slaughter, and a pillar of heads was raised. Mohan was captured and later on was buried to the waist and shot to death with arrows.[2717] News of the affair was sent to the Pādshāh.[2718]

As after being in Sihrind, Bābur is said to have spent two months hunting near Dihlī, it may be that he followed up the punitive expedition sent into the Kaithal pargana of the Karnāl District, by hunting in Nardak, a favourite ground of the Tīmūrids, which lies in that district.

Thus the gap of 936 AH. with also perhaps a month of 937 AH. is filled by the "year's" travel west of Dihlī. The record is a mere outline and in it are periods of months without mention of where Bābur was or what affairs of government were brought before him. At some time, on his return journey presumably, he will have despatched to Kashmīr the expedition referred to in the opening section of this appendix. Something further may yet be gleaned from local chronicles, from unwritten tradition, or from the witness of place-names commemorating his visit.

e. Bābur's self-surrender to save Humāyūn.

The few months, perhaps 4 to 5, between Bābur's return to Āgra from his expedition towards the North-west, and the time of his death are filled by Gul-badan and Abū'l-faẓl with matters concerning family interests only.

The first such matter these authors mention is an illness of Humāyūn during which Bābur devoted his own life to save his son's.[2719] Of this the particulars are, briefly:—That Humāyūn, while still in Saṃbhal, had had a violent attack of fever; that he was brought by water to Āgra, his mother meeting him in Muttra; and that when the disease baffled medical skill, Bābur resolved to practise the rite believed then and now in the East to be valid, of intercession and devotion of a suppliant's most valued possession in exchange for a sick man's life. Rejecting counsel to offer the Koh-i-nūr for pious uses, he resolved to supplicate for the acceptance of his life. He made intercession through a saint his daughter names, and moved thrice round Humāyūn's bed, praying, in effect, "O God! if a life may be exchanged for a life, I, who am Bābur, give my life and my being for Humāyūn." During the rite fever surged over him, and, convinced that his prayer and offering had prevailed, he cried out, "I have borne it away! I have borne it away!"[2720] Gul-badan says that he himself fell ill on that very day, while Humāyūn poured water on his head, came out and gave audience; and that they carried her Father within on account of his illness, where he kept his bed for 2 or 3 months.

There can be no doubt as to Bābur's faith in the rite he had practised, or as to his belief that his offering of life was accepted; moreover actual facts would sustain his faith and belief. Onlookers also must have believed his prayer and offering to have prevailed, since Humāyūn went back to Saṃbhal,[2721] while Bābur fell ill at once and died in a few weeks.[2722]

f. A plan to set Bābur's sons aside from the succession.

Reading the Akbar-nāma alone, there would seem to be no question about whether Bābur ever intended to give Hindūstān, at any rate, to Humāyūn, but, by piecing together various contributory matters, an opposite opinion is reached, viz. that not Khalīfa only whom Abū'l-faẓl names perhaps on Niẕāmu'd-dīn Aḥmad's warrant, but Bābur also, with some considerable number of chiefs, wished another ruler for Hindūstān. The starting-point of this opinion is a story in the T̤abaqāt-i-akbarī and, with less detail, in the Akbar-nāma, of which the gist is that Khalīfa planned to supersede Humāyūn and his three brothers in their Father's succession.[2723]

The story, in brief, is as follows:—At the time of Bābur's death Niẕāmu'd-dīn Aḥmad's father Khwāja Muḥammad Muqīm Harāwī was in the service of the Office of Works.[2724] Amīr Niẕāmu'd-dīn `Alī Khalīfa, the Chief of the Administration, had dread and suspicion about Humāyūn and did not favour his succession as Pādshāh. Nor did he favour that of Bābur's other sons. He promised "Bābur Pādshāh's son-in-law (dāmād)" Mahdī Khwāja who was a generous young man, very friendly to himself, that he would make him Pādshāh. This promise becoming known, others made their salām to the Khwāja who put on airs and accepted the position. One day when Khalīfa, accompanied by Muqīm, went to see Mahdī Khwāja in his tent, no-one else being present, Bābur, in the pangs of his disease, sent for him[2725] when he had been seated a few minutes only. When Khalīfa had gone out, Mahdī Khwāja remained standing in such a way that Muqīm could not follow but, the Khwāja unaware, waited respectfully behind him. The Khwāja, who was noted for the wildness of youth, said, stroking his beard, "Please God! first, I will flay thee!" turned round and saw Muqīm, took him by the ear, repeated a proverb of menace, "The red tongue gives the green head to the wind," and let him go. Muqīm hurried to Khalīfa, repeated the Khwāja's threat against him, and remonstrated about the plan to set all Bābur's sons aside in favour of a stranger-house.[2726] Here-upon Khalīfa sent for Humāyūn,[2727] and despatched an officer with orders to the Khwāja to retire to his house, who found him about to dine and hurried him off without ceremony. Khalīfa also issued a proclamation forbidding intercourse with him, excluded him from Court, and when Bābur died, supported Humāyūn.

As Niẕāmu'd-dīn Aḥmad was not born till 20 years after Bābur died, the story will have been old before he could appreciate it, and it was some 60 years old when it found way into the T̤abaqāt-i-akbarī and, with less detail, into the Akbar-nāma.

Taken as it stands, it is incredible, because it represents Khalīfa, and him alone, planning to subject the four sons of Bābur to the suzerainty of Mahdī Khwāja who was not a Tīmūrid, who, so far as well-known sources show, was not of a ruling dynasty or personally illustrious,[2728] and who had been associated, so lately as the autumn of 1529 AD., with his nephew Raḥīm-dād in seditious action which had so angered Bābur that, whatever the punishment actually ordered, rumour had it both men were to die.[2729] In two particulars the only Mahdī Khwāja then of Bābur's following, does not suit the story; he was not a young man in 1530 AD.,[2730] and was not a dāmād of Bābur, if that word be taken in its usual sense of son-in-law, but he was a yazna, husband of a Pādshāh's sister, in his case, of Khān-zāda Begīm.[2731] Some writers style him Sayyid Mahdī Khwāja, a double title which may indicate descent on both sides from religious houses; one is suggested to be that of Tirmiẕ by the circumstance that in his and Khān-zāda Begīm's mausoleum was buried a Tirmiẕ sayyid of later date, Shāh Abū'l-ma`ālī. But though he were of Tirmiẕ, it is doubtful if that religious house would be described by the word khānwāda which so frequently denotes a ruling dynasty.

His name may have found its way into Niẕāmu'd-dīn Aḥmad's story as a gloss mistakenly amplifying the word dāmād, taken in its less usual sense of brother-in-law. To Bābur's contemporaries the expression "Bābur Pādshāh's dāmād" (son-in-law) would be explicit, because for some 11 years before he lay on his death-bed, he had one son-in-law only, viz. Muḥammad-i-zamān Mīrzā Bāī-qarā,[2732] the husband of Ma`ṣūma Sulṯān Begīm. If that Mīrzā's name were where Mahdī Khwāja's is entered, the story of an exclusion of Bābur's sons from rule might have a core of truth.

It is incredible however that Khālīfa, with or without Bābur's concurrence, made the plan attributed to him of placing any man not a Tīmūrid in the position of Pādshāh over all Bābur's territory. I suggest that the plan concerned Hindūstān only and was one considered in connection with Bābur's intended return to Kābul, when he must have left that difficult country, hardly yet a possession, in charge of some man giving promise of power to hold it. Such a man Humāyūn was not. My suggestion rests on the following considerations:—

(1) Bābur's outlook was not that of those in Āgra in 1587 AD. who gave Abū'l-faẓl his Bāburiana material, because at that date Dihlī had become the pivot of Tīmūrid power, so that not to hold Hindūstān would imply not to be Pādshāh. Bābur's outlook on his smaller Hindūstān was different; his position in it was precarious, Kābul, not Dihlī, was his chosen centre, and from Kābul his eyes looked northwards as well as to the East. If he had lost the Hindūstān which was approximately the modern United Provinces, he might still have held what lay west of it to the Indus, as well as Qandahār.

(2) For several years before his death he had wished to return to Kābul. Ample evidence of this wish is given by his diary, his letters, and some poems in his second Dīwān (that found in the Rāmpūr MS.). As he told his sons more than once, he kept Kābul for himself.[2733] If, instead of dying in Āgra, he had returned to Kābul, had pushed his way on from Badakhshān, whether as far as Samarkand or less, had given Humāyūn a seat in those parts,—action foreshadowed by the records—a reasonable interpretation of the story that Humāyūn and his brothers were not to govern Hindūstān, is that he had considered with Khalīfa the apportionment of his territories according to the example of his ancestors Chīngīz Khān, Tīmūr and Abū-sa`īd; that by his plan of apportionment Humāyūn was not to have Hindūstān but something Tramontane; Kāmrān had already Qandahār; Sulaimān, if Humāyūn had moved beyond the out-post of Badakhshān, would have replaced him there; and Hindūstān would have gone to "Bābur Pādshāh's dāmād".

(3) Muḥammad-i-zamān had much to recommend him for Hindūstān:—Tīmūrid-born, grandson and heir of Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā, husband of Ma`ṣūma who was a Tīmūrid by double descent,[2734] protected by Bābur after the Bāī-qarā débacle in Herāt, a landless man leading such other exiles as Muḥammad Sulṯān Mīrzā,[2735] `Ādil Sulṯān, and Qāsim-i-ḥusain Sulṯān, half-Tīmūrids all, who with their Khurāsānī following, had been Bābur's guests in Kābul, had pressed on its poor resources, and thus had helped in 932 AH. (1525 AD.) to drive him across the Indus. This Bāī-qarā group needed a location; Muḥammad-i-zamān's future had to be cared for and with his, Ma`ṣūma's.

(4) It is significant of intention to give Muḥammad-i-zamān ruling status that in April 1529 AD. (Sha`bān 935 AH.) Bābur bestowed on him royal insignia, including the umbrella-symbol of sovereignty.[2736] This was done after the Mīrzā had raised objections, unspecified now in the Bābur-nāma against Bihār; they were overcome, the insignia were given and, though for military reasons he was withheld from taking up that appointment, the recognition of his royal rank had been made. His next appointment was to Jūnpūr, the capital of the fallen Sharqī dynasty. No other chief is mentioned by Bābur as receiving the insignia of royalty.

(5) It appears to have been within a Pādshāh's competence to select his successor; and it may be inferred that choice was made between Humāyūn and another from the wording of more than one writer that Khalīfa "supported" Humāyūn, and from the word "selected" used in Aḥmad-i-yādgār's anecdote.[2737] Much more would there be freedom of choice in a division of territory such as there is a good deal to suggest was the basis of Niẕāmu'd-dīn Aḥmad's story. Whatever the extent of power proposed for the dāmād, whether, as it is difficult to believe, the Pādshāh's whole supremacy, or whether the limited sovereignty of Hindūstān, it must have been known to Bābur as well as to Khalīfa. Whatever their earlier plan however, it was changed by the sequel of Humāyūn's illness which led to his becoming Pādshāh. The dāmād was dropped, on grounds it is safe to believe more impressive than his threat to flay Khalīfa or than the remonstrance of that high official's subordinate Muqīm of Herāt.

Humāyūn's arrival and continued stay in Hindūstān modified earlier dispositions which included his remaining in Badakhshān. His actions may explain why Bābur, when in 936 AH. he went as far as Lāhor, did not go on to Kābul. Nothing in the sources excludes the surmise that Māhīm knew of the bestowal of royal insignia on the Bāī-qarā Mīrzā, that she summoned her son to Āgra and there kept him, that she would do this the more resolutely if the dāmād of the plan she must have heard of, were that Bāī-qarā, and that but for Humāyūn's presence in Āgra and its attendant difficulties, Bābur would have gone to Kābul, leaving his dāmād in charge of Hindūstān.

Bābur, however, turned back from Lāhor for Āgra, and there he made the self-surrender which, resulting in Humāyūn's "selection" as Pādshāh, became a turning point in history.

Humāyūn's recovery and Bābur's immediate illness will have made the son's life seem Divinely preserved, the father's as a debt to be paid. Bābur's impressive personal experience will have dignified Humāyūn as one whom God willed should live. Such distinction would dictate the bestowal on him of all that fatherly generosity had yet to give. The imminence of death defeating all plans made for life, Humāyūn was nominated to supreme power as Pādshāh.

g. Bābur's death.

Amongst other family matters mentioned by Gul-badan as occurring shortly before her Father's death, was his arrangement of marriages for Gul-rang with Aīsān-tīmūr and for Gul-chihra with Tūkhta-būghā Chaghatāī. She also writes of his anxiety to see Hind-āl who had been sent for from Kābul but did not arrive till the day after the death.

When no remedies availed, Humāyūn was summoned from Saṃbhal. He reached Āgra four days before the death; on the morrow Bābur gathered his chiefs together for the last of many times, addressed them, nominated Humāyūn his successor and bespoke their allegiance for him. Abū'l-faẓl thus summarizes his words, "Lofty counsels and weighty mandates were imparted. Advice was given (to Humāyūn) to be munificent and just, to acquire God's favour, to cherish and protect subjects, to accept apologies from such as had failed in duty, and to pardon transgressors. And, he (Bābur) exclaimed, the cream of my testamentary dispositions is this, 'Do naught against your brothers, even though they may deserve it.' In truth," continues the historian, "it was through obedience to this mandate that his Majesty Jannat-ashiyānī suffered so many injuries from his brothers without avenging himself." Gul-badan's account of her Father's last address is simple:—"He spoke in this wise, 'For years it has been in my heart to make over the throne to Humāyūn and to retire to the Gold-scattering Garden. By the Divine grace I have obtained in health of body everything but the fulfilment of this wish. Now that illness has laid me low, I charge you all to acknowledge Humāyūn in my stead. Fail not in loyalty towards him. Be of one heart and mind towards him. I hope to God that he, for his part, will bear himself well towards men. Moreover, Humāyūn, I commit you and your brothers and all my kinsfolk and your people and my people to God's keeping, and entrust them all to you.'"

It was on Monday Jumāda 1. 5th 937 AH. (Dec. 26th 153O AD.) that Bābur made answer to his summons with the Adsum of the Musalmān, "Lord! I am here for Thee."

"Black fell the day for children and kinsfolk and all," writes his daughter;

"Alas! that time and the changeful heaven should exist without thee; Alas! and Alas! that time should remain and thou shouldst be gone;"

mourns Khwāja Kalān in the funeral ode from which Badāyūnī quoted these lines.[2738]

The body was laid in the Garden-of-rest (Ārām-bāgh) which is opposite to where the Tāj-i-maḥāll now stands. Khwāja Muḥammad `Alī `asas[2739] was made the guardian of the tomb, and many well-voiced readers and reciters were appointed to conduct the five daily Prayers and to offer supplication for the soul of the dead. The revenues of Sīkrī and 5 laks from Bīāna were set aside for the endowment of the tomb, and Māhīm Begīm, during the two and a half years of her remaining life, sent twice daily from her own estate, an allowance of food towards the support of its attendants.

In accordance with the directions of his will, Bābur's body was to be conveyed to Kābul and there to be laid in the garden of his choice, in a grave open to the sky, with no building over it, no need of a door-keeper.

Precisely when it was removed from Āgra we have not found stated. It is known from Gul-badan that Kāmrān visited his Father's tomb in Āgra in 1539 AD. (946 AH.) after the battle of Chausa; and it is known from Jauhar that the body had been brought to Kābul before 1544 AD. (952 AH.), at which date Humāyūn, in Kābul, spoke with displeasure of Kāmrān's incivility to "Bega Begīm", the "Bībī" who had conveyed their Father's body to that place.[2740] That the widow who performed this duty was the Afghān Lady, Bībī Mubārika[2741] is made probable by Gul-badan's details of the movements of the royal ladies. Bābur's family left Āgra under Hind-āl's escort, after the defeat at Chausa (June 7th, 1539 AD.); whoever took charge of the body on its journey to Kābul must have returned at some later date to fetch it. It would be in harmony with Sher Shāh's generous character if he safe-guarded her in her task.

The terraced garden Bābur chose for his burial-place lies on the slope of the hill Shāh-i-Kābul, the Sher-darwāza of European writers.[2742] It has been described as perhaps the most beautiful of the Kābul gardens, and as looking towards an unsurpassable view over the Chār-dih plain towards the snows of Paghmān and the barren, rocky hills which have been the hunting-grounds of rulers in Kābul. Several of Bābur's descendants coming to Kābul from Āgra have visited and embellished his burial-garden. Shāh-i-jahān built the beautiful mosque which stands near the grave; Jahāngīr seems to have been, if not the author, at least the prompter of the well-cut inscription adorning the upright slab of white marble of Māīdān, which now stands at the grave-head. The tomb-stone itself is a low grave-covering, not less simple than those of relations and kin whose remains have been placed near Bābur's. In the thirties of the last century [the later Sir] Alexander Burnes visited and admirably described the garden and the tomb. With him was Munshī Mohan Lāl who added to his own account of the beauties of the spot, copies of the inscriptions on the monumental slab and on the portal of the Mosque.[2743] As is shown by the descriptions these two visitors give, and by Daniel's drawings of the garden and the tomb, there were in their time two upright slabs, one behind the other, near the head of the grave. Mr. H. H. Hayden who visited the garden in the first decade of the present century, shows in his photograph of the grave, one upright stone only, the place of one of the former two having been taken by a white-washed lamp holder (chirāghdān).

The purport of the verses inscribed on the standing-slab is as follows:—

A ruler from whose brow shone the Light of God was that[2744] Back-bone of the Faith (ẕahīru'd-dīn) Muḥammad Bābur Pādshāh. Together with majesty, dominion, fortune, rectitude, the open-hand and the firm Faith, he had share in prosperity, abundance and the triumph of victorious arms. He won the material world and became a moving light; for his every conquest he looked, as for Light, towards the world of souls. When Paradise became his dwelling and Ruẓwān[2745] asked me the date, I gave him for answer, "Paradise is forever Bābur Pādshāh's abode."

h. Bābur's wives and children.[2746]

Bābur himself mentions several of his wives by name, but Gul-badan is the authority for complete lists of them and their children.

1. `Āyisha Sulṯān Begīm, daughter of Sl. Aḥmad Mīrzā Mīrān-shāhī was betrothed, when Bābur was cir. 5 years old, in 894 AH. (1488-89 AD.), bore Fakhru'n-nisa' in 906 AH. [who died in about one month], left Bābur before 909 AH. (1503 AD.).

2. Zainab Sl. Begīm, daughter of Sl. Maḥmūd Mīrzā Mīrān-shāhī, was married in 910 AH. (1504-5 AD.), died childless two or three years later.

3. Māhīm Begīm, whose parentage is not found stated, was married in 912 AH. (1506 AD.), bore Bār-būd, Mihr-jān, Āīsān-daulat, Farūq [who all died in infancy], and Humāyūn.

4. Ma`ṣūma Sl. Begīm, daughter of Sl. Aḥmad Mīrzā Mīrān-shāhī, was married in 913 AH. (1507 AD.), bore Ma`ṣūma and died at her birth, presumably early in the lacuna of 914-925 AH. (1508-19 AD.).

5. Gul-rukh Begīm, whose parentage is not found stated, was perhaps a Begchīk Mughūl, was married between 914 AH. and 925 AH. (1508-19 AD.), probably early in the period, bore Shāh-rukh, Aḥmad [who both died young], Gul`iẕār [who also may have died young], Kamrān and `Askarī.

6. Dil-dār Begīm, whose parentage is not found stated, was married in the same period as Gul-rukh, bore Gul-rang, Gul-chihra, Hind-āl, Gul-badan and Alwar, [who died in childhood].

7. The Afghān Lady (Afghānī Āghācha), Bībī Mubārika Yūsufzāī, was married in 925 AH. (1519 AD.), and died childless.

The two Circassian slaves Gul-nār Āghācha and Nār-gul Āghācha of whom T̤ahmāsp made gift to Bābur in 933 AH. (f. 305), became recognized ladies of the royal household. They are mentioned several times by Gul-badan as taking part in festivities and in family conferences under Humāyūn. Gul-nār is said by Abū'l-faẓl to have been one of Gul-badan's pilgrim band in 983 AH. (1575 AD.).

The above list contains the names of three wives whose parentage is not given or is vaguely given by the well-known sources,—namely, Māhīm, Gul-rukh and Dil-dār. What would sufficiently explain the absence of mention by Bābur of the parentage of Gul-rukh and Dil-dār is that his record of the years within which the two Begīms were married is not now with the Bābur-nāma. Presumably it has been lost, whether in diary or narrative form, in the lacuna of 914-25 AH. (1508-19 AD.). Gul-rukh appears to have belonged to the family of Begchīk Mughūls described by Ḥaidar Mīrzā[2747]; her brothers are styled Mīrzā; she was of good but not royal birth. Dil-dār's case is less simple. Nothing in her daughter Gul-badan's book suggests that she and her children were other than of the highest rank; numerous details and shades of expression show their ease of equality with royal personages. It is consistent with Gul-badan's method of enumerating her father's wives that she should not state her own mother's descent; she states it of none of her "mothers". There is this interest in trying to trace Dil-dār's parentage, that she may have been the third daughter of Sl. Maḥmūd Mīrzā and Pasha Begīm, and a daughter of hers may have been the mother of Salīma Sulṯān Begīm who was given in marriage by Humāyūn to Bairām Khān, later was married by Akbar, and was a woman of charm and literary accomplishments. Later historians, Abū'l-faẓl amongst their number, say that Salīma's mother was a daughter of Bābur's wife Sālḥa Sulṯān Begīm, and vary that daughter's name as Gul-rang-rukh-barg or -`iẕār (the last form being an equivalent of chihra, face). As there cannot have been a wife with her daughter growing up in Bābur's household, who does not appear in some way in Gul-badan's chronicle, and as Salīma's descent from Bābur need not be questioned, the knot is most readily loosened by surmising that "Sālḥa" is the real name of Gul-badan's "Dildār". Instances of double names are frequent, e.g. Māhīm, Māh-chīchām, Qarā-gūz, Āq, (My Moon, My Moon sister, Black-eyed, Fair). "Heart-holding" (Dil-dār) sounds like a home-name of affection. It is the Ma`āsir-ī-raḥīmī which gives Sālḥa as the name of Bābur's wife, Pasha's third daughter. Its author may be wrong, writing so late as he did (1025 AH.-1616 AD.), or may have been unaware that Sālḥa was (if she were) known as Dil-dār. It would not war against seeming facts to take Pasha's third daughter to be Bābur's wife Dil-dār, and Dil-dār's daughter Gul-chihra to be Salīma's mother. Gul-chihra was born in about 1516 AD., married to Tūkhta-būghā in 1530 AD., widowed in cir. 1533 AD., might have remarried with Nūru'd-dīn Chaqānīānī (Sayyid Amīr), and in 945 AH. might have borne him Salīma; she was married in 1547 AD. (954 AH.) to `Abbās Sulṯān Aūzbeg.[2748] Two matters, neither having much weight, make against taking Dil-dār to be a Mīrān-shāhī; the first being that the anonymous annotator who added to the archetype of Kehr's Codex what is entered in Appendix L.—On Māhīm's adoption of Hind-āl, styles her Dil-dār Āghācha; he, however, may have known no more than others knew of her descent; the second, that Māhīm forcibly took Dil-dār's child Hind-āl to rear; she was the older wife and the mother of the heir, but could she have taken the upper hand over a Mīrān-shāhī? A circumstance complicating the question of Salīma's maternal descent is, that historians searching the Bābur-nāma or its Persian translation the Wāqi`āt-i-bāburī for information about the three daughters of Maḥmūd Mīrān-shāhī and Pasha Bahārlū Turkmān, would find an incomplete record, one in which the husbands of the first and second daughters are mentioned and nothing is said about the third who was Bābur's wife and the grandmother of Salīma. Bābur himself appears to have left the record as it is, meaning to fill it in later; presumably he waited for the names of the elder two sisters to complete his details of the three. In the Ḥaidarabad Codex, which there is good ground for supposing a copy of his original manuscript, about three lines are left blank (f. 27) as if awaiting information; in most manuscripts, however, this indication of intention is destroyed by running the defective passage on to join the next sentence. Some chance remark of a less well-known writer, may clear up the obscurity and show that Sālḥa was Dil-dār.

Māhīm's case seems one having a different cause for silence about her parentage. When she was married in Herāt, shortly after the death of Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā, Bābur had neither wife nor child. What Abū'l-faẓl tells about her is vague; her father's name is not told; she is said to have belonged to a noble Khurāsān family, to have been related (nisbat-i-khwesh) to Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā and to have traced her descent to Shaikh Aḥmad of Jām. If her birth had been high, even though not royal, it is strange that it is not stated by Bābur when he records the birth of her son Humāyūn, incidentally by Gul-badan, or more precisely by Abū'l-faẓl. Her brothers belonged to Khost, and to judge from a considerable number of small records, seem to have been quiet, unwarlike Khwājas. Her marriage took place in a year of which a full record survives; it is one in the composed narrative, not in the diary. In the following year, this also being one included in the composed narrative, Bābur writes of his meeting with Ma`ṣūma Mīrān-shāhī in Herāt, of their mutual attraction, and of their marriage. If the marriage with Humāyūn's mother had been an equal alliance, it would agree with Bābur's custom to mention its occurrence, and to give particulars about Māhīm's descent.[2749]

i. Mr. William Erskine's estimate of Bābur.

"Z̤ahīru'd-dīn Muḥammad Bābur was undoubtedly one of the most illustrious men of his age, and one of the most eminent and accomplished princes that ever adorned an Asiatic throne. He is represented as having been above the middle size, of great vigour of body, fond of all field and warlike sports, an excellent swordsman, and a skilful archer. As a proof of his bodily strength, it is mentioned, that he used to leap from one pinnacle to another of the pinnacled ramparts used in the East, in his double-soled boots; and that he even frequently took a man under each arm and went leaping along the rampart from one of the pointed pinnacles to another. Having been early trained to the conduct of business, and tutored in the school of adversity, the powers of his mind received full development. He ascended the throne at the age of twelve, and before he had attained his twentieth year, had shared every variety of fortune; he had not only been the ruler of subject provinces but had been in thraldom to his own ambitious nobles, and obliged to conceal every sentiment of his heart; he had been alternately hailed and obeyed as a conqueror and deliverer by rich and extensive kingdoms, and forced to lurk in the deserts and mountains of Farghāna as a houseless wanderer. Down to the last dregs of life, we perceive in him strong feelings of affection for his early friends and early enjoyments. * * * He had been taught betimes, by the voice of events that cannot lie, that he was a man dependent on the kindness and fidelity of other men; and, in his dangers and escapes with his followers, had learned that he was only one of an association. * * * The native benevolence and gaiety of his disposition seems ever to overflow on all around him; * * * of his companions in arms he speaks with the frank gaiety of a soldier. * * * Ambitious he was and fond of conquest and glory in all its shapes; the enterprise in which he was for a season engaged, seems to have absorbed his whole soul, and all his faculties were exerted to bring it to a fortunate issue. His elastic mind was not broken by discomfiture, and few who have achieved such glorious conquests, have suffered more numerous or more decisive defeats. His personal courage was conspicuous during his whole life. Upon the whole, if we review with impartiality the history of Asia, we find few princes entitled to rank higher than Bābur in genius and accomplishments. * * * In activity of mind, in the gay equanimity and unbroken spirit with which he bore the extremes of good and bad fortune, in the possession of the manly and social virtues, in his love of letters and his success in the cultivation of them, we shall probably find no other Asiatic prince who can justly be placed beside him."

THE END.

APPENDICES.

A.—THE SITE AND DISAPPEARANCE OF OLD AKHSĪ.

Some modern writers, amongst whom are Dr. Schuyler, General Nalivkine and Mr. Pumpelly, have inferred from the Bābur-nāma account of Akhsī, (in its translations?) that the landslip through which Bābur's father died and the disappearance of old Akhsī were brought about by erosion. Seen by the light of modern information, this erosion theory does not seem to cover the whole ground and some other cause seems necessary in explanation of both events.

For convenience of reference, the Bābur-nāma passages required, are quoted here, with their translations.

Ḥai. MS. f. 4b. Saiḥūn daryā-sī qūrghānī astīdīn āqār. Qūrghānī baland jar austīdā wāqī' būlūb tūr. Khandaqī-nīng aūrunīgha `umīq jārlār dūr. `Umar Shaikh M. kīm mūnī pāy-takht qīldī, bīr īkī martaba tāshrāq-dīn yana jarlār sāldī.

Of this the translations are as follows:—

(a) Pers. trans. (I.O. 217, f. 3_b_): Daryā-i Saiḥūn az pāyhā qila`-i o mīrezad u qila`-i o bar jar balandī wāqi` shuda ba jāy khandaq jarhā-i `umīq uftāda. `U. Sh. M. kah ānrā pāy-takht sākhta, yak du martaba az bīrūn ham bāz jarhā andākht.

(b) Erskine (p. 5, translating from the Persian): 'The river Saiḥūn flows under the walls of the castle. The castle is situated on a high precipice, and the steep ravines around serve instead of a moat. When U. Sh. M. made it his capital he, in one or two instances, scarped the ravines outside the fort.'

(c) De Courteille (i, 8, translating from Ilminsky's imprint, p. 6): 'Le Seihoun coule au pied de la fortresse qui se dresse sur le sommet d'un ravin, dont les profondeurs lui tiennent lieu d'un fossé. `U. Sh. M. à l'époque où il en avait fait son capitale, avait augmenté à une ou deux réprises, les escarpements qui la ceignent naturellement.'

Concerning `Umar Shaikh's death, the words needed are (f. 6_b_);—

Maẕkūr būlūb aīdī kīm Akhsī qūrghānī buland jar austīdā wāqi` būlūb tūr. `Imāratlār jar yāqāsīdā aīrdī.... Mīrzā jardīn kabūtar u kabūtar-khāna bīla aūchūb shunqār būldī;—'It has been mentioned that the walled-town of Akhsī is situated above ravine(s). The royal dwellings are along a ravine. The Mīrzā, having flown with his pigeons and their house from the ravine, became a falcon (i.e. died).'

A few particulars about Akhsī will shew that, in the translations just quoted, certain small changes of wording are dictated by what, amongst other writers, Kostenko and von Schwarz have written about the oases of Turkistān.

The name Akhsī, as used by Ibn Haukal, Yāqūt and Bābur, describes an oasis township, i.e. a walled-town with its adjacent cultivated lands. In Yāqūt's time Akhsī had a second circumvallation, presumably less for defence than for the protection of crops against wild animals. The oasis was created by the Kāsān-water,[2750] upon the riverain loess of the right and higher bank of the Saiḥūn (Sīr), on level ground west of the junction of the Nārīn and the Qarā-daryā, west too of spurs from the northern hills which now abut upon the river. Yāqūt locates it in the 12th century, at one farsākh (circa 4 m.) north of the river.[2751] Depending as it did solely on the Kāsān-water, nothing dictated its location close to the Sīr, along which there is now, and there seems to have been in the 12th century, a strip of waste land. Bābur says of Akhsī what Kostenko says (i, 321) of modern Tāshkīnt, that it stood above ravines (jarlār). These were natural or artificial channels of the Kāsān-water.[2752]

To turn now to the translations;—Mr. Erskine imaged Akhsī as a castle, high on a precipice in process of erosion by the Sīr. But Bābur's word, qūrghān means the walled-town; his word for a castle is ark, citadel; and his jar, a cleft, is not rendered by 'precipice.' Again;—it is no more necessary to understand that the Sīr flowed close to the walls than it is to understand, when one says the Thames flows past below Richmond, that it washes the houses on the hill.

The key to the difficulties in the Turkī passage is provided by a special use of the word jar for not only natural ravines but artificial water-cuts for irrigation. This use of it makes clear that what `Umar Shaikh did at Akhsī was not to make escarpments but to cut new water-channels. Presumably he joined those 'further out' on the deltaic fan, on the east and west of the town, so as to secure a continuous defensive cleft round the town[2753] or it may be, in order to bring it more water.

Concerning the historic pigeon-house (f. 6_b_), it can be said safely that it did not fall into the Sīr; it fell from a jar, and in this part of its course, the river flows in a broad bed, with a low left bank. Moreover the Mīrzā's residence was in the walled-town (f. 110_b_) and there his son stayed 9 years after the accident. The slip did not affect the safety of the residence therefore; it may have been local to the birds' house. It will have been due to some ordinary circumstance since no cause for it is mentioned by Bābur, Ḥaidar or Abū'l-faẓl. If it had marked the crisis of the Sīr's approach, Akhsī could hardly have been described, 25 years later, as a strong fort.

Something is known of Akhsī, in the 10th, the 12th, the 15th and the 19th centuries, which testifies to sæcular decadence. Ibn Haukal and Yāqūt give the township an extent of 3 farsākh (12 miles), which may mean from one side to an opposite one. Yāqūt's description of it mentions four gates, each opening into well-watered lands extending a whole farsākh, in other words it had a ring of garden-suburb four miles wide.

Two meanings have been given to Bābur's words indicating the status of the oasis in the 15th century. They are, maḥallātī qūrghān-dīn bīr shar`ī yurāqrāq tūshūb tūr. They have been understood as saying that the suburbs were two miles from their urbs. This may be right but I hesitate to accept it without pointing out that the words may mean, 'Its suburbs extend two miles farther than the walled-town.' Whichever verbal reading is correct, reveals a decayed oasis.

In the 19th century, Nalivkine and Ujfalvy describe the place then bearing the name Akhsī, as a small village, a mere winter-station, at some distance from the river's bank, that bank then protected from denudation by a sand-bank.

Three distinctly-marked stages of decadence in the oasis township are thus indicated by Yāqūt, Bābur and the two modern travellers.

It is necessary to say something further about the position of the suburbs in the 15th century. Bābur quotes as especially suitable to Akhsī, the proverbial questions, 'Where is the village?'[2754] (qy. Akhsī-kīnt.) 'Where are the trees?' and these might be asked by some-one in the suburbs unable to see Akhsī or vice versâ. But granting that there were no suburbs within two miles of the town, why had the whole inner circle, two miles of Yāqūt's four, gone out of cultivation? Erosion would have affected only land between the river and the town.

Again;—if the Sīr only were working in the 15th century to destroy a town standing on the Kāsān-water, how is it that this stream does not yet reach the Sīr?

Various ingatherings of information create the impression that failure of Kāsān-water has been the dominant factor in the loss of the Akhsī township. Such failure might be due to the general desiccation of Central Asia and also to increase of cultivation in the Kāsān-valley itself. There may have been erosion, and social and military change may have had its part, but for the loss of the oasis lands and for, as a sequel, the decay of the town, desiccation seems a sufficient cause.

The Kāsān-water still supports an oasis on its riverain slope, the large Aūzbeg town of Tūpa-qūrghān (Town-of-the-hill), from the modern castle of which a superb view is had up the Kāsān-valley, now thickly studded with villages.[2755]

B.—THE BIRDS, QĪL QŪYIRŪGH AND BĀGHRĪ QARĀ.

Describing a small bird (qūsh-qīna), abundant in the Qarshī district (f. 49_b_), Bābur names it the qīl-qūyirūgh, horse-tail, and says it resembles the bāghrī qarā.

Later on he writes (f. 280) that the bāghrī qarā of India is smaller and more slender than 'those' i.e. of Transoxiana (f. 49_b_, n. 1), the blackness of its breast less deep, and its cry less piercing.

We have had difficulty in identifying the birds but at length conclude that the bāghrī qarā of Transoxiana is Pterocles arenarius, Pallas's black-bellied sand-grouse and that the Indian one is a smaller sand-grouse, perhaps a Syrrhaptes. As the qīl qūyirūgh resembles the other two, it may be a yet smaller Syrrhaptes.

Muḥ. Ṣāliḥ, writing of sport Shaibāq Khān had in Qarshī (Shaibānī-nāma, Vambéry, p. 192) mentions the 'Little bird (murghak) of Qarshī,' as on all sides making lament. The Sang-lākh[2756] gives its Persian name as khar-pala, ass-hair, says it flies in large flocks and resembles the bāghrī qarā. Of the latter he writes as abundant in the open country and as making noise (bāghīr).

The Sang-lākh (f. 119) gives the earliest and most informing account we have found of the bāghrī qarā. Its says the bird is larger than a pigeon, marked with various colours, yellow especially, black-breasted and a dweller in the stony and waterless desert. These details are followed by a quotation from `Alī-sher Nawā'ī, in which he likens his own heart to that of the bird of the desert, presumably referring to the gloom of the bird's plumage. Three synonyms are then given; Ar. qiṯā, one due to its cry (Meninsky); Pers. sang-shikan, stone-eating, (Steingass, sang-khwāra, stone-eating); and Turkī bāghīr-tīlāq which refers, I think, to its cry.

Morier (Ḥājī Bābā) in his Second journey through Persia (Lond. 1818, p. 181), mentions that a bird he calls the black-breasted partridge, (i.e. Francolinus vulgaris) is known in Turkish as bokara kara and in Persian as siyāh-sīna, both names, (he says), meaning black-breast; that it has a horse-shoe of black feathers round the forepart of the trunk, more strongly marked in the female than in the male; that they fly in flocks of which he saw immense numbers near Tabrīz (p. 283), have a soft note, inhabit the plains, and, once settled, do not run. Cock and hen alike have a small spur,—a characteristic, it may be said, identifying rather with Francolinus vulgaris than with Pterocles arenarius. Against this identification, however, is Mr. Blandford's statement that siyāh-sīna (Morier's bokara kara) is Pterocles arenarius (Report of the Persian Boundary Commission, ii, 271).

In Afghānistān and Bikanir, the sand-grouse is called tūtūrak and boora kurra (Jerdon, ii, 498). Scully explains baghītāq as Pterocles arenarius.

Perhaps I may mention something making me doubt whether it is correct to translate bāghrī qarā by black-liver and gorge-noir or other names in which the same meaning is expressed. To translate thus, is to understand a Turkī noun and adjective in Persian construction, and to make exception to the rule, amply exemplified in lists of birds, that Turkī names of birds are commonly in Turkī construction, e.g. qarā bāsh (black-head), āq-bāsh (white-head), sārīgh-sūndūk (yellow-headed wagtail). Bāghīr may refer to the cry of the bird. We learn from Mr. Ogilvie Grant that the Mongol name for the sand-grouse njūpterjūn, is derived from its cry in flight, truck, truck, and its Arabic name qiṯā is said by Meninsky to be derived from its cry kaetha, kaetha. Though the dissimilarity of the two cries is against taking the njūpterjūn and the qiṯā to be of one class of sand-grouse, the significance of the derivation of the names remains, and shows that there are examples in support of thinking that when a sand-grouse is known as bāghrī qarā, it may be so known because of its cry (bāghir).

The word qarā finds suggestive interpretation in a B. N. phrase (f. 72_b_) Taṃbal-nīng qarā-sī, Taṃbal's blackness, i.e. the dark mass of his moving men, seen at a distance. It is used also for an indefinite number, e.g. 'family, servants, retainers, followers, qarā,' and I think it may imply a massed flock.

Bābur's words (f. 280) bāghrī-nīng qarā-sī ham kam dūr, [its belly (lit. liver) also is less black], do not necessarily contradict the view that the word bāghrī in the bird's name means crying. The root bāgh has many and pliable derivatives; I suspect both Bābur (here) and Muḥ. Ṣāliḥ (l. c.) of ringing changes on words.

We are indebted for kind reply to our questions to Mr. Douglas Carruthers, Mr. Ogilvie Grant and to our friend, Mr. R. S. Whiteway.

C.—ON THE GOSHA-GĪR.

I am indebted to my husband's examination of two Persian MSS. on archery for an explanation of the word gosha-gīr, in its technical sense in archery. The works consulted are the Cyclopædia of Archery (Kulliyatu'r-rāmī I. O. 2771) and the Archer's Guide (Hidāyatu'r-rāmī I. O. 2768).

It should be premised that in archery, the word gosha describes, in the arrow, the notch by which it grips and can be carried on the string, and, in the bow, both the tip (horn) and the notch near the tip in which the string catches. It is explained by Vullers as cornu et crena arcûs cui immititur nervus.

Two passages in the Cyclopædia of Archery (f. 9 and f. 36_b_) shew gosha as the bow-tip. One says that to bend the bow, two men must grasp the two gosha; the other reports a tradition that the Archangel Gabriel brought a bow having its two gosha (tips) made of ruby. The same book directs that the gosha be made of seasoned ivory, the Archer's Guide prescribing seasoned mulberry wood.

The C. of A. (f. 125_b_) says that a bowman should never be without two things, his arrows and his gosha-gīr. The gosha-gīr may be called an item of the repairing kit; it is an implement (f. 53) for making good a warped bow-tip and for holding the string into a displaced notch. It is known also as the chaprās, brooch or buckle, and the kardāng; and is said to bear these names because it fastens in the string. Its shape is that of the upper part of the Ar. letter jīm, two converging lines of which the lower curves slightly outward. It serves to make good a warped bow, without the use of fire and it should be kept upon the bow-tip till this has reverted to its original state. Until the warp has been straightened by the gosha-gīr, the bow must be kept from the action of fire because it, (composite of sinew and glutinous substance,) is of the nature of wax.

The same implement can be used to straighten the middle of the bow, the kamān khāna. It is then called kar-dāng. It can be used there on condition that there are not two daur (curves) in the bow. If there are two the bow cannot be repaired without fire. The halāl daur is said to be characteristic of the Turkish bow. There are three daur. I am indebted to Mr. Inigo Simon for the suggestions that daur in this connection means warp and that the three twists (daur) may be those of one horn (gosha), of the whole bow warped in one curve, and of the two horns warped in opposite directions.

Of repair to the kamān-khāna it is said further that if no kardāng be available, its work can be done by means of a stick and string, and if the damage be slight only, the bow and the string can be tightly tied together till the bow comes straight. 'And the cure is with God!'

Both manuscripts named contain much technical information. Some parts of this are included in my husband's article, Oriental Crossbows (A. Q. R. 1911, p. 1). Sir Ralph Payne-Gallwey's interesting book on the Cross-bow allows insight into the fine handicraft of Turkish bow-making.

D.—ON THE RESCUE PASSAGE.

I have omitted from my translation an account of Bābur's rescue from expected death, although it is with the Ḥaidarābād Codex, because closer acquaintance with its details has led both my husband and myself to judge it spurious. We had welcomed it because, being with the true Bābur-nāma text, it accredited the same account found in the Kehr-Ilminsky text, and also because, however inefficiently, it did something towards filling the gap found elsewhere within 908 AH.

It is in the Ḥaidarābād MS. (f. 118_b_), in Kehr's MS. (p. 385), in Ilminsky's imprint (p. 144), in Les Mémoires de Bābour (i, 255) and with the St. P. University Codex, which is a copy of Kehr's.

On the other hand, it is not with the Elphinstone Codex (f. 89_b_); that it was not with the archetype of that codex the scribe's note shews (f. 90); it is with neither of the Wāqi`āt-i-bāburī (Pers. translations) nor with Leyden and Erskine's Memoirs (p. 122).[2757]

Before giving our grounds for rejecting what has been offered to fill the gap of 908 AH. a few words must be said about the lacuna itself. Nothing indicates that Bābur left it and, since both in the Elphinstone Codex and its archetype, the sentence preceding it lacks the terminal verb, it seems due merely to loss of pages. That the loss, if any, was of early date is clear,—the Elph. MS. itself being copied not later than 1567 AD. (JRAS. 1907, p. 137).

Two known circumstances, both of earlier date than that of the Elphinstone Codex, might have led to the loss,—the first is the storm which in 935 AH. scattered Bābur's papers (f. 376_b_), the second, the vicissitudes to which Humāyūn's library was exposed in his exile.[2758] Of the two the first seems the more probable cause.

The rupture of a story at a point so critical as that of Bābur's danger in Karnān would tempt to its completion; so too would wish to make good the composed part of the Bābur-nāma. Humāyūn annotated the archetype of the Elphinstone Codex a good deal but he cannot have written the Rescue passage if only because he was in a position to avoid some of its inaccuracies.

CONTEXT AND TRANSLATION OF THE RESCUE PASSAGE.

To facilitate reference, I quote the last words preceding the gap purported to be filled by the Rescue passage, from several texts;—

(a) Elphinstone MS. f. 89_b_,—Qūptūm. Bāgh gosha-sī-gha bārdīm. Aūzūm bīla andesha qīldīm. Dīdīm kīm kīshī agar yūz u agar mīng yāshāsā, ākhir hech....

(b) The Ḥai. MS. (f. 118_b_) varies from the Elphinstone by omitting the word hech and adding aūlmāk kīrāk, he must die.

(c) Pāyanda-ḥasan's Wāqi`āt-i-bāburī (I. O. 215, f. 96_b_),—Barkhwāstam u dar gosha-i bāgh raftam. Ba khūd andesha karda, guftam kah agar kase ṣad sāl yā hazār sāl `umr dāshta bāshad, ākhir hech ast. (It will be seen that this text has the hech of the Elph. MS.)

(d) `Abdu'r-raḥīm's Wāqi`āt-i-bāburī (I. O. 217, f. 79),—Barkhwāstam u ba gosha-i-bāgh raftam. Ba khūd andeshīdam u guftam kah agar kase ṣad sāl u agar hazār sāl `umr bayābad ākhir....

(e) Muḥ. Shīrāzī's lith. ed. (p. 75) finishes the sentence with ākhir khūd bāyad murd, at last one must die,—varying as it frequently does, from both of the Wāqi`āt.

(f) Kehr's MS. (p. 383-454), Ilminsky, p. 144,—Qūpūb bāghnīng bīr būrjī-ghā bārīb, khāṯirīm-ghā kīltūrdīm kīm agar adam yūz yīl u agar mīng yīl tīrīk būlsā, ākhir aūlmāk dīn aūzkā chāra yūq tūr. (I rose. Having gone to a tower of the garden, I brought it to my mind that if a person be alive 100 years or a thousand years, at last he has no help other than to die.)

The Rescue passage is introduced by a Persian couplet, identified by my husband as from Niẕāmī's Khusrau u Shīrīn, which is as follows;—

If you stay a hundred years, and if one year, Forth you must go from this heart-delighting palace.

I steadied myself for death (qarār bīrdīm). In that garden a stream came flowing;[2759] I made ablution; I recited the prayer of two inclinations (ra`kat); having raised my head for silent prayer, I was making earnest petition when my eyes closed in sleep.[2760] I am seeing[2761] that Khwāja Yaq`ūb, the son of Khwāja Yaḥyā and grandson of His Highness Khwāja `Ubaidu'l-lāh, came facing me, mounted on a piebald horse, with a large company of piebald horsemen (sic).[2762] He said: 'Lay sorrow aside! Khwāja Aḥrār (i.e. `Ubaidu'l-lāh) has sent me to you; he said, "We, having asked help for him (i.e. Bābur), will seat him on the royal throne;[2763] wherever difficulty befalls him, let him look towards us (lit. bring us to sight) and call us to mind; there will we be present." Now, in this hour, victory and success are on your side; lift up your head! awake!'

At that time I awoke happy, when Yūsuf and those with him[2764] were giving one another advice. 'We will make a pretext to deceive; to seize and bind[2765] is necessary.' Hearing these words, I said, 'Your words are of this sort, but I will see which of you will come to my presence to take me.' I was saying this when outside the garden wall[2766] came the noise of approaching horsemen. Yūsuf darogha said, 'If we had taken you to Taṃbal our affairs would have gone forward. Now he has sent again many persons to seize you.' He was certain that this noise might be the footfall of the horses of those sent by Taṃbal. On hearing those words anxiety grew upon me; what to do I did not know. At this time those horsemen, not happening to find the garden gate, broke down the wall where it was old (and) came in. I saw (kūrsām, lit. might see) that Qutluq Muḥ. Barlās and Bābā-i Pargharī, my life-devoted servants, having arrived [with], it may be, ten, fifteen, twenty persons, were approaching. Having flung themselves from their horses,[2767] bent the knee from afar and showed respect, they fell at my feet. In that state (ḥal) such ecstasy (ḥāl) came over me that you might say (goyā) God gave me life from a new source (bāsh). I said, 'Seize and bind that Yūsuf darogha and these here (tūrghān) hireling mannikins.' These same mannikins had taken to flight. They (i.e. the rescuers), having taken them, one by one, here and there, brought them bound. I said, 'Where do you come from? How did you get news?' Qutluq Muḥ. Barlās said: 'When, having fled from Akhsī, we were separated from you in the flight, we went to Andijān when the Khāns also came to Andijān. I saw a vision that Khwāja `Ubaidu'l-lāh said, "Bābur pādshāh[2768] is in a village called Karnān; go and bring him, since the royal seat (masnad) has become his possession (ta`alluq)." I having seen this vision and become happy, represented (the matter) to the Elder Khān (and) the Younger Khān. I said to the Khāns, "I have five or six younger brothers (and) sons; do you add a few soldiers. I will go through the Karnān side and bring news." The Khāns said, "It occurs to our minds also that (he) may have gone that same road (?)." They appointed ten persons; they said, "Having gone in that direction (sārī) and made very sure, bring news. Would to God you might get true news!" We were saying this when Bābā-i Parghārī said, "I too will go and seek." He also having agreed with two young men, (his) younger brothers, we rode out. It is three days to-day that we are on the road. Thank God! we have found you.' They said (dīdīlār, for dīb). They spoke (aītīlār), 'Make a move! Ride off! Take these bound ones with you! To stay here is not well; Taṃbal has had news of your coming here; go, in whatever way, and join yourself to the Khāns!' At that time we having ridden out, moved towards Andijān. It was two days that we had eaten no food; the evening prayer had come when we found a sheep, went on, dismounted, killed, and roasted. Of that same roast we ate as much as a feast. After that we rode on, hurried forward, made a five days' journey in a day and two nights, came and entered Andijān. I saluted my uncle the Elder Khān (and) my uncle the Younger Khān, and made recital of past days. With the Khāns I spent four months. My servants, who had gone looking in every place, gathered themselves together; there were more than 300 persons. It came to my mind (kīm), 'How long must I wander, a vagabond (sar-gardān),[2769] in this Farghāna country? I will make search (ṯalab) on every side (dīb).' Having said, I rode out in the month of Muḥarram to seek Khurāsān, and I went out from the country of Farghāna.[2770]

REASONS AGAINST THE REJECTION OF THE RESCUE PASSAGE.

Two circumstances have weight against rejecting the passage, its presence with the Ḥaidarābād Codex and its acceptance by Dr. Ilminsky and M. de Courteille.

That it is with the Codex is a matter needing consideration and this the more that it is the only extra matter there found. Not being with the Persian translations, it cannot be of early date. It seems likely to owe its place of honour to distinguished authorship and may well be one of the four portions (juzwe) mentioned by Jahāngīr in the Tuzūk-i-jahāngīrī,[2771] as added by himself to his ancestor's book. If so, it may be mentioned, it will have been with Bābur's autograph MS. [now not to be found], from which the Ḥaidarābād Codex shews signs of being a direct copy.[2772]

[The incongruity of the Rescue passage with the true text has been indicated by foot-notes to the translation of it already given. What condemns it on historic and other grounds will follow.]

On linguistic grounds it is a strong argument in its favour that Dr. Ilminsky and M. de Courteille should have accepted it but the argument loses weight when some of the circumstances of their work are taken into account.

In the first place, it is not strictly accurate to regard Dr. Ilminsky as accepting it unquestioned, because it is covered by his depreciatory remarks, made in his preface, on Kehr's text. He, like M. de Courteille, worked with a single Turkī MS. and neither of the two ever saw a complete true text. When their source (the Kehr-Ilminsky) was able to be collated with the Elph. and Ḥai. MSS. much and singular divergence was discovered.

I venture to suggest what appears to me to explain M. de Courteille's acceptance of the Rescue passage. Down to its insertion, the Kehr-Ilminsky text is so continuously and so curiously corrupt that it seems necessary to regard it as being a re-translation into Turkī from one of the Persian translations of the Bābur-nāma. There being these textual defects in it, it would create on the mind of a reader initiated through it, only, in the book, an incorrect impression of Bābur's style and vocabulary, and such a reader would feel no transition when passing on from it to the Rescue passage.

In opposition to this explanation, it might be said that a wrong standard set up by the corrupt text, would or could be changed by the excellence of later parts of the Kehr-Ilminsky one. In words, this is sound, no doubt, and such reflex criticism is now easy, but more than the one defective MS. was wanted even to suggest the need of such reflex criticism. The Bābur-nāma is lengthy, ponderous to poise and grasp, and work on it is still tentative, even with the literary gains since the Seventies.

Few of the grounds which weigh with us for the rejection of the Rescue passage were known to Dr. Ilminsky or M. de Courteille;—the two good Codices bring each its own and varied help; Teufel's critique on the 'Fragments,' though made without acquaintance with those adjuncts as they stand in Kehr's own volume, is of much collateral value; several useful oriental histories seem not to have been available for M. de Courteille's use. I may add, for my own part, that I have the great advantage of my husband's companionship and the guidance of his wide acquaintance with related oriental books. In truth, looking at the drawbacks now removed, an earlier acceptance of the passage appears as natural as does today's rejection.

GROUNDS FOR REJECTING THE RESCUE PASSAGE.

The grounds for rejecting the passage need here little more than recapitulation from my husband's article in the JASB. 1910, p. 221, and are as follows;—

i. The passage is in neither of the Wāqi`āt-i-bāburī.

ii. The dreams detailed are too à propos and marvellous for credence.

iii. Khwāja Yaḥyā is not known to have had a son, named Ya`qūb.

iv. The Bābur-nāma does not contain the names assigned to the rescuers.

v. The Khāns were not in Andijān and Bābur did not go there.

vi. He did not set out for Khurāsān after spending 4 months with The Khāns but after Aḥmad's death (end of 909 AH.), while Maḥmud was still in Eastern Turkistān and after about a year's stay in Sūkh.

vii. The followers who gathered to him were not 'more than 300' but between 2 and 300.

viii. The '3 days,' and the 'day and two nights,' and the '5 days' journey was one of some 70 miles, and one recorded as made in far less time.

ix. The passage is singularly inadequate to fill a gap of 14 to 16 months, during which events of the first importance occurred to Bābur and to the Chaghatāī dynasty.

x. Khwāja Aḥrārī's promises did nothing to fulfil Bābur's wishes for 908 AH. while those of Ya`qūb for immediate victory were closely followed by defeat and exile. Bābur knew the facts; the passage cannot be his. It looks as though the writer saw Bābur in Karnān across Tīmūrid success in Hindūstān.

xi. The style and wording of the passage are not in harmony with those of the true text.

Other reasons for rejection are marked change in choice of the details chosen for commemoration, e.g. when Bābur mentions prayer, he does so simply; when he tells a dream, it seems a real one. The passage leaves the impression that the writer did not think in Turkī, composed in it with difficulty, and looked at life from another view-point than Bābur's.

On these various grounds, we have come to the conclusion that it is no part of the Bābur-nāma.

[APPENDICES TO THE KĀBUL SECTION.]

E.—NAGARAHĀR, AND NĪNG-NAHĀR

Those who consult books and maps about the riverain tract between the Safed-koh (Spīn-ghur) and (Anglicé) the Kābul-river find its name in several forms, the most common being Nangrahār and Nangnahār (with variant vowels). It would be useful to establish a European book-name for the district. As European opinion differs about the origin and meaning of the names now in use, and as a good deal of interesting circumstance gathers round the small problem of a correct form (there may be two), I offer about the matter what has come into the restricted field of my own work, premising that I do this merely as one who drops a casual pebble on the cairn of observation already long rising for scholarly examination.

a. The origin and meaning of the names.

I have met with three opinions about the origin and meaning of the names found now and earlier. To each one of them obvious objection can be made. They are:—

1. That all forms now in use are corruptions of the Sanscrit word Nagarahāra, the name of the Town-of-towns which in the dū-āb of the Bārān-sū and Sūrkh-rūd left the ruins Masson describes in Wilson's Ariana Antigua. But if this is so, why is the Town-of-towns multiplied into the nine of Na-nagrahār (Nangrahār)?[2773]

2. That the names found represent Sanscrit nawā vihāra, nine monasteries, an opinion the Gazetteer of India of 1907 has adopted from Bellew. But why precisely nine monasteries? Nine appears an understatement.

3. That Nang (Ning or Nung) -nahār verbally means nine streams, (Bābur's Tūqūz-rūd,) an interpretation of long standing (Section b infra). But whence nang, ning, nung, for nine? Such forms are not in Persian, Turkī or Pushtu dictionaries, and, as Sir G. A. Grierson assures me, do not come into the Linguistic Survey.

b. On nang, ning, nung for nine.

Spite of their absence from the natural homes of words, however, the above sounds have been heard and recorded as symbols of the number nine by careful men through a long space of time.

The following instances of the use of "Nangnahār" show this, and also show that behind the variant forms there may be not a single word but two of distinct origin and sense.

1. In Chinese annals two names appear as those of the district and town (I am not able to allocate their application with certainty). The first is Na-kie-lo-ho-lo, the second Nang-g-lo-ho-lo and these, I understand to represent Nagara-hāra and Nang-nahār, due allowance being made for Chinese idiosyncrasy.[2774]

2. Some 900 years later (1527-30 AD.) Bābur also gives two names, Nagarahār (as the book-name of his tūmān) and Nīng-nahār.[2775] He says the first is found in several histories (B.N. f. 131_b_); the second will have been what he heard and also presumably what appeared in revenue accounts; of it he says, "it is nine torrents" (tūqūz-rūd).

3. Some 300 years after Bābur, Elphinstone gives two names for the district, neither of them being Bābur's book-name, "Nangrahaur[2776] or Nungnahaur, from the nine streams which issue from the Safed-koh, nung in Pushtoo signifying nine, and nahaura, a stream" (Caubul, i, 160).

4. In 1881 Colonel H. S. Tanner had heard, in Nūr-valley on the north side of the Kābul-water, that the name of the opposite district was Nīng-nahār and its meaning Nine-streams. He did not get a list of the nine and all he heard named do not flow from Safed-koh.

5. In 1884 Colonel H. G. McGregor gives two names with their explanation, "Ningrahar and Nungnihar; the former is a corruption of the latter word[2777] which in the Afghān language signifies nine rivers or rivulets." He names nine, but of them six only issue from Safed-koh.

6. I have come across the following instances in which the number nine is represented by other words than na (ni or nu); viz. the nenhan of the Chitrālī Kāfir and the noun of the Panjābi, recorded by Leech,—the nyon of the Khowārī and the huncha of the Boorishki, recorded by Colonel Biddulph.

The above instances allow opinion that in the region concerned and through a long period of time, nine has been expressed by nang (ning or nung) and other nasal or high palatal sounds, side by side with na (ni or nu). The whole matter may be one of nasal utterance,[2778] but since a large number of tribesmen express nine by a word containing a nasal sound, should that word not find place in lists of recognized symbols of sounds?

c. Are there two names of distinct origin?

1. Certainly it makes a well-connected story of decay in the Sanscrit word Nagarahāra to suppose that tribesmen, prone by their organism to nasal utterance, pronounced that word Nangrahār, and by force of their numbers made this corruption current,—that this was recognized as the name of the town while the Town-of-towns was great or in men's memory, and that when through the decay of the town its name became a meaningless husk, the wrong meaning of the Nine-streams should enter into possession.

But as another and better one can be put together, this fair-seeming story may be baseless. Its substitute has the advantage of explaining the double sequence of names shown in Section b.

The second story makes all the variant names represent one or other of two distinct originals. It leaves Nagrahār to represent Nagarahāra, the dead town; it makes the nine torrents of Safed-koh the primeval sponsors of Nīng-nahār, the name of the riverain tract. Both names, it makes contemporary in the relatively brief interlude of the life of the town. For the fertilizing streams will have been the dominant factors of settlement and of revenue from the earliest times of population and government. They arrest the eye where they and their ribbons of cultivation space the riverain waste; they are obvious units for grouping into a sub-government. Their name has a counterpart in adjacent Panj-āb; the two may have been given by one dominant power, how long ago, in what tongue matters not. The riverain tract, by virtue of its place on a highway of transit, must have been inhabited long before the town Nagarahāra was built, and must have been known by a name. What better one than Nine-streams can be thought of?

2. Bellew is quoted by the Gazetteer of India (ed. 1907) as saying, in his argument in favour of nawā vihāra, that no nine streams are found to stand sponsor, but modern maps shew nine outflows from Safed-koh to the Kābul-river between the Sūrkh-rūd and Daka, while if affluents to the former stream be reckoned, more than nine issue from the range.[2779]

Against Bellew's view that there are not nine streams, is the long persistence of the number nine in the popular name (Sect. b).

It is also against his view that he supposes there were nine monasteries, because each of the nine must have had its fertilizing water.

Bābur says there were nine; there must have been nine of significance; he knew his tūmān not only by frequent transit but by his revenue accounts. A supporting point in those accounts is likely to have been that the individual names of the villages on the nine streams would appear, with each its payment of revenue.

3. In this also is some weight of circumstance against taking Nagarahāra to be the parent of Nīng-nahār:—An earlier name of the town is said to be Udyānapūra, Garden town.[2780] Of this Bābur's Adīnapūr is held to be a corruption; the same meaning of garden has survived on approximately the same ground in Bālā-bāgh and Roẓābād.

Nagarahāra is seen, therefore, to be a parenthetical name between others which are all derived from gardens. It may shew the promotion of a "Garden-town" to a "Chief-town". If it did this, there was relapse of name when the Chief-town lost status. Was it ever applied beyond the delta? If it were, would it, when dead in the delta, persist along the riverain tract? If it were not, cadit quæstio; the suggestion of two names distinct in origin, is upheld.

Certainly the riverain tract would fall naturally under the government of any town flourishing in the delta, the richest and most populous part of the region. But for this very reason it must have had a name older than parenthetical Nagarahāra. That inevitable name would be appropriately Nīng-nahār (or Na-nahār) Nine-streams; and for a period Nagarahāra would be the Chief-town of the district of Na-nahār (Nine-streams).[2781]

d. Bābur's statements about the name.

What the cautious Bābur says of his tūmān of Nīng-nahār has weight:—

1. That some histories write it Nagarahār (Ḥaidarābād Codex, f. 131_b_);

2. That Nīng-nahār is nine torrents, i.e. mountain streams, tūquz-rud;

3. That (the) nine torrents issue from Safed-koh (f. 132_b_).

Of his first statement can be said, that he will have seen the book-name in histories he read, but will have heard Nīng-nahār, probably also have seen it in current letters and accounts.

Of his second,—that it bears and may be meant to bear two senses, (a) that the tūmān consisted of nine torrents,—their lands implied; just as he says "Asfara is four būlūks" (sub-divisions f. 3_b_)—(b) that tūqūz rūd translates nīng-nahār.

Of his third,—that in English its sense varies as it is read with or without the definite article Turkī rarely writes, but that either sense helps out his first and second, to mean that verbally and by its constituent units Nīng-nahār is nine-torrents; as verbally and by its constituents Panj-āb is five-waters.

e. Last words.

Detailed work on the Kābul section of the Bābur-nāma has stamped two impressions so deeply on me, that they claim mention, not as novel or as special to myself, but as set by the work.

The first is of extreme risk in swift decision on any problem of words arising in North Afghānistān, because of its local concourse of tongues, the varied utterance of its unlettered tribes resident or nomad, and the frequent translation of proper names in obedience to their verbal meanings. Names lie there too in strata, relics of successive occupation—Greek, Turkī, Hindī, Pushtū and tribes galore.

The second is that the region is an exceptionally fruitful field for first-hand observation of speech, the movent ocean of the uttered word, free of the desiccated symbolism of alphabets and books.

The following books, amongst others, have prompted the above note:—

Ghoswāra Inscription, Kittoe, JASB., 1848, and Kielhorn, Indian Antiquary, 1888, p. 311.

H. Sastrī's Rāmacārita, Introduction, p. 7 (ASB. Memoirs).

Cunningham's Ancient India, vol. i.

Beal's Buddhist Records, i, xxxiv, and cii, 91.

Leech's Vocabularies, JASB., 1838.

The writings of Masson (Travels and Ariana Antiqua), Wood, Vigne, etc.

Raverty's T̤abaqāt-i-nāsirī.

Jarrett's Āyīn-i-akbarī.

P.R.G.S. for maps, 1879; Macnair on the Kafirs, 1884; Tanner's On the Chugānī and neighbouring tribes of Kāfiristān, 1881.

Simpson's Nagarahāra, JASB., xiii.

Biddulph's Dialects of the Hindū-kush, JRAS.

Gazette of India, 1907, art. Jalalābād.

Bellew's Races of Afghānistān.

F.—ON THE NAME DARA-I-NŪR

Some European writers have understood the name Dara-i-nūr to mean Valley of Light, but natural features and also the artificial one mentioned by Colonel H. G. Tanner (infra), make it better to read the component nūr, not as Persian nūr, light, but as Pushtū nūr, rock. Hence it translates as Valley of Rocks, or Rock-valley. The region in which the valley lies is rocky and boulder-strewn; its own waters flow to the Kābul-river east of the water of Chitrāl. It shews other names composed with nūr, in which nūr suits if it means rock, but is inexplicable if it means light, e.g. Nūr-lām (Nūr-fort), the master-fort in the mouth of Nūr-valley, standing high on a rock between two streams, as Bābur and Tanner have both described it from eye-witness,—Nūr-gal (village), a little to the north-west of the valley,—Aūlūgh-nūr (great rock), at a crossing mentioned by Bābur, higher up the Bārān-water,—and Koh-i-nūr (Rocky-mountains), which there is ground for taking as the correct form of the familiar "Kunar" of some European writers (Raverty's Notes, p. 106). The dominant feature in these places dictates reading nūr as rock; so too the work done in Nūr-valley with boulders, of which Colonel H. G. Tanner's interesting account is subjoined (P.R.G.S. 1881, p. 284).

"Some 10 miles from the source of the main stream of the Nur-valley the Dameneh stream enters, but the waters of the two never meet; they flow side by side about three-quarters of a mile apart for about 12 miles and empty themselves into the Kunar river by different mouths, each torrent hugging closely the foot of the hills at its own side of the valley. Now, except in countries where terracing has been practised continuously for thousands of years, such unnatural topography as exists in the valley of Nur is next to impossible. The forces which were sufficient to scoop out the valley in the first instance, would have kept a water-way at the lowest part, into which would have poured the drainage of the surrounding mountains; but in the Nur-valley long-continued terracing has gradually raised the centre of the valley high above the edges. The population has increased to its maximum limit and every available inch of ground is required for cultivation; the people, by means of terrace-walls built of ponderous boulders in the bed of the original single stream, have little by little pushed the waters out of their true course, until they run, where now found, in deep rocky cuttings at the foot of the hills on either side" (p. 280).

"I should like to go on and say a good deal more about boulders; and while I am about it I may as well mention one that lies back from a hamlet in Shulut, which is so big that a house is built in a fault or crack running across its face. Another pebble lies athwart the village and covers the whole of the houses from that side."

G.—ON THE NAMES OF TWO DARA-I-NŪR WINES.

From the two names, Arat-tāshī and Sūhān (Suhār) -tāshī, which Bābur gives as those of two wines of the Dara-i-nūr, it can be inferred that he read nūr to mean rock. For if in them Turkī tāsh, rock, be replaced by Pushtū nūr, rock, two place-names emerge, Arat (-nūrī) and Sūhān (-nūrī), known in the Nūr-valley.

These may be villages where the wines were grown, but it would be quite exceptional for Bābur to say that wines are called from their villages, or indeed by any name. He says here not where they grow but what they are called.

I surmise that he is repeating a joke, perhaps his own, perhaps a standing local one, made on the quality of the wines. For whether with tāsh or with nūr (rock), the names can be translated as Rock-saw and Rock-file, and may refer to the rough and acid quality of the wines, rasping and setting the teeth on edge as does iron on stone.

The villages themselves may owe their names to a serrated edge or splintered pinnacle of weathered granite, in which local people, known as good craftsmen, have seen resemblance to tools of their trade.

H.—ON THE COUNTERMARK BIH BŪD ON COINS.

As coins of Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā Bāī-qarā and other rulers do actually bear the words Bih būd, Bābur's statement that the name of Bihbūd Beg was on the Mīrzā's coins acquires a numismatic interest which may make serviceable the following particulars concerning the passage and the beg.[2782]

a. The Turkī passage (Elph. MS. f. 135_b_; Ḥaidarābād Codex f. 173_b_; Ilminsky p. 217).

For ease of reference the Turkī, Persian and English version are subjoined:—

(1) Yana Bihbūd Beg aīdī. Būrūnlār chuhra-jīrga-sī-dā khidmat qīlūr aīdī. Mīrzā-nīng qāzāqlīqlārīdā khidmatī bāqīb Bihbūd Beg-kā bū `ināyatnī qīlīb aīdī kīm tamghā u sikka-dā ānīng ātī aīdī.

(2) The Persian translation of `Abdu'r-raḥīm (Muḥ. Shīrāzī's lith. ed. p. 110):—

Dīgar Bihbūd Beg būd. Auwalhā dar jīrga-i-chuhrahā khidmat mikard. Chūn dar qāzāqīhā Mīrzārā khidmat karda būd u ānrā mulāḥaẓa namūda, aīnrā `ināyat karda būd kah dar tamghānāt sikka[2783] nām-i-au būd.

(3) A literal English translation of the Turkī:—

Another was Bihbūd Beg. He served formerly in the chuhra-jīrga-sī (corps of braves). Looking to his service in the Mīrzā's guerilla-times, the favour had been done to Bihbūd Beg that his name was on the stamp and coin.[2784]

b. Of Bihbūd Beg.

We have found little so far to add to what Bābur tells of Bihbūd Beg and what he tells we have not found elsewhere. The likely sources of his information are Daulat Shāh and Khwānd-amīr who have written at length of Ḥusain Bāī-qarā. Considerable search in the books of both men has failed to discover mention of signal service or public honour connected with the beg. Bābur may have heard what he tells in Harāt in 912 AH. (1506 AD.) when he would see Ḥusain's coins presumably; but later opportunity to see them must have been frequent during his campaigns and visits north of Hindū-kush, notably in Balkh.

The sole mention we have found of Bihbūd Beg in the Ḥabību's-siyar is that he was one of Ḥusain's commanders at the battle of Chīkmān-sarāī which was fought with Sl. Maḥmūd Mīrzā Mīrānshāhī in Muḥarram 876 AH. (June-July 1471 AD.).[2785] His place in the list shews him to have had importance. "Amīr Niẕāmu'd-dīn `Alī-sher's brother Darwesh-i-`alī the librarian (q.v. Ḥai. Codex Index), and Amīr Bihbūd, and Muḥ. `Alī ātāka, and Bakhshīka and Shāh Walī Qīpchāq, and Dost-i-muḥammad chuhra, and Amīr Qul-i-`alī, and" (another).

The total of our information about the man is therefore:—

(1) That when Ḥusain[2786] from 861 to 873 AH. (1457 to 1469 AD.) was fighting his way up to the throne of Harāt, Bihbūd served him well in the corps of braves, (as many others will have done).

(2) That he was a beg and one of Ḥusain's commanders in 876 AH. (1471 AD.).

(3) That Bābur includes him amongst Ḥusain's begs and says of him what has been quoted, doing this circa 934 AH. (1528 AD.), some 56 years after Khwānd-amīr's mention of him s.a. 876 AH. (1471 AD.).

c. Of the term chuhra-jīrga-sī used by Bābur.

Of this term Bābur supplies an explicit explanation which I have not found in European writings. His own book amply exemplifies his explanation, as do also Khwānd-amīr's and Ḥaidar's.

He gives the explanation (f. 15_b_) when describing a retainer of his father's who afterwards became one of his own begs. It is as follows:—

"`Alī-darwesh of Khurāsān served in the Khurāsān chuhra-jīrga-sī, one of two special corps (khāṣa tābīn) of serviceable braves (yārār yīgītlār) formed by Sl. Abū-sa`īd Mīrzā when he first began to arrange the government of Khurāsān and Samarkand and, presumably, called by him the Khurāsān corps and the Samarkand corps."

This shews the circle to have consisted of fighting-men, such serviceable braves as are frequently mentioned by Bābur; and his words "yārār yīgīt" make it safe to say that if instead of using a Persian phrase, he had used a Turkī one, yīgīt, brave would have replaced chuhra, "young soldier" (Erskine). A considerable number of men on active service are styled chuhra, one at least is styled yīgīt, in the same way as others are styled beg.[2787]

Three military circles are mentioned in the Bābur-nāma, consisting respectively of braves, household begs (under Bābur's own command), and great begs. Some men are mentioned who never rose from the rank of brave (yīgīt), some who became household-begs, some who went through the three grades.

Of the corps of braves Bābur conveys the information that Abū-sa`īd founded it at a date which will have lain between 1451 and 1457 AD.; that `Umar Shaikh's man `Alī-darwesh belonged to it; and that Ḥusain's man Bihbūd did so also. Both men, `Ali-darwesh and Bihbūd, when in its circle, would appropriately be styled chuhra as men of the beg-circle were styled beg; the Dost-i-muḥammad chuhra who was a commander, (he will have had a brave's command,) at Chīkmān-sarāī (see list supra) will also have been of this circle. Instances of the use by Bābur of the name khaṣa-tābīn and its equivalent būītīkīnī are shewn on f. 209 and f. 210_b_. A considerable number of Bābur's fighting men, the braves he so frequently mentions as sent on service, are styled chuhra and inferentially belong to the same circle.[2788]

d. Of Bih būd on Ḥusain Bāī-qarā's coins.

So far it does not seem safe to accept Bābur's statement literally. He may tell a half-truth and obscure the rest by his brevity.

Nothing in the sources shows ground for signal and public honour to Bihbūd Beg, but a good deal would allow surmise that jesting allusion to his name might decide for Bih būd as a coin mark when choice had to be made of one, in the flush of success, in an assembly of the begs, and, amongst those begs, lovers of word-play and enigma.

The personal name is found written Bihbūd, as one word and with medial h; the mark is Bih būd with the terminal h in the Bih. There have been discussions moreover as to whether to read on the coins Bih būd, it was good, or Bih buvad, let it be, or become, good (valid for currency?).

The question presents itself; would the beg's name have appeared on the coins, if it had not coincided in form with a suitable coin-mark?

Against literal acceptance of Bābur's statement there is also doubt of a thing at once so ben trovato and so unsupported by evidence.

Another doubt arises from finding Bih būd on coins of other rulers, one of Iskandar Khan's being of a later date,[2789] others, of Tīmūr, Shāhrukh and Abū-sa`īd, with nothing to shew who counterstruck it on them.

On some of Ḥusain's coins the sentence Bih būd appears as part of the legend and not as a counterstrike. This is a good basis for finding a half-truth in Bābur's statement. It does not allow of a whole-truth in his statement because, as it is written, it is a coin-mark, not a name.

An interesting matter as bearing on Ḥusain's use of Bih būd is that in 865 AH. (1461 AD.) he had an incomparable horse named Bihbūd, one he gave in return for a falcon on making peace with Mustapha Khān.[2790]

e. Of Bābur's vassal-coinage.

The following historical details narrow the field of numismatic observation on coins believed struck by Bābur as a vassal of Ismā`īl Ṣafawī. They are offered because not readily accessible.

The length of Bābur's second term of rule in Transoxiana was not the three solar years of the B.M. Coin Catalogues but did not exceed eight months. He entered Samarkand in the middle of Rajab 917 AH. (c. Oct. 1st, 1511 AD.). He returned to it defeated and fled at once, after the battle of Kūl-i-malik which was fought in Ṣafar 918 AH. (mid-April to mid-May 1512 AD.). Previous to the entry he was in the field, without a fixed base; after his flight he was landless till at the end both of 920 AH. and of 1514 AD. he had returned to Kābul.

He would not find a full Treasury in Samarkand because the Aūzbegs evacuated the fort at their own time; eight months would not give him large tribute in kind. He failed in Transoxiana because he was the ally of a Shī`a; would coins bearing the Shī`a legend have passed current from a Samarkand mint? These various circumstances suggest that he could not have struck many coins of any kind in Samarkand.

The coins classed in the B.M. Catalogues as of Bābur's vassalage, offer a point of difficulty to readers of his own writings, inasmuch as neither the "Sulṯān Muḥammad" of No. 652 (gold), nor the "Sulṯān Bābur Bahādur" of the silver coins enables confident acceptance of them as names he himself would use.

I.—ON THE WEEPING-WILLOWS OF f. 190_b_.

The passage omitted from f. 190_b_, which seems to describe something decorative done with weeping willows, (bed-i-mawallah) has been difficult to all translators. This may be due to inaccurate pointing in Bābur's original MS. or may be what a traveller seeing other willows at another feast could explain.

The first Persian translation omits the passage (I.O. 215 f. 154_b_); the second varies from the Turkī, notably by changing sāch and sāj to shākh throughout (I.O. 217 f. 150_b_). The English and French translations differ much (Memoirs p. 206, Mémoires i, 414), the latter taking the mawallah to be mūla, a hut, against which much is clear in the various MSS.

Three Turkī sources[2791] agree in reading as follows:—

Mawallahlār-nī (or muwallah Ḥai. MS.) kīltūrdīlār. Bīlmān sāchlārī-nīng yā `amlī sāchlārī-nīng ārālārīgha k:msān-nī (Ilminsky, kamān) shākh-nīng (Ḥai. MS. șākh) aūzūnlūghī bīla aīnjīga aīnjīga kīsīb, qūīūb tūrlār.

The English and French translations differ from the Turkī and from one another:—

(Memoirs, p. 206) They brought in branching willow-trees. I do not know if they were in the natural state of the tree, or if the branches were formed artificially, but they had small twigs cut the length of the ears of a bow and inserted between them.

(Mémoires i, 434) On façonna des huttes (mouleh). Ils les établissent en taillant des baguettes minces, de la longeur du bout recourbé de l'arc, qu'on place entre des branches naturelles ou façonnées artificiellement, je l'ignore.

The construction of the sentence appears to be thus:—Mawal-lahlār-nī kīltūrdīlār, they brought weeping-willows; k:msān-nī qūīūbtūrlār, they had put k:msān-nī; aīnjīga aīnjīga kīsīb, cut very fine (or slender); shākh (or șākh)-nīng aūzūnlūghī, of the length of a shākh, bow, or șākh ...; bīlmān sāchlārī-nīng yā `amlī sāchlārī-nīng ārālārīgha, to (or at) the spaces of the sāchlār whether their (i.e. the willows') own or artificial sāchlār.

These translations clearly indicate felt difficulty. Mr. Erskine does not seem to have understood that the trees were Salix babylonica. The crux of the passage is the word k:msān-nī, which tells what was placed in the spaces. It has been read as kamān, bow, by all but the scribes of the two good Turkī MSS. and as in a phrase horn of a bow. This however is not allowed by the Turkī, for the reason that k:msān-nī is not in the genitive but in the accusative case. (I may say that Bābur does not use nī for nīng; he keeps strictly to the prime uses of each enclitic, nī accusative, nīng genitive.) Moreover, if k:msān-nī be taken as a genitive, the verbs qūīūb-tūrlār and kīsīb have no object, no other accusative appearing in the sentence than k:msān-nī.

A weighty reason against changing sāch into shākh is that Dr. Ilminsky has not done so. He must have attached meaning to sāch since he uses it throughout the passage. He was nearer the region wherein the original willows were seen at a feast. Unfortunately nothing shows how he interpreted the word.

Sāchmāq is a tassel; is it also a catkin and were there decorations, kimsān-nī (things kimsa, or flowers Ar. kim, or something shining, kimcha, gold brocade) hung in between the catkins?

Ilminsky writes mu'lah (with ḥamza) and this de Courteille translates by hut. The Ḥai. MS. writes muwallah (marking the ẓamma).

In favour of reading mawallah (mulah) as a tree and that tree Salix babylonica the weeping-willow, there are annotations in the Second Persian translation and, perhaps following it, in the Elphinstone MS. of nām-i-dirakht, name of a tree, dīdān-i-bed, sight of the willow, bed-i-mawallah, mournful-willow. Standing alone mawallah means weeping-willow, in this use answering to majnūn the name Panj-ābīs give the tree, from Leila's lover the distracted i.e. Majnūn (Brandis).

The whole question may be solved by a chance remark from a traveller witnessing similar festive decoration at another feast in that conservative region.

J.—ON BĀBUR'S EXCAVATED CHAMBER AT QANDAHĀR (f. 208_b_).

Since making my note (f. 208_b_) on the wording of the passage in which Bābur mentions excavation done by him at Qandahār, I have learned that he must be speaking of the vaulted chamber containing the celebrated inscriptions about which much has been written.[2792]

The primary inscription, the one commemorating Bābur's final possession of Qandahār, gives the chamber the character of a Temple of Victory and speaks of it as Rawāq-i-jahān namāī, World-shewing-portal,[2793] doubtless because of its conspicuous position and its extensive view, probably also in allusion to its declaration of victory. Mīr Ma`ṣūm writes of it as a Pesh-ṯāq, frontal arch, which, coupled with Mohan Lall's word arch (ṯāq) suggests that the chamber was entered through an arch pierced in a parallelogram smoothed on the rock and having resemblance to the pesh-tāq of buildings, a suggestion seeming the more probable that some inscriptions are on the "wings" of the arch. But by neither of the above-mentioned names do Mohan Lall and later travellers call the chamber or write of the place; all describe it by its approach of forty steps, Chihil-zīna.[3]

The excavation has been chipped out of the white-veined limestone of the bare ridge on and below which stood Old Qandahār.[2794] It does not appear from the descriptions to have been on the summit of the ridge; Bellew says that the forty steps start half-way up the height. I have found no estimate of the height of the ridge, or statement that the steps end at the chamber. The ridge however seems to have been of noticeably dominating height. It rises steeply to the north and there ends in the naze of which Bābur writes. The foot of the steps is guarded by two towers. Mohan Lall, unaccustomed to mountains, found their ascent steep and dizzy. The excavated chamber of the inscriptions, which Bellew describes as "bow-shaped and dome-roofed", he estimated as 12 feet at the highest point, 12 feet deep and 8 feet wide. Two sculptured beasts guard the entrance; Bellew calls them leopards but tigers would better symbolize the watch and ward of the Tiger Bābur. In truth the whole work, weary steps of approach, tiger guardians, commemorative chamber, laboriously incised words, are admirably symbolic of his long-sustained resolve and action, taken always with Hindūstān as the goal.

There are several inscriptions of varying date, within and without the chamber. Mohan Lall saw and copied them; Darmesteter worked on a copy; the two English observers Lumsden and Bellew made no attempt at correct interpretation. In the versions all give there are inaccuracies, arising from obvious causes, especially from want of historical data. The last word has not been said; revision awaits photography and the leisured expert. A part of the needed revision has been done by Beames, who deals with the geography of what Mīr Ma`ṣūm himself added under Akbar after he had gone as Governor to Qandahār in 1007 AH. (1598 AD.). This commemorates not Bābur's but Akbar's century of cities.

It is the primary inscription only which concerns this Appendix. This is one in relief in the dome of the chamber, recording in florid Persian that Abū'l-ghāzī Bābur took possession of Qandahār on Shawwāl 13th 928 AH. (Sep. 1st 1522 AD.), that in the same year he commanded the construction of this Rawāq-i-jahān-namāī, and that the work had been completed by his son Kāmrān at the time he made over charge of Qandahār to his brother `Askarī in 9 ... (mutilated). After this the gravure changes in character.

In the above, Bābur's title Abū'l-ghāzī fixes the date of the inscription as later than the battle of Kanwāha (f. 324_b_), because it was assumed in consequence of this victory over a Hindū, in March 1527 (Jumāda II 933 AH.).

The mutilated date 9 ... is given by Mohan Lall as 952 AH. but this does not suit several circumstances, e.g. it puts completion too far beyond the time mentioned as consumed by the work, nine years,—and it was not that at which Kāmrān made over charge to `Askarī, but followed the expulsion of both full-brothers from Qandahār by their half-brother Humāyūn.

The mutilated date 9 ... is given by Darmesteter as 933 AH. but this again does not fit the historical circumstance that Kāmrān was in Qandahār after that date and till 937 AH. This date (937 AH.) we suggest as fitting to replace the lost figures, (1) because in that year and after his father's death, Kāmrān gave the town to `Askarī and went himself to Hindūstān, and (2) because work begun in 928 AH. and recorded as occupying 70-80 men for nine years would be complete in 937 AH.[2795] The inscription would be one of the last items of the work.

The following matters are added here because indirectly connected with what has been said and because not readily accessible.

a. Birth of Kāmrān.

Kāmrān's birth falling in a year of one of the Bābur-nāma gaps, is nowhere mentioned. It can be closely inferred as 914 or 915 AH. from the circumstances that he was younger than Humāyūn born late in 913 AH., that it is not mentioned in the fragment of the annals of 914 AH., and that he was one of the children enumerated by Gul-badan as going with her father to Samarkand in 916 AH. (Probably the children did not start with their father in the depth of winter across the mountains.) Possibly the joyful name Kāmrān is linked to the happy issue of the Mughūl rebellion of 914 AH. Kāmrān would thus be about 18 when left in charge of Kābul and Qandahār by Bābur in 932 AH. before the start for the fifth expedition to Hindūstān.

A letter from Bābur to Kāmrān in Qandahār is with Kehr's Latin version of the Bābur-nāma, in Latin and entered on the lining of the cover. It is shewn by its main topic viz. the despatch of Ibrāhīm Lūdī's son to Kāmrān's charge, to date somewhere close to Jan. 3rd 1527 (Rabī`u'l-awwal 29th 933 AH.) because on that day Bābur writes of the despatch (Ḥai. Codex f. 306_b_ foot).

Presumably the letter was with Kāmrān's own copy of the Bābur-nāma. That copy may have reached Humāyūn's hands (JRAS 1908 p. 828 et seq.). The next known indication of the letter is given in St. Petersburg by Dr. Kehr. He will have seen it or a copy of it with the B.N. Codex he copied (one of unequaled correctness), and he, no doubt, copied it in its place on the fly-leaf or board of his own transcript, but if so, it has disappeared.

Fuller particulars of it and of other items accompanying it are given in JRAS 1908 p. 828 et seq.

K.—AN AFGHĀN LEGEND.

My husband's article in the Asiatic Quarterly Review of April 1901 begins with an account of the two MSS. from which it is drawn, viz. I.O. 581 in Pushtū, I.O. 582 in Persian. Both are mainly occupied with an account of the Yūsuf-zāī. The second opens by telling of the power of the tribe in Afghānistān and of the kindness of Malik Shāh Sulaimān, one of their chiefs, to Aūlūgh Beg Mīrzā Kābulī, (Bābur's paternal uncle,) when he was young and in trouble, presumably as a boy ruler.

It relates that one day a wise man of the tribe, Shaikh `Us̤mān saw Sulaimān sitting with the young Mīrzā on his knee and warned him that the boy had the eyes of Yazīd and would destroy him and his family as Yazīd had destroyed that of the Prophet. Sulaimān paid him no attention and gave the Mīrzā his daughter in marriage. Subsequently the Mīrzā having invited the Yūsuf-zāī to Kābul, treacherously killed Sulaimān and 700 of his followers. They were killed at the place called Siyāh-sang near Kābul; it is still known, writes the chronicler in about 1770 AD. (1184 AH.), as the Grave of the Martyrs. Their tombs are revered and that of Shaikh `Us̤mān in particular.

Shāh Sulaimān was the eldest of the seven sons of Malik Tāju'd-dīn; the second was Sulṯān Shāh, the father of Malik Aḥmad. Before Sulaimān was killed he made three requests of Aūlūgh Beg; one of them was that his nephew Aḥmad's life might be spared. This was granted.

Aūlūgh Beg died (after ruling from 865 to 907 AH.), and Bābur defeated his son-in-law and successor M. Muqīm (Arghūn, 910 AH.). Meantime the Yūsuf-zāī had migrated to Pashāwar but later on took Sawād from Sl. Wais (Ḥai. Codex ff. 219, 220_b_, 221).

When Bābur came to rule in Kābul, he at first professed friendship for the Yūsuf-zāī but became prejudiced against them through their enemies the Dilazāk[2796] who gave force to their charges by a promised subsidy of 70,000 shāhrukhī. Bābur therefore determined, says the Yūsuf-zāī chronicler, to kill Malik[2797] Aḥmad and so wrote him a friendly invitation to Kābul. Aḥmad agreed to go, and set out with four brothers who were famous musicians. Meanwhile the Dilazāk had persuaded Bābur to put Aḥmad to death at once, for they said Aḥmad was so clever and eloquent that if allowed to speak, he would induce the Pādshāh to pardon him.

On Aḥmad's arrival in Kābul, he is said to have learned that Bābur's real object was his death. His companions wanted to tie their turbans together and let him down over the wall of the fort, but he rejected their proposal as too dangerous for him and them, and resolved to await his fate. He told his companions however, except one of the musicians, to go into hiding in the town.

Next morning there was a great assembly and Bābur sat on the daïs-throne. Aḥmad made his reverence on entering but Bābur's only acknowledgment was to make bow and arrow ready to shoot him. When Aḥmad saw that Bābur's intention was to shoot him down without allowing him to speak, he unbuttoned his jerkin and stood still before the Pādshāh. Bābur, astonished, relaxed the tension of his bow and asked Aḥmad what he meant. Aḥmad's only reply was to tell the Pādshāh not to question him but to do what he intended. Bābur again asked his meaning and again got the same reply.

Bābur put the same question a third time, adding that he could not dispose of the matter without knowing more. Then Aḥmad opened the mouth of praise, expatiated on Bābur's excellencies and said that in this great assemblage many of his subjects were looking on to see the shooting; that his jerkin being very thick, the arrow might not pierce it; the shot might fail and the spectators blame the Pādshāh for missing his mark; for these reasons he had thought it best to bare his breast. Bābur was so pleased by this reply that he resolved to pardon Aḥmad at once, and laid down his bow.

Said he to Aḥmad, "What sort of man is Buhlūl Lūdī?" "A giver of horses," said Aḥmad.

"And of what sort his son Sikandar?" "A giver of robes."

"And of what sort is Bābur?" "He," said Aḥmad, "is a giver of heads."

"Then," rejoined Bābur, "I give you yours."

The Pādshāh now became quite friendly with Aḥmad, came down from his throne, took him by the hand and led him into another room where they drank together. Three times did Bābur have his cup filled, and after drinking a portion, give the rest to Aḥmad. At length the wine mounted to Bābur's head; he grew merry and began to dance. Meantime Aḥmad's musician played and Aḥmad who knew Persian well, poured out an eloquent harangue. When Bābur had danced for some time, he held out his hands to Aḥmad for a reward (bakhshīsh), saying, "I am your performer." Three times did he open his hands, and thrice did Aḥmad, with a profound reverence, drop a gold coin into them. Bābur took the coins, each time placing his hand on his head. He then took off his robe and gave it to Aḥmad; Aḥmad took off his own coat, gave it to Adu the musician, and put on what the Pādshāh had given.

Aḥmad returned safe to his tribe. He declined a second invitation to Kābul, and sent in his stead his brother Shāh Manṣūr. Manṣūr received speedy dismissal as Bābur was displeased at Aḥmad's not coming. On his return to his tribe Manṣūr advised them to retire to the mountains and make a strong sangur. This they did; as foretold, Bābur came into their country with a large army. He devastated their lands but could make no impression on their fort. In order the better to judge of its character, he, as was his wont, disguised himself as a Qalandar, and went with friends one dark night to the Mahūra hill where the stronghold was, a day's journey from the Pādshāh's camp at Dīārūn.

It was the `Īd-i-qurbān and there was a great assembly and feasting at Shāh Manṣūr's house, at the back of the Mahūra-mountain, still known as Shāh Manṣūr's throne. Bābur went in his disguise to the back of the house and stood among the crowd in the courtyard. He asked servants as they went to and fro about Shāh Manṣūr's family and whether he had a daughter. They gave him straightforward answers.

At the time Musammat Bībī Mubāraka, Shāh Manṣur's daughter was sitting with other women in a tent. Her eye fell on the qalandars and she sent a servant to Bābur with some cooked meat folded between two loaves. Bābur asked who had sent it; the servant said it was Shāh Manṣūr's daughter Bībī Mubāraka. "Where is she?" "That is she, sitting in front of you in the tent." Bābur Pādshāh became entranced with her beauty and asked the woman-servant, what was her disposition and her age and whether she was betrothed. The servant replied by extolling her mistress, saying that her virtue equalled her beauty, that she was pious and brimful of rectitude and placidity; also that she was not betrothed. Bābur then left with his friends, and behind the house hid between two stones the food that had been sent to him.

He returned to camp in perplexity as to what to do; he saw he could not take the fort; he was ashamed to return to Kābul with nothing effected; moreover he was in the fetters of love. He therefore wrote in friendly fashion to Malik Aḥmad and asked for the daughter of Shāh Manṣūr, son of Shāh Sulaimān. Great objection was made and earlier misfortunes accruing to Yūsuf-zāī chiefs who had given daughters to Aūlūgh Beg and Sl. Wais (Khān Mīrzā?) were quoted. They even said they had no daughter to give. Bābur replied with a "beautiful" royal letter, told of his visit disguised to Shāh Manṣūr's house, of his seeing Bībī Mubāraka and as token of the truth of his story, asked them to search for the food he had hidden. They searched and found. Aḥmad and Manṣūr were still averse, but the tribesmen urged that as before they had always made sacrifice for the tribe so should they do now, for by giving the daughter in marriage, they would save the tribe from Bābur's anger. The Maliks then said that it should be done "for the good of the tribe".

When their consent was made known to Bābur, the drums of joy were beaten and preparations were made for the marriage; presents were sent to the bride, a sword of his also, and the two Maliks started out to escort her. They are said to have come from Thana by M`amūra (?), crossed the river at Chakdara, taken a narrow road between two hills and past Talāsh-village to the back of Tīrī (?) where the Pādshāh's escort met them. The Maliks returned, spent one night at Chakdara and next morning reached their homes at the Mahūra sangur.

Meanwhile Runa the nurse who had control of Malik Manṣūr's household, with two other nurses and many male and female servants, went on with Bībī Mubāraka to the royal camp. The bride was set down with all honour at a large tent in the middle of the camp.

That night and on the following day the wives of the officers came to visit her but she paid them no attention. So, they said to one another as they were returning to their tents, "Her beauty is beyond question, but she has shewn us no kindness, and has not spoken to us; we do not know what mystery there is about her."

Now Bībī Mubāraka had charged her servants to let her know when the Pādshāh was approaching in order that she might receive him according to Malik Aḥmad's instructions. They said to her, "That was the pomp just now of the Pādshāh's going to prayers at the general mosque." That same day after the Mid-day Prayer, the Pādshāh went towards her tent. Her servants informed her, she immediately left her divan and advancing, lighted up the carpet by her presence, and stood respectfully with folded hands. When the Pādshāh entered, she bowed herself before him. But her face remained entirely covered. At length the Pādshāh seated himself on the divan and said to her, "Come Afghāniya, be seated." Again she bowed before him, and stood as before. A second time he said, "Afghāniya, be seated." Again she prostrated herself before him and came a little nearer, but still stood. Then the Pādshāh pulled the veil from her face and beheld incomparable beauty. He was entranced, he said again, "O, Afghāniya, sit down." Then she bowed herself again, and said, "I have a petition to make. If an order be given, I will make it." The Pādshāh said kindly, "Speak." Whereupon she with both hands took up her dress and said, "Think that the whole Yūsuf-zāī tribe is enfolded in my skirt, and pardon their offences for my sake." Said the Pādshāh, "I forgive the Yūsuf-zāī all their offences in thy presence, and cast them all into thy skirt. Hereafter I shall have no ill-feeling to the Yūsuf-zāī." Again she bowed before him; the Pādshāh took her hand and led her to the divan.

When the Afternoon Prayer time came and the Pādshāh rose from the divan to go to prayers, Bībī Mubāraka jumped up and fetched him his shoes.[2798] He put them on and said very pleasantly, "I am extremely pleased with you and your tribe and I have pardoned them all for your sake." Then he said with a smile, "We know it was Malik Aḥmad taught you all these ways." He then went to prayers and the Bībī remained to say hers in the tent.

After some days the camp moved from Dīārūn and proceeded by Bajaur and Tankī to Kābul.[2799]...

Bībī Mubāraka, the Blessed Lady, is often mentioned by Gul-badan; she had no children; and lived an honoured life, as her chronicler says, until the beginning of Akbar's reign, when she died. Her brother Mīr Jamāl rose to honour under Bābur, Humāyūn and Akbar.

L.—ON MĀHĪM'S ADOPTION OF HIND-ĀL.

The passage quoted below about Māhīm's adoption of the unborn Hind-āl we have found so far only in Kehr's transcript of the Bābur-nāma (i.e. the St. Petersburg Foreign Office Codex). Ilminsky reproduced it (Kāsān imprint p. 281) and de Courteille translated it (ii, 45), both with endeavour at emendation. It is interpolated in Kehr's MS. at the wrong place, thus indicating that it was once marginal or apart from the text.

I incline to suppose the whole a note made by Humāyūn, although part of it might be an explanation made by Bābur, at a later date, of an over-brief passage in his diary. Of such passages there are several instances. What is strongly against its being Bābur's where otherwise it might be his, is that Māhīm, as he always calls her simply, is there written of as Ḥaẓrat Wālida, Royal Mother and with the honorific plural. That plural Bābur uses for his own mother (dead 14 years before 925 AH.) and never for Māhīm. The note is as follows:—

"The explanation is this:—As up to that time those of one birth (tūqqān, womb) with him (Humāyūn), that is to say a son Bār-būl, who was younger than he but older than the rest, and three daughters, Mihr-jān and two others, died in childhood, he had a great wish for one of the same birth with him.[2800] I had said 'What it would have been if there had been one of the same birth with him!' (Humāyūn). Said the Royal Mother, 'If Dil-dār Āghācha bear a son, how is it if I take him and rear him?' 'It is very good' said I."

So far doubtfully might be Bābur's but it may be Humāyūn's written as a note for Bābur. What follows appears to be by some-one who knew the details of Māhīm's household talk and was in Kābul when Dil-dār's child was taken from her.

"Seemingly women have the custom of taking omens in the following way:—When they have said, 'Is it to be a boy? is it to be a girl?' they write `Alī or Ḥasan on one of two pieces of paper and Fāṯima on the other, put each paper into a ball of clay and throw both into a bowl of water. Whichever opens first is taken as an omen; if the man's, they say a man-child will be born; if the woman's, a girl will be born. They took the omen; it came out a man."

"On this glad tidings we at once sent letters off.[2801] A few days later God's mercy bestowed a son. Three days before the news[2802] and three days after the birth, they[2803] took the child from its mother, (she) willy-nilly, brought it to our house[2804] and took it in their charge. When we sent the news of the birth, Bhīra was being taken. They named him Hind-āl for a good omen and benediction."[2805]

The whole may be Humāyūn's, and prompted by a wish to remove an obscurity his father had left and by sentiment stirred through reminiscence of a cherished childhood.

Whether Humāyūn wrote the whole or not, how is it that the passage appears only in the Russian group of Bāburiana?

An apparent answer to this lies in the following little mosaic of circumstances:—The St. Petersburg group of Bāburiana[2806] is linked to Kāmrān's own copy of the Bābur-nāma by having with it a letter of Bābur to Kāmrān and also what may be a note indicating its passage into Humāyūn's hands (JRAS 1908 p. 830). If it did so pass, a note by Humāyūn may have become associated with it, in one of several obvious ways. This would be at a date earlier than that of the Elphinstone MS. and would explain why it is found in Russia and not in Indian MSS.[2807]

[APPENDICES TO THE HINDŪSTĀN SECTION.]

M.—ON THE TERM BAḤRĪ QŪT̤ĀS.

That the term baḥrī qūṯās is interpreted by Meninski, Erskine, and de Courteille in senses so widely differing as equus maritimus, mountain-cow, and bœuf vert de mer is due, no doubt, to their writing when the qūṯās, the yāk, was less well known than it now is.

The word qūṯās represents both the yāk itself and its neck-tassel and tail. Hence Meninski explains it by nodus fimbriatus ex cauda seu crinibus equi maritimi. His "sea-horse" appears to render baḥrī qūṯās, and is explicable by the circumstance that the same purposes are served by horse-tails and by yāk-tails and tassels, namely, with both, standards are fashioned, horse-equipage is ornamented or perhaps furnished with fly-flappers, and the ordinary hand-fly-flappers are made, i.e. the chowries of Anglo-India.

Erskine's "mountain-cow" (Memoirs p. 317) may well be due to his munshī's giving the yāk an alternative name, viz. Kosh-gau (Vigne) or Khāsh-gau (Ney Elias), which appears to mean mountain-cow (cattle, oxen).[2808]

De Courteille's Dictionary p. 422, explains qūtās (qūṯās) as bœuf marin (baḥrī qūṯās) and his Mémoires ii, 191, renders Bābur's baḥrī qūṯās by bœuf vert de mer (f. 276, p. 490 and n. 8).

The term baḥrī qūṯās could be interpreted with more confidence if one knew where the seemingly Arabic-Turkī compound originated.[2809] Bābur uses it in Hindūstān where the neck-tassel and the tail of the domestic yāk are articles of commerce, and where, as also probably in Kābul, he will have known of the same class of yāk as a saddle-animal and as a beast of burden into Kashmīr and other border-lands of sufficient altitude to allow its survival. A part of its wide Central Asian habitat abutting on Kashmīr is Little Tibet, through which flows the upper Indus and in which tame yāk are largely bred, Skardo being a place specially mentioned by travellers as having them plentifully. This suggests that the term baḥrī qūṯās is due to the great river (baḥr) and that those of which Bābur wrote in Hindūstān were from Little Tibet and its great river. But baḥrī may apply to another region where also the domestic yāk abounds, that of the great lakes, inland seas such as Pangong, whence the yāk comes and goes between e.g. Yārkand and the Hindūstān border.

The second suggestion, viz. that "baḥrī qūṯās" refers to the habitat of the domestic yāk in lake and marsh lands of high altitude (the wild yāk also but, as Tibetan, it is less likely to be concerned here) has support in Dozy's account of the baḥrī falcon, a bird mentioned also by Abū'l-faẓl amongst sporting birds (Āyīn-i-akbarī, Blochmann's trs. p. 295):—"Baḥrī, espèce de faucon le meilleur pour les oiseaux de marais. Ce renseignment explique peut-être l'origine du mot. Marguerite en donne la même etymologie que Tashmend et le Père Guagix. Selon lui ce faucon aurait été appelé ainsi parce qu'il vient de l'autre côté de la mer, mais peut-être dériva-t-il de baḥrī dans le sens de marais, flaque, étang."

Dr. E. Denison Ross' Polyglot List of Birds (Memoirs of the Asiatic Society of Bengal ii, 289) gives to the Qarā Qīrghāwal (Black pheasant) the synonym "Sea-pheasant", this being the literal translation of its Chinese name, and quotes from the Manchū-Chinese "Mirror" the remark that this is a black pheasant but called "sea-pheasant" to distinguish it from other black ones.

It may be observed that Bābur writes of the yāk once only and then of the baḥrī qūṯās so that there is no warrant from him for taking the term to apply to the wild yāk. His cousin and contemporary Ḥaidar Mīrzā, however, mentions the wild yāk twice and simply as the wild qūṯās.

The following are random gleanings about "baḥrī" and the yāk:—

(1) An instance of the use of the Persian equivalent daryā'ī of baḥrī, sea-borne or over-sea, is found in the Akbar-nāma (Bib. Ind. ed. ii, 216) where the African elephant is described as fīl-i-daryā'ī.

(2) In Egypt the word baḥrī has acquired the sense of northern, presumably referring to what lies or is borne across its northern sea, the Mediterranean.

(3) Vigne (Travels in Kashmīr ii, 277-8) warns against confounding the qūch-qār i.e. the gigantic moufflon, Pallas' Ovis ammon, with the Kosh-gau, the cow of the Kaucasus, i.e. the yāk. He says, "Kaucasus (hodie Hindū-kush) was originally from Kosh, and Kosh is applied occasionally as a prefix, e.g. Kosh-gau, the yāk or ox of the mountain or Kaucasus." He wrote from Skardo in Little Tibet and on the upper Indus. He gives the name of the female yāk as yāk-mo and of the half-breeds with common cows as bzch, which class he says is common and of "all colours".

(4) Mr. Ney Elias' notes (Tārīkh-i-rashīdī trs. pp. 302 and 466) on the qūṯās are of great interest. He gives the following synonymous names for the wild yāk, Bos Poëphagus, Khāsh-gau, the Tibetan yāk or Dong.

(5) Hume and Henderson (Lāhor to Yārkand p. 59) write of the numerous black yāk-hair tents seen round the Pangong Lake, of fine saddle yāks, and of the tame ones as being some white or brown but mostly black.

(6) Olufsen's Through the Unknown Pamirs (p. 118) speaks of the large numbers of Bos grunniens (yāk) domesticated by the Kirghiz in the Pamirs.

(7) Cf. Gazetteer of India s.n. yāk.

(8) Shaikh Zain applies the word baḥrī to the porpoise, when paraphrasing the Bābur-nāma f. 281_b_.

N.—NOTES ON A FEW BIRDS.

In attempting to identify some of the birds of Bābur's lists difficulty arises from the variety of names provided by the different tongues of the region concerned, and also in some cases by the application of one name to differing birds. The following random gleanings enlarge and, in part, revise some earlier notes and translations of Mr. Erskine's and my own. They are offered as material for the use of those better acquainted with bird-lore and with Himālayan dialects.

a. Concerning the lūkha, lūja, lūcha, kūja (f.135 and f.278_b_).

The nearest word I have found to lūkha and its similars is likkh, a florican (Jerdon, ii, 615), but the florican has not the chameleon colours of the lūkha (var.). As Bābur when writing in Hindūstān, uses such "book-words" as Ar. baḥrī (qūṯās) and Ar. bū-qalamūn (chameleon), it would not be strange if his name for the "lūkha" bird represented Ar. awja, very beautiful, or connected with Ar. loḥ, shining splendour.

The form kūja is found in Ilminsky's imprint p.361 (Mémoires ii, 198, koudjeh).

What is confusing to translators is that (as it now seems to me) Bābur appears to use the name kabg-i-darī in both passages (f.135 and f.278_b_) to represent two birds; (1) he compares the lūkha as to size with the kabg-i-darī of the Kābul region, and (2) for size and colour with that of Hindūstān. But the bird, of the Western Himālayas known by the name kabg-i-darī is the Himālayan snow-cock, Tetraogallus himālayensis, Turkī, aūlār and in the Kābul region, chīūrtika (f.249, Jerdon, ii, 549-50); while the kabg-i-darī (syn. chikor) of Hindūstān, whether of hill or plain, is one or more of much smaller birds.

The snow-cock being 28 inches in length, the lūkha bird must be of this size. Such birds as to size and plumage of changing colour are the Lophophori and Trapagons, varieties of which are found in places suiting Bābur's account of the lūkha.

It may be noted that the Himālayan snow-cock is still called kabg-i-darī in Afghānistān (Jerdon, ii, 550) and in Kashmīr (Vigne's Travels in Kashmīr ii, 18). As its range is up to 18,000 feet, its Persian name describes it correctly whether read as "of the mountains" (dari), or as "royal" (darī) through its splendour.

I add here the following notes of Mr. Erskine's, which I have not quoted already where they occur (cf. f. 135 and f. 278_b_):—

On f. 135, "lokheh" is said to mean hill-chikor.

On f. 278_b_, to "lūjeh", "The Persian has lūkheh."

" to "kepki durrī", "The kepkī deri, or durri is much larger than the common kepk of Persia and is peculiar to Khorāsān. It is said to be a beautiful bird. The common kepk of Persia and Khorāsān is the hill-chikor of India."

" to "higher up", "The lujeh may be the chikor of the plains which Hunter calls bartavelle or Greek partridge."

The following corrections are needed about my own notes:—(1) on f. 135 (p. 213) n. 7 is wrongly referred; it belongs to the first word, viz. kabg-i-darī, of p. 214; (2) on f. 279 (p. 496) n. 2 should refer to the second kabg-i-darī.

b. Birds called mūnāl (var. monāl and moonaul).

Yule writing in Hobson Jobson (p. 580) of the "moonaul" which he identifies as Lophophorus Impeyanus, queries whether, on grounds he gives, the word moonaul is connected etymologically with Sanscrit muni, an "eremite". In continuation of his topic, I give here the names of other birds called mūnāl, which I have noticed in various ornithological works while turning their pages for other information.

Besides L. Impeyanus and Trapagon Ceriornis satyra which Yule mentions as called "moonaul", there are L. refulgens, mūnāl and Ghūr (mountain)-mūnāl; Trapagon Ceriornis satyra, called mūnāl in Nipāl; T. C. melanocephalus, called sing (horned)-mūnāl in the N.W. Himālayas; T. himālayensis, the jer- or cher-mūnāl of the same region, known also as chikor; and Lerwa nevicola, the snow-partridge known in Garhwal as Quoir- or Qūr-mūnāl. Do all these birds behave in such a way as to suggest that mūnāl may imply the individual isolation related by Jerdon of L. Impeyanus, "In the autumnal and winter months numbers are generally collected in the same quarter of the forest, though often so widely scattered that each bird appears to be alone?" My own search amongst vocabularies of hill-dialects for the meaning of the word has been unsuccessful, spite of the long range mūnāls in the Himālayas.

c. Concerning the word chīūrtika, chourtka.

Jerdon's entry (ii, 549, 554) of the name chourtka as a synonym of Tetraogallus himālayensis enables me to fill a gap I have left on f. 249 (p. 491 and n. 6),[2810] with the name Himālayan snow-cock, and to allow Bābur's statement to be that he, in January 1520 AD. when coming down from the Bād-i-pīch pass, saw many snow-cocks. The Memoirs (p.282) has "chikors", which in India is a synonym for kabg-i-darī; the Mémoires (ii, 122) has sauterelles, but this meaning of chīūrtika does not suit wintry January. That month would suit for the descent from higher altitudes of snow-cocks. Griffith, a botanist who travelled in Afghānistān cir. 1838 AD., saw myriads of cicadæ between Qilat-i-ghilzai and Ghazni, but the month was July.

d. On the qūṯān (f. 142, p. 224; Memoirs, p. 153; Mémoires ii, 313).

Mr. Erskine for qūṯān enters khawāṣil [gold-finch] which he will have seen interlined in the Elphinstone Codex (f. 109_b_) in explanation of qūṯān.

Shaikh Effendi (Kunos' ed., p. 139) explains qūṯān to be the gold-finch, Steiglitz.

Ilminsky's qūtān (p. 175) is translated by M. de Courteille as pélicane and certainly some copies of the 2nd Persian translation [Muḥ. Shīrāzi's p. 90] have ḥawāṣil, pelican.

The pelican would class better than the small finch with the

herons and egrets of Bābur's trio; it also would appear a more likely bird to be caught "with the cord".

That Bābur's qūṯān (ḥawāṣil) migrated in great numbers is however against supposing it to be Pelicanus onocrotatus which is seen in India during the winter, because it appears there in moderate numbers only, and Blanford with other ornithologists states that no western pelican migrates largely into India.

Perhaps the qūṯān was Linnæus' Pelicanus carbo of which one synonym is Carbo comoranus, the cormorant, a bird seen in India in large numbers of both the large and small varieties. As cormorants are not known to breed in that country, they will have migrated in the masses Bābur mentions.

A translation matter falls to mention here:—After saying that the aūqār (grey heron), qarqara (egret), and qūtān (cormorant) are taken with the cord, Bābur says that this method of bird-catching is unique (bū nūḥ qūsh tūtmāq ghair muqarrar dūr) and describes it. The Persian text omits to translate the tūtmāq (by P. giriftan); hence Erskine (Mems. p. 153) writes, "The last mentioned fowl" (i.e. the qūṯān) "is rare," notwithstanding Bābur's statement that all three of the birds he names are caught in masses. De Courteille (p. 313) writes, as though only of the qūtān, "ces derniers toutefois ne se prennent qu'accidentelment," perhaps led to do so by knowledge of the circumstance that Pelicanus onocrotatus is rare in India.

O.—NOTES BY HUMĀYŪN ON SOME HINDŪSTĀN FRUITS.

The following notes, which may be accepted as made by Humāyūn and in the margin of the archetype of the Elphinstone Codex, are composed in Turkī which differs in diction from his father's but is far closer to that classic model than is that of the producer [Jahāngīr?] of the "Fragments" (Index s.n.). Various circumstances make the notes difficult to decipher verbatim and, unfortunately, when writing in Jan. 1917, I am unable to collate with its original in the Advocates Library, the copy I made of them in 1910.

a. On the kadhil, jack-fruit, Artocarpus integrifolia (f. 283_b_, p. 506; Elphinstone MS. f. 235_b_).[2811]

The contents of the note are that the strange-looking pumpkin (qar`, which is also Ibn Batuta's word for the fruit), yields excellent white juice, that the best fruit grows from the roots of the tree,[2812] that many such grow in Bengal, and that in Bengal and Dihli there grows a kadhil-tree covered with hairs (Artocarpus hirsuta?).

b. On the amrit-phal, mandarin-orange, Citrus aurantium (f. 287, p. 512; Elphinstone Codex, f. 238_b_, l. 12).

The interest of this note lies in its reference to Bābur.

A Persian version of it is entered, without indication of what it is or of who was its translator, in one of the volumes of Mr. Erskine's manuscript remains, now in the British Museum (Add. 26,605, p. 88). Presumably it was made by his Turkish munshi for his note in the Memoirs (p. 329).

Various difficulties oppose the translation of the Turkī note; it is written into the text of the Elphinstone Codex in two instalments, neither of them in place, the first being interpolated in the account of the amil-bīd fruit, the second in that of the jāsūn flower; and there are verbal difficulties also. The Persian translation is not literal and in some particulars Mr. Erskine's rendering of this differs from what the Turkī appears to state.

The note is, tentatively, as follows:[2813]—"His honoured Majesty Firdaus-makān[2814]—may God make his proof clear!—did not favour the amrit-phal;[2815] as he considered it insipid,[2816] he likened it to the mild-flavoured[2817] orange and did not make choice of it. So much was the mild-flavoured orange despised that if any person had disgusted (him) by insipid flattery(?) he used to say, 'He is like orange-juice.'"[2818]

"The amrit-phal is one of the very good fruits. Though its juice is not relishing (? chūchūq), it is extremely pleasant-drinking. Later on, in my own time, its real merit became known. Its tartness may be that of the orange (nāranj)and lemu."[2819]

The above passage is followed, in the text of the Elphinstone Codex, by Bābur's account of the jāsūn flower, and into this a further instalment of Humāyūn's notes is interpolated, having opposite its first line the marginal remark, "This extra note, seemingly made by Humāyūn Pādshāh, the scribe has mistakenly written into the text." Whether its first sentence refer to the amrit-phal or to the amil-bīd must be left for decision to those well acquainted with the orange-tribe. It is obscure in my copy and abbreviated in its Persian translation; summarized it may state that when the fruit is unripe, its acidity is harmful to the digestion, but that it is very good when ripe.—The note then continues as below:—

c. The kāmila, H. kauṅlā, the orange.[2820]

"There are in Bengal two other fruits of the acid kind. Though the amrit-phal be not agreeable, they have resemblance to it (?)."

"One is the kāmila which may be as large as an orange (nāranj); some took it to be a large nārangī (orange) but it is much pleasanter eating than the nārangī and is understood not to have the skin of that (fruit)."

d. The samṯara.[2821]

"The other is the samṯara which is larger than the orange (nāranj) but is not tart; unlike the amrit-phal it is not of poor flavour (kam maza) or little relish (chūchūk). In short a better fruit is not seen. It is good to see, good to eat, good to digest. One does not forget it. If it be there, no other fruit is chosen. Its peel may be taken off by the hand. However much of the fruit be eaten, the heart craves for it again. Its juice does not soil the hand at all. Its skin separates easily from its flesh. It may be taken during and after food. In Bengal the samṯara is rare (ghārib) (or excellent, `asīz). It is understood to grow in one village Sanārgām (Sonargaon) and even therein a special quarter. There seems to be no fruit so entirely good as the samṯara amongst fruits of its class or, rather, amongst fruits of all kinds."

Corrigendum:—In my note on the turunj bajāurī (p. 511, n. 3) for bijaurā read bījaurā; and on p. 510, l. 2, for palm read fingers.

Addendum:—p. 510, l. 5. After yūsūnlūk add:—"The natives of Hindūstān when not wearing their ear-rings, put into the large ear-ring holes, slips of the palm-leaf bought in the bāzārs, ready for the purpose. The trunk of this tree is handsomer and more stately than that of the date."

P.—REMARKS ON BĀBUR'S REVENUE LIST (fol. 292).

a. Concerning the date of the List.

The Revenue List is the last item of Bābur's account of Hindūstān and, with that account, is found s.a. 932 AH., manifestly too early, (1) because it includes districts and their revenues which did not come under Bābur's authority until subdued in his Eastern campaigns of 934 and 935 AH., (2) because Bābur's statement is that the "countries" of the List "are now in my possession" (in loco p. 520).

The List appears to be one of revenues realized in 936 or 937 AH. and not one of assessment or estimated revenue, (1) because Bābur's wording states as a fact that the revenue was 52 krūrs; (2) because the Persian heading of the (Persian) List is translatable as "Revenue (jama`)[2822] of Hindūstān from what has so far come under the victorious standards".

b. The entry of the List into European Literature.

Readers of the L. and E. Memoirs of Bābur are aware that it does not contain the Revenue List (p. 334). The omission is due to the absence of the List from the Elphinstone Codex and from the `Abdu'r-raḥīm Persian translation. Since the Memoirs of Bābur was published in 1826 AD., the List has come from the Bābur-nāma into European literature by three channels.

Of the three the one used earliest is Shaikh Zain's T̤abaqāt-i-bāburī which is a Persian paraphrase of part of Bābur's Hindūstān section. This work provided Mr. Erskine with what he placed in his History of India (London 1854, i, 540, Appendix D), but his manuscript, now B.M. Add. 26,202, is not the best copy of Shaikh Zain's book, being of far less importance than B.M. Or. 1999, [as to which more will be said.][2823]

The second channel is Dr. Ilminsky's imprint of the Turkī text (Kāsān 1857, p. 379), which is translated by the Mémoires de Bāber (Paris 1871, ii, 230).

The third channel is the Ḥaidarābād Codex, in the English translation of which [in loco] the List is on p. 521.

Shaikh Zain may have used Bābur's autograph manuscript for his paraphrase and with it the Revenue List. His own autograph manuscript was copied in 998 AH. (1589-90 AD.) by Khwānd-amīr's grandson `Abdu'l-lāh who may be the scribe "Mīr `Abdu'l-lāh" of the Āyīn-i-akbarī (Blochmann's trs. p. 109). `Abdu'l-lāh's transcript (from which a portion is now absent,) after having been in Sir Henry Elliot's possession, has become B.M. Or. 1999. It is noticed briefly by Professor Dowson (l.c. iv, 288), but he cannot have observed that the "old, worm-eaten" little volume contains Bābur's Revenue List, since he does not refer to it.

c. Agreement and variation in copies of the List.

The figures in the two copies (Or. 1999 and Add. 26,202) of the T̤abaqāt-i-bāburī are in close agreement. They differ, however, from those in the Ḥaidarābād Codex, not only in a negligible unit and a ten of tankas but in having 20,000 more tankas from Oudh and Baraich and 30 laks of tankas more from Trans-sutlej.

The figures in the two copies of the Bābur-nāma, viz. the Ḥaidarābād Codex and the Kehr-Ilminsky imprint are not in agreement throughout, but are identical in opposition to the variants (20,000 t. and 30 l.) mentioned above. As the two are independent, being collateral descendants of Bābur's original papers, the authority of the Ḥaidarābād Codex in the matter of the List is still further enhanced.

d. Varia.

(1) The place-names of the List are all traceable, whatever their varied forms. About the entry L:knū [or L:knūr] and B:ks:r [or M:ks:r] a difficulty has been created by its variation in manuscripts, not only in the List but where the first name occurs s.a. 934 and 935 AH. In the Ḥaidarābād List and in that of Or. 1999 L:knūr is clearly written and may represent (approximately) modern Shahābād in Rāmpūr. Erskine and de Courteille, however, have taken it to be Lakhnau in Oudh. [The distinction of Lakhnaur from Lakhnau in the historical narrative is discussed in Appendix T.]

(2) It may be noted, as of interest, that the name Sarwār is an abbreviation of Sarjūpār which means "other side of Sarjū" (Sarū, Goghrā; E. and D.'s H. of I. i, 56, n.4).

(3) Rūp-narā[:i]n (Deo or Dev) is mentioned in Ajodhya Prasad's short history of Tirhut and Darbhanga, the Gulzār-i-Bihār (Calcutta 1869, Cap. v, 88) as the 9th of the Brahman rulers of Tirhut and as having reigned for 25 years, from 917 to 942 Faslī(?). If the years were Ḥijrī, 917-42 AH. would be 1511-1535.[2824]

(4) Concerning the tanka the following modern description is quoted from Mr. R. Shaw's High Tartary (London 1871, p. 464) "The tanga" (or tanka) "is a nominal coin, being composed of 25 little copper cash, with holes pierced in them and called dahcheen. These are strung together and the quantity of them required to make up the value of one of these silver ingots" ("kooroos or yamboo, value nearly _£_17") "weighs a considerable amount. I once sent to get change for a kooroos, and my servants were obliged to charter a donkey to bring it home."

(5) The following interesting feature of Shaikh Zain's T̤abaqāt-i-bāburī has been mentioned to me by my husband:—Its author occasionally reproduces Bābur's Turkī words instead of paraphrasing them in Persian, and does this for the noticeable passage in which Bābur records his dissatisfied view of Hindūstān (f. 290_b_, in loco p. 518), prefacing his quotation with the remark that it is best and will be nearest to accuracy not to attempt translation but to reproduce the Pādshāh's own words. The main interest of the matter lies in the motive for reproducing the ipsissima verba. Was that motive deferential? Did the revelation of feeling and opinion made in the quoted passage clothe it with privacy so that Shaikh Zain reserved its perusal from the larger public of Hindūstān who might read Persian but not Turkī? Some such motive would explain the insertion untranslated of Bābur's letters to Humāyūn and to Khwāja Kalān which are left in Turkī by `Abdu'r-raḥīm Mīrzā.[2825]

Q.—CONCERNING THE "RĀMPŪR DĪWĀN".

Pending the wide research work necessary to interpret Bābur's Hindūstān poems which the Rāmpūr manuscript preserves, the following comments, some tentative and open to correction, may carry further in making the poems publicly known, what Dr. E. Denison Ross has effected by publishing his Facsimile of the manuscript.[2826] It is legitimate to associate comment on the poems with the Bābur-nāma because many of them are in it with their context of narrative; most, if not all, connect with it; some without it, would be dull and vapid.

a. An authorized English title.

The contents of the Rāmpūr MS. are precisely what Bābur describes sending to four persons some three weeks after the date attached to the manuscript,[2827] viz. "the Translation and whatnot of poems made on coming to Hindūstān";[2828] and a similar description may be meant in the curiously phrased first clause of the colophon, but without mention of the Translation (of the Wālidiyyah-risāla).[2829] Hence, if the poems, including the Translation, became known as the Hindūstān Poems or Poems made in Hindūstān, such title would be justified by their author's words. Bābur does not call the Hindūstān poems a dīwān even when, as in the above quotation, he speaks of them apart from his versified translation of the Tract. In what has come down to us of his autobiography, he applies the name Dīwān to poems of his own once only, this in 925 AH. (f. 237_b_) when he records sending "my dīwān" to Pūlād Sl. Aūzbeg.

b. The contents of the Rāmpūr MS.

There are three separate items of composition in the manuscript, marked as distinct from one another by having each its ornamented frontispiece, each its scribe's sign (mīm) of Finis, each its division from its neighbour by a space without entry. The first and second sections bear also the official sign [ṣaḥ[h.]] that the copy has been inspected and found correct.

(1) The first section consists of Bābur's metrical translation of Khwāja `Ubaidu'l-lāh Aḥrārī's Parental Tract (Wālidiyyah-risāla), his prologue in which are his reasons for versifying the Tract and his epilogue which gives thanks for accomplishing the task. It ends with the date 935 (Ḥai. MS. f. 346). Below this are mīm and ṣaḥ[h.], the latter twice; they are in the scribe's handwriting, and thus make against supposing that Bābur wrote down this copy of the Tract or its archetype from which the official ṣaḥ[h.] will have been copied. Moreover, spite of bearing two vouchers of being a correct copy, the Translation is emended, in a larger script which may be that of the writer of the marginal quatrain on the last page of the [Rāmpūr] MS. and there attested by Shāh-i-jahān as Bābur's autograph entry. His also may have been the now expunged writing on the half-page left empty of text at the end of the Tract. Expunged though it be, fragments of words are visible.[2830]

(2) The second section has in its frontispiece an inscription illegible (to me) in the Facsimile. It opens with a masnawī of 41 couplets which is followed by a ghazel and numerous poems in several measures, down to a triad of rhymed couplets (matla`?), the whole answering to descriptions of a Dīwān without formal arrangement. After the last couplet are mīm and ṣaḥ[h.] in the scribe's hand-writing, and a blank quarter-page. Mistakes in this section have been left uncorrected, which supports the view that its ṣaḥ[h.] avouches the accuracy of its archetype and not its own.[2831]

(3) The third section shows no inscription on its frontispiece. It opens with the masnawī of eight couplets, found also in the Bābur-nāma (f. 312), one of earlier date than many of the poems in the second section. It is followed by three rubā`ī which complete the collection of poems made in Hindūstān. A prose passage comes next, describing the composition and transposition-in-metre of a couplet of 16 feet, with examples in three measures, the last of which ends in l. 4 of the photograph.—While fixing the date of this metrical game, Bābur incidentally allows that of his Treatise on Prosody to be inferred from the following allusive words:—"When going to Saṃbhal (f. 330_b_) in the year (933 AH.) after the conquest of Hindūstān (932 AH.), two years after writing the `Arūẓ, I composed a couplet of 16 feet."—From this the date of the Treatise is seen to be 931 AH., some two years later than that of the Mubīn. The above metrical exercise was done about the same time as another concerning which a Treatise was written, viz. that mentioned on f. 330_b_, when a couplet was transposed into 504 measures (Section f, p. lxv).—The Facsimile, it will be noticed, shows something unusual in the last line of the prose passage on Plate XVIII B, where the scattering of the words suggests that the scribe was trying to copy page per page.

The colophon (which begins on l. 5 of the photograph) is curiously worded, as though the frequent fate of last pages had befallen its archetype, that of being mutilated and difficult for a scribe to make good; it suggests too that the archetype was verse.[2832] Its first clause, even if read as Hind-stān jānibī `azīmat qīlghānī (i.e. not qīlghālī, as it can be read), has an indirectness unlike Bābur's corresponding "after coming to Hindūstān" (f. 357_b_), and is not definite; (2) bū aīrdī (these were) is not the complement suiting aūl dūrūr (those are); (3) Bābur does not use the form dūrūr in prose; (4) the undue space after dūrūr suggests connection with verse; (5) there is no final verb such as prose needs. The meaning, however, may be as follows:—The poems made after resolving on (the)

Hindūstān parts (jānibī?) were these I have written down (taḥrīr qīldīm), and past events are those I have narrated (taqrīr) in the way that (nī-chūk kīm) (has been) written in these folios (aūrāq) and recorded in those sections (ajzā').—From this it would appear that sections of the Bābur-nāma (f. 376_b_, p. 678) accompanied the Hindūstān poems to the recipient of the message conveyed by the colophon.

Close under the colophon stands Ḥarara-hu Bābur and the date Monday, Rabī` II. 15th 935 (Monday, December 27th 1528 AD.), the whole presumably brought over from the archetype. To the question whether a signature in the above form would be copied by a scribe, the Elphinstone Codex gives an affirmative answer by providing several examples of notes, made by Humāyūn in its archetype, so-signed and brought over either into its margin or interpolated in its text. Some others of Humāyūn's notes are not so-signed, the scribe merely saying they are Humāyūn Pādshāh's.—It makes against taking the above entry of Bābur's name to be an autograph signature, (1) that it is enclosed in an ornamented border, as indeed is the case wherever it occurs throughout the manuscript; (2) that it is followed by the scribe's mīm. [See end of following section.]

c. The marginal entries shown in the photograph.

The marginal note written length-wise by the side of the text is signed by Shāh-i-jahān and attests that the rubā`ī and the signature to which it makes reference are in Bābur's autograph hand-writing. His note translates as follows:—This quatrain and blessed name are in the actual hand-writing of that Majesty (ān ḥaẓrat) Firdaus-makānī Bābur Pādshāh Ghāzī—May God make his proof clear!—Signed (Ḥararā-hu), Shāh-i-jahān son of Jahāngīr Pādshāh son of Akbar Pādshāh son of Humāyūn Pādshāh son of Bābur Pādshāh.[2833]

The second marginal entry is the curiously placed rubā`ī, which is now the only one on the page, and now has no signature attaching to it. It has the character of a personal message to the recipient of one of more books having identical contents. That these two entries are there while the text seems so clearly to be written by a scribe, is open to the explanation that when (as said about the colophon, p. lx) the rectangle of text was made good from a mutilated archetype, the original margin was placed round the rifacimento? This superposition would explain the entries and seal-like circles, discernible against a strong light, on the reverse of the margin only, through the rifacimento page. The upper edge of the rectangle shows sign that the margin has been adjusted to it [so far as one can judge from a photograph]. Nothing on the face of the margin hints that the text itself is autograph; the words of the colophon, taḥrīr qīldīm (i.e. I have written down) cannot hold good against the cumulative testimony that a scribe copied the whole manuscript.—The position of the last syllable [nī] of the rubā`ī shows that the signature below the colophon was on the margin before the diagonal couplet of the rubā`ī was written,—therefore when the margin was fitted, as it looks to have been fitted, to the rifacimento. If this be the order of the two entries [i.e. the small-hand signature and the diagonal couplet], Shāh-i-jahān's "blessed name" may represent the small-hand signature which certainly shows minute differences from the writing of the text of the MS. in the name Bābur (q.v. passim in the Rāmpūr MS.).

d. The Bāburī-khat̤t̤ (Bābūr's script).

So early as 910 AH. the year of his conquest of Kābul, Bābur devised what was probably a variety of nakhsh, and called it the Bāburī-khat̤t̤ (f. 144_b_), a name used later by Ḥaidar Mīrzā, Niẕāmu'd-dīn Aḥmad and `Abdu'l-qādir Badāyūnī. He writes of it again (f. 179) s.a. 911 AH. when describing an interview had in 912 AH. with one of the Harāt Qāẓīs, at which the script was discussed, its specialities (mufradāt) exhibited to, and read by the Qāẓī who there and then wrote in it.[2834] In what remains to us of the Bābur-nāma it is not mentioned again till 935 AH. (fol. 357_b_) but at some intermediate date Bābur made in it a copy of the Qorān which he sent to Makka.[2835] In 935 AH. (f. 357_b_) it is mentioned in significant association with the despatch to each of four persons of a copy of the Translation (of the Wālidiyyah-risāla) and the Hindūstān poems, the significance of the association being that the simultaneous despatch with these copies of specimens of the Bāburī-khat̤t̤ points to its use in the manuscripts, and at least in Hind-āl's case, to help given for reading novel forms in their text. The above are the only instances now found in the Bābur-nāma of mention of the script.

The little we have met with—we have made no search—about the character of the script comes from the Abūshqa, s.n. sīghnāq, in the following entry:—

Sīghnāq ber nū`ah khat̤t̤ der Chaghatāīda khat̤t̤ Bāburī u ghairī kibī ki Bābur Mīrzā ash`ār'nda kīlūr bait

Khūblār khat̤t̤ī naṣīb'ng būlmāsā Bābur nī tāng?

Bāburī khat̤t̤ī aīmās dūr khat̤t̤ sīghnāqī mū dūr?[2836]

The old Osmanli-Turkish prose part of this appears to mean:—"Sīghnāq is a sort of hand-writing, in Chaghatāī the Bāburī-khat̤t̤ and others resembling it, as appears in Bābur Mīrzā's poems. Couplet":—

Without knowing the context of the couplet I make no attempt to translate it because its words khat̤t̤ or khaṭ and sīghnāq lend themselves to the kind of pun (īhām) "which consists in the employment of a word or phrase having more than one appropriate meaning, whereby the reader is often left in doubt as to the real significance of the passage."[2837] The rest of the rubā`ī may be given [together with the six other quotations of Bābur's verse now known only through the Abūshqa], in early Taẕkirātu 'sh-shu`āra of date earlier than 967 AH.

The root of the word sīghnāq will be sīq, pressed together, crowded, included, etc.; taking with this notion of compression, the explanations feine Schrift of Shaikh Effendi (Kunos) and Vambéry's pétite écriture, the Sīghnāqī and Bāburī Scripts are allowed to have been what that of the Rāmpūr MS. is, a small, compact, elegant hand-writing.—A town in the Caucasus named Sīghnākh, "située à peu près à 800 mètres d'altitude, commença par être une forteresse et un lieu de refuge, car telle est la signification de son nom tartare."[2838] Sīghnāqī is given by de Courteille (Dict. p. 368) as meaning a place of refuge or shelter.

The Bāburī-khat̤t̤ will be only one of the several hands Bābur is reputed to have practised; its description matches it with other niceties he took pleasure in, fine distinctions of eye and ear in measure and music.

e. Is the Rāmpūr MS. an example of the Bāburī-khat̤t̤?

Though only those well-acquainted with Oriental manuscripts dating before 910 AH. (1504 AD.) can judge whether novelties appear in the script of the Rāmpūr MS. and this particularly in its head-lines, there are certain grounds for thinking that though the manuscript be not Bābur's autograph, it may be in his script and the work of a specially trained scribe.

I set these grounds down because although the signs of a scribe's work on the manuscript seem clear, it is "locally" held to be Bābur's autograph. Has a tradition of its being in the Bāburī-khat̤t̤ glided into its being in the khat̤t̤-i-Bābur? Several circumstances suggest that it may be written in the Bāburī-khat̤t̤:—(1) the script is specially associated with the four transcripts of the Hindūstān poems (f. 357_b_), for though many letters must have gone to his sons, some indeed are mentioned in the Bābur-nāma, it is only with the poems that specimens of it are recorded as sent; (2) another matter shows his personal interest in the arrangement of manuscripts, namely, that as he himself about a month after the four books had gone off, made a new ruler, particularly on account of the head-lines of the Translation, it may be inferred that he had made or had adopted the one he superseded, and that his plan of arranging the poems was the model for copyists; the Rāmpūr MS. bearing, in the Translation section, corrections which may be his own, bears also a date earlier than that at which the four gifts started; it has its headlines ill-arranged and has throughout 13 lines to the page; his new ruler had 11; (3) perhaps the words taḥrīr qīldīm used in the colophon of the Rāmpūr MS. should be read with their full connotation of careful and elegant writing, or, put modestly, as saying, "I wrote down in my best manner," which for poems is likely to be in the Bāburī-khat̤t̤.[2839]

Perhaps an example of Bābur's script exists in the colophon, if not in the whole of the Mubīn manuscript once owned by Berézine, by him used for his Chréstomathie Turque, and described by him as "unique". If this be the actual manuscript Bābur sent into Mā warā'u'n-nahr (presumably to Khwāja Aḥrārī's family), its colophon which is a personal message addressed to the recipients, is likely to be autograph.

f. Metrical amusements.

(1) Of two instances of metrical amusements belonging to the end of 933 AH. and seeming to have been the distractions of illness, one is a simple transposition "in the fashion of the circles" (dawā'ir) into three measures (Rāmpūr MS. Facsimile, Plate XVIII and p. 22); the other is difficult because of the high number of 504 into which Bābur says (f. 330_b_) he cut up the following couplet:—

_Gūz u qāsh u soz u tīlīnī mū dī? Qad u khadd u saj u bīlīnī mū dī?_

All manuscripts agree in having 504, and Bābur wrote a tract (risāla) upon the transpositions.[2840] None of the modern treatises on Oriental Prosody allow a number so high to be practicable, but Maulānā Saifī of Bukhārā, of Bābur's own time (f. 180_b_) makes 504 seem even moderate, since after giving much detail about rubā`ī measures, he observes, "Some say there are 10,000" (Arūẓ-i-Saifī, Ranking's trs. p. 122). Presumably similar possibilities were open for the couplet in question. It looks like one made for the game, asks two foolish questions and gives no reply, lends itself to poetic license, and, if permutation of words have part in such a game, allows much without change of sense. Was Bābur's cessation of effort at 504 capricious or enforced by the exhaustion of possible changes? Is the arithmetical statement 9 × 8 × 7 = 504 the formula of the practicable permutations?

(2) To improvise verse having a given rhyme and topic must have demanded quick wits and much practice. Bābur gives at least one example of it (f. 252_b_) but Jahāngīr gives a fuller and more interesting one, not only because a rubā`ī of Bābur's was the model but from the circumstances of the game:[2841]—It was in 1024 AH. (1615 AD.) that a letter reached him from Māwarā'u'n-nahr written by Khwāja Hāshim Naqsh-bandī [who by the story is shown to have been of Aḥrārī's line], and recounting the long devotion of his family to Jahāngīr's ancestors. He sent gifts and enclosed in his letter a copy of one of Bābur's quatrains which he said Ḥaẓrat Firdaus-makānī had written for Ḥaẓrat Khwājagī (Aḥrārī's eldest son; f. 36_b_, p. 62 n. 2). Jahāngīr quotes a final hemistich only, "Khwājagīra mānda'īm, Khwājagīrā banda'īm" and thereafter made an impromptu verse upon the one sent to him.

A curious thing is that the line he quotes is not part of the quatrain he answered, but belongs to another not appropriate for a message between darwesh and pādshāh, though likely to have been sent by Bābur to Khwājagī. I will quote both because the matter will come up again for who works on the Hindūstān poems.[2842]

(1) The quatrain from the Hindūstān Poems is:—

Dar hawā'ī nafs gumrah `umr ẓāi` karda'īm [kanda'īm?]; _Pesh ahl-i-allāh az af`āl-i-khūd sharmanda'īm; Yak naẕr bā mukhlaṣān-i-khasta-dil farmā ki mā Khwājagīrā mānda'īm u Khwājagīrā banda'īm._

(2) That from the Akbar-nāma is:—

_Darweshānrā agarcha nah as khweshānīm, Lek az dil u jān mu`taqid eshānīm; Dūr ast magū`ī shāhī az darweshī, Shāhīm walī banda-i-darweshānīm._

The greater suitability of the second is seen from Jahāngīr's answering impromptu for which by sense and rhyme it sets the model; the meaning, however, of the fourth line in each may be identical, namely, "I remain the ruler but am the servant of the darwesh." Jahāngīr's impromptu is as follows:—

_Āī ānki marā mihr-i-tū besh az besh ast, Az daulat yād-i-būdat āī darwesh ast; Chandānki'z muẕẖ dahāt dilam shād shavad Shadīm az ānki laṯif az ḥadd besh ast._

He then called on those who had a turn for verse to "speak one" i.e. to improvise on his own; it was done as follows:—

_Dārīm agarcha shaghal-i-shāhī dar pesh, Har laḥẕa kunīm yād-i-darweshān besh; Gar shād shavad'z mā dil-i-yak darwesh, Ānra shumarīm ḥaṣil-i-shāhī khwesh._

R.—CHANDĪRĪ AND GŪĀLĪĀR.

The courtesy of the Government of India enables me to reproduce from the Archæological Survey Reports of 1871, Sir Alexander Cunningham's plans of Chandīrī and Gūālīār, which illustrate Bābur's narrative on f. 333, p. 592, and f. 340, p. 607.

S.—CONCERNING THE BĀBUR-NĀMA DATING OF 935 AH.

The dating of the diary of 935 AH. (f. 339 et seq.) is several times in opposition to what may be distinguished as the "book-rule" that the 12 lunar months of the Ḥijra year alternate in length between 30 and 29 days (intercalary years excepted), and that Muḥarram starts the alternation with 30 days. An early book stating the rule is Gladwin's Bengal Revenue Accounts; a recent one, Ranking's ed. of Platts' Persian Grammar.

As to what day of the week was the initial day of some of the months in 935 AH. Bābur's days differ from Wüstenfeld's who gives the full list of twelve, and from Cunningham's single one of Muḥarram 1st.

It seems worth while to draw attention to the flexibility, within limits, of Bābur's dating, [not with the object of adversely criticizing a rigid and convenient rule for common use, but as supplementary to that rule from a somewhat special source], because he was careful and observant, his dating was contemporary, his record, as being de die in diem, provides a check of consecutive narrative on his dates, which, moreover, are all held together by the external fixtures of Feasts and by the marked recurrence of Fridays observed. Few such writings as the Bābur-nāma diaries appear to be available for showing variation within a year's limit.

In 935 AH. Bābur enters few full dates, i.e. days of the week and month. Often he gives only the day of the week, the safest, however, in a diary. He is precise in saying at what time of the night or the day an action was done; this is useful not only as helping to get over difficulties caused by minor losses of text, but in the more general matter of the transference of a Ḥijra night-and-day which begins after sunset, to its Julian equivalent, of a day-and-night which begins at 12 a.m. This sometimes difficult transference affords a probable explanation of a good number of the discrepant dates found in Oriental-Occidental books.

Two matters of difference between the Bābur-nāma dating and that of some European calendars are as follows:—

a. Discrepancy as to the day of the week on which Muḥ 935 AH. began.

This discrepancy is not a trivial matter when a year's diary is concerned. The record of Muḥ. 1st and 2nd is missing from the Bābur-nāma; Friday the 3rd day of Muḥarram is the first day specified; the 1st was a Wednesday therefore. Erskine accepted this day; Cunningham and Wüstenfeld give Tuesday. On three grounds Wednesday seems right—at any rate at that period and place:—(1) The second Friday in Muḥarram was `Āshūr, the 10th (f. 240); (2) Wednesday is in serial order if reckoning be made from the last surviving date of 934 AH. with due allowance of an intercalary day to Ẕū'l-ḥijja (Gladwin), i.e. from Thursday Rajab 12th (April 2nd 1528 AD. f. 339, p. 602); (3) Wednesday is supported by the daily record of far into the year.

b. Variation in the length of the months of 935 AH.

There is singular variation between the Bābur-nāma and Wüstenfeld's Tables, both as to the day of the week on which months began, and as to the length of some months. This variation is shown in the following table, where asterisks mark agreement as to the days of the week, and the capital letters, quoted from W.'s Tables, denote A, Sunday; B, Tuesday, etc. (the bracketed names being of my entry).

Bābur-nāma. Wüstenfeld Days. Days. Muḥarram 29 Wednesday 30 C (Tuesday) Ṣafar 30 Thursday* 29 E (Thursday)* Rabī` I. 30 Saturday 30 F (Friday) " II. 29 Monday 29 A (Sunday) Jumadā I. 30 Tuesday 30 B (Monday) " II. 29 Thursday 29 D (Wednesday) Rajab 29 Friday 30 E (Thursday) Sha`bān 30 Saturday* 29 G (Saturday)* Ramẓān 29 Monday 30 A (Sunday) Shawwal 30 Tuesday* 29 C (Tuesday)* Ẕū'l-qa`da 29 Thursday 30 D (Wednesday) Ẕū'l-ḥijja 30 Friday* 29 T (Friday)*

The table shows that notwithstanding the discrepancy discussed in section a, of Bābur's making 935 AH. begin on a Wednesday, and Wüstenfeld on a Tuesday, the two authorities agree as to the initial week-day of four months out of twelve, viz. Ṣafar, Sha`bān, Shawwal and Ẕū'l-ḥijja.

Again:—In eight of the months the Bābur-nāma reverses the "book-rule" of alternative Muḥarram 30 days, Ṣafar 29 days et seq. by giving Muḥarram 29, Ṣafar 30. (This is seen readily by following the initial days of the week.) Again:—these eight months are in pairs having respectively 29 and 30 days, and the year's total is 364.—Four months follow the fixed rule, i.e. as though the year had begun Muḥ. 30 days, Ṣafar 29 days—namely, the two months of Rabī` and the two of Jumāda.—Ramẓān to which under "book-rule" 30 days are due, had 29 days, because, as Bābur records, the Moon was seen on the 29th.—In the other three instances of the reversed 30 and 29, one thing is common, viz. Muḥarram, Rajab, Ẕū'l-qa`da (as also Ẕū'l-ḥijja) are "honoured" months.—It would be interesting if some expert in this Musalmān matter would give the reasons dictating the changes from rule noted above as occurring in 935 AH.

c. Varia.

(1) On f. 367 Saturday is entered as the 1st day of Sha`bān and Wednesday as the 4th, but on f. 368_b_ stands Wednesday 5th, as suits the serial dating. If the mistake be not a mere slip, it may be due to confusion of hours, the ceremony chronicled being accomplished on the eve of the 5th, Anglicé, after sunset on the 4th.

(2) A fragment only survives of the record of Ẕū'l-ḥijja 935 AH. It contains a date, Thursday 7th, and mentions a Feast which will be that of the `Īdu'l-kabīr on the 10th (Sunday). Working on from this to the first-mentioned day of 936 AH. viz. Tuesday, Muḥarram 3rd, the month (which is the second of a pair having 29 and 30 days) is seen to have 30 days and so to fit on to 936 AH. The series is Sunday 10th, 17th, 24th (Sat. 30th) Sunday 1st, Tuesday 3rd.

Two clerical errors of mine in dates connecting with this Appendix are corrected here:—(1) On p. 614 n. 5, for Oct. 2nd read Oct. 3rd; (2) on p. 619 penultimate line of the text, for Nov. 28th read Nov. 8th.

T.—ON L:KNŪ (LAKHNAU) AND L:KNŪR (LAKHNŪR, NOW SHĀHĀBĀD IN RĀMPŪR).

One or other of the above-mentioned names occurs eight times in the Bābur-nāma (s.a. 932, 934, 935 AH.), some instances being shown by their context to represent Lakhnau in Oudh, others inferentially and by the verbal agreement of the Ḥaidarābād Codex and Kehr's Codex to stand for Lakhnūr (now Shāhābād in Rāmpūr). It is necessary to reconsider the identification of those not decided by their context, both because there is so much variation in the copies of the `Abdu'r-raḥīm Persian translation that they give no verbal help, and because Mr. Erskine and M. de Courteille are in agreement about them and took the whole eight to represent Lakhnau. This they did on different grounds, but in each case their agreement has behind it a defective textual basis.—Mr. Erskine, as is well known, translated the `Abdu'r-raḥīm Persian text without access to the original Turkī but, if he had had the Elphinstone Codex when translating, it would have given him no help because all the eight instances occur on folios not preserved by that codex. His only sources were not-first-rate Persian MSS. in which he found casual variation from terminal nū to nūr, which latter form may have been read by him as nūū (whence perhaps the old Anglo-Indian transliteration he uses, Luknow).[2843]—M. de Courteille's position is different; his uniform Lakhnau obeyed the same uniformity in his source the Kāsān Imprint, and would appear to him the more assured for the concurrence of the Memoirs. His textual basis, however, for these words is Dr. Ilminsky's and not Kehr's. No doubt the uniform Lakhnū of the Kāsān Imprint is the result of Dr. Ilminsky's uncertainty as to the accuracy of his single Turkī archetype [Kehr's MS.], and also of his acceptance of Mr. Erskine's uniform Luknow.[2844]—Since the Ḥaidarābād Codex became available and its collation with Kehr's Codex has been made, a better basis for distinguishing between the L:knū and L:knūr of the Persian MSS. has been obtained.[2845] The results of the collation are entered in the following table, together with what is found in the Kāsān Imprint and the Memoirs. [N.B. The two sets of bracketed instances refer each to one place; the asterisks show where Ilminsky varies from Kehr.]

Ḥai. MS. Kehr's MS. Kāsān Imprint. Memoirs. 1. {f. 278_b_ L:knūr L:knū L:knū, p. 361 Luknow. 2. {f. 338 L:knū " " p. 437 "

3. f. 292_b_ L:knūr L:knūr " p. 379* not entered.

4. f. 329 L:knūr L:knūr " p. 362* Luknow. 5. f. 334 L:knū L:knū " p. 432* "

6. {f. 376 L:knū L:knūr " p. 486* " 7. {f. 376_b_ L:knūr " " p. 487* " 8. {f. 377_b_ L:knū " " p. 488* "

The following notes give some grounds for accepting the names as the two Turkī codices agree in giving them:—

The first and second instances of the above table, those of the Ḥai. Codex f. 278_b_ and f. 338, are shown by their context to represent Lakhnau.

The third (f. 292_b_) is an item of Bābur's Revenue List. The Turkī codices are supported by B.M. Or. 1999, which is a direct copy of Shaikh Zain's autograph T̤ābaqāt-i-bāburī, all three having L:knūr. Kehr's MS. and Or. 1999 are descendants of the second degree from the original List; that the Ḥai. Codex is a direct copy is suggested by its pseudo-tabular arrangement of the various items.—An important consideration supporting L:knūr, is that the List is in Persian and may reasonably be accepted as the one furnished officially for the Pādshāh's information when he was writing his account of Hindūstān (cf. Appendix P, p. liv). This official character disassociates it from any such doubtful spelling by the foreign Pādshāh as cannot but suggest itself when the variants of e.g. Dalmau and Bangarmau are considered. L:knūr is what three persons copying independently read in the official List, and so set down that careful scribes i.e. Kehr and `Abdu'l-lāh (App. P) again wrote L:knūr.[2846]—Another circumstance favouring L:knūr (Lakhnūr) is that the place assigned to it in the List is its geographical one between Saṃbhal and Khairābād.—Something for [or perhaps against] accepting Lakhnūr as the sarkār of the List may be known in local records or traditions. It had been an important place, and later on it paid a large revenue to Akbar [as part of Saṃbhal].—It appears to have been worth the attention of Bīban Jalwānī (f. 329).—Another place is associated with L:knūr in the Revenue List, the forms of which are open to a considerable number of interpretations besides that of Baksar shown in loco on p. 521. Only those well acquainted with the United Provinces or their bye-gone history can offer useful suggestion about it. Maps show a "Madkar" 6 m. south of old Lakhnūr; there are in the United Provinces two Baksars and as many other Lakhnūrs (none however being so suitable as what is now Shāhābād). Perhaps in the archives of some old families there may be help found to interpret the entry L:knūr u B:ks:r (var.), a conjecture the less improbable that the Gazetteer of the Province of Oude (ii, 58) mentions a farmān of Bābur Pādshāh's dated 1527 AD. and upholding a grant to Shaikh Qāẓī of Bīlgrām.

The fourth instance (f. 329) is fairly confirmed as Lakhnūr by its context, viz. an officer received the district of Badāyūn from the Pādshāh and was sent against Bīban who had laid siege to L:knūr on which Badāyūn bordered.—At the time Lakhnau may have been held from Bābur by Shaikh Bāyazīd Farmūlī in conjunction with Aūd. Its estates are recorded as still in Farmūlī possession, that of the widow of "Kala Pahār" Farmūlī.—(See infra.)

The fifth instance (f. 334) connects with Aūd (Oudh) because royal troops abandoning the place L:knū were those who had been sent against Shaikh Bāyazīd in Aūd.

The remaining three instances (f. 376, f. 376_b_, f. 377_b_) appear to concern one place, to which Bīban and Bāyazīd were rumoured to intend going, which they captured and abandoned. As the table of variants shows, Kehr's MS. reads Lakhnūr in all three places, the Ḥai. MS. once only, varying from itself as it does in Nos. 1 and 2.—A circumstance supporting Lakhnūr is that one of the messengers sent to Bābur with details of the capture was the son of Shāh Muḥ. Dīwāna whose record associates him rather with Badakhshān, and with Humāyūn and Saṃbhal [perhaps with Lakhnūr itself] than with Bābur's own army.—Supplementing my notes on these three instances, much could be said in favour of reading Lakhnūr, about time and distance done by the messengers and by `Abdu'l-lah kitābdār, on his way to Saṃbhal and passing near Lakhnūr; much too about the various rumours and Bābur's immediate counter-action. But to go into it fully would need lengthy treatment which the historical unimportance of the little problem appears not to demand.—Against taking the place to be Lakhnau there are the considerations (a) that Lakhnūr was the safer harbourage for the Rains and less near the westward march of the royal troops returning from the battle of the Goghrā; (b) that the fort of Lakhnau was the renowned old Machchi-bawan (cf. Gazetteer of the Province of Oude, 3 vols., 1877, ii, 366).—So far as I have been able to fit dates and transactions together, there seems no reason why the two Afghāns should not have gone to Lakhnūr, have crossed the Ganges near it, dropped down south [perhaps even intending to recross at Dalmau] with the intention of getting back to the Farmūlīs and Jalwānīs perhaps in Sārwār, perhaps elsewhere to Bāyazīd's brother Ma`rūf.

U.—THE INSCRIPTIONS ON BĀBUR'S MOSQUE IN AJODHYA (OUDH).

Thanks to the kind response made by the Deputy-Commissioner of Fyzābād to my husband's enquiry about two inscriptions mentioned by several Gazetteers as still existing on "Bābur's Mosque" in Oudh, I am able to quote copies of both.[2847]

a. The inscription inside the Mosque is as follows:—

1. _Ba farmūda-i-Shāh Bābur ki `ādilash Banā'īst tā kākh-i-gardūn mulāqī_,

2. _Banā kard īn muhbiṯ-i-qudsiyān Amīr-i-sa`ādat-nishān Mīr Bāqī_

3. _Bavad khair bāqī! chū sāl-i-banā'īsh `Iyān shud ki guftam_,—Buvad khair bāqī (935).

The translation and explanation of the above, manifestly made by a Musalmān and as such having special value, are as follows:—[2848]

1. By the command of the Emperor Bābur whose justice is an edifice reaching up to the very height of the heavens,

2. The good-hearted Mīr Bāqī built this alighting-place of angels;[2849]

3. Bavad khāir bāqī! (May this goodness last for ever!)[2850]

The year of building it was made clear likewise when I said, Buvad khair bāqī ( = 935).[2851]

The explanation of this is:—

1st couplet:—The poet begins by praising the Emperor Bābur under whose orders the mosque was erected. As justice is the (chief) virtue of kings, he naturally compares his (Bābur's) justice to a palace reaching up to the very heavens, signifying thereby that the fame of that justice had not only spread in the wide world but had gone up to the heavens.

2nd couplet:—In the second couplet, the poet tells who was entrusted with the work of construction. Mīr Bāqī was evidently some nobleman of distinction at Bābur's Court.—The noble height, the pure religious atmosphere, and the scrupulous cleanliness and neatness of the mosque are beautifully suggested by saying that it was to be the abode of angels.

3rd couplet:—The third couplet begins and ends with the expression Buvad khair bāqī. The letters forming it by their numerical values represent the number 935, thus:—

B = 2, v = 6, d = 4 total 12 Kh = 600, ai = 10, r = 200 " 810 B = 2, ā = 1, q = 100, r = 10 " 113 ___ Total 935

The poet indirectly refers to a religious commandment (dictum?) of the Qorān that a man's good deeds live after his death, and signifies that this noble mosque is verily such a one.

b. The inscription outside the Mosque is as follows:—

1. _Ba nām-i-anki dānā hast akbar Ki khāliq-i-jamla `ālam lā-makānī_

2. _Durūd Muṣṯafá ba`d az sitāyish Ki sarwar-i-aṃbiyā' dū jahānī_

3. _Fasāna dar jahān Bābur qalandar Ki shud dar daur gītī kāmrānī._[2852]

The explanation of the above is as follows:—

In the first couplet the poet praises God, in the second Muḥammad, in the third Bābur.—There is a peculiar literary beauty in the use of the word lā-makānī in the 1st couplet. The author hints that the mosque is meant to be the abode of God, although He has no fixed abiding-place.—In the first hemistich of the 3rd couplet the poet gives Bābur the appellation of qalandar, which means a perfect devotee, indifferent to all worldly pleasures. In the second hemistich he gives as the reason for his being so, that Bābur became and was known all the world over as a qalandar, because having become Emperor of India and having thus reached the summit of worldly success, he had nothing to wish for on this earth.[2853]

The inscription is incomplete and the above is the plain interpretation which can be given to the couplets that are to hand. Attempts may be made to read further meaning into them but the language would not warrant it.

V.—BĀBUR'S GARDENS IN AND NEAR KĀBUL.

The following particulars about gardens made by Bābur in or near Kābul, are given in Muḥammad Amīr of Kazwīn's Pādshāh-nāma (Bib. Ind. ed. p. 585, p. 588).

Ten gardens are mentioned as made:—the Shahr-ārā (Town-adorning) which when Shāh-i-jahān first visited Kābul in the 12th year of his reign (1048 AH.-1638 AD.) contained very fine plane-trees Bābur had planted, beautiful trees having magnificent trunks,[2854]—the Chār-bāgh,—the Bāgh-i-jalau-khāna,[2855]—the Aūrta-bāgh (Middle-garden),—the Ṣaurat-bāgh,—the Bāgh-i-mahtāb (Moonlight-garden),—the Bāgh-i-āhū-khāna (Garden-of-the-deer-house),—and three smaller ones. Round these gardens rough-cast walls were made (renewed?) by Jahāngīr (1016 AH.).

The above list does not specify the garden Bābur made and selected for his burial; this is described apart (l.c. p. 588) with details of its restoration and embellishment by Shāh-i-jahān the master-builder of his time, as follows:—

The burial-garden was 500 yards (gaz) long; its ground was in 15 terraces, 30 yards apart(?). On the 15th terrace is the tomb of Ruqaiya Sulṯān Begam[2856]; as a small marble platform (chabūṭra) had been made near it by Jahāngīr's command, Shāh-i-jahān ordered (both) to be enclosed by a marble screen three yards high.—Bābur's tomb is on the 14th terrace. In accordance with his will, no building was erected over it, but Shāh-i-jahān built a small marble mosque on the terrace below.[2857] It was begun in the 17th year (of Shāh-i-jahān's reign) and was finished in the 19th, after the conquest of Balkh and Badakhshān, at a cost of 30,000 rūpīs. It is admirably constructed.—From the 12th terrace running-water flows along the line (rasta) of the avenue;[2858] but its 12 water-falls, because not constructed with cemented stone, had crumbled away and their charm was lost; orders were given therefore to renew them entirely and lastingly, to make a small reservoir below each fall, and to finish with Kābul marble the edges of the channel and the waterfalls, and the borders of the reservoirs.—And on the 9th terrace there was to be a reservoir 11 x 11 yards, bordered with Kābul marble, and on the 10th terrace one 15 x 15, and at the entrance to the garden another 15 x 15, also with a marble border.—And there was to be a gateway adorned with gilded cupolas befitting that place, and beyond (pesh) the gateway a square station,[2859] one side of which should be the garden-wall and the other three filled with cells; that running-water should pass through the middle of it, so that the destitute and poor people who might gather there should eat their food in those cells, sheltered from the hardship of snow and rain.[2860]

FOOTNOTES

[1] From Atkinson's Sketches in Afghanistan (I.O. Lib. & B.M.).

[2] See p. 710 (where for "Daniels" read Atkinson).

[3] See Gul-badan Begim's Humayun-nama Index III, in loco.Return to passage

[4] Cf. Cap. II, PROBLEMS OF THE MUTILATED BABUR-NAMA and Tarīkh-i-rashīdi, trs. p. 174.Return to passage

[5] The suggestion, implied by my use of this word, that Babur may have definitely closed his autobiography (as Timur did under other circumstances) is due to the existence of a compelling cause viz. that he would be expectant of death as the price of Humayun's restored life (p. 701).

[6] Cf. p. 83 and n. and Add. Note, P. 83 for further emendation of a contradiction effected by some malign influence in the note (p. 83) between parts of that note, and between it and Babur's account of his not-drinking in Herat.

[7] Teufel held its title to be waqi` (this I adopted in 1908), but it has no definite support and in numerous instances of its occurrence to describe the acts or doings of Babur, it could be read as a common noun.

[8] It stands on the reverse of the frontal page of the Haidarabad Codex; it is Timur-pulad's name for the Codex he purchased in Bukhara, and it is thence brought on by Kehr (with Ilminski), and Klaproth (Cap. III); it is used by Khwafi Khan (d. cir. 1732), etc.

[9] That Babur left a complete record much indicates beyond his own persistence and literary bias, e.g. cross-reference with and needed complements from what is lost; mention by other writers of Babur's information, notably by Haidar.

[10] App. H, xxx.

[11] p. 446, n. 6. Babur's order for the cairn would fit into the lost record of the first month of the year (p. 445).

[12] Parts of the Babur-nama sent to Babur's sons are not included here.

[13] The standard of comparison is the 382 fols. of the Haidarabad Codex.

[14] This MS. is not to be confused with one Erskine misunderstood Humayun to have copied (Memoirs, p. 303 and JRAS. 1900, p. 443).

[15] For precise limits of the original annotation see p. 446 n.—For details about the E. Codex see JRAS. 1907, art. The Elph. Codex, and for the colophon AQR. 1900, July, Oct. and JRAS. 1905, pp. 752, 761.

[16] See Index s.n. and III ante and JRAS. 1900-3-5-6-7.

[17] Here speaks the man reared in touch with European classics; (pure) Turki though it uses no relatives (Radloff) is lucid. Cf. Cap. IV The Memoirs of Babur.

[18] For analysis of a retranslated passage see JRAS. 1908, p. 85.

[19] Tuzuk-i-jahangiri, Rogers & Beveridge's trs. i, 110; JRAS. 1900, p. 756, for the Persian passage, 1908, p. 76 for the "Fragments", 1900, p. 476 for Ilminski's Preface (a second translation is accessible at the B.M. and I.O. Library and R.A.S.), Memoirs Preface, p. ix, Index s.nn. de Courteille, Teufel, Bukhara MSS. and Part iii eo cap.

[20] For Shah-i-jahan's interest in Timur see sign given in a copy of his note published in my translation volume of Gul-badan Begim's Humayun-nama, p. xiii.

[21] JRAS. 1900 p. 466, 1902 p. 655, 1905 art. s.n., 1908 pp. 78, 98; Index in loco s.n.

[22] Cf. JRAS. 1900, Nos. VI, VII, VIII.

[23] Ilminski's difficulties are foreshadowed here by the same confusion of identity between the Babur-nama proper and the Bukhara compilation (Preface, Part iii, p. li).

[24] Cf. Erskine's Preface passim, and in loco item XI, cap. iv. The Memoirs of Baber, and Index s.n.

[25] The last blow was given to the phantasmal reputation of the book by the authoritative Haidarabad Codex which now can be seen in facsimile in many Libraries.

[26] But for present difficulties of intercourse with Petrograd, I would have re-examined with Kehr's the collateral Codex of 1742 (copied in 1839 and now owned by the Petrograd University). It might be useful; as Kehr's volume has lost pages and may be disarranged here and there.

The list of Kehr's items is as follows:—

1 (not in the Imprint). A letter from Babur to Kamran the date of which is fixed as 1527 by its committing Ibrahim Ludi's son to Kamran's charge (p. 544). It is heard of again in the Bukhara Compilation, is lost from Kehr's Codex, and preserved from his archetype by Klaproth who translated it. Being thus found in Bukhara in the first decade of the eighteenth century (our earliest knowledge of the Compilation is 1709), the inference is allowed that it went to Bukhara as loot from the defeated Kamran's camp and that an endorsement its companion Babur-nama (proper) bears was made by the Auzbeg of two victors over Kamran, both of 1550, both in Tramontana.(1)

2 (not in Imp.). Timur-pulad's memo. about the purchase of his Codex in cir. 1521 (eo cap. post).

3 (Imp. 1). Compiler's Preface of Praise (JRAS. 1900, p. 474).

4 (Imp. 2). Babur's Acts in Farghana, in diction such as to seem a re-translation of the Persian translation of 1589. How much of Kamran's MS. was serviceable is not easy to decide, because the Turki fettering of `Abdu'r-rahim's Persian lends itself admirably to re-translation.(2)

5 (Imp. 3). The "Rescue-passage" (App. D) attributable to Jahangir.

6 (Imp. 4). Babur's Acts in Kabul, seeming (like No. 4) a re-translation or patching of tattered pages. There are also passages taken verbatim from the Persian.

7 (Imp. omits). A short length of Babur's Hindustan Section, carefully shewn damaged by dots and dashes.

8 (Imp. 5). Within 7, the spurious passage of App. L and also scattered passages about a feast, perhaps part of 7.

9 (Imp. separates off at end of vol.). Translated passage from the Akbar-nāma, attributable to Jahangir, briefly telling of Kanwa (1527), Babur's latter years (both changed to first person), death and court.(3)

[Babur's history has been thus brought to an end, incomplete in the balance needed of 7. In Kehr's volume a few pages are left blank except for what shews a Russian librarian's opinion of the plan of the book, "Here end the writings of Shah Babur."]

10 (Imp. omits). Preface to the history of Humayun, beginning at the Creation and descending by giant strides through notices of Khans and Sultans to "Babur Mirza who was the father of Humayun Padshah". Of Babur what further is said connects with the battle of Ghaj-davan (918-1512 q.v.). It is ill-informed, laying blame on him as if he and not Najm Sani had commanded—speaks of his preference for the counsel of young men and of the numbers of combatants. It is noticeable for more than its inadequacy however; its selection of the Ghaj-davan episode from all others in Babur's career supports circumstantially what is dealt with later, the Ghaj-davani authorship of the Compilation.

11 (Imp. omits). Under a heading "Humayun Padshah" is a fragment about (his? Accession) Feast, whether broken off by loss of his pages or of those of his archetype examination of the P. Univ. Codex may show.

12 (Imp. 6). An excellent copy of Babur's Hindustan Section, perhaps obtained from the Ahrari house. [This Ilminski places (I think) where Kehr has No. 7.] From its position and from its bearing a scribe's date of completion (which Kehr brings over), viz. Tamt shud 1126 (Finished 1714), the compiler may have taken it for Humayun's, perhaps for the account of his reconquest of Hind in 1555.

[The remaining entries in Kehr's volume are a quatrain which may make jesting reference to his finished task, a librarian's Russian entry of the number of pages (831), and the words Etablissement Orientale, Fr. v. Adelung, 1825 (the Director of the School from 1793).(4)]

[27] That Babur-nama of the "Kamran-docket" is the mutilated and tattered basis, allowed by circumstance, of the compiled history of Babur, filled out and mended by the help of the Persian translation of 1589. Cf. Kehr's Latin Trs. fly-leaf entry; Klaproth s.n.; A.N. trs. H.B., p. 260; JRAS. 1908, 1909, on the "Kamran-docket" where are defects needing Klaproth's second article (1824).

[28] For an analysis of an illustrative passage see JRAS. 1906; for facilities of re-translation see eo cap. p. xviii, where Erskine is quoted.

[29] See A.N. trans., p. 260; Prefaces of Ilminski and de Courteille; ZDMG. xxxvii, Teufel's art.; JRAS. 1906.

[30] For particulars about Kehr's Codex see Smirnov's Catalogue of the School Library and JRAS. 1900, 1906. Like others who have made statements resting on the mistaken identity of the Bukhara Compilation, many of mine are now given to the winds.

[31] See Gregorief's "Russian policy regarding Central Asia", quoted in Schuyler's Turkistan, App. IV.

[32] The Mission was well received, started to return to Petrograd, was attacked by Turkmans, went back to Bukhara, and there stayed until it could attempt the devious route which brought it to the capital in 1725.

[33] One might say jestingly that the spirit in the book had rebelled since 1725 against enforced and changing masquerade as a phantasm of two other books!

[34] Neither Ilminski nor Smirnov mentions another "Babur-nama" Codex than Kehr's.

[35] A Correspondent combatting my objection to publishing a second edition of the Memoirs, backed his favouring opinion by reference to `Umar Khayyam and Fitzgerald. Obviously no analogy exists; Erskine's redundance is not the flower of a deft alchemy, but is the prosaic consequence of a secondary source.Return to passage

[36] The manuscripts relied on for revising the first section of the Memoirs, (i.e. 899 to 908 AH.-1494 to 1502 AD.) are the Elphinstone and the Ḥaidarābād Codices. To variants from them occurring in Dr. Kehr's own transcript no authority can be allowed because throughout this section, his text appears to be a compilation and in parts a retranslation from one or other of the two Persian translations (Wāqi`āt-i-bāburī) of the Bābur-nāma. Moreover Dr. Ilminsky's imprint of Kehr's text has the further defect in authority that it was helped out from the Memoirs, itself not a direct issue from the Turkī original.Return to passage

Information about the manuscripts of the Bābur-nāma can be found in the JRAS for 1900, 1902, 1905, 1906, 1907 and 1908.

The foliation marked in the margin of this book is that of the Ḥaidarābād Codex and of its facsimile, published in 1905 by the Gibb Memorial Trust.

[37] Bābur, born on Friday, Feb. 14th. 1483 (Muḥarram 6, 888 AH.), succeeded his father, `Umar Shaikh who died on June 8th. 1494 (Ramẓān 4, 899 AH.).Return to passage

[38] pād-shāh, protecting lord, supreme. It would be an anachronism to translate pādshāh by King or Emperor, previous to 913 AH. (1507 AD.) because until that date it was not part of the style of any Tīmūrid, even ruling members of the house being styled Mīrzā. Up to 1507 therefore Bābur's correct style is Bābur Mīrzā. (Cf. f. 215 and note.)Return to passage

[39] See Āyīn-i-akbarī, Jarrett, p. 44.Return to passage

[40] The Ḥai. MS. and a good many of the W.-i-B. MSS. here write Aūtrār. [Aūtrār like Tarāz was at some time of its existence known as Yāngī (New).] Tarāz seems to have stood near the modern Auliya-ātā; Ālmālīgh,—a Metropolitan see of the Nestorian Church in the 14th. century,—to have been the old capital of Kuldja, and Ālmātū (var. Ālmātī) to have been where Vernoe (Vierny) now is. Ālmālīgh and Ālmātū owed their names to the apple (ālmā). Cf. Bretschneider's Mediæval Geography p. 140 and T.R. (Elias and Ross) s.nn.Return to passage

[41] Mughūl u Aūzbeg jihatdīn. I take this, the first offered opportunity of mentioning (1) that in transliterating Turkī words I follow Turkī lettering because I am not competent to choose amongst systems which e.g. here, reproduce Aūzbeg as Ūzbeg, Özbeg and Euzbeg; and (2) that style being part of an autobiography, I am compelled, in pressing back the Memoirs on Bābur's Turkī mould, to retract from the wording of the western scholars, Erskine and de Courteille. Of this compulsion Bābur's bald phrase Mughūl u Aūzbeg jihatdīn provides an illustration. Each earlier translator has expressed his meaning with more finish than he himself; `Abdu'r-raḥīm, by az jihat `ubūr-i (Mughūl u) Aūzbeg, improves on Bābur, since the three towns lay in the tideway of nomad passage (`ubūr) east and west; Erskine writes "in consequence of the incursions" etc. and de C. "grace aux ravages commis" etc.Return to passage

[42] Schuyler (ii, 54) gives the extreme length of the valley as about 160 miles and its width, at its widest, as 65 miles.Return to passage

[43] Following a manifestly clerical error in the Second W.-i-B. the Akbar-nāma and the Mems. are without the seasonal limitation, "in winter." Bābur here excludes from winter routes one he knew well, the Kīndīrlīk Pass; on the other hand Kostenko says that this is open all the year round. Does this contradiction indicate climatic change? (Cf. f. 54b and note; A.N. Bib. Ind. ed. i, 85 (H. Beveridge i, 221) and, for an account of the passes round Farghāna, Kostenko's Turkistān Region, Tables of Contents.)Return to passage

[44] Var. Banākat, Banākas̤, Fīākat, Fanākand. Of this place Dr. Rieu writes (Pers. cat. i, 79) that it was also called Shāsh and, in modern times, Tāshkīnt. Bābur does not identify Fanākat with the Tāshkīnt of his day but he identifies it with Shāhrukhiya (cf. Index s.nn.) and distinguishes between Tāshkīnt-Shāsh and Fanākat-Shāhrukhiya. It may be therefore that Dr. Rieu's Tāshkīnt-Fanākat was Old Tāshkīnt,—(Does Fanā-kīnt mean Old Village?) some 14 miles nearer to the Saiḥūn than the Tāshkīnt of Bābur's day or our own.Return to passage

[45] hech daryā qātīlmās. A gloss of dīgar (other) in the Second W.-i-B. has led Mr. Erskine to understand "meeting with no other river in its course." I understand Bābur to contrast the destination of the Saiḥūn which he [erroneously] says sinks into the sands, with the outfall of e.g. the Amū into the Sea of Aral.Return to passage

Cf. First W.-i-B. I.O. MS. 215 f. 2; Second W.-i-B. I.O. MS. 217 f. 1b and Ouseley's Ibn Haukal p. 232-244; also Schuyler and Kostenko l.c.

[46] Bābur's geographical unit in Central Asia is the township or, with more verbal accuracy, the village i.e. the fortified, inhabited and cultivated oasis. Of frontiers he says nothing.Return to passage

[47] i.e. they are given away or taken. Bābur's interest in fruits was not a matter of taste or amusement but of food. Melons, for instance, fresh or stored, form during some months the staple food of Turkistānīs. Cf. T.R. p. 303 and (in Kāshmīr) 425; Timkowski's Travels of the Russian Mission i, 419 and Th. Radloff's Réceuils d'Itinéraires p. 343.Return to passage

N.B. At this point two folios of the Elphinstone Codex are missing.

[48] Either a kind of melon or the pear. For local abundance of pears see Āyīn-i-akbarī, Blochmann p. 6; Kostenko and Von Schwarz.Return to passage

[49] qūrghān, i.e. the walled town within which was the citadel (ark).Return to passage

[50] Tūqūz tarnau sū kīrār, bū `ajab tūr kīm bīr yīrdīn ham chīqmās. Second W.-i-B. I.O. 217 f. 2, nuh jū'ī āb dar qila` dar mī āyid u īn `ajab ast kah hama az yak jā ham na mī bar āyid. (Cf. Mems. p. 2 and Méms. i, 2.) I understand Bābur to mean that all the water entering was consumed in the town. The supply of Andijān, in the present day, is taken both from the Āq Būrā (i.e. the Aūsh Water) and, by canal, from the Qarā Daryā.Return to passage

[51] khandaqnīng tāsh yānī. Second W.-i-B. I.O. 217 f. 2 dar kīnār sang bast khandaq. Here as in several other places, this Persian translation has rendered Turkī tāsh, outside, as if it were Turkī tāsh, stone. Bābur's adjective stone is sangīn (f. 45b l. 8). His point here is the unusual circumstance of a high-road running round the outer edge of the ditch. Moreover Andijān is built on and of loess. Here, obeying his Persian source, Mr. Erskine writes "stone-faced ditch"; M. de C. obeying his Turkī one, "bord extérieur."Return to passage

[52] qīrghāwal āsh-kīnasī bīla. Āsh-kīna, a diminutive of āsh, food, is the rice and vegetables commonly served with the bird. Kostenko i, 287 gives a recipe for what seems āsh-kīna.Return to passage

[53] b. 1440; d. 1500 AD.Return to passage

[54] Yūsuf was in the service of Bāī-sunghar Mīrzā Shāhrukhī (d. 837 AH.-1434 AD.). Cf. Daulat Shāh's _Memoirs of the Poets_ (Browne) pp. 340 and 350-1. (H.B.)Return to passage

[55] gūzlār aīl bīzkāk kūb būlūr. Second W.-i-B. (I.O. 217 f. 2) here and on f. 4 has read Turkī gūz, eye, for Turkī gūz or goz, autumn. It has here a gloss not in the Ḥaidarābād or Kehr's MSS. (Cf. Mems. p. 4 note.) This gloss may be one of Humāyūn's numerous notes and may have been preserved in the Elphinstone Codex, but the fact cannot now be known because of the loss of the two folios already noted. (See Von Schwarz and Kostenko concerning the autumn fever of Transoxiana.)Return to passage

[56] The Pers. trss. render yīghāch by farsang; Ujfalvy also takes the yīghāch and the farsang as having a common equivalent of about 6 kilomètres. Bābur's statements in yīghāch however, when tested by ascertained distances, do not work out into the farsang of four miles or the kilomètre of 8 kil. to 5 miles. The yīghāch appears to be a variable estimate of distance, sometimes indicating the time occupied on a given journey, at others the distance to which a man's voice will carry. (Cf. Ujfalvy Expédition scientifique ii, 179; Von Schwarz p. 124 and de C.'s Dict. s.n. yīghāch. In the present instance, if Bābur's 4 y. equalled 4 f. the distance from Aūsh to Andijān should be about 16 m.; but it is 33 m. 1-3/4 fur. i.e. 50 versts. Kostenko ii, 33.) I find Bābur's yīghāch to vary from about 4 m. to nearly 8 m.Return to passage

[57] āqār sū, the irrigation channels on which in Turkistān all cultivation depends. Major-General Gérard writes, (Report of the Pamir Boundary Commission, p. 6,) "Osh is a charming little town, resembling Islāmābād in Kāshmīr,—everywhere the same mass of running water, in small canals, bordered with willow, poplar and mulberry." He saw the Āq Būrā, the White wolf, mother of all these running waters, as a "bright, stony, trout-stream;" Dr. Stein saw it as a "broad, tossing river." (Buried Cities of Khotan, p. 45.) Cf. Réclus vi, cap. Farghāna; Kostenko i, 104; Von Schwarz s.nn.Return to passage

[58] Aūshnīng faẓīlatīdā khailī aḥādis̤ wārid dūr. Second W.-i-B. (I.O. 217 f. 2) Faẓīlat-i-Aūsh aḥadis̤ wārid ast. Mems. (p. 3) "The excellencies of Ush are celebrated even in the sacred traditions." Méms. (i, 2) "On cite beaucoup de traditions qui célèbrent l'excellence de ce climat." Aūsh may be mentioned in the traditions on account of places of pilgrimage near it; Bābur's meaning may be merely that its excellencies are traditional. Cf. Ujfalvy ii, 172.Return to passage

[59] Most travellers into Farghāna comment on Bābur's account of it. One much discussed point is the position of the Barā Koh. The personal observations of Ujfalvy and Schuyler led them to accept its identification with the rocky ridge known as the Takht-i-sulaimān. I venture to supplement this by the suggestion that Bābur, by Barā Koh, did not mean the whole of the rocky ridge, the name of which, Takht-i-sulaimān, an ancient name, must have been known to him, but one only of its four marked summits. Writing of the ridge Madame Ujfalvy says, "Il y a quatre sommets dont le plus élevé est le troisième comptant par le nord." Which summit in her sketch (p. 327) is the third and highest is not certain, but one is so shewn that it may be the third, may be the highest and, as being a peak, can be described as symmetrical i.e. Bābur's mauzūn. For this peak an appropriate name would be Barā Koh.Return to passage

If the name Barā Koh could be restricted to a single peak of the Takht-i-sulaimān ridge, a good deal of earlier confusion would be cleared away, concerning which have written, amongst others, Ritter (v, 432 and 732); Réclus (vi. 54); Schuyler (ii, 43) and those to whom these three refer. For an excellent account, graphic with pen and pencil, of Farghāna and of Aūsh see Madame Ujfalvy's De Paris à Samarcande cap. v.

[60] rūd. This is a precise word since the Āq Būrā (the White Wolf), in a relatively short distance, falls from the Kūrdūn Pass, 13,400 ft. to Aūsh, 3040 ft. and thence to Andijān, 1380 ft. Cf. Kostenko i, 104; Huntingdon in Pumpelly's Explorations in Turkistān p. 179 and the French military map of 1904.Return to passage

[61] Whether Bābur's words, bāghāt, bāghlār and bāghcha had separate significations, such as orchard, vineyard and ordinary garden i.e. garden-plots of small size, I am not able to say but what appears fairly clear is that when he writes bāghāt u bāghlār he means all sorts of gardens, just as when he writes begāt u beglār, he means begs of all ranks.Return to passage

[62] Madame Ujfalvy has sketched a possible successor. Schuyler found two mosques at the foot of Takht-i-sulaimān, perhaps Bābur's Jauza Masjid.Return to passage

[63] aūl shāh-jū'īdīn sū qūyārlār.Return to passage

[64] Ribbon Jasper, presumably.Return to passage

[65] Kostenko (ii, 30), 71-3/4 versts i.e. 47 m. 4-1/2 fur. by the Postal Road.Return to passage

[66] Instead of their own kernels, the Second W.-i-B. stuffs the apricots, in a fashion well known in India by khūbānī, with almonds (maghz-i badām). The Turkī wording however allows the return to the apricots of their own kernels and Mr. Rickmers tells me that apricots so stuffed were often seen by him in the Zar-afshān Valley. My husband has shewn me that Niẕāmī in his Haft Paikar appears to refer to the other fashion, that of inserting almonds:—Return to passage

"I gave thee fruits from the garden of my heart, Plump and sweet as honey in milk; Their substance gave the lusciousness of figs, In their hearts were the kernels of almonds."

[67] What this name represents is one of a considerable number of points in the Bābur-nāma I am unable to decide. Kīyīk is a comprehensive name (cf. Shaw's Vocabulary); āq kīyīk might mean white sheep or white deer. It is rendered in the Second W.-i-B., here, by ahū-i-wāriq and on f. 4, by ahū-i-safed. Both these names Mr. Erskine has translated by "white deer," but he mentions that the first is said to mean argālī i.e. ovis poli, and refers to Voyages de Pallas iv, 325.Return to passage

[68] Concerning this much discussed word, Bābur's testimony is of service. It seems to me that he uses it merely of those settled in towns (villages) and without any reference to tribe or nationality. I am not sure that he uses it always as a noun; he writes of a Sārt kīshī, a Sārt person. His Asfara Sārts may have been Turkī-speaking settled Turks and his Marghīnānī ones Persian-speaking Tājiks. Cf. Shaw's Vocabulary; s.n. Sārt; Schuyler i, 104 and note; Nalivkine's Histoire du Khanat de Khokand p. 45 n. Von Schwarz s.n.; Kostenko i, 287; Petzbold's Turkistan p. 32.Return to passage

[69] Shaikh Burhānu'd-dīn `Alī Qīlīch: b. circa 530 AH. (1135 AD.) d. 593 AH. (1197 AD.). See Hamilton's Hidāyat.Return to passage

[70] The direct distance, measured on the map, appears to be about 65 m. but the road makes détour round mountain spurs. Mr. Erskine appended here, to the "farsang" of his Persian source, a note concerning the reduction of Tatar and Indian measures to English ones. It is rendered the less applicable by the variability of the yīghāch, the equivalent for a farsang presumed by the Persian translator.Return to passage

[71] Ḥai. MS. Farsī-gū'ī. The Elph. MS. and all those examined of the W.-i-B. omit the word Farsī; some writing kohī (mountaineer) for gū'ī. I judge that Bābur at first omitted the word Farsī, since it is entered in the Ḥai. MS. above the word gū'ī. It would have been useful to Ritter (vii, 733) and to Ujfalvy (ii, 176). Cf. Kostenko i, 287 on the variety of languages spoken by Sārts.Return to passage

[72] Of the Mirror Stone neither Fedtschenko nor Ujfalvy could get news.Return to passage

[73] Bābur distinguishes here between Tāshkīnt and Shāhrukhiya. Cf. f. 2 and note to Fanākat.Return to passage

[74] He left the hill-country above Sūkh in Muḥarram 910 AH. (mid-June 1504 AD.).Return to passage

[75] For a good account of Khujand see Kostenko i, 346.Return to passage

[76] Khujand to Andijān 187 m. 2 fur. (Kostenko ii, 29-31) and, helped out by the time-table of the Transcaspian Railway, from Khujand to Samarkand appears to be some 154 m. 5-1/4 fur.Return to passage

[77] Both men are still honoured in Khujand (Kostenko i, 348). For Khwāja Kamāl's Life and Dīwān, see Rieu ii, 632 and Ouseley's Persian Poets p. 192. Cf. f. 83b and note.Return to passage

[78] kūb artūq dūr, perhaps brought to Hindūstān where Bābur wrote the statement.Return to passage

[79] Turkish arrow-flight, London, 1791, 482 yards.Return to passage

[80] I have found the following forms of this name,—Ḥai. MS., M:nūgh:l; Pers. trans. and Mems., Myoghil; Ilminsky, M:tugh:l; Méms. Mtoughuil; Réclus, Schuyler and Kostenko, Mogul Tau; Nalivkine, "d'apres Fedtschenko," Mont Mogol; Fr. Map of 1904, M. Muzbek. It is the western end of the Kurāma Range (Kīndīr Tau), which comes out to the bed of the Sīr, is 26-2/3 miles long and rises to 4000 ft. (Kostenko, i, 101). Von Schwarz describes it as being quite bare; various writers ascribe climatic evil to it.Return to passage

[81] Pers. trans. ahū-i-safed. Cf. f. 3b note.Return to passage

[82] These words translate into Cervus marāl, the Asiatic Wapiti, and to this Bābur may apply them. Dictionaries explain marāl as meaning hind or doe but numerous books of travel and Natural History show that it has wider application as a generic name, i.e. deer. The two words būghū and marāl appear to me to be used as e.g. drake and duck are used. Marāl and duck can both imply the female sex, but also both are generic, perhaps primarily so. Cf. for further mention of būghū-marāl f. 219 and f. 276. For uses of the word marāl, see the writings e.g. of Atkinson, Kostenko (iii, 69), Lyddeker, Littledale, Selous, Ronaldshay, Church (Chinese Turkistan), Biddulph (Forsyth's Mission).Return to passage

[83] Cf. f. 2 and note.Return to passage

[84] Schuyler (ii, 3), 18 m.Return to passage

[85] Ḥai. MS. Hamesha bū deshttā yīl bār dūr. Marghīnānghā kīm sharqī dūr, hamesha mūndīn yīl bārūr; Khujandghā kīm gharībī dūr, dā'im mūndīn yīl kīlūr.Return to passage

This is a puzzling passage. It seems to say that wind always goes east and west from the steppe as from a generating centre. E. and de C. have given it alternative directions, east or west, but there is little point in saying this of wind in a valley hemmed in on the north and the south. Bābur limits his statement to the steppe lying in the contracted mouth of the Farghāna valley (pace Schuyler ii, 51) where special climatic conditions exist such as (a) difference in temperature on the two sides of the Khujand narrows and currents resulting from this difference,—(b) the heating of the narrows by sun-heat reflected from the Mogol-tau,—and (c) the inrush of westerly wind over Mīrzā Rabāṯ. Local knowledge only can guide a translator safely but Bābur's directness of speech compels belief in the significance of his words and this particularly when what he says is unexpected. He calls the Hā Darwesh a whirling wind and this it still is. Thinkable at least it is that a strong westerly current (the prevailing wind of Farghāna) entering over Mīrzā Rabāṯ and becoming, as it does become, the whirlwind of Hā Darwesh on the hemmed-in steppe,—becoming so perhaps by conflict with the hotter indraught through the Gates of Khujand—might force that indraught back into the Khujand Narrows (in the way e.g. that one Nile in flood forces back the other), and at Khujand create an easterly current. All the manuscripts agree in writing to (ghā) Marghīnān and to (ghā) Khujand. It may be observed that, looking at the map, it appears somewhat strange that Bābur should take, for his wind objective, a place so distant from his (defined) Hā Darwesh and seemingly so screened by its near hills as is Marghīnān. But that westerly winds are prevalent in Marghīnān is seen e.g. in Middendorff's Einblikke in den Farghāna Thal (p. 112). Cf. Réclus vi, 547; Schuyler ii, 51; Cahun's Histoire du Khanat de Khokand p. 28 and Sven Hedin's Durch Asien's Wüsten s.n. būrān.

[86] _bādiy__a_; a word perhaps selected as punning on bād, wind.Return to passage

[87] i.e. Akhsī Village. This word is sometimes spelled Akhsīkīs̤ but as the old name of the place was Akhsī-kīnt, it may be conjectured at least that the s̤ā'ī mas̤allas̤a of Akhsīkīs̤ represents the three points due for the nūn and tā of kīnt. Of those writing Akhsīkīt may be mentioned the Ḥai. and Kehr's MSS. (the Elph. MS. here has a lacuna) the Z̤afar-nāma (Bib. Ind. i, 44) and Ibn Haukal (Ouseley p. 270); and of those writing the word with the s̤ā'ī muṣallas̤a (i.e. as Akhsīkīs̤), Yāqūt's Dict, i, 162, Reinaud's Abū'l-feda I. ii, 225-6, Ilminsky (p. 5) departing from his source, and I.O. Cat. (Ethé) No. 1029. It may be observed that Ibn Haukal (Ouseley p. 280) writes Banākaṣ for Banākat. For As̤īru'd-dīn Akhsīkītī, see Rieu ii, 563; Daulat Shāh (Browne) p. 121 and Ethé I.O. Cat. No. 1029.Return to passage

[88] Measured on the French military map of 1904, this may be 80 kil. i.e. 50 miles.Return to passage

[89] Concerning several difficult passages in the rest of Bābur's account of Akhsī, see Appendix A.Return to passage

[90] The W.-i-B. here translates būghū-marāl by gazawn and the same word is entered, under-line, in the Ḥai. MS. Cf. f. 3b and note and f. 4 and note.Return to passage

[91] postīn pesh b:r:h. This obscure Persian phrase has been taken in the following ways:—Return to passage

(a) W.-i-B. I.O. 215 and 217 (i.e. both versions) reproduce the phrase. (b) W.-i-B. MS., quoted by Erskine, p. 6 note, (postīn-i mīsh burra). (c) Leyden's MS. Trs., a sheepskin mantle of five lambskins. (d) Mems., Erskine, p. 6, a mantle of five lambskins. (e) The Persian annotator of the Elph. MS., underlining pesh, writes, panj, five. (f) Klaproth (Archives, p. 109), _pustini pisch breh, d.h. gieb den vorderen Pelz_. (g) Kehr, p. 12 (Ilminsky p. 6) postin bīsh b:r:h. (h) De. C, i, 9, fourrure d'agneau de la première qualité.

The "lambskins" of L. and E. carry on a notion of comfort started by their having read sayāh, shelter, for Turkī sā'ī, torrent-bed; de C. also lays stress on fur and warmth, but would not the flowery border of a mountain stream prompt rather a phrase bespeaking ornament and beauty than one expressing warmth and textile softness? If the phrase might be read as postīn pesh perā, what adorns the front of a coat, or as postīn pesh bar rah, the fine front of the coat, the phrase would recall the gay embroidered front of some leathern postins.

[92] Var. tabarkhūn. The explanation best suiting its uses, enumerated here, is Redhouse's second, the Red Willow. My husband thinks it may be the Hyrcanian Willow.Return to passage

[93] Steingass describes this as "an arrow without wing or point" (barb?) and tapering at both ends; it may be the practising arrow, t`alīm aūqī, often headless.Return to passage

[94] tabarraklūq. Cf. f. 48b foot, for the same use of the word.Return to passage

[95] yabrūju'ṣ-ṣannam. The books referred to by Bābur may well be the Rauzatu'ṣ-ṣafā and the Ḥabību's-siyār, as both mention the plant.Return to passage

[96] The Turkī word āyīq is explained by Redhouse as awake and alert; and by Meninski and de Meynard as sobered and as a return to right senses. It may be used here as a equivalent of mihr in mihr-giyāh, the plant of love.Return to passage

[97] Mr. Ney Elias has discussed the position of this group of seven villages. (Cf. T. R. p. 180 n.) Arrowsmith's map places it (as Iti-kint) approximately where Mr. Th. Radloff describes seeing it i.e. on the Farghāna slope of the Kurāma range. (Cf. Réceuil d'Itinéraires p. 188.) Mr. Th. Radloff came into Yītī-kīnt after crossing the Kīndīrlīk Pass from Tāshkīnt and he enumerates the seven villages as traversed by him before reaching the Sīr. It is hardly necessary to say that the actual villages he names may not be those of Bābur's Yītī-kint. Wherever the word is used in the Bābur-nāma and the Tārīkh-i-rashīdī, it appears from the context allowable to accept Mr. Radloff's location but it should be borne in mind that the name Yītī-kīnt (Seven villages or towns) might be found as an occasional name of Altī-shahr (Six towns). See T.R. s.n. Altī-shahr.Return to passage

[98] kīshī, person, here manifestly fighting men.Return to passage

[99] Elph. MS. f. 2b; First W.-i-B. I.O. 215 f. 4b; Second W.-i-B. I.O. 217 f. 4; Mems. p. 6; Ilminsky p. 7; Méms. i. 10.Return to passage

The rulers whose affairs are chronicled at length in the Farghāna Section of the B.N. are, (I) of Timūrid Turks, (always styled Mīrzā), (a) the three Mīrān-shāhī brothers, Aḥmad, Maḥmūd and `Umar Shaikh with their successors, Bāī-sunghar, `Alī and Bābur; (b) the Bāī-qarā, Ḥusain of Harāt: (II) of Chīngīz Khānīds, (always styled Khān,) (a) the two Chaghatāī Mughūl brothers, Maḥmūd and Aḥmad; (b) the Shaibānid Aūzbeg, Muḥammad Shaibānī (Shāh-i-bakht or Shaibāq or Shāhī Beg).

In electing to use the name Shaibānī, I follow not only the Ḥai. Codex but also Shaibānī's Boswell, Muḥammad Ṣāliḥ Mīrzā. The Elph. MS. frequently uses Shaibāq but its authority down to f. 198 (Ḥai. MS. f. 243b) is not so great as it is after that folio, because not till f. 198 is it a direct copy of Bābur's own. It may be more correct to write "the Shaibānī Khān" and perhaps even "the Shaibānī."

[100] bī murād, so translated because retirement was caused once by the overruling of Khwāja `Ubaidu'l-lāh Aḥrārī. (T.R. p. 113.)Return to passage

[101] Once the Mīrzā did not wish Yūnas to winter in Akhsī; once did not expect him to yield to the demand of his Mughūls to be led out of the cultivated country (wilāyat). His own misconduct included his attack in Yūnas on account of Akhsī and much falling-out with kinsmen. (T.R. s.nn.)Return to passage

[102] i.e. one made of non-warping wood (Steingass), perhaps that of the White Poplar. The Shāh-nāma (Turner, Maçon ed. i, 71) writes of a Chāchī bow and arrows of khadang, i.e. white poplar. (H.B.)Return to passage

[103] i.e. Rābī`a-sulṯān, married circa 893 AH.-1488 AD. For particulars about her and all women mentioned in the B.N. and the T.R. see Gulbadan Begīm's Humāyūn-nāma, Or. Trs. Series.Return to passage

[104] jar, either that of the Kāsān Water or of a deeply-excavated canal. The palace buildings are mentioned again on f. 110b. Cf. Appendix A.Return to passage

[105] i.e. soared from earth, died. For some details of the accident see A.N. (H. Beveridge, i, 220.)Return to passage

[106] Ḥ.S. ii,-192, Firishta, lith. ed. p. 191 and D'Herbélot, sixth.Return to passage

It would have accorded with Bābur's custom if here he had mentioned the parentage of his father's mother. Three times (fs. 17b, 70b, 96b) he writes of "Shāh Sulṯan Begīm" in a way allowing her to be taken as `Umar Shaikh's own mother. Nowhere, however, does he mention her parentage. One even cognate statement only have we discovered, viz. Khwānd-amīr's (Ḥ.S. ii, 192) that `Umar Shaikh was the own younger brother (barādar khurdtar khūd) of Aḥmad and Maḥmūd. If his words mean that the three were full-brothers, `Umar Shaikh's own mother was Ābū-sa`īd's Tarkhān wife. Bābur's omission (f. 21b) to mention his father with A. and M. as a nephew of Darwesh Muḥammad Tarkhān would be negative testimony against taking Khwānd-amīr's statement to mean "full-brother," if clerical slips were not easy and if Khwānd-amir's means of information were less good. He however both was the son of Maḥmūd's wāzir (Ḥ.S. ii, 194) and supplemented his book in Bābur's presence.

To a statement made by the writer of the biographies included in Kehr's B.N. volume, that `U.S.'s family (aūmāgh) is not known, no weight can be attached, spite of the co-incidence that the Mongol form of aūmāgh, i.e. aūmāk means Mutter-leib. The biographies contain too many known mistakes for their compiler to outweigh Khwānd-amīr in authority.

[107] Cf. Rauzatu'ṣ-ṣafā vi, 266. (H.B.)Return to passage

[108] Dara-i-gaz, south of Balkh. This historic feast took place at Merv in 870 AH. (1465 AD.). As `Umar Shaikh was then under ten, he may have been one of the Mīrzās concerned.Return to passage

[109] Khudāī-bīrdī is a Pers.-Turkī hybrid equivalent of Theodore; tūghchī implies the right to use or (as hereditary standard-bearer,) to guard the tūgh; Timūr-tāsh may mean i.a. Friend of Tīmūr (a title not excluded here as borne by inheritance. Cf. f. 12b and note), Sword-friend (i.e. Companion-in-arms), and Iron-friend (i.e. stanch). Cf. Dict. s.n. Tīmūr-bāsh, a sobriquet of Charles XII.Return to passage

[110] Elph. and Ḥai. MSS. qūbā yūzlūq; this is under-lined in the Elph. MS. by ya`nī pur ghosht. Cf. f. 68b for the same phrase. The four earlier trss. viz. the two W.-i-B., the English and the French, have variants in this passage.Return to passage

[111] The apposition may be between placing the turban-sash round the turban-cap in a single flat fold and winding it four times round after twisting it on itself. Cf. f. 18 and Hughes Dict. of Islām s.n. turban.Return to passage

[112] qaẓālār, the prayers and fasts omitted when due, through war, travel sickness, etc.Return to passage

[113] rawān sawādī bār īdī; perhaps, wrote a running hand. De C. i, 13, ses lectures courantes étaient....Return to passage

[114] The dates of `Umar Shaikh's limits of perusal allow the Quintets (Khamsatīn) here referred to to be those of Niẕāmī and Amīr Khusrau of Dihlī. The Maṣnawī must be that of Jalālu'd-dīn Rūmī. (H.B.)Return to passage

[115] Probably below the Tīrāk (Poplar) Pass, the caravan route much exposed to avalanches.Return to passage

Mr. Erskine notes that this anecdote is erroneously told as of Bābur by Firishta and others. Perhaps it has been confused with the episode on f. 207b. Firishta makes another mistaken attribution to Bābur, that of Ḥasan of Yaq`ūb's couplet. (H.B.) Cf. f. 13b and Dow's Hindustan ii, 218.

[116] yīgītlār, young men, the modern jighit. Bābur uses the word for men on the effective fighting strength. It answers to the "brave" of North. American Indian story; here de C. translates it by braves.Return to passage

[117] ma`jūn. Cf. Von Schwarz p. 286 for a recipe.Return to passage

[118] mutaiyam. This word, not clearly written in all MSS., has been mistaken for yītīm. Cf. JRAS 1910 p. 882 for a note upon it by my husband to whom I owe the emendation.Return to passage

[119] na'l u dāghī bisyār īdī, that is, he had inflicted on himself many of the brands made by lovers and enthusiasts. Cf. Chardin's Voyages ii, 253 and Lady M. Montague's Letters p. 200.Return to passage

[120] tīka sīkrītkū, lit. likely to make goats leap, from sīkrīmāk to jump close-footed (Shaw).Return to passage

[121] sīkrīkān dūr. Both sīkrītkū and sīkrīkān dūr, appear to dictate translation in general terms and not by reference to a single traditional leap by one goat.Return to passage

[122] i.e. Russian; it is the Arys tributary of the Sīr.Return to passage

[123] The Fr. map of 1904 shows Kas, in the elbow of the Sīr, which seems to represent Khwāṣ.Return to passage

[124] i.e. the Chīr-chīk tributary of the Sīr.Return to passage

[125] Concerning his name, see T.R. p. 173.Return to passage

[126] i.e. he was a head-man of a horde sub-division, nominally numbering 10,000, and paying their dues direct to the supreme Khān. (T.R. p. 301.)Return to passage

[127] ghūnchachī i.e. one ranking next to the four legal wives, in Turkī aūdālīq, whence odalisque. Bābur and Gul-badan mention the promotion of several to Begīm's rank by virtue of their motherhood.Return to passage

[128] One of Bābur's quatrains, quoted in the Abūshqa, is almost certainly addressed to Khān-zāda. Cf. A.Q. Review, Jan. 1911, p. 4; H. Beveridge's Some verses of Bābur. For an account of her marriage see Shaibānī-nāma (Vambéry) cap. xxxix.Return to passage

[129] Kehr's MS. has a passage here not found elsewhere and seeming to be an adaptation of what is at the top of Ḥai. MS. f. 88. (Ilminsky, p. 10, ba wujūd ... tāpīb.)Return to passage

[130] tūshtī, which here seems to mean that she fell to his share on division of captives. Muḥ. Ṣaliḥ makes it a love-match and places the marriage before Bābur's departure. Cf. f. 95 and notes.Return to passage

[131] aūgāhlān. Khurram would be about five when given Balkh in circa 911 AH. (1505 AD.). He died when about 12. Cf. Ḥ.S. ii, 364.Return to passage

[132] This fatrat (interregnum) was between Bābur's loss of Farghāna and his gain of Kābul; the furṣatlār were his days of ease following success in Hindūstān and allowing his book to be written.Return to passage

[133] qīlālīng, lit. do thou be (setting down), a verbal form recurring on f. 227b l. 2. With the same form (aīt)ālīng, lit. do thou be saying, the compiler of the Abūshqa introduces his quotations. Shaw's paradigm, qīlīng only. Cf. A.Q.R. Jan. 1911, p. 2.Return to passage

[134] Kehr's MS. (Ilminsky p. 12) and its derivatives here interpolate the erroneous statement that the sons of Yūnas were Afāq and Bābā Khāns.Return to passage

[135] i.e. broke up the horde. Cf. T.R. p. 74.Return to passage

[136] See f. 50b for his descent.Return to passage

[137] Descendants of these captives were in Kāshghar when Ḥaidar was writing the T.R. It was completed in 953 AH. (1547 AD.). Cf. T.R. pp. 81 and 149.Return to passage

[138] An omission from his Persian source misled Mr. Erskine here into making Abū-sa`īd celebrate the Khānīm's marriage, not with himself but with his defeated foe, `Abdu'l-`azīz who had married her 28 years earlier.Return to passage

[139] Aīsān-būghā was at Āq Sū in Eastern Turkistān; Yūnas Khān's head-quarters were in Yītī-kīnt. The Sāghārīchī tūmān was a subdivision of the Kūnchī Mughūls.Return to passage

[140] Khān kūtārdīlār. The primitive custom was to lift the Khān-designate off the ground; the phrase became metaphorical and would seem to be so here, since there were two upon the felt. Cf., however, Th. Radloff's Récueil d'Itinéraires p. 326.Return to passage

[141] qūyūb īdī, probably in childhood.Return to passage

[142] She was divorced by Shaibānī Khān in 907 AH. in order to allow him to make lawful marriage with her niece, Khān-zāda.Return to passage

[143] This was a prudential retreat before Shaibānī Khān. Cf. f. 213.Return to passage

[144] The "Khān" of his title bespeaks his Chaghatāī-Mughūl descent through his mother, the "Mīrzā," his Tīmūrid-Turkī, through his father. The capture of the women was facilitated by the weakening of their travelling escort through his departure. Cf. T.R. p. 203.Return to passage

[145] Qila`-i-ẕafar. Its ruins are still to be seen on the left bank of the Kukcha. Cf. T.R. p. 220 and Kostenko i, 140. For Mubārak Shāh Muẓaffarī see f. 213 and T.R. s.n.Return to passage

[146] Ḥabība, a child when captured, was reared by Shaibānī and by him given in marriage to his nephew. Cf. T.R. p. 207 for an account of this marriage as saving Ḥaidar's life.Return to passage

[147] i.e. she did not take to flight with her husband's defeated force, but, relying on the victor, her cousin Bābur, remained in the town. Cf. T.R. p. 268. Her case receives light from Shahr-bānū's (f. 169).Return to passage

[148] Muḥammad Ḥaidar Mīrzā Kūrkān Dūghlāt Chaghatāī Mūghūl, the author of the Tārīkh-i-rashīdī; b. 905 AH. d. 958 AH. (b. 1499 d. 1551 AD.). Of his clan, the "Oghlāt" (Dūghlāt) Muḥ. ṣāliḥ says that it was called "Oghlāt" by Mughūls but Qūngūr-āt (Brown Horse) by Aūzbegs.Return to passage

[149] _Baz garadad ba aṣl-i-khūd hama chīz, Zar-i-ṣāfī u naqra u airzīn._Return to passage

These lines are in Arabic in the introduction to the Anwār-i-suhailī. (H.B.) The first is quoted by Ḥaidar (T.R. p. 354) and in Field's Dict. of Oriental Quotations (p. 160). I understand them to refer here to Ḥaidar's return to his ancestral home and nearest kin as being a natural act.

[150] tā'ib and ṯarīqā suggest that Ḥaidar had become an orthodox Musalmān in or about 933 AH. (1527 AD.).Return to passage

[151] Abū'l-faẓl adds music to Ḥaidar's accomplishments and Ḥaidar's own Prologue mentions yet others.Return to passage

[152] Cf. T.R. s.n. and Gul-badan's H.N. s.n. Ḥaram Begīm.Return to passage

[153] i.e. Alexander of Macedon. For modern mention of Central Asian claims to Greek descent see i.a. Kostenko, Von Schwarz, Holdich and A. Durand. Cf. Burnes' Kābul p. 203 for an illustration of a silver patera (now in the V. and A. Museum), once owned by ancestors of this Shāh Sulṯān Muḥammad.Return to passage

[154] Cf. f. 6b note.Return to passage

[155] i.e. Khān's child.Return to passage

[156] The careful pointing of the Ḥai. MS. clears up earlier confusion by showing the narrowing of the vowels from ālāchī to alacha.Return to passage

[157] The Elph. MS. (f. 7) writes Aūng, Khān's son, Prester John's title, where other MSS. have Adik. Bābur's brevity has confused his account of Sulṯān-nigār. Widowed of Maḥmūd in 900 AH. she married Adik; Adik, later, joined Shaibānī Khān but left him in 908 AH. perhaps secretly, to join his own Qāzāq horde. He was followed by his wife, apparently also making a private departure. As Adik died shortly after 908 AH. his daughters were born before that date and not after it as has been understood. Cf. T.R. and G.B.'s H.N. s.nn.; also Mems. p. 14 and Méms. i, 24.Return to passage

[158] Presumably by tribal custom, yīnkālīk, marriage with a brother's widow. Such marriages seem to have been made frequently for the protection of women left defenceless.Return to passage

[159] Sa`īd's power to protect made him the refuge of several kinswomen mentioned in the B.N. and the T.R. This mother and child reached Kāshghar in 932 AH. (1526 AD.).Return to passage

Here Bābur ends his [interpolated] account of his mother's family and resumes that of his father's.

[160] Bābur uses a variety of phrases to express Lordship in the Gate. Here he writes aīshīknī bāshlātīb; elsewhere, aīshīk ikhtiyārī qīlmāq and mīnīng aīshīkīmdā ṣāḥib ikhtiyārī qīlmāq. Von Schwarz (p. 159) throws light on the duties of the Lord of the Gate (Aīshīk Āghāsī). "Das Thür ... führt in eine grosse, vier-eckige, höhe Halle, deren Boden etwa 2 m. über den Weg erhoben ist. In dieser Halle, welche alle passieren muss, der durch das Thor eingeht, reitet oder fahrt, ist die Thorwache placiert. Tagsüber sind die Thore beständig öffen, nach Eintritt der Dunkelheit aber werden dieselben geschlossen und die Schlüssel dem zuständigen Polizeichef abgeliefert.... In den erwähnten Thorhallen nehmen in den hoch unabhängigen Gebieten an Bazar-tagen haufig die Richter Platz, um jedem der irgend ein Anliegen hat, so fort Recht zu sprechen. Die zudiktierten Strafen werden auch gleich in diesem selben locale vollzogen und eventuell die zum Hangen verurteilten Verbrecher an den Deckbalken aufgehängt, so dass die Besucher des Bazars unter den gehenkten durchpassieren müssen."Return to passage

[161] bu khabarnī `Abdu'l-wahhāb shaghāwaldīn `arẓa-dāsht qīlīb Mīrzāghā chāptūrdīlār. This passage has been taken to mean that the shaghāwal, i.e. chief scribe, was the courier, but I think Bābur's words shew that the shaghāwal's act preceded the despatch of the news. Moreover the only accusative of the participle and of the verb is khabarnī. `Abdu'l-wahhāb had been `Umar Shaikh's and was now Aḥmad's officer in Khujand, on the main road for Aūrā-tīpā whence the courier started on the rapid ride. The news may have gone verbally to `Abdu'l-wahhāb and he have written it on to Aḥmad and Abū-sa`īd.Return to passage

[162] Measured from point to point even, the distance appears to be over 500 miles. Concerning Bābā Khākī see Ḥ.S. ii. 224; for rapid riding i.a. Kostenko iii, cap. Studs.Return to passage

[163] qūshūqlārnī yakhshī aītūrā īkān dūr. Elph. MS. for qūshūq, tūyūk. Qūshūq is allowed, both by its root and by usage, to describe improvisations of combined dance and song. I understand from Bābur's tense, that his information was hearsay only.Return to passage

[164] i.e. of the military class. Cf. Vullers s.n. and T.R. p. 301.Return to passage

[165] The Hūma is a fabulous bird, overshadowing by whose wings brings good-fortune. The couplet appears to be addressed to some man, under the name Hūma, from whom Ḥasan of Yaq`ūb hoped for benefit.Return to passage

[166] khāk-bīla; the Sanglākh, (quoting this passage) gives khāk-p:l:k as the correct form of the word.Return to passage

[167] Cf. f. 99b.Return to passage

[168] One of Tīmūr's begs.Return to passage

[169] i.e. uncle on the mother's side, of any degree, here a grandmother's brother. The title appears to have been given for life to men related to the ruling House. Parallel with it are Madame Mère, Royal Uncle, Sulṯān Wālida.Return to passage

[170] kīm dīsā būlghāī, perhaps meaning, "Nothing of service to me."Return to passage

[171] Wais the Thin.Return to passage

[172] Cf. Chardin ed. Langlès v, 461 and ed. 1723 AD. v, 183.Return to passage

[173] n.e. of Kāsān. Cf. f. 74. Ḥai MS., erroneously, Samarkand.Return to passage

[174] An occasional doubt arises as to whether a ṯaurī of the text is Arabic and dispraises or Turkī and laudatory. Cf. Mems. p. 17 and Méms. i, 3.Return to passage

[175] Elph. and Ḥai. MSS. aftābachī, water-bottle bearer on journeys; Kehr (p. 82) aftābchī, ewer-bearer; Ilminsky (p. 19) akhtachi, squire or groom. Circumstances support aftābachī. Yūnas was town-bred, his ewer-bearer would hardly be the rough Mughūl, Qaṃbar-`alī, useful as an aftābachī.Return to passage

[176] Bābur was Governor of Andijān and the month being June, would be living out-of-doors. Cf. Ḥ.S. ii. 272 and Schuyler ii, 37.Return to passage

[177] To the word Sherīm applies Abū'l-ghāzī's explanation of Nurūm and Ḥājīm, namely, that they are abbreviations of Nūr and Ḥājī Muḥammad. It explains Sulṯānīm also when used (f. 72) of Sl. Muḥammad Khānika but of Sulṯānīm as the name is common with Bābur, Ḥaidar and Gul-badan, i.e. as a woman's, Busbecq's explanation is the better, namely, that it means My Sulṯān and is applied to a person of rank and means. This explains other women's titles e.g. Khānīm, my Khān and Ākām (Ākīm), My Lady. A third group of names formed like the last by enclitic 'm (my), may be called names of affection, e.g. Māhīm, My Moon, Jānīm, My Life. (Cf. Persian equivalents.) Cf. Abū'l-ghāzī's Shajarat-i-Turkī (Désmaisons p. 272); and Ogier Ghiselin de Busbecq's Life and Letters (Forster and Daniel i, 38.)Return to passage

[178] Namāz-gāh; generally an open terrace, with a wall towards the Qibla and outside the town, whither on festival days the people go out in crowds to pray. (Erskine.)Return to passage

[179] Bēglār (nīng) mīnī u wilāyatnī tāpshūrghūlārī dūr; a noticeably idiomatic sentence. Cf. f. 16b 1. 6 and 1. 7 for a repetition.Return to passage

[180] Maḥmūd was in Tāshkīnt, Aḥmad in Kāshghār or on the Āq-sū.Return to passage

[181] The B.N. contains a considerable number of what are virtually footnotes. They are sometimes, as here, entered in the middle of a sentence and confuse the narrative; they are introduced by kīm, a mere sign of parenthetical matter to follow, and some certainly, known not to be Bābur's own, must have stood first on the margin of his text. It seems best to enter them as Author's notes.Return to passage

[182] i.e. the author of the Hidāyat. Cf. f. 3b and note; Blochmann Āyīn-i-akbarī s.n. qulij and note; Bellew's Afghan Tribes p. 100, Khilich.Return to passage

[183] Ar. dead, gone. The precision of Bābur's words khānwādalār and yūsūnlūq is illustrated by the existence in the days of Tīmūr, in Marghīnān, (Burhānu'd-dīn's township) of a ruler named Aīlīk Khān, apparently a descendant of Sātūq-būghrā Khān (b. 384 AH.-994 AD.) so that in Khwāja Qāẓī were united two dynasties, (khānwādalār), one priestly, perhaps also regal, the other of bye-gone ruling Khāns. Cf. D'Herbélot p. 433; Yarkand Mission, Bellew p. 121; Taẕkirat-i Sulṯān Sātūq-būghrā Khān Ghāzī Pādshāh and Tārīkh-i-nāṣirī (Raverty s.n.)Return to passage

[184] darzī; Ḥ.S. khaiyāṯ.Return to passage

[185] bīr yīrgā (qūyūb), lit. to one place.Return to passage

[186] i.e. reconstructed the earthern defences. Cf. Von Schwarz s.n. loess.Return to passage

[187] They had been sent, presumably, before `Umar Shaikh's death, to observe Sl. Aḥmad M.'s advance. Cf. f. 6.Return to passage

[188] The time-table of the Andijān Railway has a station, Kouwa (Qabā).Return to passage

[189] Bābur, always I think, calls this man Long Ḥasan; Khwānd-amīr styles him Khwāja Ḥasan; he seems to be the brother of one of `Umar Shaikh's fathers-in-law, Khwāja Ḥusain.Return to passage

[190] bātqāq. This word is underlined in the Elph. MS. by dil-dil and in the Ḥai. MS. by jam-jama. It is translated in the W.-i-B. by āb pur hīla, water full of deceit; it is our Slough of Despond. It may be remarked that neither Zenker nor Steingass gives to dil-dil or jam-jama the meaning of morass; the Akbar-nāma does so. (H.B. ii, 112.)Return to passage

[191] ṯawīla ṯawīla ātlār yīghīlīb aūlā kīrīshtī. I understand the word yīghīlīb to convey that the massing led to the spread of the murrain.Return to passage

[192] jān tārātmāqlār i.e. as a gift to their over-lord.Return to passage

[193] Perhaps, Bābur's maternal great-uncle. It would suit the privileges bestowed on Tarkhāns if their title meant Khān of the Gifts (Turkī tar, gift). In the Bāburnāma, it excludes all others. Most of Aḥmad's begs were Tarkhāns, Arghūns and Chīngīz Khānids, some of them ancestors of later rulers in Tatta and Sind. Concerning the Tarkhāns see T.R. p. 55 and note; A.N. (H.B. s.n.) Elliot and Dowson's History of India, 498.Return to passage

[194] Cf. f. 6.Return to passage

[195] beg ātākā, lit. beg for father.Return to passage

[196] T.R. s.n. Ābā-bikr.Return to passage

[197] Cf. f. 6b and note.Return to passage

[198] faqra u masākin, i.e. those who have food for one day and those who have none in hand. (Steingass.)Return to passage

[199] For fashions of sitting, see Tawārīkh-i-guzīda Naṣrat-nāma B.M. Or. 3222. Aḥmad would appear to have maintained the deferential attitude by kneeling and sitting back upon his heels.Return to passage

[200] bīr sūnkāk bār īkān dūr. I understand that something defiling must have been there, perhaps a bone.Return to passage

[201] Khwājanīng ham āyāghlārī ārādā īdī.Return to passage

[202] īlbāsūn, a kind of mallard (Abūshqa), here perhaps a popinjay. Cf. Ḥ.S. ii, 193 for Aḥmad's skill as an archer, and Payne-Gallwey's Cross-bow p. 225.Return to passage

[203] qabāq, an archer's mark. Abū'l-ghāzī (Kāsān ed. p. 181. 5) mentions a hen (tūqūq) as a mark. Cf. Payne-Gallwey l.c. p. 231.Return to passage

[204] qīrghīcha, astar palumbarius. (Shaw's Voc. Scully.)Return to passage

[205] Perhaps, not quarrelsome.Return to passage

[206] The T.R. (p. 116) attributes the rout to Shaibānī's defection. The Ḥ.S. (ii, 192) has a varied and confused account. An error in the T.R. trs. making Shaibānī plunder the Mughūls, is manifestly clerical.Return to passage

[207] i.e. condiment, ce qu'on ajoute au pain.Return to passage

[208] Cf. f. 6.Return to passage

[209] qāzāqlār; here, if Bābur's, meaning his conflicts with Taṃbal, but as the Begīm may have been some time in Khujand, the qāzāqlār may be of Samarkand.Return to passage

[210] All the (Turkī) Bābur-nāma MSS. and those examined of the W.-i-B. by writing aūltūrdī (killed) where I suggest to read aūlnūrdī (devenir comme il faut) state that Aḥmad killed Qātāq. I hesitate to accept this (1) because the only evidence of the murder is one diacritical point, the removal of which lifts Aḥmad's reproach from him by his return to the accepted rules of a polygamous household; (2) because no murder of Qātāq is chronicled by Khwānd-amīr or other writers; and (3) because it is incredible that a mild, weak man living in a family atmosphere such as Bābur, Ḥaidar and Gul-badan reproduce for us, should, while possessing facility for divorce, kill the mother of four out of his five children.Return to passage

Reprieve must wait however until the word tīrīklīk is considered. This Erskine and de C. have read, with consistency, to mean life-time, but if aūlnūrdī be read in place of aūltūrdī (killed), tīrīklīk may be read, especially in conjunction with Bābur's `āshīqlīklār, as meaning living power or ascendancy. Again, if read as from tīrik, a small arrow and a consuming pain, tīrīklīk may represent Cupid's darts and wounds. Again it might be taken as from tīrāmāk, to hinder, or forbid.

Under these considerations, it is legitimate to reserve judgment on Aḥmad.

[211] It is customary amongst Turks for a bride, even amongst her own family, to remain veiled for some time after marriage; a child is then told to pluck off the veil and run away, this tending, it is fancied, to the child's own success in marriage. (Erskine.)Return to passage

[212] Bābur's anecdote about Jānī Beg well illustrates his caution as a narrator. He appears to tell it as one who knowing the point of a story, leads up to it. He does not affirm that Jānī Beg's habits were strange or that the envoy was an athlete but that both things must have been (īkān dūr) from what he had heard or to suit the point of the anecdote. Nor does he affirm as of his own knowledge that Aūzbegs calls a strong man (his zor kīshī) a būkuh (bull) but says it is so understood (dīr īmīsh).Return to passage

[213] Cf. f. 170.Return to passage

[214] The points of a tīpūchāq are variously stated. If the root notion of the name be movement (tīp), Erskine's observation, that these horses are taught special paces, is to the point. To the verb tīprāmāq dictionaries assign the meaning of movement with agitation of mind, an explanation fully illustrated in the B.N. The verb describes fittingly the dainty, nervous action of some trained horses. Other meanings assigned to tūpūchāq are roadster, round-bodied and swift.Return to passage

[215] Cf. f. 37b.Return to passage

[216] Cf. f. 6b and note.Return to passage

[217] mashaf kitābat qīlūr īdī.Return to passage

[218] Cf. f. 36 and Ḥ.S. ii. 271.Return to passage

[219] sīnkīlīsī ham mūndā īdī.Return to passage

[220] khāna-wādalār, viz. the Chaghatāī, the Tīmūrid in two Mīrān-shāhī branches, `Alī's and Bābur's and the Bāī-qarā in Harāt.Return to passage

[221] aūghlāqchī i.e. player at kūk-būrā. Concerning the game, see Shaw's Vocabulary; Schuyler i, 268; Kostenko iii, 82; Von Schwarz s.n. baiga.Return to passage

[222] Ẕū'l-ḥijja 910 AH.-May 1505 AD. Cf. f. 154. This statement helps to define what Bābur reckoned his expeditions into Hindūstān.Return to passage

[223] Aīkū (Ayāgū)-tīmūr Tarkhān Arghūn d. circa 793 AH.-1391 AD. He was a friend of Tīmūr. See Z̤.N. i, 525 etc.Return to passage

[224] āndāq ikhlāq u aṯawārī yūq īdī kīm dīsā būlghāī. The Shāh-nāma cap. xviii, describes him as a spoiled child and man of pleasure, caring only for eating, drinking and hunting. The Shaibānī-nāma narrates his various affairs.Return to passage

[225] i.e., cutlass, a parallel sobriquet to qīlīch, sword. If it be correct to translate by "cutlass," the nickname may have prompted Bābur's brief following comment, mardāna īkān dūr, i.e. Qulī Muḥ. must have been brave because known as the Cutlass. A common variant in MSS. from Būghdā is Bāghdād; Bāghdād was first written in the Ḥai. MS. but is corrected by the scribe to būghdā.Return to passage

[226] So pointed in the Ḥai. MS. I surmise it a clan-name.Return to passage

[227] i.e. to offer him the succession. The mountain road taken from Aūrā-tīpā would be by Āb-burdan, Sara-tāq and the Kām Rūd defile.Return to passage

[228] īrīldī. The departure can hardly have been open because Aḥmad's begs favoured Maḥmūd; Malik-i-Muḥammad's party would be likely to slip away in small companies.Return to passage

[229] This well-known Green, Grey or Blue palace or halting-place was within the citadel of Samarkand. Cf. f. 37. It served as a prison from which return was not expected.Return to passage

[230] Cf. f. 27. He married a full-sister of Bāī-sunghar.Return to passage

[231] Gulistān Part I. Story 27. For "steaming up," see Tennyson's Lotus-eaters Choric song, canto 8 (H.B.).Return to passage

[232] Elph. MS. f. 16b; First W.-i-B. I.O. 215 f. 19; Second W.-i-B. I.O. 217 f. 15b; Memoirs p. 27.Return to passage

[233] He was a Dūghlāt, uncle by marriage of Ḥaidar Mīrzā and now holding Khost for Maḥmūd. See T.R. s.n. for his claim on Aīsān-daulat's gratitude.Return to passage

[234] tāsh qūrghān dā chīqār dā. Here (as e.g. f. 110b l. 9) the Second W.-i-B. translates tāsh as though it meant stone instead of outer. Cf. f. 47 for an adjectival use of tāsh, stone, with the preposition (tāsh) din. The places contrasted here are the citadel (ark) and the walled-town (qūrghān). The chīqār (exit) is the fortified Gate-house of the mud circumvallation. Cf. f. 46 for another example of chīqār.Return to passage

[235] Elph. Ḥai. Kehr's MSS., ānīng bīla bār kīshi bār beglārnī tūtūrūldī. This idiom recurs on f. 76b l. 8. A palimpsest entry in the Elph. MS. produces the statement that when Ḥasan fled, his begs returned to Andijān.Return to passage

[236] Ḥai. MS. awī mūnkūzī, underlined by sāgh-i-gāū, cows' thatched house. [T. mūnkūz, lit. horn, means also cattle.] Elph. MS., awī mūnkūsh, underlined by dar jā'ī khwāb alfakhta, sleeping place. [T. mūnkūsh, retired.]Return to passage

[237] The first qāchār of this pun has been explained as gurez-gāh, sharm-gāh, hinder parts, fuite and vertèbre inférieur. The Ḥ.S. (ii, 273 l. 3 fr. ft.) says the wound was in a vital (maqattal) part.Return to passage

[238] From Niẕāmī's Khusrau u Shirīn, Lahore lith. ed. p. 137 l. 8. It is quoted also in the A.N. Bib. Ind. ed. ii, 207 (H.B. ii, 321). (H.B.).Return to passage

[239] See Hughes Dictionary of Islām s.nn. Eating and Food.Return to passage

[240] Cf. f. 6b and note. If `Umar Shaikh were Maḥmūd's full-brother, his name might well appear here.Return to passage

[241] i.e. "Not a farthing, not a half-penny."Return to passage

[242] Here the Mems. enters a statement, not found in the Turkī text, that Maḥmūd's dress was elegant and fashionable.Return to passage

[243] n:h:l:m. My husband has cleared up a mistake (Mems. p. 28 and Méms. i, 54) of supposing this to be the name of an animal. It is explained in the A.N. (i, 255. H.B. i, 496) as a Badakhshī equivalent of tasqāwal; tasqāwal var. tāshqāwal, is explained by the Farhang-i-aẕfarī, a Turkī-Persian Dict. seen in the Mullā Fīroz Library of Bombay, to mean rāh band kunanda, the stopping of the road. Cf. J.R.A.S. 1900 p. 137.Return to passage

[244] i.e. "a collection of poems in the alphabetical order of the various end rhymes." (Steingass.)Return to passage

[245] At this battle Daulat-shāh was present. Cf. Browne's D.S. for Astarābād p. 523 and for Andikhūd p. 532. For this and all other references to D.S. and Ḥ.S. I am indebted to my husband.Return to passage

[246] The following dates will help out Bābur's brief narrative. Maḥmūd æt. 7, was given Astarābād in 864 AH. (1459-60 AD.); it was lost to Ḥusain at Jauz-wilāyat and Maḥmūd went into Khurāsān in 865 AH.; he was restored by his father in 866 AH.; on his father's death (873 AH.-1469 AD.) he fled to Harāt, thence to Samarkand and from there was taken to Ḥiṣār æt. 16. Cf. D'Herbélot s.n. Abū-sa`ad; Ḥ.S. i, 209; Browne's D.S. p. 522.Return to passage

[247] Presumably the "Hindūstān the Less" of Clavijo (Markham p. 3 and p. 113), approx. Qaṃbar-`alī's districts. Clavijo includes Tīrmīẕ under the name.Return to passage

[248] Perhaps a Ṣufī term,—longing for the absent friend. For particulars about this man see Ḥ.S. ii, 235 and Browne's D.S. p. 533.Return to passage

[249] Here in the Ḥai. MS. is one of several blank spaces, waiting for information presumably not known to Bābur when writing. The space will have been in the archetype of the Ḥai. MS. and it makes for the opinion that the Ḥai. MS. is a direct copy of Bābur's own. This space is not left in the Elph. MS. but that MS. is known from its scribe's note (f. 198) down to f. 198 (Ḥai. MS. f. 243b) to have been copied from "other writings" and only subsequent to its f. 198 from Bābur's own. Cf. JRAS 1906 p. 88 and 1907 p. 143.Return to passage

[250] The T.R. (p. 330) supplies this name.Return to passage

[251] Cf. f. 35b. This was a betrothal only, the marriage being made in 903 AH. Cf. Ḥ.S. ii, 260 and Gul-badan's H.N. f. 24b.Return to passage

[252] Kehr's MS. supplies Aī (Moon) as her name but it has no authority. The Elph. MS. has what may be lā nām, no name, on its margin and over tūrūtūnchī (4th.) its usual sign of what is problematical.Return to passage

[253] See Ḥ.S. ii, 250. Here Pīr-i-Muḥammad Aīlchī-būghā was drowned. Cf. f. 29.Return to passage

[254] Chaghānīān is marked in Erskine's (Mems.) map as somewhere about the head of (Fr. map 1904) the Ilyak Water, a tributary of the Kāfir-nighān.Return to passage

[255] i.e. when Bābur was writing in Hindūstān.Return to passage

[256] For his family see f. 55b note to Yār-`alī Balāl.Return to passage

[257] bā wujūd turklūk muhkam paidā kunanda īdī.Return to passage

[258] Roebuck's Oriental Proverbs (p. 232) explains the five of this phrase where seven might be expected, by saying that of this Seven days' world (qy. days of Creation) one is for birth, another for death, and that thus five only are left for man's brief life.Return to passage

[259] The cognomen Aīlchī-būghā, taken with the bearer's recorded strength of fist, may mean Strong man of Aīlchī (the capital of Khutan). One of Tīmūr's commanders bore the name. Cf. f. 21b for būghū as athlete.Return to passage

[260] Hazārāspī seems to be Mīr Pīr Darwesh Hazārāspī. With his brother, Mīr `Alī, he had charge of Balkh. See Rauzatu'ṣ-ṣafā B.M. Add. 23506, f. 242b; Browne's D.S. p. 432. It may be right to understand a hand-to-hand fight between Hazārāspī and Aīlchī-būghā. The affair was in 857 AH. (1453 AD.).Return to passage

[261] yārāq sīz, perhaps trusting to fisticuffs, perhaps without mail. Bābur's summary has confused the facts. Muḥ. Aīlchī-būghā was sent by Sl. Maḥmūd Mīrzā from Ḥiṣār with 1,000 men and did not issue out of Qūndūz. (Ḥ.S. ii, 251.) His death occurred not before 895 AH.Return to passage

[262] See T.R. s.nn. Mīr Ayūb and Ayūb.Return to passage

[263] This passage is made more clear by f. 120b and f. 125b.Return to passage

[264] He is mentioned in _`Alī-sher Nawā'ī's Majālis-i-nafā'is_; see B.M. Add. 7875, f. 278 and Rieu's Turkish Catalogue.Return to passage

[265] ? full of splits or full handsome.Return to passage

[266] This may have occurred after Abū-sa`īd Mīrzā's death whose son Abā-bikr was. Cf. f. 28. If so, over-brevity has obscured the statement.Return to passage

[267] mīnglīgh aīldīn dūr, perhaps of those whose hereditary Command was a Thousand, the head of a Mīng (Pers. Hazāra), i.e. of the tenth of a tūmān.Return to passage

[268] qūrghān-nīng tāshīdā yāngī tām qūpārīb sālā dūr. I understand, that what was taken was a new circumvallation in whole or in part. Such double walls are on record. Cf. Appendix A.Return to passage

[269] bahādurlūq aūlūsh, an actual portion of food.Return to passage

[270] i.e. either unmailed or actually naked.Return to passage

[271] The old English noun strike expresses the purpose of the sar-kob. It is "an instrument for scraping off what rises above the top" (Webster, whose example is grain in a measure). The sar-kob is an erection of earth or wood, as high as the attacked walls, and it enabled besiegers to strike off heads appearing above the ramparts.Return to passage

[272] i.e. the dislocation due to `Umar Shaikh's death.Return to passage

[273] Cf. f. 13. The Ḥ.S. (ii, 274) places his son, Mīr Mughūl, in charge, but otherwise agrees with the B.N.Return to passage

[274] Cf. Clavijo, Markham p. 132. Sir Charles Grandison bent the knee on occasions but illustrated MSS. e.g. the B.M. Tawārīkh-i-guzīda Naṣrat-nāma show that Bābur would kneel down on both knees. Cf. f. 123b for the fatigue of the genuflection.Return to passage

[275] I have translated kūrūshūb thus because it appears to me that here and in other places, stress is laid by Bābur upon the mutual gaze as an episode of a ceremonious interview. The verb kūrūshmak is often rendered by the Persian translators as daryāftan and by the L. and E. Memoirs as to embrace. I have not found in the B.N. warrant for translating it as to embrace; qūchūshmāq is Bābur's word for this (f. 103). Daryāftan, taken as to grasp or see with the mind, to understand, well expresses mutual gaze and its sequel of mutual understanding. Sometimes of course, kūrūsh, the interview does not imply kūrūsh, the silent looking in the eyes with mutual understanding; it simply means se voyer e.g. f. 17. The point is thus dwelt upon because the frequent mention of an embrace gives a different impression of manners from that made by "interview" or words expressing mutual gaze.Return to passage

[276] dābān. This word Réclus (vi, 171) quoting from Fedschenko, explains as a difficult rocky defile; art, again, as a dangerous gap at a high elevation; bel, as an easy low pass; and kūtal, as a broad opening between low hills. The explanation of kūtal does not hold good for Bābur's application of the word (f. 81b) to the Sara-tāq.Return to passage

[277] Cf. f. 4b and note. From Bābur's special mention of it, it would seem not to be the usual road.Return to passage

[278] The spelling of this name is uncertain. Variants are many. Concerning the tribe see T.R. p. 165 n.Return to passage

[279] Niẕāmu'd-dīn `Alī Barlās: see Gul-badan's H.N. s.n. He served Bābur till the latter's death.Return to passage

[280] i.e. Ẕū'n-nūn or perhaps the garrison.Return to passage

[281] i.e. down to Shaibānī's destruction of Chaghatāī rule in Tāshkīnt in 1503 AD.Return to passage

[282] Elph. MS. f. 23; W.-i-B. I.O. 215 f. 26 and 217 f. 21; Mems. p. 35.Return to passage

Bābur's own affairs form a small part of this year's record; the rest is drawn from the Ḥ.S. which in its turn, uses Bābur's f. 34 and f. 37b. Each author words the shared material in his own style; one adding magniloquence, the other retracting to plain statement, indeed summarizing at times to obscurity. Each passes his own judgment on events, e.g. here Khwānd-amīr's is more favourable to Ḥusain Bāī-qarā's conduct of the Ḥiṣār campaign than Bābur's. Cf. Ḥ.S. ii, 256-60 and 274.

[283] This feint would take him from the Oxus.Return to passage

[284] Tīrmīẕ to Ḥiṣār, 96m. (Réclus vi, 255).Return to passage

[285] Ḥ.S. Wazr-āb valley. The usual route is up the Kām Rūd and over the Mūra pass to Sara-tāq. Cf. f. 81b.Return to passage

[286] i.e. the Ḥiṣārī mentioned a few lines lower and on f. 99b. Nothing on f. 99b explains his cognomen.Return to passage

[287] The road is difficult. Cf. f. 81b.Return to passage

[288] Khwānd-amīr also singles out one man for praise, Sl. Maḥmūd Mīr-i-ākhwur; the two names probably represent one person. The sobriquet may refer to skill with a matchlock, to top-spinning (firnagī-bāz) or to some lost joke. (Ḥ.S. ii, 257.)Return to passage

[289] This pregnant phrase has been found difficult. It may express that Bābur assigned the sulṯāns places in their due precedence; that he seated them in a row; and that they sat cross-legged, as men of rank, and were not made, as inferiors, to kneel and sit back on their heels. Out of this last meaning, I infer comes the one given by dictionaries, "to sit at ease," since the cross-legged posture is less irksome than the genuflection, not to speak of the ease of mind produced by honour received. Cf. f. 18b and note on Aḥmad's posture; Redhouse s.nn. bāghīsh and bāghdāsh; and B.M. Tawārīkh-i-guzīda naṣrat-nāma, in the illustrations of which the chief personage, only, sits cross-legged.Return to passage

[290] siyāsat. My translation is conjectural only.Return to passage

[291] sar-kob. The old English noun strike, "an instrument for scraping off what appears above the top," expresses the purpose of the wall-high erections of wood or earth (L. agger) raised to reach what shewed above ramparts. Cf. Webster.Return to passage

[292] Presumably lower down the Qūndūz Water.Return to passage

[293] aūz pādshāhī u mīrzālārīdīn artīb.Return to passage

[294] sic. Ḥai. MS.; Elph. MS. "near Tāliqān"; some W.-i-B. MSS. "Great Garden." Gul-badan mentions a Tāliqān Garden. Perhaps the Mīrzā went so far east because, Ẕū'n-nūn being with him, he had Qandahār in mind. Cf. f. 42b.Return to passage

[295] i.e. Sayyid Muḥammad `Alī. See f. 15 n. to Sherīm. Khwāja Changāl lies 14 m. below Tāliqān on the Tāliqān Water. (Erskine.)Return to passage

[296] f. 27b, second.Return to passage

[297] The first was circa 895 AH.-1490 AD. Cf. f. 27b.Return to passage

[298] Bābur's wording suggests that their common homage was the cause of Badī`u'z-zamān's displeasure but see f. 41.Return to passage

[299] The Mīrzā had grown up with Ḥiṣārīs. Cf. Ḥ.S. ii, 270.Return to passage

[300] As the husband of one of the six Badakhshī Begīms, he was closely connected with local ruling houses. See T.R. p. 107.Return to passage

[301] i.e. Muḥammad `Ubaidu'l-lāh the elder of Aḥrārī's two sons. d. 911 AH. See Rashaḥāt-i-`ain-alḥayāt (I.O. 633) f. 269-75; and Khizīnatu'l-aṣfīya lith. ed. i, 597.Return to passage

[302] Bū yūq tūr, i.e. This is not to be.Return to passage

[303] d. 908 AH. He was not, it would seem, of the Aḥrārī family. His own had provided Pontiffs (Shaikhu'l-islām) for Samarkand through 400 years. Cf. Shaibānī-nāma, Vambéry, p. 106; also, for his character, p. 96.Return to passage

[304] i.e. he claimed sanctuary.Return to passage

[305] Cf. f. 45b and Pétis de la Croix's _Histoire de Chīngīz Khān_ pp. 171 and 227. What Tīmūr's work on the Gūk Sarāī was is a question for archæologists.Return to passage

[306] i.e. over the Aītmak Pass. Cf. f. 49.Return to passage

[307] Ḥai. MS. ārālighīgha. Elph. MS. ārāl, island.Return to passage

[308] See f. 179b for Binā'ī. Muḥammad Ṣāliḥ Mīrzā Khwārizmī is the author of the Shaibānī-nāma.Return to passage

[309] Elph. MS. f. 27; W.-i-B. I.O. 215 f. 30b and 217 f. 25; Mems. p. 42.Return to passage

[310] i.e. Circassian. Muḥammad Ṣāliḥ (Sh.N. Vambéry p. 276 l. 58) speaks of other Aūzbegs using Chirkas swords.Return to passage

[311] aīrtā yāzīghā. My translation is conjectural. Aīrtā implies i.a. foresight. Yāzīghā allows a pun at the expense of the sulṯāns; since it can be read both as to the open country and as for their (next, aīrtā) misdeeds. My impression is that they took the opportunity of being outside Samarkand with their men, to leave Bāī-sunghar and make for Shaibānī, then in Turkistān. Muḥammad Ṣāliḥ also marking the tottering Gate of Sl. `Alī Mīrzā, left him now, also for Shaibānī. (Vambéry cap. xv.)Return to passage

[312] aūmāq, to amuse a child in order to keep it from crying.Return to passage

[313] i.e. with Khwāja Yahya presumably. See f. 38.Return to passage

[314] This man is mentioned also in the Tawārikh-i-guzīda Naṣratnāma B.M. Or. 3222 f. 124b.Return to passage

[315] Ḥ.S., on the last day of Ramẓān (June 28th. 1497 AD.).Return to passage

[316] Muḥammad Sīghal appears to have been a marked man. I quote from the T.G.N.N. (see supra), f. 123b foot, the information that he was the grandson of Ya`qūb Beg. Zenker explains Sīghalī as the name of a Chaghatāī family. An Ayūb-i-Ya`qūb Begchīk Mughūl may be an uncle. See f. 43 for another grandson.Return to passage

[317] baẓ'ī kīrkān-kīnt-kīsākkā bāsh-sīz-qīlghān Mughūllārnī tūtūb. I take the word kīsāk in this highly idiomatic sentence to be a diminutive of kīs, old person, on the analogy of mīr, mīrāk, mard, mardak. [The Ḥ.S. uses Kīsāk (ii, 261) as a proper noun.] The alliteration in kāf and the mighty adjective here are noticeable.Return to passage

[318] Qāsim feared to go amongst the Mughūls lest he should meet retaliatory death. Cf. f. 99b.Return to passage

[319] This appears from the context to be Yām (Jām) -bāī and not the Djouma (Jām) of the Fr. map of 1904, lying farther south. The Avenue named seems likely to be Tīmūr's of f. 45b and to be on the direct road for Khujand. See Schuyler i, 232.Return to passage

[320] būghān buyīnī. W.-i-B. 215, yān, thigh, and 217 gardan, throat. I am in doubt as to the meaning of būghān; perhaps the two words stand for joint at the nape of the neck. Khwāja-i-kalān was one of seven brothers, six died in Bābur's service, he himself served till Bābur's death.Return to passage

[321] Cf. f. 48.Return to passage

[322] Khorochkine (Radlov's Réceuil d'Itinéraires p. 241) mentions Pul-i-mougak, a great stone bridge thrown across a deep ravine, east of Samarkand. For Kūl-i-maghāk, deep pool, or pool of the fosse, see f. 48b.Return to passage

[323] From Khwānd-amīr's differing account of this affair, it may be surmised that those sending the message were not treacherous; but the message itself was deceiving inasmuch as it did not lead Bābur to expect opposition. Cf. f. 43 and note.Return to passage

[324] Of this nick-name several interpretations are allowed by the dictionaries.Return to passage

[325] See Schuyler i, 268 for an account of this beautiful Highland village.Return to passage

[326] Here Bābur takes up the thread, dropped on f. 36, of the affairs of the Khurāsānī mīrzās. He draws on other sources than the Ḥ.S.; perhaps on his own memory, perhaps on information given by Khurāsānīs with him in Hindūstān e.g. Ḥusain's grandson. See f. 167b. Cf. Ḥ.S. ii, 261.Return to passage

[327] bāghīshlāb tūr. Cf. f. 34 note to bāghīsh dā.Return to passage

[328] Bū sozlār aūnūlūng. Some W.-i-B. MSS., Farāmosh bakunīd for nakunīd, thus making the Mīrzā not acute but rude, and destroying the point of the story i.e. that the Mīrzā pretended so to have forgotten as to have an empty mind. Khwānd-amīr states that `Alī-sher prevailed at first; his tears therefore may have been of joy at the success of his pacifying mission.Return to passage

[329] i.e. B.Z.'s father, Ḥusain, against Mū`min's father, B.Z. and Ḥusain's son, Muz̤affar Ḥusain against B.Z.'s son Mū`min;—a veritable conundrum.Return to passage

[330] Garzawān lies west of Balkh. Concerning Pul-i-chirāgh Col. Grodekoff's Ride to Harāt (Marvin p. 103 ff.) gives pertinent information. It has also a map showing the Pul-i-chirāgh meadow. The place stands at the mouth of a triply-bridged defile, but the name appears to mean Gate of the Lamp (cf. Gate of Tīmūr), and not Bridge of the Lamp, because the Ḥ.S. and also modern maps write bīl (bel), pass, where the Turkī text writes pul, bridge, narrows, pass.Return to passage

The lamp of the name is one at the shrine of a saint, just at the mouth of the defile. It was alight when Col. Grodekoff passed in 1879 and to it, he says, the name is due now—as it presumably was 400 years ago and earlier.

[331] Khwānd-amīr heard from the Mīrzā on the spot, when later in his service, that he was let down the precipice by help of turban-sashes tied together.Return to passage

[332] yīkīt yīlāng u yāyāq yālīng; a jingle made by due phonetic change of vowels; a play too on yālāng, which first means stripped i.e. robbed and next unmailed, perhaps sometimes bare-bodied in fight.Return to passage

[333] qūsh-khāna. As the place was outside the walls, it may be a good hawking ground and not a falconry.Return to passage

[334] The Ḥ.S. mentions (ii, 222) a Sl. Aḥmad of Chār-shaṃba, a town mentioned e.g. by Grodekoff p. 123. It also spoils Bābur's coincidence by fixing Tuesday, Shab`ān 29th. for the battle. Perhaps the commencement of the Muḥammadan day at sunset, allows of both statements.Return to passage

[335] Elph. MS. f. 30b; W.-i-B. I.O. 215 f. 34 and 217 f. 26b; Mems. p. 46.Return to passage

The abruptness of this opening is due to the interposition of Sl. Ḥusain M.'s affairs between Bābur's statement on f. 41 that he returned from Aūrgūt and this first of 903 AH. that on return he encamped in Qulba.

[336] See f. 48b.Return to passage

[337] i.e. Chūpān-ātā; see f. 45 and note.Return to passage

[338] Aūghlāqchī, the Grey Wolfer of f. 22.Return to passage

[339] A sobriquet, the suppliant or perhaps something having connection with musk. Ḥ.S. ii, 278, son of Ḥ.D.Return to passage

[340] i.e. grandson (of Muḥammad Sīghal). Cf. f. 39.Return to passage

[341] This seeming sobriquet may show the man's trade. Kāl is a sort of biscuit; qāshūq may mean a spoon.Return to passage

[342] The Ḥ.S. does not ascribe treachery to those inviting Bābur into Samarkand but attributes the murder of his men to others who fell on them when the plan of his admission became known. The choice here of "town-rabble" for retaliatory death supports the account of Ḥ.S. ii.Return to passage

[343] "It was the end of September or beginning of October" (Erskine).Return to passage

[344] awī u kīpa yīrlār. Awī is likely to represent kibitkas. For kīpa yīr, see Zenker p. 782.Return to passage

[345] Interesting reference may be made, amongst the many books on Samarkand, to Sharafu'd-dīn `Alī Yazdī's Z̤afar-nāma Bib. Ind. ed. i, 300, 781, 799, 800 and ii, 6, 194, 596 etc.; to Ruy Gonzalves di Clavijo's Embassy to Tīmūr (Markham) cap. vi and vii; to Ujfalvy's Turkistan ii, 79 and Madame Ujfalvy's De Paris à Samarcande p. 161,—these two containing a plan of the town; to Schuyler's Turkistan; to Kostenko's Turkistan Gazetteer i, 345; to Réclus, vi, 270 and plan; and to a beautiful work of the St. Petersburg Archæological Society, Les Mosquées de Samarcande, of which the B.M. has a copy.Return to passage

[346] This statement is confused in the Elp. and Ḥai. MSS. The second appears to give, by abjad, lat. 40° 6" and long. 99'. Mr. Erskine (p. 48) gives lat. 39' 57" and long. 99' 16", noting that this is according to Ūlūgh Beg's Tables and that the long. is calculated from Ferro. The Ency. Br. of 1910-11 gives lat. 39' 39" and long. 66' 45".Return to passage

[347] The enigmatical cognomen, Protected Town, is of early date; it is used i.a. by Ibn Batūta in the 14th. century. Bābur's tense refers it to the past. The town had frequently changed hands in historic times before he wrote. The name may be due to immunity from damage to the buildings in the town. Even Chīngīz Khān's capture (1222 AD.) left the place well-preserved and its lands cultivated, but it inflicted great loss of men. Cf. Schuyler i, 236 and his authorities, especially Bretschneider.Return to passage

[348] Here is a good example of Bābur's caution in narrative. He does not affirm that Samarkand became Musalmān, or (infra) that Quṣam ibn `Abbās went, or that Alexander founded but in each case uses the presumptive past tense, resp. būlghān dūr, bārghān dūr, bīnā qīlghān dūr, thus showing that he repeats what may be inferred or presumed and not what he himself asserts.Return to passage

[349] i.e. of Muḥammad. See Z̤.N. ii, 193.Return to passage

[350] i.e. Fat Village. His text misleading him, Mr. Erskine makes here the useful irrelevant note that Persians and Arabs call the place Samar-qand and Turks, Samar-kand, the former using qaf (q), the latter kaf (k). Both the Elph. and the Ḥai. MSS. write Samarqand.Return to passage

For use of the name Fat Village, see Clavijo (Markham p. 170), Simesquinte, and Bretschneider's Mediæval Geography pp. 61, 64, 66 and 163.

[351] qadam. Kostenko (i, 344) gives 9 m. as the circumference of the old walls and 1-2/3m. as that of the citadel. See Mde. Ujfalvy p. 175 for a picture of the walls.Return to passage

[352] Ma`lūm aīmās kīm mūncha paidā būlmīsh būlghāī; an idiomatic phrase.Return to passage

[353] d. 333 AH. (944 AD.). See D'Herbélot art. Mātridī p. 572.Return to passage

[354] See D'Herbélot art. Aschair p. 124.Return to passage

[355] Abū `Abdu'l-lāh bin Ismā`īlu'l-jausī b. 194 AH. d. 256 AH. (810-870 AD.). See D'Herbélot art. Bokhārī p. 191, art. Giorag p. 373, and art. Ṣāḥiḥu'l-bokhārī p. 722. He passed a short period, only, of his life in Khartank, a suburb of Samarkand.Return to passage

[356] Cf. f. 3b and n. 1.Return to passage

[357] This though 2475 ft. above the sea is only some 300 ft. above Samarkand. It is the Chūpān-ātā (Father of Shepherds) of maps and on it Tīmūr built a shrine to the local patron of shepherds. The Zar-afshān, or rather, its Qarā-sū arm, flows from the east of the Little Hill and turns round it to flow west. Bābur uses the name Kohik Water loosely; e.g. for the whole Zar-afshān when he speaks (infra) of cutting off the Dar-i-gham canal but for its southern arm only, the Qarā-sū in several places, and once, for the Dar-i-gham canal. See f. 49b and Kostenko i. 192.Return to passage

[358] rūd. The Zar-afshān has a very rapid current. See Kostenko i, 196, and for the canal, i, 174. The name Dar-i-gham is used also for a musical note having charm to witch away grief; and also for a town noted for its wines.Return to passage

[359] What this represents can only be guessed; perhaps 150 to 200 miles. Abū'l-fidā (Reinaud ii, 213) quotes Ibn Haukal as saying that from Bukhārā up to "Bottam" (this seems to be where the Zar-afshān emerges into the open land) is eight days' journey through an unbroken tangle of verdure and gardens.Return to passage

[360] See Schuyler i, 286 on the apportionment of water to Samarkand and Bukhārā.Return to passage

[361] It is still grown in the Samarkand region, and in Mr. Erskine's time a grape of the same name was cultivated in Aurangābād of the Deccan.Return to passage

[362] i.e. Shāhrukhī, Tīmūr's grandson, through Shāhrukh. It may be noted here that Bābur never gives Tīmūr any other title than Beg and that he styles all Tīmūrids, Mīrzā (Mīr-born).Return to passage

[363] Mr. Erskine here points out the contradiction between the statements (i) of Ibn Haukal, writing, in 367 AH. (977 AD.), of Samarkand as having a citadel (ark), an outer-fort (qūrghān) and Gates in both circumvallations; and (2) of Sharafu'd-dīn Yazdī (Z̤.N.) who mentions that when, in Tīmūr's day, the Getes besieged Samarkand, it had neither walls nor gates. See Ouseley's Ibn Haukal p. 253; Z̤.N. Bib. Ind. ed. i, 109 and Pétis de la Croix's Z̤.N. (_Histoire de Tīmūr Beg_) i, 91.Return to passage

[364] Here still lies the Ascension Stone, the Gūk-tāsh, a block of greyish white marble. Concerning the date of the erection of the building and meaning of its name, see e.g. Pétis de la Croix's Histoire de Chīngīz Khān p. 171; Mems. p. 40 note; and Schuyler s.n.Return to passage

[365] This seems to be the Bībī Khānīm Mosque. The author of Les Mosquées de Samarcande states that Tīmūr built Bībī Khānīm and the Gūr-i-amīr (Amīr's tomb); decorated Shāh-i-zinda and set up the Chūpān-ātā shrine. Cf. f. 46 and note to Jahāngīr Mīrzā, as to the Gūr-i-amīr.Return to passage

[366] Cap. II. Quoting from Sale's Qur'ān (i, 24) the verse is, "And Ibrāhīm and Ismā`īl raised the foundations of the house, saying, 'Lord! accept it from us, for Thou art he who hearest and knowest; Lord! make us also resigned to Thee, and show us Thy holy ceremonies, and be turned to us, for Thou art easy to be reconciled, and merciful.'"Return to passage

[367] or, buland, Garden of the Height or High Garden. The Turkī texts have what can be read as buldī but the Z̤.N. both when describing it (ii, 194) and elsewhere (e.g. ii, 596) writes buland. Buldī may be a clerical error for bulandī, the height, a name agreeing with the position of the garden.Return to passage

[368] In the Heart-expanding Garden, the Spanish Ambassadors had their first interview with Tīmūr. See Clavijo (Markham p. 130). Also the Z̤.N. ii, 6 for an account of its construction.Return to passage

[369] Judging from the location of the gardens and of Bābur's camps, this appears to be the Avenue mentioned on f. 39b and f. 40.Return to passage

[370] See infra f. 48 and note.Return to passage

[371] The Plane-tree Garden. This seems to be Clavijo's Bayginar, laid out shortly before he saw it (Markham p. 136).Return to passage

[372] The citadel of Samarkand stands high; from it the ground slopes west and south; on these sides therefore gardens outside the walls would lie markedly below the outer-fort (tāsh-qūrghān). Here as elsewhere the second W.-i-B. reads stone for outer (Cf. index s.n. tāsh). For the making of the North garden see Z̤.N. i, 799.Return to passage

[373] Tīmūr's eldest son, d. 805 AH. (1402 AD.), before his father, therefore. Bābur's wording suggests that in his day, the Gūr-i-amīr was known as the Madrāsa. See as to the buildings Z̤.N. i, 713 and ii, 492, 595, 597, 705; Clavijo (Markham p. 164 and p. 166); and Les Mosquées de Samarcande.Return to passage

[374] Hindūstān would make a better climax here than Samarkand does.Return to passage

[375] These appear to be pictures or ornamentations of carved wood. Redhouse describes islīmī as a special kind of ornamentation in curved lines, similar to Chinese methods.Return to passage

[376] i.e. the Black Stone (ka'ba) at Makkah to which Musalmāns turn in prayer.Return to passage

[377] As ancient observatories were themselves the instruments of astronomical observation, Bābur's wording is correct. Aūlūgh Beg's great quadrant was 180 ft. high; Abū-muḥammad Khujandī's sextant had a radius of 58 ft. Jā'ī Singh made similar great instruments in Jā'īpūr, Dihlī has others. Cf. Greaves Misc. Works i, 50; Mems. p. 51 note; Āiyīn-i-akbarī (Jarrett) ii, 5 and note; Murray's Hand-book to Bengal p. 331; Indian Gazetteer xiii, 400.Return to passage

[378] b. 597 AH. d. 672 AH. (1201-1274 AD.). See D'Herbélot's art. Naṣīr-i-dīn p. 662; Abū'l-fidā (Reinaud, Introduction i, cxxxviii) and Beale's Biographical Dict. s.n.Return to passage

[379] a grandson of Chīngīz Khān, d. 663 AH. (1265 AD.). The cognomen Aīl-khānī (Īl-khānī) may mean Khān of the Tribe.Return to passage

[380] Ḥarūnu'r-rashīd's second son; d. 218 AH. (833 AD.).Return to passage

[381] Mr. Erskine notes that this remark would seem to fix the date at which Bābur wrote it as 934 AH. (1527 AD.), that being the 1584th. year of the era of Vikramāditya, and therefore at three years before Bābur's death. (The Vikramāditya era began 57 BC.)Return to passage

[382] Cf. index s.n. tāsh.Return to passage

[383] This remark may refer to the 34 miles between the town and the quarries of its building stone. See f. 49 and note to Aītmāk Pass.Return to passage

[384] Steingass, any support for the back in sitting, a low wall in front of a house. See Vullers p. 148 and Burhān-i-qāṯi`; p. 119. Perhaps a dado.Return to passage

[385] beg u begāt, bāgh u bāghcha.Return to passage

[386] Four Gardens, a quadrilateral garden, laid out in four plots. The use of the name has now been extended for any well-arranged, large garden, especially one belonging to a ruler (Erskine).Return to passage

[387] As two of the trees mentioned here are large, it may be right to translate nārwān, not by pomegranate, but as the hard-wood elm, Madame Ujfalvy's 'karagatche' (p. 168 and p. 222). The name qarā-yīghāch (karagatch), dark tree, is given to trees other than this elm on account of their deep shadow.Return to passage

[388] Now a common plan indeed! See Schuyler i, 173.Return to passage

[389] juwāz-i-kaghazlār (nīng) sū'ī, i.e. the water of the paper-(pulping)-mortars. Owing to the omission from some MSS. of the word sū, water, juwāz has been mistaken for a kind of paper. See Mems. p. 52 and Méms. i, 102; A.Q.R. July 1910, p. 2, art. Paper-mills of Samarkand (H.B.); and Madame Ujfalvy p. 188. Kostenko, it is to be noted, does not include paper in his list (i, 346) of modern manufactures of Samarkand.Return to passage

[390] Mine of mud or clay. My husband has given me support for reading gil, and not gul, rose;—(1) In two good MSS. of the W.-i-B. the word is pointed with kasra, i.e. as for gil, clay; and (2) when describing a feast held in the garden by Tīmūr, the Z̤.N. says the mud-mine became a rose-mine, shuda Kān-i-gil Kān-i-gul. [Mr. Erskine refers here to Pétis de la Croix's Histoire de Tīmūr Beg (i.e. Z̤.N.) i, 96 and ii, 133 and 421.]Return to passage

[391] qūrūgh. Vullers, classing the word as Arabic, Zenker, classing it as Eastern Turkī, and Erskine (p. 42 n.) explain this as land reserved for the summer encampment of princes. Shaw (Voc. p. 155), deriving it from qūrūmāq, to frighten, explains it as a fenced field of growing grain.Return to passage

[392] Cf. f. 40. There it is located at one yīghāch and here at 3 kurohs from the town.Return to passage

[393] ṯaur. Cf. Zenker s.n. I understand it to lie, as Khān Yūrtī did, in a curve of the river.Return to passage

[394] 162 m. by rail.Return to passage

[395] Cf. f. 3.Return to passage

[396] tīrīsīnī sūīūb. The verb sūīmāk, to despoil, seems to exclude the common plan of stoning the fruit. Cf. f. 3b, dānasīnī alīp, taking out the stones.Return to passage

[397] Mīn Samarkandtā aūl (or auwal) aīchkāndā Bukhārā chāghīrlār nī aīchār aīdīm. These words have been understood to refer to Bābur's initial drinking of wine but this reading is negatived by his statement (f. 189) that he first drank wine in Harāt in 912 AH. I understand his meaning to be that the wine he drank in Samarkand was Bukhārā wine. The time cannot have been earlier than 917 AH. The two words aūl aīchkāndā, I read as parallel to aūl (bāghrī qarā) (f. 280) 'that drinking,' 'that bird,' i.e. of those other countries, not of Hindūstān where he wrote.Return to passage

It may be noted that Bābur's word for wine, chāghīr, may not always represent wine of the grape but may include wine of the apple and pear (cider and perry), and other fruits. Cider, its name seeming to be a descendant of chāghīr, was introduced into England by Crusaders, its manufacture having been learned from Turks in Palestine.

[398] 48 m. 3 fur. by way of the Aītmāk Pass (mod. Takhta Qarachi), and, Réclus (vi, 256) Buz-gala-khāna, Goat-house.Return to passage

[399] The name Aītmāk, to build, appears to be due to the stone quarries on the range. The pass-head is 34 m. from Samarkand and 3000 ft. above it. See Kostenko ii, 115 and Schuyler ii, 61 for details of the route.Return to passage

[400] The description of this hall is difficult to translate. Clavijo (Markham 124) throws light on the small recesses. Cf. Z̤.N. i, 781 and 300 and Schuyler ii, 68.Return to passage

[401] The Tāq-i-kisrī, below Bāghdād, is 105 ft. high, 84 ft. span and 150 ft. in depth (Erskine).Return to passage

[402] Cf. f. 46. Bābur does not mention that Tīmūr's father was buried at Kesh. Clavijo (Markham p. 123) says it was Tīmūr's first intention to be buried near his father, in Kesh.Return to passage

[403] Abū'l-fidā (Reinaud II, ii, 21) says that Nasaf is the Arabic and Nakhshab the local name for Qarshī. Ibn Haukal (Ouseley p. 260) writes Nakhshab.Return to passage

[404] This word has been translated burial-place and cimetière but Qarshī means castle, or royal-residence. The Z̤.N. (i, 111) says that Qarshī is an equivalent for Ar. qaṣr, palace, and was so called, from one built there by Qublāī Khān (d. 1294 AD.). Perhaps Bābur's word is connected with Gūrkhān, the title of sovereigns in Khutan, and means great or royal-house, i.e. palace.Return to passage

[405] 94 m. 6-1/2 fur. via Jām (Kostenko i, 115.)Return to passage

[406] See Appendix B.Return to passage

[407] some 34 m. (Kostenko i, 196). Schuyler mentions that he heard in Qarā-kūl a tradition that the district, in bye-gone days, was fertilized from the Sīr.Return to passage

[408] Cf. f. 45.Return to passage

[409] By abjad the words `Abbās kasht yield 853. The date of the murder was Ramẓān 9, 853 AH. (Oct. 27th. 1449 AD.).Return to passage

[410] This couplet is quoted in the Rauẓatu'ṣ-ṣafā (lith. ed. vi, f. 234 foot) and in the Ḥ.S. ii, 44. It is said, in the R.Ṣ. to be by Niẕāmī and to refer to the killing by Shīrūya of his father, Khusrau Parwīz in 7 AH. (628 AD.). The Ḥ.S. says that `Abdu'l-laṯīf constantly repeated the couplet, after he had murdered his father. [See also Daulat Shāh (Browne p. 356 and p. 366.) H.B.]Return to passage

[411] By abjad, Bābā Ḥusain kasht yields 854. The death was on Rabi` I, 26, 854 AH. (May 9th. 1450 AD.). See R.Ṣ. vi, 235 for an account of this death.Return to passage

[412] This overstates the time; dates shew 1 yr. 1 mth. and a few days.Return to passage

[413] i.e. The Khān of the Mughūls, Bābur's uncle.Return to passage

[414] Elph. MS. aūrmaghāīlār, might not turn; Ḥai. and Kehr's MSS. (sar bā bād) bīrmāghāīlār, might not give. Both metaphors seem drawn from the protective habit of man and beast of turning the back to a storm-wind.Return to passage

[415] i.e. betwixt two waters, the Miyān-i-dū-āb of India. Here, it is the most fertile triangle of land in Turkistān (Réclus, vi, 199), enclosed by the eastern mountains, the Nārīn and the Qarā-sū; Rabāṯik-aūrchīnī, its alternative name, means Small Station sub-district. From the uses of aūrchīn I infer that it describes a district in which there is no considerable head-quarters fort.Return to passage

[416] i.e. his own, Qūtlūq-nigār Khānīm and hers, Aīsān-daulat Begīm, with perhaps other widows of his father, probably Shāh Sulṯān Begīm.Return to passage

[417] Cf. f. 16 for almost verbatim statements.Return to passage

[418] Blacksmith's Dale. Ahangarān appears corrupted in modern maps to Angren. See Ḥ.S. ii, 293 for Khwānd-amīr's wording of this episode.Return to passage

[419] Cf. f. 1b and Kostenko i, 101.Return to passage

[420] i.e. Khān Uncle (Mother's brother).Return to passage

[421] n.w. of the Sang ferry over the Sīr.Return to passage

[422] perhaps, messenger of good tidings.Return to passage

[423] This man's family connections are interesting. He was `Alī-shukr Beg Bahārlū's grandson, nephew therefore of Pāshā Begīm; through his son, Saif-`alī Beg, he was the grandfather of Bairām Khān-i-khānān and thus the g.g.f. of `Abdu'r-raḥīm Mīrzā, the translator of the Second Wāqi`āt-i-bāburī. See Firishta lith. ed. p. 250.Return to passage

[424] Bābur's (step-)grandmother, co-widow with Aīsān-daulat of Yūnas Khān and mother of Aḥmad and Maḥmud Chaghatāī.Return to passage

[425] Here the narrative picks up the thread of Khusrau Shāh's affairs, dropped on f. 44.Return to passage

[426] mīng tūmān fulūs, i.e. a thousand sets-of-ten-thousand small copper coins. Mr. Erskine (Mems. p. 61) here has a note on coins. As here the tūmān does not seem to be a coin but a number, I do not reproduce it, valuable as it is per se.Return to passage

[427] ārīqlār; this the annotator of the Elph. MS. has changed to āshlīq, provisions, corn.Return to passage

[428] Samān-chī may mean Keeper of the Goods. Tīngrī-bīrdī, Theodore, is the purely Turkī form of the Khudāī-bīrdī, already met with several times in the B.N.Return to passage

[429] Bast (Bost) is on the left bank of the Halmand.Return to passage

[430] Cf. f. 56b.Return to passage

[431] known as Kābulī. He was a son of Abū-sa`īd and thus an uncle of Bābur. He ruled Kābul and Ghaznī from a date previous to his father's death in 873 AH. (perhaps from the time `Umar Shaikh was not sent there, in 870 AH. See f. 6b) to his death in 907 AH. Bābur was his virtual successor in Kābul, in 910 AH.Return to passage

[432] Elph. MS. f. 42; W.-i-B. I.O. 215 f. 47b and 217 f. 38; Mems. p. 63. Bābur here resumes his own story, interrupted on f. 56.Return to passage

[433] aīsh achīlmādī, a phrase recurring on f. 59b foot. It appears to imply, of trust in Providence, what the English "The way was not opened," does. Cf. f. 60b for another example of trust, there clinching discussion whether to go or not to go to Marghīnān.Return to passage

[434] i.e. Aḥrārī. He had been dead some 10 years. The despoilment of his family is mentioned on f. 23b.Return to passage

[435] fatratlār, here those due to the deaths of Aḥmad and Maḥmūd with their sequel of unstable government in Samarkand.Return to passage

[436] Aūghlāqchī, the player of the kid-game, the gray-wolfer. Yār-yīlāq will have gone with the rest of Samarkand into `Alī's hands in Rajab 903 AH. (March 1498). Contingent terms between him and Bābur will have been made; Yūsuf may have recognized some show of right under them, for allowing Bābur to occupy Yār-yīlāq.Return to passage

[437] i.e. after 933 AH. Cf. f. 46b and note concerning the Bikramāditya era. See index s.n. Aḥmad-i-yūsuf and Ḥ.S. ii, 293.Return to passage

[438] This plural, unless ironical, cannot be read as honouring `Alī; Bābur uses the honorific plural most rarely and specially, e.g. for saintly persons, for The Khān and for elder women-kinsfolk.Return to passage

[439] bīr yārīm yīl. Dates shew this to mean six months. It appears a parallel expression to Pers. hasht-yak, one-eighth.Return to passage

[440] Ḥ.S. ii, 293, in place of these two quotations, has a misra`,—Na rāy ṣafar kardan u na rūy iqāmat, (Nor resolve to march, nor face to stay).Return to passage

[441] i.e. in Samarkand.Return to passage

[442] Point to point, some 145 m. but much further by the road. Tang-āb seems likely to be one of the head-waters of Khwāja Bikargān-water. Thence the route would be by unfrequented hill-tracks, each man leading his second horse.Return to passage

[443] tūn yārīmī naqāra waqtīdā. Tūn yārīmī seems to mean half-dark, twilight. Here it cannot mean mid-night since this would imply a halt of twelve hours and Bābur says no halt was made. The drum next following mid-day is the one beaten at sunset.Return to passage

[444] The voluntary prayer, offered when the sun has well risen, fits the context.Return to passage

[445] I understand that the obeisance was made in the Gate-house, between the inner and outer doors.Return to passage

[446] This seeming sobriquet may be due to eloquence or to good looks.Return to passage

[447] qarā tīyāq. Cf. f. 63 where black bludgeons are used by a red rabble.Return to passage

[448] He was head-man of his clan and again with Shaibānī in 909 AH. (Sh. N. Vambéry, p. 272). Erskine (p. 67) notes that the Manghīts are the modern Nogais.Return to passage

[449] i.e. in order to allow for the here very swift current. The Ḥ.S. varying a good deal in details from the B.N. gives the useful information that Aūzūn Ḥasan's men knew nothing of the coming of the Tāshkīnt Mughūls.Return to passage

[450] Cf. f. 4b and App. A. as to the position of Akhsī.Return to passage

[451] bārīnī qīrdīlār. After this statement the five exceptions are unexpected; Bābur's wording is somewhat confused here.Return to passage

[452] i.e. in Hindūstān.Return to passage

[453] Taṃbal would be the competitor for the second place.Return to passage

[454] 47 m. 4-1/2 fur.Return to passage

[455] Bābur had been about two lunar years absent from Andijān but his loss of rule was of under 16 months.Return to passage

[456] A scribe's note entered here on the margin of the Ḥai. MS. is to the effect that certain words are not in the noble archetype (nashka sharīf); this supports other circumstances which make for the opinion that this Codex is a direct copy of Bābur's own MS. See Index s.n. Ḥai. MS. and JRAS 1906, p. 87.Return to passage

[457] Musalmān here seems to indicate mental contrast with Pagan practices or neglect of Musalmān observances amongst Mughūls.Return to passage

[458] i.e. of his advisors and himself.Return to passage

[459] Cf. f. 34.Return to passage

[460] circa 933 AH. All the revolts chronicled by Bābur as made against himself were under Mughūl leadership. Long Ḥasan, Taṃbal and `Alī-dost were all Mughūls. The worst was that of 914 AH. (1518 AD.) in which Qulī Chūnāq disgraced himself (T.R. p. 357).Return to passage

[461] Chūnāq may indicate the loss of one ear.Return to passage

[462] Būqāq, amongst other meanings, has that of one who lies in ambush.Return to passage

[463] This remark has interest because it shews that (as Bābur planned to write more than is now with the B.N. MSS.) the first gap in the book (914 AH. to 925 AH.) is accidental. His own last illness is the probable cause of this gap. Cf. JRAS 1905, p. 744. Two other passages referring to unchronicled matters are one about the Bāgh-i-ṣafā (f. 224), and one about Sl. `Alī T̤aghāī (f. 242).Return to passage

[464] I surmise Aīlāīsh to be a local name of the Qarā-daryā affluent of the Sīr.Return to passage

[465] aīkī aūch naubat chāpqūlāb bāsh chīqārghalī qūīmās. I cannot feel so sure as Mr. E. and M. de C. were that the man's head held fast, especially as for it to fall would make the better story.Return to passage

[466] Tūqā appears to have been the son of a T̤aghāī, perhaps of Sherīm; his name may imply blood-relationship.Return to passage

[467] For the verb awīmāq, to trepan, see f. 67 note 5.Return to passage

[468] The Fr. map of 1904 shews a hill suiting Bābur's location of this Hill of Pleasure.Return to passage

[469] A place near Kābul bears the same name; in both the name is explained by a legend that there Earth opened a refuge for forty menaced daughters.Return to passage

[470] Elph. MS. f. 47b; W.-i-B. I.O. 215 f. 53 and 217 f. 43; Mems. p. 70.Return to passage

[471] From Andijān to Aūsh is a little over 33 miles. Taṃbal's road was east of Bābur's and placed him between Andijān and Aūzkīnt where was the force protecting his family.Return to passage

[472] mod. Mazy, on the main Aūsh-Kāshghar road.Return to passage

[473] āb-duzd; de C. i, 144, prise d'eau.Return to passage

[474] This simile seems the fruit of experience in Hindūstān. See f. 333, concerning Chānderi.Return to passage

[475] These two Mughūls rebelled in 914 AH. with Sl. Qulī Chūnāq (T.R. s.n.).Return to passage

[476] awīdī. The head of Captain Dow, fractured at Chunār by a stone flung at it, was trepanned (Saiyār-i-muta`akhirīn, p. 577 and Irvine l .c. p. 283). Yār-`alī was alive in 910 AH. He seems to be the father of the great Bairām Khān-i-khānān of Akbar's reign.Return to passage

[477] chasht-gāh; midway between sunrise and noon.Return to passage

[478] ṯaurī; because providing prisoners for exchange.Return to passage

[479] shakh tūtūlūr īdī, perhaps a palisade.Return to passage

[480] i.e. from Ḥiṣār where he had placed him in 903 AH.Return to passage

[481] qūba yūzlūq (f. 6b and note 4). The Turkmān features would be a maternal inheritance.Return to passage

[482] He is "Saifī Maulānā `Arūzī" of Rieu's Pers. Cat. p. 525. Cf. Ḥ.S. ii, 341. His book, `Arūz-i-saifī has been translated by Blochmann and by Ranking.Return to passage

[483] namāz aūtār īdī. I understand some irony from this (de Meynard's Dict. s.n. aūtmāq).Return to passage

[484] The maṯla` of poems serve as an index of first lines.Return to passage

[485] Cf. f. 30.Return to passage

[486] Cf. f. 37b.Return to passage

[487] i.e. scout and in times of peace, huntsman. On the margin of the Elph. Codex here stands a note, mutilated in rebinding;—Sl. Aḥmad pidr-i-Qūch Beg ast * * * pidr-i-Sher-afgan u Sher-afgan * * * u Sl. Ḥusain Khān * * * Qūch Beg ast. Hamesha * * * dar khāna Shaham Khān * * *.Return to passage

[488] pītīldī; W.-i-B. navishta shud, words indicating the use by Bābur of a written record.Return to passage

[489] Cf. f. 6b and note and f. 17 and note.Return to passage

[490] tūlūk; i.e. other food than grain. Fruit, fresh or preserved, being a principal constituent of food in Central Asia, tūlūk will include several, but chiefly melons. "Les melons constituent presque seuls vers le fin d'été, la nourriture des classes pauvres" (Th. Radloff. l.c. p. 343).Return to passage

[491] Cf. f. 6b and note.Return to passage

[492] tūlkī var. tūlkū, the yellow fox. Following this word the Ḥai. MS. has u dar kamīn dūr instead of u rangīn dūr.Return to passage

[493] bī ḥadd; with which I.O. 215 agrees but I.O. 217 adds farbih, fat, which is right in fact (f. 2b) but less pertinent here than an unlimited quantity.Return to passage

[494] Here a pun on `ajab may be read.Return to passage

[495] Cf. f. 15, note to T̤aghāī.Return to passage

[496] Apparently not the usual Kīndīr-līk pass but one n.w. of Kāsān.Return to passage

[497] A ride of at least 40 miles, followed by one of 20 to Kāsān.Return to passage

[498] Cf. f. 72 and f. 72b. Tīlba would seem to have left Taṃbal.Return to passage

[499] Taṃbalnīng qarāsī.Return to passage

[500] i.e. the Other (Mid-afternoon) Prayer.Return to passage

[501] ātīnīng būīnīnī qātīb. Qātmāq has also the here-appropriate meaning of to stiffen.Return to passage

[502] aīlīk qūshmāq, i.e. Bābur's men with the Kāsān garrison. But the two W.-i-B. write merely dast burd and dast kardan.Return to passage

[503] The meaning of Ghazna here is uncertain. The Second W.-i-B. renders it by ar. qaryat but up to this point Bābur has not used qaryat for village. Ghazna-namangān cannot be modern Namangān. It was 2 m. from Archīān where Taṃbal was, and Bābur went to Bīshkhārān to be between Taṃbal and Machamī, coming from the south. Archīān and Ghazna-namangān seem both to have been n. or n.w. of Bīshkārān (see maps).Return to passage

It may be mentioned that at Archīān, in 909 AH. the two Chaghatāī Khāns and Bābur were defeated by Shaibānī.

[504] bīzlār. The double plural is rare with Bābur; he writes bīz, we, when action is taken in common; he rarely uses mīn, I, with autocratic force; his phrasing is largely impersonal, e.g. with rare exceptions, he writes the impersonal passive verb.Return to passage

[505] bāshlīghlār. Teufel was of opinion that this word is not used as a noun in the B.N. In this he is mistaken; it is so used frequently, as here, in apposition. See ZDMG, xxxvii, art. Bābur und Abū`l-faẓl.Return to passage

[506] Cf. f. 54 foot.Return to passage

[507] Cf. f. 20. She may have come from Samarkand and `Alī's household or from Kesh and the Tarkhān households.Return to passage

[508] Cf. f. 26 l. 2 for the same phrase.Return to passage

[509] He is the author of the Shaibānī-nāma.Return to passage

[510] dāng and fils (infra) are small copper coins.Return to passage

[511] Cf. f. 25 l. 1 and note 1.Return to passage

[512] Probably the poet again; he had left Harāt and was in Samarkand (Sh. N. Vambéry, p. 34 l. 14).Return to passage

[513] From what follows, this Mughūl advance seems a sequel to a Tarkhān invitation.Return to passage

[514] By omitting the word Mīr the Turkī text has caused confusion between this father and son (Index s.nn.).Return to passage

[515] bīz khūd kharāb bū mu`āmla aīdūk. These words have been understood earlier, as referring to the abnormal state of Bābur's mind described under Sec. r. They better suit the affairs of Samarkand because Bābur is able to resolve on action and also because he here writes bīz, we, and not mīn, I, as in Sec. r.Return to passage

[516] For būlghār, rendezvous, see also f. 78 l. 2 fr. ft.Return to passage

[517] 25 m. only; the halts were due probably to belated arrivals.Return to passage

[518] Some of his ties would be those of old acquaintance in Ḥiṣār with `Alī's father's begs, now with him in Samarkand.Return to passage

[519] Point to point, some 90 m. but further by road.Return to passage

[520] Bū waqi` būlghāch, manifestly ironical.Return to passage

[521] Sangzār to Aūrā-tīpā, by way of the hills, some 50 miles.Return to passage

[522] The Sh. N. Vambéry, p. 60, confirms this.Return to passage

[523] Cf. f. 74b.Return to passage

[524] Macham and Awīghūr, presumably.Return to passage

[525] gūzlār tūz tūtī, i.e. he was blinded for some treachery to his hosts.Return to passage

[526] Muḥ. Ṣāliḥ's well-informed account of this episode has much interest, filling out and, as by Shaibānī's Boswell, balancing Bābur's. Bābur is obscure about what country was to be given to `Alī. Pāyanda-ḥasan paraphrases his brief words;—Shaibānī was to be as a father to `Alī and when he had taken `Alī's father's wilāyāt, he was to give a country to `Alī. It has been thought that the gift to `Alī was to follow Shaibānī's recovery of his own ancestral camping-ground (yūrt) but this is negatived, I think, by the word, wilāyāt, cultivated land.Return to passage

[527] Elp. MS. f. 57b; W.-i-B. I.O. 215 f. 63b and I.O. 217 f. 52; Mems. p. 82.Return to passage

Two contemporary works here supplement the B.N.; (1) the (Tawārikh-i-guzīda) Naṣrat-nāma, dated 908 AH. (B.M. Turkī Or. 3222) of which Berezin's Shaibāni-nāma is an abridgment; (2) Muḥ. Ṣāliḥ Mīrzā's Shaibānī-nāma (Vambéry trs. cap. xix et seq.). The Ḥ.S. (Bomb. ed. p. 302, and Tehran ed. p. 384) is also useful.

[528] i.e. on his right. The Ḥ.S. ii, 302 represents that `Alī was well-received. After Shaibāq had had Zuhra's overtures, he sent an envoy to `Alī and Yaḥya; the first was not won over but the second fell in with his mother's scheme. This difference of view explains why `Alī slipped away while Yaḥya was engaged in the Friday Mosque. It seems likely that mother and son alike expected their Aūzbeg blood to stand them in good stead with Shaibāq.Return to passage

[529] He tried vainly to get the town defended. "Would to God Bābur Mīrzā were here!" he is reported as saying, by Muḥ. Ṣāliḥ.Return to passage

[530] Perhaps it is for the play of words on `Alī and `Alī's life (jān) that this man makes his sole appearance here.Return to passage

[531] i.e. rich man or merchant, but Bī (infra) is an equivalent of Beg.Return to passage

[532] Muḥ. Ṣāliḥ, invoking curses on such a mother, mentions that Zuhra was given to a person of her own sort.Return to passage

[533] The Sh. N. and Naṣrat-nāma attempt to lift the blame of `Alī's death from Shaibāq; the second saying that he fell into the Kohik-water when drunk.Return to passage

[534] Harāt might be his destination but the Ḥ.S. names Makka. Some dismissals towards Khurāsān may imply pilgrimage to Meshhed.Return to passage

[535] Used also by Bābur's daughter, Gul-badan (l.c. f. 31).Return to passage

[536] Cut off by alien lands and weary travel.Return to passage

[537] The Pers. annotator of the Elph. Codex has changed Alāī to wīlāyat, and dābān (pass) to yān, side. For the difficult route see Schuyler, i, 275, Kostenko, i, 129 and Rickmers, JRGS. 1907, art. Fan Valley.Return to passage

[538] Amongst Turks and Mughūls, gifts were made by nines.Return to passage

[539] Ḥiṣār was his earlier home.Return to passage

[540] Many of these will have been climbed in order to get over places impassable at the river's level.Return to passage

[541] Schuyler quotes a legend of the lake. He and Kostenko make it larger.Return to passage

[542] The second occasion was when he crossed from Sūkh for Kābul in 910 AH. (fol. 120).Return to passage

[543] This name appears to indicate a Command of 10,000 (Bretschneider's Mediæval Researches, i, 112).Return to passage

[544] It seems likely that the cloth was soiled. Cf. f. 25 and Hughes Dict. of Islām s.n. Eating.Return to passage

[545] As, of the quoted speech, one word only, of three, is Turkī, others may have been dreamed. Shaikh Maṣlaḥat's tomb is in Khujand where Bābur had found refuge in 903 AH.; it had been circumambulated by Tīmūr in 790 AH. (1390 AD.) and is still honoured.Return to passage

This account of a dream compares well for naturalness with that in the seemingly-spurious passage, entered with the Ḥai. MS. on f. 118. For examination of the passage see JRAS, Jan. 1911, and App. D.

[546] He was made a Tarkhān by diploma of Shaibānī (Ḥ.S. ii, 306, l. 2).Return to passage

[547] Here the Ḥai. MS. begins to use the word Shaibāq in place of its previously uniform Shaibānī. As has been noted (f. 5b n. 2), the Elph. MS. writes Shaibāq. It may be therefore that a scribe has changed the earlier part of the Ḥai. MS. and that Bābur wrote Shaibāq. From this point my text will follow the double authority of the Elph. and Ḥai. MSS.Return to passage

[548] In 875 AH. (1470 AD.). Ḥusain was then 32 years old. Bābur might have compared his taking of Samarkand with Tīmūr's capture of Qarshī, also with 240 followers (Z̤.N. i, 127). Firishta (lith. ed. p. 196) ascribes his omission to do so to reluctance to rank himself with his great ancestor.Return to passage

[549] This arrival shews that Shaibānī expected to stay in Samarkand. He had been occupying Turkistān under The Chaghatāī Khān.Return to passage

[550] `Alī-sher died Jan. 3rd. 1501. It is not clear to what disturbances Bābur refers. He himself was at ease till after April 20th. 1502 and his defeat at Sar-i-pul. Possibly the reference is to the quarrels between Binā'ī and `Alī-sher. Cf. Sām Mīrzā's Anthology, trs. S. de Saçy, Notices et Extraits iv, 287 et seq.Return to passage

[551] I surmise a double play-of-words in this verse. One is on two rhyming words, ghala and mallah and is illustrated by rendering them as oat and coat. The other is on pointed and unpointed letters, i.e. ghala and `ala. We cannot find however a Persian word `ala, meaning garment.Return to passage

[552] Bābur's refrain is ghūsīdūr, his rhymes būl, (buyur)ūl and tūl. Binā'ī makes būlghūsīdūr his refrain but his rhymes are not true viz. yīr, (sa)mar and lār.Return to passage

[553] Shawwāl 906 AH. began April 20th. 1501.Return to passage

[554] From the Bū-stān, Graf ed. p. 55, l. 246.Return to passage

[555] Sīkīz Yīldūz. See Chardin's Voyages, v, 136 and Table; also Stanley Lane Poole's Bābur, p. 56.Return to passage

[556] In 1791 AD. Muḥ. Effendi shot 482 yards from a Turkish bow, before the R. Tox. S.; not a good shot, he declared. Longer ones are on record. See Payne-Gallwey's Cross-bow and AQR. 1911, H. Beveridge's Oriental Cross-bows.Return to passage

[557] In the margin of the Elph. Codex, here, stands a Persian verse which appears more likely to be Humāyūn's than Bābur's. It is as follows:Return to passage

Were the Mughūl race angels, they would be bad; Written in gold, the name Mughūl would be bad; Pluck not an ear from the Mughūl's corn-land, What is sown with Mughūl seed will be bad.

This verse is written into the text of the First W.-i-B. (I.O. 215 f. 72) and is introduced by a scribe's statement that it is by ān Ḥaẓrat, much as notes known to be Humāyūn's are elsewhere attested in the Elph. Codex. It is not in the Ḥai. and Kehr's MSS. nor with, at least many, good copies of the Second W.-i-B.

[558] This subterranean water-course, issuing in a flowing well (Erskine) gave its name to a bastion (Ḥ.S. ii, 300).Return to passage

[559] nāwak, a diminutive of nāo, a tube. It is described, in a MS. of Bābur's time, by Muḥ. Budhā'ī, and, in a second of later date, by Amīnu'd-dīn (AQR 1911, H.B.'s Oriental Cross-bows).Return to passage

[560] Kostenko, i, 344, would make the rounds 9 m.Return to passage

[561] bīr yūz ātliqnīng ātinī nāwak aūqī bila yakhshī atīm. This has been read by Erskine as though būz āt, pale horse, and not yūz ātlīq, Centurion, were written. De. C. translates by Centurion and a marginal note of the Elph. Codex explains yūz ātlīq by ṣad aspagī.Return to passage

[562] The Sh. N. gives the reverse side of the picture, the plenty enjoyed by the besiegers.Return to passage

[563] He may have been attached to the tomb of Khwāja `Abdu'l-lāh Anṣārī in Harāt.Return to passage

[564] The brusque entry here and elsewhere of e.g. Taṃbal's affairs, allows the inference that Bābur was quoting from perhaps a news-writer's, contemporary records. For a different view of Taṃbal, the Sh. N. cap. xxxiii should be read.Return to passage

[565] Five-villages, on the main Khujand-Tāshkīnt road.Return to passage

[566] turk, as on f. 28 of Khusrau Shāh.Return to passage

[567] Elph. MS. f. 68b; W.-i-B. I.O. 215 f. 78 and 217 f. 61b; Mems. p. 97.Return to passage

The Kehr-Ilminsky text shews, in this year, a good example of its Persification and of Dr. Ilminsky's dealings with his difficult archetype by the help of the Memoirs.

[568] tāshlāb. The Sh. N. places these desertions as after four months of siege.Return to passage

[569] It strikes one as strange to find Long Ḥasan described, as here, in terms of his younger brother. The singularity may be due to the fact that Ḥusain was with Bābur and may have invited Ḥasan. It may be noted here that Ḥusain seems likely to be that father-in-law of `Umar Shaikh mentioned on f. 12b and 13b.Return to passage

[570] This laudatory comment I find nowhere but in the Ḥai. Codex.Return to passage

[571] There is some uncertainty about the names of those who left.Return to passage

[572] The Sh. N. is interesting here as giving an eye-witness' account of the surrender of the town and of the part played in the surrender by Khān-zāda's marriage (cap. xxxix).Return to passage

[573] The first seems likely to be a relation of Niẕāmu'd-dīn `Alī Khalīfa; the second was Mole-marked, a foster-sister. The party numbered some 100 persons of whom Abū'l-makāram was one (Ḥ.S. ii, 310).Return to passage

[574] Bābur's brevity is misleading; his sister was not captured but married with her own and her mother's consent before attempt to leave the town was made. Cf. Gul-badan's H.N. f. 3b and Sh. N. Vambéry, p. 145.Return to passage

[575] The route taken avoided the main road for Dīzak; it can be traced by the physical features, mentioned by Bābur, on the Fr. map of 1904. The Sh. N. says the night was extraordinarily dark. Departure in blinding darkness and by unusual ways shews distrust of Shaibāq's safe-conduct suggesting that Yaḥyā's fate was in the minds of the fugitives.Return to passage

[576] The texts differ as to whether the last two lines are prose or verse. All four are in Turkī, but I surmise a clerical error in the refrain of the third, where būlūb is written for būldī.Return to passage

[577] The second was in 908 AH. (f. 18_b_); the third in 914 AH. (f. 216 b); the fourth is not described in the B.N.; it followed Bābur's defeat at Ghaj-diwān in 918 AH. (Erskine's History of India, i, 325). He had a fifth, but of a different kind, when he survived poison in 933 AH. (f. 305).Return to passage

[578] Ḥai. MS. qāqāsrāq; Elph. MS. yānasrāq.Return to passage

[579] ātūn, one who instructs in reading, writing and embroidery. Cf. Gulbadan's H.N. f. 26. The distance walked may have been 70 or 80 m.Return to passage

[580] She was the wife of the then Governor of Aūrā-tīpā, Muḥ. Ḥusain Dūghlāt.Return to passage

[581] It may be noted here that in speaking of these elder women Bābur uses the honorific plural, a form of rare occurrence except for such women, for saintly persons and exceptionally for The supreme Khān. For his father he has never used it.Return to passage

[582] This name has several variants. The village lies, in a valley-bottom, on the Aq-sū and on a road. See Kostenko, i, 119.Return to passage

[583] She had been divorced from Shaibānī in order to allow him to make legal marriage with her niece, Khān-zāda.Return to passage

[584] Amongst the variants of this name, I select the modern one. Macha is the upper valley of the Zar-afshān.Return to passage

[585] Tīmūr took Dihlī in 801 AH. (Dec. 1398), i.e. 103 solar and 106 lunar years earlier. The ancient dame would then have been under 5 years old. It is not surprising therefore that in repeating her story Bābur should use a tense betokening hear-say matter (bārib īkān dūr).Return to passage

[586] The anecdote here following, has been analysed in JRAS 1908, p. 87, in order to show warrant for the opinion that parts of the Kehr-Ilminsky text are retranslations from the Persian W.-i-B.Return to passage

[587] Amongst those thus leaving seem to have been Qaṃbar-`alī (f. 99b).Return to passage

[588] Cf. f. 107 foot.Return to passage

[589] The Sh. N. speaks of the cold in that winter (Vambéry, p. 160). It was unusual for the Sīr to freeze in this part of its course (Sh. N. p. 172) where it is extremely rapid (Kostenko, i, 213).Return to passage

[590] Cf. f. 4b.Return to passage

[591] Point to point, some 50 miles.Return to passage

[592] Āhangarān-julgasī, a name narrowed on maps to Angren (valley).Return to passage

[593] Faut shūd Nuyān. The numerical value of these words is 907. Bābur when writing, looks back 26 years to the death of this friend.Return to passage

[594] Āb-burdan village is on the Zar-afshān; the pass is 11,200 ft. above the sea. Bābur's boundaries still hold good and the spring still flows. See Ujfalvy l.c. i. 14; Kostenko, i, 119 and 193; Rickmers, JRGS 1907, p. 358.Return to passage

[595] From the Bū-stān (Graf's ed. Vienna 1858, p. 561). The last couplet is also in the Gulistān (Platts' ed. p. 72). The Bombay lith. ed. of the Bū-stān explains (p. 39) that the "We" of the third couplet means Jamshīd and his predecessors who have rested by his fountain.Return to passage

[596] nīma. The First W.-i-B. (I.O. 215 f. 81 l. 8) writes tawārīkh, annals.Return to passage

[597] This may be the Khwāja Hijrī of the A.N. (index s.n.); and Badāyūnī's Ḥasan Hijrī, Bib. Ind. iii, 385; and Ethé's Pers. Cat. No. 793; and Bod. Cat. No. 189.Return to passage

[598] The Ḥai. MS. points in the last line as though punning on Khān and Jān, but appears to be wrong.Return to passage

[599] For an account of the waste of crops, the Sh. N. should be seen (p. 162 and 180).Return to passage

[600] I think this refers to last year's move (f. 94 foot).Return to passage

[601] In other words, the T. preposition, meaning E. in, at, etc. may be written with t or d, as ta(tā) or as da(dā). Also the one meaning E. towards, may be gha, qa, or ka (with long or short vowel).Return to passage

[602] dīm, a word found difficult. It may be a derivative of root de, tell, and a noun with the meaning of English tale (number). The First W.-i-B. renders it by san, and by san, Abū'l-ghāzī expresses what Bābur's dīm expresses, the numbering of troops. It occurs thrice in the B.N. (here, on f. 183b and on f. 264b). In the Elphinstone Codex it has been written-over into Ivīm, once resembles vīm more than dīm and once is omitted. The L. and E. Memoirs (p. 303) inserts what seems a gloss, saying that a whip or bow is used in the count, presumably held by the teller to 'keep his place' in the march past. The Siyāsat-nāma (Schefer, trs. p. 22) names the whip as used in numbering an army.Return to passage

[603] The acclamation of the standards is depicted in B.M. W.-i-B. Or. 3714 f. 128b. One cloth is shewn tied to the off fore-leg of a live cow, above the knee, Bābur's word being aūrtā aīlīk (middle-hand).Return to passage

[604] The libation was of fermented mares'-milk.Return to passage

[605] lit. their one way.Return to passage

[606] Cf. T.R. p. 308.Return to passage

[607] Elph. MS. f. 74; W.-i-B. I.O. 215 f. 83 and 217 f. 66; Mems. p. 104.Return to passage

[608] It may be noted that Bābur calls his mother's brothers, not ṯaghāī but dādā father. I have not met with an instance of his saying 'My ṯaghāī' as he says 'My dādā.' Cf. index s.n. taghāī.Return to passage

[609] kūrūnūsh qīlīb, reflective from kūrmak, to see.Return to passage

[610] A rider's metaphor.Return to passage

[611] As touching the misnomer, 'Mughūl dynasty' for the Tīmūrid rulers in Hindūstān, it may be noted that here, as Bābur is speaking to a Chaghatāī Mughūl, his 'Turk' is left to apply to himself.Return to passage

[612] Gulistān, cap. viii, Maxim 12 (Platts' ed. p. 147).Return to passage

[613] This backward count is to 890 AH. when Aḥmad fled from cultivated lands (T.R. p. 113).Return to passage

[614] It becomes clear that Aḥmad had already been asked to come to Tāshkīnt.Return to passage

[615] Cf. f. 96b for his first departure without help.Return to passage

[616] Yagha (Yaghma) is not on the Fr. map of 1904, but suitably located is Turbat (Tomb) to which roads converge.Return to passage

[617] Elph. MS. tūshkūcha; Ḥai. MS. yūkūnchā. The importance Aḥmad attached to ceremony can be inferred by the details given (f. 103) of his meeting with Maḥmūd.Return to passage

[618] kūrūshkāīlār. Cf. Redhouse who gives no support for reading the verb kūrmak as meaning to embrace.Return to passage

[619] būrk, a tall felt cap (Redhouse). In the adjective applied to the cap there are several variants. The Ḥai. MS. writes muftūl, solid or twisted. The Elph. MS. has muftūn-lūq which has been understood by Mr. Erskine to mean, gold-embroidered.Return to passage

[620] The wording suggests that the decoration is in chain-stitch, pricked up and down through the stuff.Return to passage

[621] tāsh chantāī. These words have been taken to mean whet-stone (bilgū-tāsh). I have found no authority for reading tāsh as whet-stone. Moreover to allow 'bag of the stone' to be read would require tāsh (nīng) chantāī-sī in the text.Return to passage

[622] lit. bag-like things. Some will have held spare bow-strings and archers' rings, and other articles of 'repairing kit.' With the gifts, it seems probable that the gosha-gīr (f. 107) was given.Return to passage

[623] Vullers, clava sex foliis.Return to passage

[624] Zenker, casse-tête. Kīstin would seem to be formed from the root, kīs, cutting, but M. de C. describes it as a ball attached by a strap or chain to a handle. Sanglākh, a sort of mace (gurz).Return to passage

[625] The Rauzatu'ṣ-ṣafā states that The Khāns left Tāshkīnt on Muḥarram 15th (July 21st. 1502), in order to restore Bābur and expel Taṃbal (Erskine).Return to passage

[626] lit. saw the count (dīm). Cf. f. 100 and note concerning the count. Using a Persian substitute, the Kehr-Ilminsky text writes san (kūrdīlār).Return to passage

[627] Elph. MS. aṃbārchī, steward, for Itārchī, a tribal-name. The 'Mīrzā' and the rank of the army-begs are against supposing a steward in command. Here and just above, the texts write Mīrzā-i-Itārchī and Mīrzā-i-Dūghlāt, thus suggesting that in names not ending with a vowel, the iẓāfat is required for exact transliteration, e.g. Muḥammad-i-dūghlāt.Return to passage

[628] Alāī-līq aūrchīnī. I understand the march to have been along the northern slope of the Little Alāī, south of Aūsh.Return to passage

[629] As of Ālmālīgh and Ālmātū (fol. 2b) Bābur reports a tradition with caution. The name Aūz-kīnt may be read to mean 'Own village,' independent, as Aūz-beg, Own-beg.Return to passage

[630] He would be one of the hereditary Khwājas of Andijān (f. 16).Return to passage

[631] For several battle-cries see Th. Radloff's Réceuils etc. p. 322.Return to passage

[632] qāshqa ātlīq kīshī. For a parallel phrase see f. 92b.Return to passage

[633] Bābur does not explain how the imbroglio was cleared up; there must have been a dramatic moment when this happened.Return to passage

[634] Darwāna (a trap-door in a roof) has the variant dur-dāna, a single pearl; tūqqāī perhaps implies relationship; lūlū is a pearl, a wild cow etc.Return to passage

[635] Ḥai. MS. sāīrt kīshī. Muḥ. `Alī is likely to be the librarian (cf. index s.n.).Return to passage

[636] Elph. MS. ramāqgha u tūr-gā; Ḥai. MS. tārtātgha u tūr-gā. Ilminsky gives no help, varying much here from the true text. The archetype of both MSS. must have been difficult to read.Return to passage

[637] The Ḥai. MS.'s pointing allows the sobriquet to mean 'Butterfly.' His family lent itself to nick-names; in it three brothers were known respectively as Fat or Lubberly, Fool and, perhaps, Butterfly.Return to passage

[638] bīrk ārīgh, doubly strong by its trench and its current.Return to passage

[639] I understand that time failed to set the standard in its usual rest. E. and de C. have understood that the yak-tail (qūtās tūghī f. 100) was apart from the staff and that time failed to adjust the two parts. The tūgh however is the whole standard; moreover if the tail were ever taken off at night from the staff, it would hardly be so treated in a mere bivouac.Return to passage

[640] aīshīklīk tūrlūq, as on f. 113. I understand this to mean that the two men were as far from their followers as sentries at a Gate are posted outside the Gate.Return to passage

[641] So too 'Piero of Cosimo' and 'Lorenzo of Piero of the Medici.' Cf. the names of five men on f. 114.Return to passage

[642] shashtīm. The shasht (thumb) in archery is the thumb-shield used on the left hand, as the zih-gīr (string-grip), the archer's ring, is on the right-hand thumb.Return to passage

It is useful to remember, when reading accounts of shooting with the Turkī (Turkish) bow, that the arrows (aūq) had notches so gripping the string that they kept in place until released with the string.

[643] sar-i-sabz gosha gīr. The gosha-gīr is an implement for remedying the warp of a bow-tip and string-notch. For further particulars see Appendix C.Return to passage

The term sar-i-sabz, lit. green-head, occurs in the sense of 'quite young' or 'new,' in the proverb, 'The red tongue loses the green head,' quoted in the T̤abaqāt-i-akbarī account of Bābur's death. Applied here, it points to the gosha-gīr as part of the recent gift made by Aḥmad to Bābur.

[644] Taṃbal aīkāndūr. By this tense I understand that Bābur was not at first sure of the identity of the pseudo-sentries, partly because of their distance, partly, it may be presumed, because of concealment of identity by armour.Return to passage

[645] dūwulgha būrkī; i.e. the soft cap worn under the iron helm.Return to passage

[646] Nūyān's sword dealt the blow (f. 97b). Gul-badan also tells the story (f. 77) à propos of a similar incident in Humāyūn's career. Bābur repeats the story on f. 234.Return to passage

[647] yāldāghlāmāī dūr aīdīm. The Second W.-i-B. has taken this as from yāltūrmāq, to cause to glisten, and adds the gloss that the sword was rusty (I.O. 217 f. 70b).Return to passage

[648] The text here seems to say that the three men were on foot, but this is negatived by the context.Return to passage

[649] Amongst the various uses of the verb tūshmak, to descend in any way, the B.N. does not allow of 'falling (death) in battle.' When I made the index of the Ḥai. MS. facsimile, this was not known to me; I therefore erroneously entered the men enumerated here as killed at this time.Return to passage

[650] Elph. MS. yakhshī. Zenker explains bakhshī (pay-master) as meaning also a Court-physician.Return to passage

[651] The Ḥai. Elph. and Kehr's MS. all have pūchqāq tāqmāq or it may be pūḥqāq tāqmāq. T. būkhāq means bandage, pūchāq, rind of fruit, but the word clear in the three Turkī MSS. means, skin of a fox's leg.Return to passage

[652] The daryā here mentioned seems to be the Kāsān-water; the route taken from Bīshkhārān to Pāp is shewn on the Fr. map to lead past modern Tūpa-qūrghān. Pāp is not marked, but was, I think, at the cross-roads east of Touss (Karnān).Return to passage

[653] Presumably Jahāngīr's.Return to passage

[654] Here his father was killed (f. 6b). Cf. App. A.Return to passage

[655] `Alī-dost's son (f. 79b).Return to passage

[656] The sobriquet Khīz may mean Leaper, or Impetuous.Return to passage

[657] kūīlāk, syn. kūnglāk, a shirt not opening at the breast. It will have been a short garment since the under-vest was visible.Return to passage

[658] i.e. when Bābur was writing in Hindūstān. Exactly at what date he made this entry is not sure. `Alī was in Koel in 933 AH. (f. 315) and then taken prisoner, but Bābur does not say he was killed,—as he well might say of a marked man, and, as the captor was himself taken shortly after, `Alī may have been released, and may have been in Koel again. So that the statement 'now in Koel' may refer to a time later than his capture. The interest of the point is in its relation to the date of composition of the Bābur-nāma.Return to passage

No record of `Alī's bravery in Aūsh has been preserved. The reference here made to it may indicate something attempted in 908 AH. after Bābur's adventure in Karnān (f. 118b) or in 909 AH. from Sūkh. Cf. Translator's note f. 118b.

[659] aūpchīnlīk. Vambéry, gepanzert; Shaw, four horse-shoes and their nails; Steingass, aūpcha-khāna, a guard-house.Return to passage

[660] Sang is a ferry-station (Kostenko, i, 213). Pāp may well have been regretted (f. 109b and f. 112b)! The well-marked features of the French map of 1904 allows Bābur's flight to be followed.Return to passage

[661] In the Turkī text this saying is in Persian; in the Kehr-Ilminsky, in Turkī, as though it had gone over with its Persian context of the W.-i-B. from which the K.-I. text here is believed to be a translation.Return to passage

[662] Cf. f. 96b and Fr. Map for route over the Kīndīr-tau.Return to passage

[663] This account of Muḥ. Bāqir reads like one given later to Bābur; he may have had some part in Bābur's rescue (cf. Translator's Note to f. 118b).Return to passage

[664] Perhaps reeds for a raft. Sh. N. p. 258, Sāl aūchūn bār qāmīsh, reeds are there also for rafts.Return to passage

[665] Here the Turkī text breaks off, as it might through loss of pages, causing a blank of narrative extending over some 16 months. Cf. App. D. for a passage, supposedly spurious, found with the Ḥaidarābād Codex and the Kehr-Ilminsky text, purporting to tell how Bābur was rescued from the risk in which the lacuna here leaves him.Return to passage

[666] As in the Farghāna Section, so here, reliance is on the Elphinstone and Ḥaidarābād MSS. The Kehr-Ilminsky text still appears to be a retranslation from the Wāqi`āt-i-bāburī and verbally departs much from the true text; moreover, in this Section it has been helped out, where its archetype was illegible or has lost fragmentary passages, from the Leyden and Erskine Memoirs. It may be mentioned, as between the First and the Second Wāqi`āt-i-bāburī, that several obscure passages in this Section are more explicit in the First (Pāyanda-ḥasan's) than in its successor (`Abdu-r-raḥīm's).Return to passage

[667] Elph. MS. f. 90b; W.-i-B. I.O. 215, f. 96b and 217, f. 79; Mems. p. 127. "In 1504 AD. Ferdinand the Catholic drove the French out of Naples" (Erskine). In England, Henry VII was pushing forward a commercial treaty, the Intercursus malus, with the Flemings and growing in wealth by the exactions of Empson and Dudley.Return to passage

[668] presumably the pastures of the "Ilak" Valley. The route from Sūkh would be over the `Alā`u'd-dīn-pass, into the Qīzīl-sū valley, down to Āb-i-garm and on to the Aīlāq-valley, Khwāja `Imād, the Kāfirnigān, Qabādīān, and Aūbāj on the Amū. See T.R. p. 175 and Farghāna Section, p. 184, as to the character of the journey.Return to passage

[669] Amongst the Turkī tribes, the time of first applying the razor to the face is celebrated by a great entertainment. Bābur's miserable circumstances would not admit of this (Erskine).Return to passage

The text is ambiguous here, reading either that Sūkh was left or that Aīlāq-yīlāq was reached in Muḥarram. As the birthday was on the 8th, the journey very arduous and, for a party mostly on foot, slow, it seems safest to suppose that the start was made from Sūkh at the end of 909 AH. and not in Muḥarram, 910 AH.

[670] chārūq, rough boots of untanned leather, formed like a moccasin with the lower leather drawn up round the foot; they are worn by Khīrghīz mountaineers and caravan-men on journeys (Shaw).Return to passage

[671] chāpān, the ordinary garment of Central Asia (Shaw).Return to passage

[672] The ālāchūq, a tent of flexible poles, covered with felt, may be the khargāh (kibitka); Persian chādar seems to represent Turkī āq awī, white house.Return to passage

[673] i.e. with Khusrau's power shaken by Aūzbeg attack, made in the winter of 909 AH. (Shaibānī-nāma cap. lviii).Return to passage

[674] Cf. ff. 81 and 81b. The armourer's station was low for an envoy to Bābur, the superior in birth of the armourer's master.Return to passage

[675] var. Chaqānīān and Saghānīān. The name formerly described the whole of the Ḥiṣār territory (Erskine).Return to passage

[676] the preacher by whom the Khuṯba is read (Erskine).Return to passage

[677] bī bāqī or bī Bāqī; perhaps a play of words with the double meaning expressed in the above translation.Return to passage

[678] Amongst these were widows and children of Bābur's uncle, Maḥmūd (f. 27b).Return to passage

[679] aūghūl. As being the son of Khusrau's sister, Aḥmad was nephew to Bāqī; there may be in the text a scribe's slip from one aūghūl to another, and the real statement be that Aḥmad was the son of Bāqī's son, Muḥ. Qāsim, which would account for his name Aḥmad-i-qāsim.Return to passage

[680] Cf. f. 67.Return to passage

[681] Bābur's loss of rule in Farghāna and Samarkand.Return to passage

[682] about 7 miles south of Aībak, on the road to Sar-i-tāgh (mountain-head, Erskine).Return to passage

[683] viz. the respective fathers, Maḥmūd and `Umar Shaikh. The arrangement was made in 895 AH. (1490 AD.).Return to passage

[684] Gulistān cap. i, story 3. Part of this quotation is used again on f. 183.Return to passage

[685] Maḥmūd's sons under whom Bāqī had served.Return to passage

[686] Uncles of all degrees are included as elder brethren, cousins of all degrees, as younger ones.Return to passage

[687] Presumably the ferries; perhaps the one on the main road from the north-east which crosses the river at Fort Murgh-āb.Return to passage

[688] Nine deaths, perhaps where the Amū is split into nine channels at the place where Mīrzā Khān's son Sulaimān later met his rebel grandson Shāh-rukh (T̤abaqāt-i-akbarī, Elliot & Dowson, v, 392, and A.N. Bib. Ind., 3rd ed., 441). Tūqūz-aūlūm is too far up the river to be Arnold's "shorn and parcelled Oxus".Return to passage

[689] Shaibāq himself had gone down from Samarkand in 908 AH. and in 909 AH. and so permanently located his troops as to have sent their families to them. In 909 AH. he drove Khusrau into the mountains of Badakhshān, but did not occupy Qūndūz; thither Khusrau returned and there stayed till now, when Shaibāq again came south (fol. 123). See Sh. N. cap. lviii et seq.Return to passage

[690] From Taṃbal, to put down whom he had quitted his army near Balkh (Sh. N. cap. lix).Return to passage

[691] This, one of the many Red-rivers, flows from near Kāhmard and joins the Andar-āb water near Dūshī.Return to passage

[692] A garī is twenty-four minutes.Return to passage

[693] Qorān, Surat iii, verse 25; Sale's Qorān, ed. 1825, i, 56.Return to passage

[694] Cf. f. 82.Return to passage

[695] viz. Bāī-sanghar, bowstrung, and Mas`ūd, blinded.Return to passage

[696] Muḥ. Ṣāliḥ is florid over the rubies of Badakhshān he says Bābur took from Khusrau, but Ḥaidar says Bābur not only had Khusrau's property, treasure, and horses returned to him, but refused all gifts Khusrau offered. "This is one trait out of a thousand in the Emperor's character." Ḥaidar mentions, too, the then lack of necessaries under which Bābur suffered (Sh. N., cap. lxiii, and T.R. p. 176).Return to passage

[697] Cf. T. R. p. 134 n. and 374 n.Return to passage

[698] Jība, so often used to describe the quilted corselet, seems to have here a wider meaning, since the jība-khāna contained both joshan and kūhah, i.e. coats-of-mail and horse-mail with accoutrements. It can have been only from this source that Bābur's men obtained the horse-mail of f. 127.Return to passage

[699] He succeeded his father, Aūlūgh Beg Kābulī, in 907 AH.; his youth led to the usurpation of his authority by Sherīm Ẕikr, one of his begs; but the other begs put Sherīm to death. During the subsequent confusions Muḥ. Muqīm Arghūn, in 908 AH., got possession of Kābul and married a sister of `Abdu'r-razzāq. Things were in this state when Bābur entered the country in 910 AH. (Erskine).Return to passage

[700] var. Ūpīān, a few miles north of Chārikār.Return to passage

[701] Suhail (Canopus) is a most conspicuous star in Afghānistān; it gives its name to the south, which is never called Janūb but Suhail; the rising of Suhail marks one of their seasons (Erskine). The honour attaching to this star is due to its seeming to rise out of Arabia Felix.Return to passage

[702] The lines are in the Preface to the Anwār-i-suhailī (Lights of Canopus).Return to passage

[703] "Die Kirghis-qazzāq drücken die Sonnen-höhe in Pikenaus" (von Schwarz, p. 124).Return to passage

[704] Presumably, dark with shade, as in qarā-yīghāch, the hard-wood elm (f. 47b and note to narwān).Return to passage

[705] i.e. Sayyid Muḥammad `Alī, the door-ward. These būlāks seem likely to have been groups of 1,000 fighting-men (Turki Mīng).Return to passage

[706] In-the-water and Water-head.Return to passage

[707] Walī went from his defeat to Khwāst; wrote to Maḥmūd Aūzbeg in Qūndūz to ask protection; was fetched to Qūndūz by Muḥ. Ṣāliḥ, the author of the Shaibānī-nāma, and forwarded from Qūndūz to Samarkand (Sh. N. cap. lxiii). Cf. f. 29b.Return to passage

[708] i.e. where justice was administered, at this time, outside Bābur's tent.Return to passage

[709] They would pass Ajar and make for the main road over the Dandān-shikan Pass.Return to passage

[710] The clansmen may have obeyed Aḥmad's orders in thus holding up the families.Return to passage

[711] The name may be from Turkī tāq, a horse-shoe, but I.O. 215 f. 102 writes Persian naqīb, the servant who announces arriving guests.Return to passage

[712] Here, as immediately below, when mentioning the Chār-bāgh and the tomb of Qūtlūq-qadam, Bābur uses names acquired by the places at a subsequent date. In 910 AH. the Taster was alive; the Chār-bāgh was bought by Bābur in 911 AH., and Qūtlūq-qadam fought at Kānwāha in 933 AH.Return to passage

[713] The Kūcha-bāgh is still a garden about 4 miles from Kābul on the north-west and divided from it by a low hill-pass. There is still a bridge on the way (Erskine).Return to passage

[714] Presumably that on which the Bālā-ḥiṣār stood, the glacis of a few lines further.Return to passage

[715] Cf. f. 130.Return to passage

[716] One of Muqīm's wives was a Tīmūrid, Bābur's first-cousin, the daughter of Aūlūgh Beg Kābulī; another was Bībī Zarīf Khātūn, the mother of that Māh-chūchūq, whose anger at her marriage to Bābur's faithful Qāsim Kūkūldāsh has filled some pages of history (Gulbadan's H.N. s.n. Māh-chūchūq and Erskine's B. and H. i, 348).Return to passage

[717] Some 9 m. north of Kābul on the road to Āq-sarāī.Return to passage

[718] The Ḥai. MS. (only) writes First Rabī but the Second better suits the near approach of winter.Return to passage

[719] Elph. MS. fol. 97; W.-i-B. I.O. 215 f. 102b and 217 f. 85; Mems. p. 136. Useful books of the early 19th century, many of them referring to the Bābur-nāma, are Conolly's Travels, Wood's Journey, Elphinstone's Caubul, Burnes' Cabool, Masson's Narrative, Lord's and Leech's articles in JASB 1838 and in Burnes' Reports (India Office Library), Broadfoot's Report in RGS Supp. Papers vol. I.Return to passage

[720] f. 1b where Farghāna is said to be on the limit of cultivation.Return to passage

[721] f. 131b. To find these tūmāns here classed with what was not part of Kābul suggest a clerical omission of "beyond" or "east of" (Lamghānāt). It may be more correct to write Lāmghānāt, since the first syllable may be lām, fort. The modern form Laghmān is not used in the Bābur-nāma, nor, it may be added is Paghmān for Pamghān.Return to passage

[722] It will be observed that Bābur limits the name Afghānistān to the countries inhabited by Afghān tribesmen; they are chiefly those south of the road from Kābul to Pashāwar (Erskine). See Vigne, p. 102, for a boundary between the Afghāns and Khurāsān.Return to passage

[723] Al-birūnī's Indika writes of both Turk and Hindū-shāhī Kings of Kābul. See Raverty's Notes p. 62 and Stein's _Shāhī Kings of Kābul_. The mountain is 7592 ft. above the sea, some 1800 ft. therefore above the town.Return to passage

[724] The Kābul-river enters the Chār-dih plain by the Dih-i-yaq`ūb narrows, and leaves it by those of Dūrrīn. Cf. S.A. War, Plan p. 288 and Plan of action at Chār-āsiyā (Four-mills), the second shewing an off-take which may be Wais Ātāka's canal. See Vigne, p. 163 and Raverty's Notes pp. 69 and 689.Return to passage

[725] This, the Bālā-jūī (upper-canal) was a four-mill stream and in Masson's time, as now, supplied water to the gardens round Bābur's tomb. Masson found in Kābul honoured descendants of Wais Ātāka (ii, 240).Return to passage

[726] But for a, perhaps negligible, shortening of its first vowel, this form of the name would describe the normal end of an irrigation canal, a little pool, but other forms with other meanings are open to choice, e.g. small hamlet (Pers. kul), or some compound containing Pers. gul, a rose, in its plain or metaphorical senses. Jarrett's Āyīn-i-akbarī writes Gul-kīnah, little rose (?). Masson (ii, 236) mentions a similar pleasure-resort, Sanjī-tāq.Return to passage

[727] The original ode, with which the parody agrees in rhyme and refrain, is in the Dīwān, s.l. Dāl (Brockhaus ed. 1854, i, 62 and lith. ed. p. 96). See Wilberforce Clarke's literal translation i, 286 (H. B.). A marginal note to the Ḥaidarābād Codex gives what appears to be a variant of one of the rhymes of the parody.Return to passage

[728] aūlūgh kūl; some 3 m. round in Erskine's time; mapped as a swamp in S.A. War p. 288.Return to passage

[729] A marginal note to the Ḥai. Codex explains this name to be an abbreviation of Khwāja Shamsū'd-dīn Jān-bāz (or Jahān-bāz; Masson, ii, 279 and iii, 93).Return to passage

[730] i.e. the place made holy by an impress of saintly foot-steps.Return to passage

[731] Two eagles or, Two poles, used for punishment. Vigne's illustration (p. 161) clearly shows the spur and the detached rock. Erskine (p. 137 n.) says that `Uqābain seems to be the hill, known in his day as `Āshiqān-i-`ārifān, which connects with Bābur Bādshāh. See Raverty's Notes p. 68.Return to passage

[732] During most of the year this wind rushes through the Hindū-kush (Parwān)-pass; it checks the migration of the birds (f. 142), and it may be the cause of the deposit of the Running-sands (Burnes, p. 158). Cf. Wood, p. 124.Return to passage

[733] He was Badī`u'z-zamān's Ṣadr before serving Bābur; he died in 918 AH. (1512 AD.), in the battle of Kūl-i-malik where `Ubaidu'l-lāh Aūzbeg defeated Bābur. He may be identical with Mīr Ḥusain the Riddler of f. 181, but seems not to be Mullā Muḥ. Badakhshī, also a Riddler, because the Ḥabību's-siyār (ii, 343 and 344) gives this man a separate notice. Those interested in enigmas can find one made by T̤ālib on the name Yaḥya (Ḥ.S. ii, 344). Sharafu'd-dīn `Alī Yazdī, the author of the Z̤afar-nāma, wrote a book about a novel kind of these puzzles (T.R. p. 84).Return to passage

[734] The original couplet is as follows:—Return to passage

_Bakhūr dar arg-i Kābul mai, bagardān kāsa pāy dar pāy, Kah ham koh ast, u ham daryā, u ham shahr ast, u ham ṣaḥrā'._

What T̤ālib's words may be inferred to conceal is the opinion that like Badī`u'z-zamān and like the meaning of his name, Kābul is the Wonder-of-the-world. (Cf. M. Garçin de Tassy's Rhétorique [p. 165], for ces combinaisons énigmatiques.)

[735] All MSS. do not mention Kāshghar.Return to passage

[736] Khīta (Cathay) is Northern China; Chīn (infra) is China; Rūm is Turkey and particularly the provinces near Trebizond (Erskine).Return to passage

[737] 300% to 400% (Erskine).Return to passage

[738] Persian sinjid, Brandis, elæagnus hortensis; Erskine (Mems. p. 138) jujube, presumably the zizyphus jujuba of Speede, Supplement p. 86. Turkī yāngāq, walnut, has several variants, of which the most marked is yānghkāq. For a good account of Kābul fruits see Masson, ii, 230.Return to passage

[739] a kind of plum (?). It seems unlikely to be a cherry since Bābur does not mention cherries as good in his old dominions, and Firminger (p. 244) makes against it as introduced from India. Steingass explains alū-bālū by "sour-cherry, an armarylla"; if sour, is it the Morello cherry?Return to passage

[740] The sugar-cane was seen in abundance in Lan-po (Lamghān) by a Chinese pilgrim (Beale, p. 90); Bābur's introduction of it may have been into his own garden only in Nīngnahār (f. 132b).Return to passage

[741] i.e. the seeds of pinus Gerardiana.Return to passage

[742] rawāshlār. The green leaf-stalks (chūkrī) of ribes rheum are taken into Kābul in mid-April from the Pamghān-hills; a week later they are followed by the blanched and tended rawāsh (Masson, ii, 7). See Gul-badan's H.N. trs. p. 188, Vigne, p. 100 and 107, Masson, ii, 230, Conolly, i, 213.Return to passage

[743] a large green fruit, shaped something like a citron; also a large sort of cucumber (Erskine).Return to passage

[744] The ṣāḥibī, a grape praised by Bābur amongst Samarkandī fruits, grows in Koh-dāman; another well-known grape of Kābul is the long stoneless ḥusainī, brought by Afghān traders into Hindūstān in round, flat boxes of poplar wood (Vigne, p. 172).Return to passage

[745] An allusion, presumably, to the renouncement of wine made by Bābur and some of his followers in 933 AH. (1527 AD. f. 312). He may have had `Umar Khayyām's quatrain in mind, "Wine's power is known to wine-bibbers alone" (Whinfield's 2nd ed. 1901, No. 164).Return to passage

[746] pūstīn, usually of sheep-skin. For the wide range of temperature at Kābul in 24 hours, see Ency. Brtt. art. Afghānistān. The winters also vary much in severity (Burnes, p. 273).Return to passage

[747] Index s.n. As he fought at Kānwāha, he will have been buried after March 1527 AD.; this entry therefore will have been made later. The Curriers'-gate is the later Lahor-gate (Masson, ii, 259).Return to passage

[748] Index s.n.Return to passage

[749] For lists of the Hindū-kush passes see Leech's Report VII; Yule's Introductory Essay to Wood's Journey 2nd ed.; PRGS 1879, Markham's art. p. 121.Return to passage

The highest cols on the passes here enumerated by Bābur are,—Khawāk 11,640 ft.—T̤ūl, height not known,—Pārandī 15,984 ft.—Bāj-gāh (Toll-place) 12,000 ft.—Walīān (Saints) 15,100 ft.—Chahār-dār (Four-doors) 18,900 ft. and Shibr-tū 9800 ft. In considering the labour of their ascent and descent, the general high level, north and south of them, should be borne in mind; e.g. Chārikār (Chār-yak-kār) stands 5200 ft. and Kābul itself at 5780 ft. above the sea.

[750] i.e. the hollow, long, and small-bāzār roads respectively. Panjhīr is explained by Hindūs to be Panj-sher, the five lion-sons of Pandu (Masson, iii, 168).Return to passage

[751] Shibr is a Hazāra district between the head of the Ghūr-bund valley and Bāmīān. It does not seem to be correct to omit the tū from the name of the pass. Persian tū, turn, twist (syn. pīch) occurs in other names of local passes; to read it here as a turn agrees with what is said of Shibr-tū pass as not crossing but turning the Hindū-kush (Cunningham). Lord uses the same wording about the Ḥājī-ghāt (var. -kāk etc.) traverse of the same spur, which "turns the extremity of the Hindū-kush". See Cunningham's Ancient Geography, i, 25; Lord's Ghūr-bund (JASB 1838 p. 528), Masson, iii, 169 and Leech's Report VII.Return to passage

[752] Perhaps through Jālmīsh into Saighān.Return to passage

[753] i.e. they are closed.Return to passage

[754] It was unknown in Mr. Erskine's day (Mems. p. 140). Several of the routes in Raverty's Notes (p. 92 etc.) allow it to be located as on the Īrī-āb, near to or identical with Bāghzān, 35 kurohs (70 m.) s.s.e. of Kābul.Return to passage

[755] Farmūl, about the situation of which Mr. Erskine was in doubt, is now marked in maps, Ūrghūn being its principal village.Return to passage

[756] 15 miles below Atak (Erskine). Mr. Erskine notes that he found no warrant, previous to Abū'l-faẓl's, for calling the Indus the Nīl-āb, and that to find one would solve an ancient geographical difficulty. This difficulty, my husband suggests, was Alexander's supposition that the Indus was the Nile. In books grouping round the Bābur-nāma, the name Nīl-āb is not applied to the Indus, but to the ferry-station on that river, said to owe its name to a spring of azure water on its eastern side. (Cf. Afẓal Khān Khattak, R.'s Notes p. 447.)Return to passage

I find the name Nīl-āb applied to the Kābul-river:—1. to its Arghandī affluent (Cunningham, p. 17, Map); 2. through its boatman class, the Nīl-ābīs of Lālpūra, Jalālābād and Kūnār (G. of I. 1907, art. Kābul); 3. inferentially to it as a tributary of the Indus (D'Herbélot); 4. to it near its confluence with the grey, silt-laden Indus, as blue by contrast (Sayyid Ghulām-i-muḥammad, R.'s Notes p. 34). (For Nīl-āb (Naulibis?) in Ghūr-bund see Cunningham, p. 32 and Masson, iii, 169.)

[757] By one of two routes perhaps,—either by the Khaibar-Nīngnahār-Jagdālīk road, or along the north bank of the Kābul-river, through Goshṭa to the crossing where, in 1879, the 10th Hussars met with disaster. See S.A. War, Map 2 and p. 63; Leech's Reports II and IV (Fords of the Indus); and R.'s Notes p. 44.Return to passage

[758] Hāru, Leech's Harroon, apparently, 10 m. above Atak. The text might be read to mean that both rivers were forded near their confluence, but, finding no warrant for supposing the Kābul-river fordable below Jalālābād, I have guided the translation accordingly; this may be wrong and may conceal a change in the river.Return to passage

[759] Known also as Dhān-kot and as Mu`az̤z̤am-nagar (Ma`āṣiru'l-`umrā i, 249 and A.N. trs. H.B. index s.n. Dhān-kot). It was on the east bank of the Indus, probably near modern Kālā-bāgh, and was washed away not before 956 AH. (1549 AD. H. Beveridge).Return to passage

[760] Chaupāra seems, from f. 148b, to be the Chapari of Survey Map 1889. Bābur's Dasht is modern Dāman.Return to passage

[761] aīmāq, used usually of Mughūls, I think. It may be noted that Lieutenant Leech compiled a vocabulary of the tongue of the Mughūl Aīmāq in Qandahār and Harāt (JASB 1838, p. 785).Return to passage

[762] The Āyīn-i-akbarī account of Kābul both uses and supplements the Bābur-nāma.Return to passage

[763] viz. `Alī-shang, Alangār and Mandrāwar (the Lamghānāt proper), Nīngnahār (with its bulūk, Kāma), Kūnār-with-Nūr-gal, (and the two bulūks of Nūr-valley and Chaghān-sarāī).Return to passage

[764] See Appendix E, On Nagarahāra.Return to passage

[765] The name Adīnapūr is held to be descended from ancient Udyānapūra (Garden-town); its ancestral form however was applied to Nagarahāra, apparently, in the Bārān-Sūrkh-rūd dū-āb, and not to Bābur's dārogha's seat. The Sūrkh-rūd's deltaic mouth was a land of gardens; when Masson visited Adīnapūr he went from Bālā-bāgh (High-garden); this appears to stand where Bābur locates his Bāgh-i-wafā, but he was shown a garden he took to be this one of Bābur's, a mile higher up the Sūrkh-rūd. A later ruler made the Chār-bāgh of maps. It may be mentioned that Bālā-bāgh has become in some maps Rozābād (Garden-town). See Masson, i, 182 and iii, 186; R.'s Notes; and Wilson's Ariana Antiqua, Masson's art.Return to passage

[766] One of these tangī is now a literary asset in Mr. Kipling's My Lord the Elephant. Bābur's 13 y. represent some 82 miles; on f. 137b the Kābul-Ghaznī road of 14 y. represents some 85; in each case the yīghāch works out at over six miles (Index s.n. yīghāch and Vigne, p. 454). Sayyid Ghulām-i-muḥammad traces this route minutely (R.'s Notes pp. 57, 59).Return to passage

[767] Masson was shewn "Chaghatai castles", attributed to Bābur (iii, 174).Return to passage

[768] Dark-turn, perhaps, as in Shibr-tū, Jāl-tū, etc. (f. 130b and note to Shibr-tū).Return to passage

[769] f. 145 where the change is described in identical words, as seen south of the Jagdālīk-pass. The Bādām-chashma pass appears to be a traverse of the eastern rampart of the Tīzīn-valley.Return to passage

[770] Appendix E, On Nagarahāra.Return to passage

[771] No record exists of the actual laying-out of the garden; the work may have been put in hand during the Mahmand expedition of 914 AH. (f. 216); the name given to it suggests a gathering there of loyalists when the stress was over of the bad Mughūl rebellion of that year (f. 216b where the narrative breaks off abruptly in 914 AH. and is followed by a gap down to 925 AH.-1519 AD.).Return to passage

[772] No annals of 930 AH. are known to exist; from Ṣafar 926 AH. to 932 AH. (Jan. 1520-Nov. 1525 AD.) there is a lacuna. Accounts of the expedition are given by Khāfī Khān, i, 47 and Firishta, lith. ed. p. 202.Return to passage

[773] Presumably to his son, Humāyūn, then governor in Badakhshān; Bukhārā also was under Bābur's rule.Return to passage

[774] Here, qārī, yards. The dimensions 10 by 10, are those enjoined for places of ablution.Return to passage

[775] Presumably those of the tūqūz-rūd, supra. Cf. Appendix E, On Nagarahāra.Return to passage

[776] White-mountain; Pushtū, Spīn-ghur (or ghar).Return to passage

[777] i.e. the Lamghānāt proper. The range is variously named; in (Persian) Siyāh-koh (Black-mountain), which like Turkī Qarā-tāgh may mean non-snowy; by Tājīks, Bāgh-i-ātāka (Foster-father's garden); by Afghāns, Kanda-ghur, and by Lamghānīs Koh-i-būlān,—Kanda and Būlān both being ferry-stations below it (Masson, iii, 189; also the Times Nov. 20th 1912 for a cognate illustration of diverse naming).Return to passage

[778] A comment made here by Mr. Erskine on changes of name is still appropriate, but some seeming changes may well be due to varied selection of land-marks. Of the three routes next described in the text, one crosses as for Mandrāwar; the second, as for `Alī-shang, a little below the outfall of the Tīzīn-water; the third may take off from the route, between Kābul and Tag-aū, marked in Col. Tanner's map (PRGS 1881 p. 180). Cf. R's Route 11; and for Aūlūgh-nūr, Appendix F, On the name Nūr.Return to passage

[779] The name of this pass has several variants. Its second component, whatever its form, is usually taken to mean pass, but to read it here as pass would be redundant, since Bābur writes "pass (kūtal) of Bād-i-pīch". Pich occurs as a place name both east (Pīch) and west (Pīchghān) of the kūtal, but what would suit the bitter and even fatal winds of the pass would be to read the name as Whirling-wind (bād-i-pīch). Another explanation suggests itself from finding a considerable number of pass-names such as Shibr-tū, Jāi-tū, Qarā-tū, in which tū is a synonym of pīch, turn, twist; thus Bād-i-pīch may be the local form of Bād-tū, Windy-turn.Return to passage

[780] See Masson, iii, 197 and 289. Both in Pashāī and Lamghānī, lām means fort.Return to passage

[781] See Appendix F, On the name Dara-i-nūr.Return to passage

[782] ghair mukarrar. Bābur may allude to the remarkable change men have wrought in the valley-bottom (Appendix F, for Col. Tanner's account of the valley).Return to passage

[783] f. 154.Return to passage

[784] diospyrus lotus, the European date-plum, supposed to be one of the fruits eaten by the Lotophagi. It is purple, has bloom and is of the size of a pigeon's egg or a cherry. See Watts' Economic Products of India; Brandis' Forest Trees, Illustrations; and Speede's Indian Hand-book.Return to passage

[785] As in Lombardy, perhaps; in Luhūgur vines are clipped into standards; in most other places in Afghānistān they are planted in deep trenches and allowed to run over the intervening ridges or over wooden framework. In the narrow Khūlm-valley they are trained up poplars so as to secure them the maximum of sun. See Wood's Report VI p. 27; Bellew's Afghānistān p. I75 and Mems. p. 142 note.Return to passage

[786] Appendix G, On the names of two Nūrī wines.Return to passage

[787] This practice Bābur viewed with disgust, the hog being an impure animal according to Muḥammadan Law (Erskine).Return to passage

[788] The Khazīnatu'l-asfiyā (ii, 293) explains how it came about that this saint, one honoured in Kashmīr, was buried in Khutlān. He died in Hazāra (Paklī) and there the Paklī Sulṯān wished to have him buried, but his disciples, for some unspecified reason, wished to bury him in Khutlān. In order to decide the matter they invited the Sultān to remove the bier with the corpse upon it. It could not be stirred from its place. When, however, a single one of the disciples tried to move it, he alone was able to lift it, and to bear it away on his head. Hence the burial in Khutlān. The death occurred in 786 AH. (1384 AD.). A point of interest in this legend is that, like the one to follow, concerning dead women, it shews belief in the living activities of the dead.Return to passage

[789] The MSS. vary between 920 and 925 AH.—neither date seems correct. As the annals of 925 AH. begin in Muḥarram, with Bābur to the east of Bājaur, we surmise that the Chaghān-sarāī affair may have occurred on his way thither, and at the end of 924 AH.Return to passage

[790] karanj, coriandrum sativum.Return to passage

[791] Some 20-24 m. north of Jalālābād. The name Multa-kundī may refer to the Rām-kundī range, or mean Lower district, or mean Below Kundī. See Biddulph's Khowārī Dialect s.n under; R.'s Notes p. 108 and Dict. s.n. kund; Masson, i, 209.Return to passage

[792] i.e. treat her corpse as that of an infidel (Erskine).Return to passage

[793] It would suit the position of this village if its name were found to link to the Turkī verb chaqmāq, to go out, because it lies in the mouth of a defile (Dahānah-i-koh, Mountain-mouth) through which the road for Kāfiristān goes out past the village. A not-infrequent explanation of the name to mean White-house, Āq-sarāī, may well be questioned. Chaghān, white, is Mughūlī and it would be less probable for a Mughūlī than for a Turkī name to establish itself. Another explanation may lie in the tribe name Chugānī. The two forms chaghān and chaghār may well be due to the common local interchange in speech of n with r. (For Dahānah-i-koh see [some] maps and Raverty's Bājaur routes.)Return to passage

[794] Nīmchas, presumably,—half-bred in custom, perhaps in blood—; and not improbably, converted Kāfirs. It is useful to remember that Kāfiristān was once bounded, west and south, by the Bārān-water.Return to passage

[795] Kāfir wine is mostly poor, thin and, even so, usually diluted with water. When kept two or three years, however, it becomes clear and sometimes strong. Sir G. S. Robertson never saw a Kāfir drunk (Kāfirs of the Hindū-kush, p. 591).Return to passage

[796] Kāma might have classed better under Nīngnahār of which it was a dependency.Return to passage

[797] i.e. water-of-Nijr; so too, Badr-aū and Tag-aū. Nijr-aū has seven-valleys (JASB 1838 p. 329 and Burnes' Report X). Sayyid Ghulām-i-muḥammad mentions that Bābur established a frontier-post between Nijr-aū and Kāfiristān which in his own day was still maintained. He was an envoy of Warren Hastings to Tīmūr Shāh Sadozī (R.'s Notes p. 36 and p. 142).Return to passage

[798] Kāfirwash; they were Kafirs converted to Muḥammadanism.Return to passage

[799] Archa, if not inclusive, meaning conifer, may represent juniperus excelsa, this being the common local conifer. The other trees of the list are pinus Gerardiana (Brandis, p. 690), quercus bīlūt, the holm-oak, and pistacia mutica or khanjak, a tree yielding mastic.Return to passage

[800] rūba-i-parwān, pteromys inornatus, the large, red flying-squirrel (Blandford's Fauna of British India, Mammalia, p. 363).Return to passage

[801] The giz is a short-flight arrow used for shooting small birds etc. Descending flights of squirrels have been ascertained as 60 yards, one, a record, of 80 (Blandford).Return to passage

[802] Apparently tetrogallus himalayensis, the Himalayan snow-cock (Blandford, iv, 143).Burnes (Cabool p. 163) describes the kabg-i-darī as the rara avis of the Kābul Kohistān, somewhat less than a turkey, and of the chikor (partridge) species. It was procured for him first in Ghūr-bund, but, when snow has fallen, it could be had nearer Kābul. Bābur's bū-qalamūn may have come into his vocabulary, either as a survival direct from Greek occupation of Kābul and Panj-āb, or through Arabic writings. PRGS 1879 p. 251, Kaye's art. and JASB 1838 p. 863, Hodgson's art.Return to passage

[803] Bartavelle's Greek-partridge, tetrao- or perdrix-rufus [f. 279 and Mems. p. 320 n.].Return to passage

[804] A similar story is told of some fields near Whitby:—"These wild geese, which in winter fly in great flocks to the lakes and rivers unfrozen in the southern parts, to the great amazement of every-one, fall suddenly down upon the ground when they are in flight over certain neighbouring fields thereabouts; a relation I should not have made, if I had not received it from several credible men." See Notes to Marmion p. xlvi (Erskine); Scott's Poems, Black's ed. 1880, vii, 104.Return to passage

[805] Are we to infer from this that the musk-rat (Crocidura cœrulea, Lydekker, p. 626) was not so common in Hindūstān in the age of Bābur as it has now become? He was not a careless observer (Erskine).Return to passage

[806] Index s.n. Bābur-nāma, date of composition; also f. 131.Return to passage

[807] In the absence of examples of bund to mean kūtal, and the presence "in those countries" of many in which bund means koh, it looks as though a clerical error had here written kūtal for koh. But on the other hand, the wording of the next passage shows just the confusion an author's unrevised draft might shew if a place were, as this is, both a tūmān and a kūtal (i.e. a steady rise to a traverse). My impression is that the name Ghūr-bund applies to the embanking spur at the head of the valley-tūmān, across which roads lead to Ghūrī and Ghūr (PRGS 1879, Maps; Leech's Report VII; and Wood's VI).Return to passage

[808] So too when, because of them, Leech and Lord turned back, re infectâ.Return to passage

[809] It will be noticed that these villages are not classed in any tūmān; they include places "rich without parallel" in agricultural products, and level lands on which towns have risen and fallen, one being Alexandria ad Caucasum. They cannot have been part of the unremunerative Ghūr-bund tūmān; from their place of mention in Bābur's list of tūmāns, they may have been part of the Kābul tūmān (f. 178), as was Koh-dāman (Burnes' Cabool p. 154; Haughton's Charikar p. 73; and Cunningham's Ancient History, i, 18).Return to passage

[810] Dūr-namāī, seen from afar (Masson, iii, 152) is not marked on the Survey Maps; Masson, Vigne and Haughton locate it. Bābur's "head" and "foot" here indicate status and not location.Return to passage

[811] Mems. p. 146 and Méms, i, 297, Arabs' encampment and Cellule des Arabes. Perhaps the name may refer to uses of the level land and good pasture by horse qāfilas, since Kurra is written with tashdīd in the Ḥaidarābād Codex, as in kurra-tāz, a horse-breaker. Or the tāziyān may be the fruit of a legend, commonly told, that the saint of the neighbouring Running-sands was an Arabian.Return to passage

[812] Presumably this is the grass of the millet, the growth before the ear, on which grazing is allowed (Elphinstone, i, 400; Burnes, p. 237).Return to passage

[813] Wood, p. 115; Masson, iii, 167; Burnes, p. 157 and JASB 1838 p. 324 with illustration; Vigne, pp. 219, 223; Lord, JASB 1838 p. 537; Cathay and the way thither, Hakluyt Society vol. I. p. xx, para. 49; History of Musical Sands, C. Carus-Wilson.Return to passage

[814] West might be more exact, since some of the group are a little north, others a little south of the latitude of Kābul.Return to passage

[815] Affluents and not true sources in some cases (Col. Holdich's Gates of India, s.n. Koh-i-bābā; and PRGS 1879, maps pp. 80 and 160).Return to passage

[816] The Pamghān range. These are the villages every traveller celebrates. Masson's and Vigne's illustrations depict them well.Return to passage

[817] Cercis siliquastrum, the Judas-tree. Even in 1842 it was sparingly found near Kābul, adorning a few tombs, one Bābur's own. It had been brought from Sih-yārān where, as also at Chārikār, (Chār-yak-kār) it was still abundant and still a gorgeous sight. It is there a tree, as at Kew, and not a bush, as in most English gardens (Masson, ii, 9; Elphinstone, i, 194; and for the tree near Harāt, f. 191 n. to Ṣafar).Return to passage

[818] Khwāja Maudūd of Chisht, Khwāja Khāwand Sa`īd and the Khwāja of the Running-sands (Elph. MS. f. 104b, marginal note).Return to passage

[819] The yellow-flowered plant is not cercis siliquastrum but one called mahaka(?) in Persian, a shrubby plant with pea-like blossoms, common in the plains of Persia, Bilūchistān and Kābul (Masson, iii, 9 and Vigne, p. 216).Return to passage

[820] The numerical value of these words gives 925 (Erskine). F. 246b et seq. for the expedition.Return to passage

[821] f. 178. I.O. MS. No. 724, Haft-iqlīm f. 135 (Ethé, p. 402); Rieu, pp. 21_a_, 1058_b_.Return to passage

[822] of Afghan habit. The same term is applied (f. 139b) to the Zurmutīs; it may be explained in both places by Bābur's statement that Zurmutīs grow corn, but do not cultivate gardens or orchards.Return to passage

[823] aīkān dūr. Sabuk-tīgīn, d. 387 AH.-997 AD., was the father of Sl. Maḥmūd Ghaznawī, d. 421 AH.-1030 AD.Return to passage

[824] d. 602 AH.-1206 AD.Return to passage

[825] Some Musalmāns fast through the months of Rajab, Sha`bān and Ramẓān; Muḥammadans fast only by day; the night is often given to feasting (Erskine).Return to passage

[826] The Garden; the tombs of more eminent Muṣalmāns are generally in gardens (Erskine). See Vigne's illustrations, pp. 133, 266.Return to passage

[827] i.e. the year now in writing. The account of the expedition, Bābur's first into Hindūstān, begins on f. 145.Return to passage

[828] i.e. the countries groupable as Khurāsān.Return to passage

[829] For picture and account of the dam, see Vigne, pp. 138, 202.Return to passage

[830] f. 295b.Return to passage

[831] The legend is told in numerous books with varying location of the spring. One narrator, Zakarīyā Qazwīnī, reverses the parts, making Jāī-pāl employ the ruse; hence Leyden's note (Mems. p. 150; E. and D.'s History of India ii, 20, 182 and iv, 162; for historical information, R.'s Notes p. 320). The date of the events is shortly after 378 AH.-988 AD.Return to passage

[832] R.'s Notes s.n. Zurmut.Return to passage

[833] The question of the origin of the Farmūlī has been written of by several writers; perhaps they were Turks of Persia, Turks and Tājīks.Return to passage

[834] This completes the list of the 14 tūmāns of Kābul, viz. Nīngnahār, `Alī-shang, Alangār, Mandrāwar, Kūnār-with-Nūr-gal, Nijr-aū, Panjhīr, Ghūr-bund, Koh-dāman (with Kohistān?), Luhūgur (of the Kābul tūmān), Ghaznī, Zurmut, Farmūl and Bangash.Return to passage

[835] Between Nijr-aū and Tag-aū (Masson, iii, 165). Mr. Erskine notes that Bābur reckoned it in the hot climate but that the change of climate takes place further east, between `Alī-shang and Aūzbīn (i.e. the valley next eastwards from Tag-aū).Return to passage

[836] būghūzlārīghā furṣat būlmās; i.e. to kill them in the lawful manner, while pronouncing the Bi'smi'llāh.Return to passage

[837] This completes the bulūks of Kābul viz. Badr-aū (Tag-aū), Nūr-valley, Chaghān-sarāī, Kāma and Ālā-sāī.Return to passage

[838] The rūpī being equal to 2-1/2 shāhrukhīs, the shāhrukhī may be taken at 10_d._ thus making the total revenue only £33,333 6_s._ 8_d._ See Āyīn-i-akbarī ii, 169 (Erskine).Return to passage

[839] sic in all B. N. MSS. Most maps print Khost. Muḥ. Ṣāliḥ says of Khwāst, "Who sees it, would call it a Hell" (Vambéry, p. 361).Return to passage

[840] Bābur's statement about this fodder is not easy to translate; he must have seen grass grow in tufts, and must have known the Persian word būta (bush). Perhaps kāh should be read to mean plant, not grass. Would Wood's bootr fit in, a small furze bush, very plentiful near Bāmiān? (Wood's Report VI, p. 23; and for regional grasses, Aitchison's Botany of the Afghān Delimitation Commission, p. 122.)Return to passage

[841] nāzū, perhaps cupressus torulosa (Brandis, p.693).Return to passage

[842] f. 276.Return to passage

[843] A laborious geographical note of Mr. Erskine's is here regretfully left behind, as now needless (Mems. p. 152).Return to passage

[844] Here, mainly wild-sheep and wild-goats, including mār-khẉār.Return to passage

[845] Perhaps, no conifers; perhaps none of those of the contrasted hill-tract.Return to passage

[846] While here dasht (plain) represents the eastern skirt of the Mehtar Sulaimān range, dūkī or dūgī (desert) seems to stand for the hill tracts on the west of it, and not, as on f. 152, for the place there specified.Return to passage

[847] Mems. p. 152, "A narrow place is large to the narrow-minded"; Méms. i, 311, "Ce qui n'est pas trop large, ne reste pas vide." Literally, "So long as heights are not equal, there is no vis-a-vis," or, if tāng be read for tīng, "No dawn, no noon," i.e. no effect without a cause.Return to passage

[848] I have not lighted on this name in botanical books or explained by dictionaries. Perhaps it is a Cis-oxanian name for the sax-aol of Transoxania. As its uses are enumerated by some travellers, it might be Haloxylon ammodendron, ta-ghas etc. and sax-aol (Aitchison, p. 102).Return to passage

[849] f. 135b note to Ghūr-bund.Return to passage

[850] I understand that wild-goats, wild-sheep and deer (āhū) were not localized, but that the dun-sheep migrated through. Antelope (āhū) was scarce in Elphinstone's time.Return to passage

[851] qīzīl kīyik which, taken with its alternative name, arqārghalcha, allows it to be the dun-sheep of Wood's Journey p. 241. From its second name it may be Ovis amnon (Raos), or O. argalī.Return to passage

[852] tusqāwal, var. tutqāwal, tus̱aqāwal and tūshqāwal, a word which has given trouble to scribes and translators. As a sporting-term it is equivalent to shikār-i-nihilam; in one or other of its forms I find it explained as Weg-hüter, Fahnen-hüter, Zahl-meister, Schlucht, Gefahrlicher-weg and Schmaler-weg. It recurs in the B.N. on f. 197b l. 5 and l. 6 and there might mean either a narrow road or a Weg-hüter. If its Turkī root be tūs, the act of stopping, all the above meanings can follow, but there may be two separate roots, the second, tūsh, the act of descent (JRAS 1900 p. 137, H. Beveridge's art. On the word nihilam).Return to passage

[853] qūshlīk, aītlīk. Elphinstone writes (i, 191) of the excellent greyhounds and hawking birds of the region; here the bird may be the charkh, which works with the dogs, fastening on the head of the game (Von Schwarz, p. 117, for the same use of eagles).Return to passage

[854] An antelope resembling the usual one of Hindūstān is common south of Ghaznī (Vigne, p. 110); what is not found may be some classes of wild-sheep, frequent further north, at higher elevation, and in places more familiar to Bābur.Return to passage

[855] The Parwān or Hindū-kush pass, concerning the winds of which see f. 128.Return to passage

[856] tūrnā u qarqara; the second of which is the Hindī būglā, heron, egret ardea gazetta, the furnisher of the aigrette of commerce.Return to passage

[857] The aūqār is ardea cinerea, the grey heron; the qarqara is ardea gazetta, the egret. Qūṯān is explained in the Elph. Codex (f. 110) by khawāsil, goldfinch, but the context concerns large birds; Scully (Shaw's Voc.) has qodan, water-hen, which suits better.Return to passage

[858] giz, the short-flight arrow.Return to passage

[859] a small, round-headed nail with which a whip-handle is decorated (Vambéry). Such a stud would keep the cord from slipping through the fingers and would not check the arrow-release.Return to passage

[860] It has been understood (Mems. p. 158 and Méms. i, 313) that the arrow was flung by hand but if this were so, something heavier than the giz would carry the cord better, since it certainly would be difficult to direct a missile so light as an arrow without the added energy of the bow. The arrow itself will often have found its billet in the closely-flying flock; the cord would retrieve the bird. The verb used in the text is aītmāq, the one common to express the discharge of arrows etc.Return to passage

[861] For Tīmūrids who may have immigrated the fowlers see Raverty's Notes p. 579 and his Appendix p. 22.Return to passage

[862] milwāh; this has been read by all earlier translators, and also by the Persian annotator of the Elph. Codex, to mean shākh, bough. For decoy-ducks see Bellew's Notes on Afghānistān p. 404.Return to passage

[863] qūlān qūyirūghī. Amongst the many plants used to drug fish I have not found this one mentioned. Khār-zāhra and khār-fāq approach it in verbal meaning; the first describes colocynth, the second, wild rue. See Watts' Economic Products of India iii, 366 and Bellew's Notes pp. 182, 471 and 478.Return to passage

[864] Much trouble would have been spared to himself and his translators, if Bābur had known a lobster-pot.Return to passage

[865] The fish, it is to be inferred, came down the fall into the pond.Return to passage

[866] Burnes and Vigne describe a fall 20 miles from Kābul, at "Tangī Gharoi", [below where the Tag-aū joins the Bārān-water,] to which in their day, Kābulīs went out for the amusement of catching fish as they try to leap up the fall. Were these migrants seeking upper waters or were they captives in a fish-pond?Return to passage

[867] Elph. MS. f. 111; W.-i-B. I.O. 215 f. 116b and 217 f. 97b; Mems. p. 155; Méms. i, 318.Return to passage

[868] mihmān-beglār, an expression first used by Bābur here, and due, presumably, to accessions from Khusrau Shāh's following. A parallel case is given in Max Müller's Science of Language i, 348 ed. 1871, "Turkmān tribes ... call themselves, not subjects, but guests of the Uzbeg Khāns."Return to passage

[869] tiyūl-dīk in all the Turkī MSS. Ilminsky, de Courteille and Zenker, yitūl-dīk, Turkī, a fief.Return to passage

[870] Wilāyat khūd hech bīrīlmādī; W.-i-B. 215 f. 116b, Wilāyat dāda na shuda and 217 f. 97b, Wilāyat khūd hech dāda na shud. By this I understand that he kept the lands of Kābul itself in his own hands. He mentions (f. 350) and Gul-badan mentions (H.N. f. 40b) his resolve so to keep Kābul. I think he kept not only the fort but all lands constituting the Kābul tūmān (f. 135b and note).Return to passage

[871] Saifī dūr, qalamī aīmās, i.e. tax is taken by force, not paid on a written assessment.Return to passage

[872] khar-wār, about 700 lbs Averdupois (Erskine). Cf. Āyīn-i-akbarī (Jarrett, ii, 394).Return to passage

[873] Niẕāmu'd-dīn Aḥmad and Badāyūnī both mention this script and say that in it Bābur transcribed a copy of the Qorān for presentation to Makka. Badāyūnī says it was unknown in his day, the reign of Akbar (T̤abaqāt-i-akbarī, lith. ed. p. 193, and Muntakhabu't-tawārīkh Bib. Ind. ed. iii, 273).Return to passage

[874] Bābur's route, taken with one given by Raverty (Notes p. 691), allows these Hazāras, about whose location Mr. Erskine was uncertain, to be located between the Takht-pass (Arghandī-Maidān-Unai road), on their east, and the Sang-lākh mountains, on their west.Return to passage

[875] The Takht-pass, one on which from times immemorial, toll (nirkh) has been taken.Return to passage

[876] khāṯir-khwāh chāpīlmādī, which perhaps implies mutual discontent, Bābur's with his gains, the Hazāras' with their losses. As the second Persian translation omits the negative, the Memoirs does the same.Return to passage

[877] Bhīra being in Shāhpūr, this Khān's daryā will be the Jehlam.Return to passage

[878] Bābur uses Persian dasht and Hindī dūkī, plain and hill, for the tracts east and west of Mehtar Sulaimān. The first, dasht, stands for Dāman (skirt) and Dara-i-jāt, the second, dūkī, indefinitely for the broken lands west of the main range, but also, in one instance for the Dūkī [Dūgī] district of Qandahār, as will be noted.Return to passage

[879] f. 132. The Jagdālīk-pass for centuries has separated the districts of Kābul and Nīngnahār. Forster (Travels ii, 68), making the journey the reverse way, was sensible of the climatic change some 3m. east of Gandamak. Cf. Wood's Report I. p. 6.Return to passage

[880] These are they whose families Nāṣir Mīrzā shepherded out of Kābul later (f. 154, f. 155).Return to passage

[881] Bird's-dome, opposite the mouth of the Kūnār-water (S.A. War, Map p. 64).Return to passage

[882] This word is variously pointed and is uncertain. Mr. Erskine adopted "Pekhi", but, on the whole, it may be best to read, here and on f. 146, Ar. fajj or pers. paj, mountain or pass. To do so shews the guide to be one located in the Khaibar-pass, a Fajjī or Pajī.Return to passage

[883] mod. Jām-rūd (Jām-torrent), presumably.Return to passage

[884] G. of I. xx, 125 and Cunningham's Ancient History i, 80. Bābur saw the place in 925 AH. (f. 232b).Return to passage

[885] Cunningham, p. 29. Four ancient sites, not far removed from one another, bear this name, Bīgrām, viz. those near Hūpīān, Kābul, Jalālābād and Pashāwar.Return to passage

[886] Cunningham, i, 79.Return to passage

[887] Perhaps a native of Kamarī on the Indus, but kamarī is a word of diverse application (index s.n.).Return to passage

[888] The annals of this campaign to the eastward shew that Bābur was little of a free agent; that many acts of his own were merciful; that he sets down the barbarity of others as it was, according to his plan of writing (f. 86); and that he had with him undisciplined robbers of Khusrau Shāh's former following. He cannot be taken as having power to command or control the acts of those, his guest-begs and their following, who dictated his movements in this disastrous journey, one worse than a defeat, says Ḥaidar Mīrzā.Return to passage

[889] For the route here see Masson, i, 117 and Colquhoun's With the Kuram Field-force p. 48.Return to passage

[890] The Ḥai. MS. writes this Dilah-zāk.Return to passage

[891] i.e. raised a force in Bābur's name. He took advantage of this farmān in 911 AH. to kill Bāqī Chagkānīānī (f. 159b-160).Return to passage

[892] Of the Yūsuf-zāī and Ranjīt-sīngh, Masson says, (i, 141) "The miserable, hunted wretches threw themselves on the ground, and placing a blade or tuft of grass in their mouths, cried out, "I am your cow." This act and explanation, which would have saved them from an orthodox Hindū, had no effect with the infuriated Sikhs." This form of supplication is at least as old as the days of Firdausī (Erskine, p. 159 n.). The Bahār-i-`ajam is quoted by Vullers as saying that in India, suppliants take straw in the mouth to indicate that they are blanched and yellow from fear.Return to passage

[893] This barbarous custom has always prevailed amongst the Tartar conquerors of Asia (Erskine). For examples under Timūr see Raverty's Notes p. 137.Return to passage

[894] For a good description of the road from Kohāt to Thāl see Bellew's Mission p. 104.Return to passage

[895] F. 88b has the same phrase about the doubtful courage of one Sayyidī Qarā.Return to passage

[896] Not to the mod. town of Bannū, [that having been begun only in 1848 AD.] but wherever their wrong road brought them out into the Bannū amphitheatre. The Survey Map of 1868, No. 15, shews the physical features of the wrong route.Return to passage

[897] Perhaps he connived at recovery of cattle by those raided already.Return to passage

[898] Tāq is the Tank of Maps; Bāzār was s.w. of it. Tank for Tāq looks to be a variant due to nasal utterance (Vigne, p. 77, p. 203 and Map; and, as bearing on the nasal, in loco, Appendix E).Return to passage

[899] If return had been made after over-running Bannū, it would have been made by the Tochī-valley and so through Farmūl; if after over-running the Plain, Bābur's details shew that the westward turn was meant to be by the Gūmāl-valley and one of two routes out of it, still to Farmūl; but the extended march southward to near Dara-i-Ghazī Khān made the westward turn be taken through the valley opening at Sakhī-sawār.Return to passage

[900] This will mean, none of the artificial runlets familiar where Bābur had lived before getting to know Hindūstān.Return to passage

[901] sauda-āt, perhaps, pack-ponies, perhaps, bred for sale and not for own use. Burnes observes that in 1837 Lūhānī merchants carried precisely the same articles of trade as in Bābur's day, 332 years earlier (Report IX p. 99).Return to passage

[902] Mr. Erskine thought it probable that the first of these routes went through Kanigūram, and the second through the Ghwālirī-pass and along the Gūmāl. Birk, fastness, would seem an appropriate name for Kanigūram, but, if Bābur meant to go to Ghaznī, he would be off the ordinary Gūmāl-Ghaznī route in going through Farmūl (Aūrgūn). Raverty's Notes give much useful detail about these routes, drawn from native sources. For Barak (Birk) see Notes pp. 88, 89; Vigne, p. 102.Return to passage

[903] From this it would seem that the alternative roads were approached by one in common.Return to passage

[904] tūmshūq, a bird's bill, used here, as in Selsey-bill, for the naze (nose), or snout, the last spur, of a range.Return to passage

[905] Here these words may be common nouns.Return to passage

[906] Nū-roz, the feast of the old Persian New-year (Erskine); it is the day on which the Sun enters Aries.Return to passage

[907] In the [Turkī] Elph. and Ḥai. MSS. and in some Persian ones, there is a space left here as though to indicate a known omission.Return to passage

[908] kamarī, sometimes a cattle-enclosure, which may serve as a sangur. The word may stand in one place of its Bābur-nāma uses for Gum-rāhī (R.'s Notes s.n. Gum-rāhān).Return to passage

[909] Index s.n.Return to passage

[910] Vigne, p. 241.Return to passage

[911] This name can be translated "He turns not back" or "He stops not".Return to passage

[912] i.e. five from Bīlah.Return to passage

[913] Raverty gives the saint's name as Pīr Kānūn (Ar. kānūn, listened to). It is the well-known Sakhī-sarwār, honoured hy Hindūs and Muḥammadans. (G. of I., xxi, 390; R.'s Notes p. 11 and p. 12 and JASB 1855; Calcutta Review 1875, Macauliffe's art. On the fair at Sakhi-sarwar; Leech's Report VII, for the route; Khazīnatu 'l-asfiyā iv, 245.)Return to passage

[914] This seems to be the sub-district of Qandahār, Dūkī or Dūgī.Return to passage

[915] khar-gāh, a folding tent on lattice frame-work, perhaps a khibitka.Return to passage

[916] It may be more correct to write Kāh-mard, as the Ḥai. MS. does and to understand in the name a reference to the grass(kāh)-yielding capacity of the place.Return to passage

[917] f. 121.Return to passage

[918] This may mean, what irrigation has not used.Return to passage

[919] Mr. Erskine notes that the description would lead us to imagine a flock of flamingoes. Masson found the lake filled with red-legged, white fowl (i, 262); these and also what Bābur saw, may have been the China-goose which has body and neck white, head and tail russet (Bellew's Mission p. 402). Broadfoot seems to have visited the lake when migrants were few, and through this to have been led to adverse comment on Bābur's accuracy (p. 350).Return to passage

[920] The usual dryness of the bed may have resulted from the irrigation of much land some 12 miles from Ghaznī.Return to passage

[921] This is the Luhūgur (Logar) water, knee-deep in winter at the ford but spreading in flood with the spring-rains. Bābur, not being able to cross it for the direct roads into Kābul, kept on along its left bank, crossing it eventually at the Kamarī of maps, s.e. of Kābul.Return to passage

[922] This disastrous expedition, full of privation and loss, had occupied some four months (T.R. p. 201).Return to passage

[923] f. 145b.Return to passage

[924] f. 133b and Appendix F.Return to passage

[925] They were located in Mandrāwar in 926 AH. (f. 251).Return to passage

[926] This was done, manifestly, with the design of drawing after the families their fighting men, then away with Bābur.Return to passage

[927] f. 163. Shaibāq Khān besieged Chīn Ṣufī, Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā's man in Khwārizm (T. R. p. 204; Shaibānī-nāma, Vambéry, Table of Contents and note 89).Return to passage

[928] Survey Map 1889, Sadda. The Rāgh-water flows n.w. into the Oxus (Amū).Return to passage

[929] birk, a mountain stronghold; cf. f. 149b note to Birk (Barak).Return to passage

[930] They were thus driven on from the Bārān-water (f. 154b).Return to passage

[931] f. 126b.Return to passage

[932] Ḥiṣār, presumably.Return to passage

[933] Here "His Honour" translates Bābur's clearly ironical honorific plural.Return to passage

[934] These two sulṯāns, almost always mentioned in alliance, may be Tīmūrids by maternal descent (Index s.nn.). So far I have found no direct statement of their parentage. My husband has shewn me what may be one indication of it, viz. that two of the uncles of Shaibāq Khān (whose kinsmen the sulṯāns seem to be), Qūj-kūnjī and Sīūnjak, were sons of a daughter of the Tīmūrid Aūlūgh Beg Samarkandī (Ḥ.S. ii, 318). See Vambéry's Bukhārā p. 248 note.Return to passage

[935] For the deaths of Taṃbal and Maḥmūd, mentioned in the above summary of Shaibāq Khān's actions, see the Shaibānī-nāma, Vambéry, p. 323.Return to passage

[936] Ḥ.S. ii, 323, for Khusrau Shāh's character and death.Return to passage

[937] f. 124.Return to passage

[938] Khwāja-of-the-rhubarb, presumably a shrine near rhubarb-grounds (f. 129b).Return to passage

[939] yakshī bārdīlār, lit. went well, a common expression in the Bābur-nāma, of which the reverse statement is yamānlīk bīla bārdī (f. 163). Some Persian MSS. make the Mughūls disloyal but this is not only in opposition to the Turkī text, it is a redundant statement since if disloyal, they are included in Bābur's previous statement, as being Khusrau Shāh's retainers. What might call for comment in Mughūls would be loyalty to Bābur.Return to passage

[940] Elph. MS. f. 121b: W.-i-B. I.O. 215 f. 126 and 217 f. 106b; Mems. p. 169.Return to passage

[941] tāgh-dāmanasī, presumably the Koh-dāman, and the garden will thus be the one of f. 136b.Return to passage

[942] If these heirs were descendants of Aūlūgh Beg M. one would be at hand in `Abdu'r-razzāq, then a boy, and another, a daughter, was the wife of Muqīm Arghūn. As Mr. Erskine notes, Musalmāns are most scrupulous not to bury their dead in ground gained by violence or wrong.Return to passage

[943] The news of Aḥmad's death was belated; he died some 13 months earlier, in the end of 909 AH. and in Eastern Turkistān. Perhaps details now arrived.Return to passage

[944] i.e. the fortieth day of mourning, when alms are given.Return to passage

[945] Of those arriving, the first would find her step-daughter dead, the second her sister, the third, his late wife's sister (T. R. p. 196).Return to passage

[946] This will be the earthquake felt in Agra on Ṣafar 3rd 911 AH. (July 5th 1505 AD. Erskine's History of India i, 229 note). Cf. Elliot and Dowson, iv, 465 and v, 99.Return to passage

[947] Raverty's Notes p. 690.Return to passage

[948] bīr kitta tāsh ātīmī; var. bāsh ātīmī. If tāsh be right, the reference will probably be to the throw of a catapult.Return to passage

[949] Here almost certainly, a drummer, because there were two tambours and because also Bābur uses `aūdī & ghachakī for the other meanings of ṯambourchi, lutanist and guitarist. The word has found its way, as tambourgi, into Childe Harold's Pilgrimage (Canto ii, lxxii. H. B.).Return to passage

[950] Kābul-Ghaznī road (R.'s Notes index s.n.).Return to passage

[951] var. Yārī. Tāzī is on the Ghaznī-Qalāt-i-ghilzāī road (R.'s Notes, Appendix p. 46).Return to passage

[952] i.e. in Kābul and in the Trans-Himalayan country.Return to passage

[953] These will be those against Bābur's suzerainty done by their defence of Qalāt for Muqīm.Return to passage

[954] tabaqa, dynasty. By using this word Bābur shews recognition of high birth. It is noticeable that he usually writes of an Arghūn chief either simply as "Beg" or without a title. This does not appear to imply admission of equality, since he styles even his brothers and sisters Mīrzā and Begīm; nor does it shew familiarity of intercourse, since none seems to have existed between him and Ẕū'n-nūn or Muqīm. That he did not admit equality is shewn on f. 208. The T.R. styles Ẕū'n-nūn "Mīrzā", a title by which, as also by Shāh, his descendants are found styled (A.-i-a. Blochmann, s.n.).Return to passage

[955] Turkī khachar is a camel or mule used for carrying personal effects. The word has been read by some scribes as khanjar, dagger.Return to passage

[956] In 910 AH. he had induced Bābur to come to Kābul instead of going into Khurāsān (Ḥ.S. iii, 319); in the same year he dictated the march to Kohāt, and the rest of that disastrous travel. His real name was not Bāqī but Muḥammad Bāqir (Ḥ.S. iii, 311).Return to passage

[957] These transit or custom duties are so called because the dutiable articles are stamped with a ṯamghā, a wooden stamp.Return to passage

[958] Perhaps this word is an equivalent of Persian goshī, a tax on cattle and beasts of burden.Return to passage

[959] Bāqī was one only and not the head of the Lords of the Gate.Return to passage

[960] The choice of the number nine, links on presumably to the mystic value attached to it e.g. Tarkhāns had nine privileges; gifts were made by nines.Return to passage

[961] It is near Ḥasan-abdāl (A.-i-A. Jarrett, ii, 324).Return to passage

[962] For the farmān, f. 146b; for Gujūrs, G. of I.Return to passage

[963] var. Khwesh. Its water flows into the Ghūr-bund stream; it seems to be the Dara-i-Turkmān of Stanford and the Survey Maps both of which mark Janglīk. For Hazāra turbulence, f. 135b and note.Return to passage

[964] The repetition of aūq in this sentence can hardly be accidental.Return to passage

[965] ṯaur [dara], which I take to be Turkī, round, complete.Return to passage

[966] Three MSS. of the Turkī text write bīr sīmīzlūq tīwah; but the two Persian translations have yak shuturlūq farbīh, a shuturlūq being a baggage-camel with little hair (Erskine).Return to passage

[967] brochettes, meat cut into large mouthfuls, spitted and roasted.Return to passage

[968] Perhaps he was officially an announcer; the word means also bearer of good news.Return to passage

[969] yīlāng, without mail, as in the common phrase yīgīt yīlāng, a bare brave.Return to passage

[970] aūpchīn, of horse and man (f. 113b and note).Return to passage

[971] Manifestly Bābur means that he twice actually helped to collect the booty.Return to passage

[972] This is that part of a horse covered by the two side-pieces of a Turkī saddle, from which the side-arch springs on either side (Shaw).Return to passage

[973] Bārān-nīng ayāghī. Except the river I have found nothing called Bārān; the village marked Baian on the French Map would suit the position; it is n.e. of Chār-yak-kār (f. 184b note).Return to passage

[974] i.e. prepared to fight.Return to passage

[975] For the Hazāra (Turkī, Mīng) on the Mīrzā's road see Raverty's routes from Ghaznī to the north. An account given by the Tārīkh-i-rashīdī (p. 196) of Jahāngīr's doings is confused; its parenthetical "(at the same time)" can hardly be correct. Jahāngīr left Ghaznī now, (911 AH.), as Bābur left Kābul in 912 AH. without knowledge of Ḥusain's death (911 AH.). Bābur had heard it (f. 183b) before Jahāngīr joined him (912 AH.); after their meeting they went on together to Herī. The petition of which the T. R. speaks as made by Jahāngīr to Bābur, that he might go into Khurāsān and help the Bāī-qarā Mīrzās must have been made after the meeting of the two at Ṣaf-hill (f. 184b).Return to passage

[976] The plurals they and their of the preceding sentence stand no doubt for the Mīrzā, Yūsuf and Buhlūl who all had such punishment due as would lead them to hear threat in Qāsim's words now when all were within Bābur's pounce.Return to passage

[977] These are the aīmāqs from which the fighting-men went east with Bābur in 910 AH. and the families in which Nāṣir shepherded across Hindu-kush (f. 154 and f. 155).Return to passage

[978] yamānlīk bīla bārdī; cf. f. 156b and n. for its opposite, yakhshī bārdīlār; and T. R. p. 196.Return to passage

[979] One might be of mail, the other of wadded cloth.Return to passage

[980] Chīn Ṣūfī was Ḥusain Bāī-qarā's man (T.R. p. 204). His arduous defence, faithfulness and abandonment recall the instance of a later time when also a long road stretched between the man and the help that failed him. But the Mīrzā was old, his military strength was, admittedly, sapped by ease; hence his elder Khartum, his neglect of his Gordon.Return to passage

It should be noted that no mention of the page's fatal arrow is made by the Shaibānī-nāma (Vambéry, p. 442), or by the Tārīkh-i-rashīdī (p. 204). Chīn Ṣūfī's death was on the 21st of the Second Rabī 911 AH. (Aug. 22nd 1505 AD.).

[981] This may be the "Baboulei" of the French Map of 1904, on the Herī-Kushk-Marūchāq road.Return to passage

[982] Elph. MS. f. 127; W.-i-B. I.O. 215 f. 132 and 217 f. 111b; Mems. p. 175; Méms. i, 364.Return to passage

That Bābur should have given his laborious account of the Court of Herī seems due both to loyalty to a great Tīmūrid, seated in Tīmūr Beg's place (f. 122b), and to his own interest, as a man-of-letters and connoisseur in excellence, in that ruler's galaxy of talent. His account here opening is not complete; its sources are various; they include the Ḥabību's-siyār and what he will have learned himself in Herī or from members of the Bāī-qarā family, knowledgeable women some of them, who were with him in Hindūstān. The narrow scope of my notes shews that they attempt no more than to indicate further sources of information and to clear up a few obscurities.

[983] Tīmūr's youngest son, d. 850 AH. (1446 AD.). Cf. Ḥ.S. iii, 203. The use in this sentence of Amīr and not Beg as Tīmūr's title is, up to this point, unique in the Bābur-nāma; it may be a scribe's error.Return to passage

[984] Fīrūza's paternal line of descent was as follows:—Fīrūza, daughter of Sl. Ḥusain Qānjūt, son of Ākā Begīm, daughter of Tīmūr. Her maternal descent was:—Fīrūza, d. of Qūtlūq-sulṯān Begīm, d. of Mīrān-shāh, s. of Tīmūr. She died Muḥ. 24th 874 AH. (July 25th 1489 AD. Ḥ.S. iii, 218).Return to passage

[985] "No-one in the world had such parentage", writes Khwānd-amīr, after detailing the Tīmūrid, Chīngīz-khānid, and other noted strains meeting in Ḥusain Bāī-qarā (Ḥ.S. iii, 204).Return to passage

[986] The Elph. MS. gives the Begīm no name; Badī`u'l-jamāl is correct (Ḥ.S. iii, 242). The curious "Badka" needs explanation. It seems probable that Bābur left one of his blanks for later filling-in; the natural run of his sentence here is "Ākā B. and Badī`u'l-jamāl B." and not the detail, which follows in its due place, about the marriage with Aḥmad.Return to passage

[987] Dīwān bāshīdā ḥāṣir būlmās aīdī; the sense of which may be that Bāī-qarā did not sit where the premier retainer usually sat at the head of the Court (Pers. trs. sar-i-dīwān).Return to passage

[988] From this Wais and Sl. Ḥusain M.'s daughter Sulṯānīm (f. 167b) were descended the Bāī-qarā Mīrzās who gave Akbar so much trouble.Return to passage

[989] As this man might be mistaken for Bābur's uncle (q.v.) of the same name, it may be well to set down his parentage. He was a s. of Mīrzā Sayyidī Aḥmad, s. of Mīrān-shāh, s. of Tīmūr (Ḥ.S. iii, 217, 241). I have not found mention elsewhere of "Aḥmad s. of Mīrān-shāh"; the sayyidī in his style points to a sayyida mother. He was Governor of Herī for a time, for Sl. H.M.; `Alī-sher has notices of him and of his son, Kīchīk Mīrzā (Journal Asiatique xvii, 293, M. Belin's art. where may be seen notices of many other men mentioned by Bābur).Return to passage

[990] He collected and thus preserved `Alī-sher's earlier poems (Rieu's Pers. Cat. p. 294). Mu'inu'd-dīn al Zamji writes respectfully of his being worthy of credence in some Egyptian matters with which he became acquainted in twice passing through that country on his Pilgrimage (Journal Asiatique xvi, 476, de Meynard's article).Return to passage

[991] Kīchīk M.'s quatrain is a mere plagiarism of Jāmī's which I am indebted to my husband for locating as in the Dīwān I.O. MS. 47 p. 47; B.M. Add. 7774 p. 290; and Add. 7775 p. 285. M. Belin interprets the verse as an expression of the rise of the average good man to mystical rapture, not as his lapse from abstinence to indulgence (l.c. xvii, 296 and notes).Return to passage

[992] Elph. MS. younger but Ḥai. MS. older in which it is supported by the "also" (ham) of the sentence.Return to passage

[993] modern Astrakhan. Ḥusain's guerilla wars were those through which he cut his way to the throne of Herī. This begīm was married first to Pīr Budāgh Sl. (Ḥ.S. iii, 242); he dying, she was married by Aḥmad, presumably by levirate custom (yīnkālīk; f. 12 and note). By Aḥmad she had a daughter, styled Khān-zāda Begīm whose affairs find comment on f. 206 and Ḥ.S. iii, 359. (The details of this note negative a suggestion of mine that Badka was the Rābī`a-sulṯān of f. 168 (Gul-badan, App. s. nn.).)Return to passage

[994] This is a felt wide-awake worn by travellers in hot weather (Shaw); the Turkmān bonnet (Erskine).Return to passage

[995] Ḥai. MS. yamānlīk, badly, but Elph. MS. namāyan, whence Erskine's showy.Return to passage

[996] This was a proof that he was then a Shī`a (Erskine).Return to passage

[997] The word perform may be excused in speaking of Musalmān prayers because they involve ceremonial bendings and prostrations (Erskine).Return to passage

[998] If Bābur's 40 include rule in Herī only, it over-states, since Yādgār died in 875 AH. and Ḥusain in 911 AH. while the intervening 36 years include the 5 or 6 temperate ones. If the 40 count from 861 AH. when Ḥusain began to rule in Merv, it under-states. It is a round number, apparently.Return to passage

[999] Relying on the Ilminsky text, Dr. Rieu was led into the mistake of writing that Bābur gave Ḥusain the wrong pen-name, i.e. Ḥusain, and not Ḥusainī (Turk. Cat. p. 256).Return to passage

[1000] Daulat-shāh says that as he is not able to enumerate all Ḥusain's feats-of-arms, he, Turkmān fashion, offers a gift of Nine. The Nine differ from those of Bābur's list in some dates; they are also records of victory only (Browne, p. 521; Not. et Extr. iv, 262, de Saçy's article).

[1001] Wolves'-water, a river and its town at the s.e. corner of the Caspian, the ancient boundary between Russia and Persia. The name varies a good deal in MSS.

[1002] The battle was at Tarshīz; Abū-sa`īd was ruling in Herī; Daulat-shāh (l.c. p. 523) gives 90 and 10,000 as the numbers of the opposed forces!

[1003] f. 26b and note; Ḥ.S. iii, 209; Daulat-shāh p. 523.

[1004] The loser was the last Shāhrukhī ruler. Chanārān (variants) is near Abīward, Anwārī's birth-place (Ḥ.S. iii, 218; D.S. p. 527).

[1005] f. 85. D.S. (p. 540) and the Ḥ.S. (iii, 223) dwell on Ḥusain's speed through three continuous days and nights.

[1006] f. 26; Ḥ.S. iii, 227; D.S. p. 532.

[1007] Abū-sa`īd's son by a Badakhshī Begīm (T.R. p. 108); he became his father's Governor in Badakhshān and married Ḥusain Bāī-qarā's daughter Begīm Sultān at a date after 873 AH. (f. 168 and note; Ḥ.S. iii, 196, 229, 234-37; D.S. p. 535).

[1008] f. 152.

[1009] Abā-bikr was defeated and put to death at the end of Rajah 884 AH.-Oct. 1479 AD. after flight before Ḥusain across the Gurgān-water (Ḥ.S. iii, 196 and 237 but D.S. p. 539, Ṣafar 885 AH.).

[1010] f. 41, Pul-i-chirāgh; for Halwā-spring, Ḥ.S. iii, 283 and Rieu's Pers. Cat. p. 443.

[1011] f. 33 (p. 57) and f. 57b.

[1012] In commenting thus Bābur will have had in mind what he best knew, Ḥusain's futile movements at Qūndūz and Ḥiṣār.

[1013] qālīb aīdī; if qālīb be taken as Turkī, survived or remained, it would not apply here since many of Ḥusain's children predeceased him; Ar. qālab would suit, meaning begotten, born.

There are discrepancies between Bābur's details here and Khwānd-amīr's scattered through the Ḥabību's-siyār, concerning Ḥusain's family.

[1014] bī ḥuẓūrī, which may mean aversion due to Khadīja Begīm's malevolence.

[1015] Some of the several goings into `Irāq chronicled by Bābur point to refuge taken with Tīmūrids, descendants of Khalīl and `Umar, sons of Mirān-shāh (Lane-Poole's _Muhammadan Dynasties_, Table of the Timūrids).

[1016] He died before his father (Ḥ.S. iii, 327).

[1017] He will have been killed previous to Ramẓān 3rd 918 AH. (Nov. 12th, 1512 AD.), the date of the battle of Ghaj-dawān when Nijm S̱ānī died.

[1018] The bund here may not imply that both were in prison, but that they were bound in close company, allowing Ismā`īl, a fervent Shī`a, to convert the Mīrzā.

[1019] The bātmān is a Turkish weight of 13lbs (Meninsky) or 15lbs (Wollaston). The weight seems likely to refer to the strength demanded for rounding the bow (kamān guroha-sī) i.e. as much strength as to lift 40 bātmāns. Rounding or bending might stand for stringing or drawing. The meaning can hardly be one of the weight of the cross-bow itself. Erskine read gūrdehieh for guroha (p. 180) and translated by "double-stringed bow"; de Courteille (i, 373) read guirdhiyeh, arrondi, circulaire, in this following Ilminsky who may have followed Erskine. The Elph. and Ḥai. MSS. and the first W.-i-B. (I.O. 215 f. 113b) have kamān guroha-sī; the second W.-i-B. omits the passage, in the MSS. I have seen.

[1020] yakhshīlār bārīb tūr; lit. good things went (on); cf. f. 156b and note.

[1021] Badī`u'z-zamān's son, drowned at Chausa in 946 AH. (1539 AD.) A.N. (H. Beveridge, i, 344).

[1022] Qalāt-i-nādirī, in Khurāsān, the birth-place of Nādir Shāh (T.R. p. 209).

[1023] bīr gīna qīz, which on f. 86b can fitly be read to mean daughterling, Töchterchen, fillette, but here and i.a. f. 168, must have another meaning than diminutive and may be an equivalent of German Stück and mean one only. Gul-badan gives an account of Shād's manly pursuits (H.N. f. 25b).

[1024] He was the son of Mahdī Sl. (f. 320b) and the father of `Āqil Sl. Aūzbeg (A.N. index s.n.). Several matters suggest that these men were of the Shabān Aūzbegs who intermarried with Ḥusain Bāī-qarā's family and some of whom went to Bābur in Hindūstān. One such matter is that Kābul was the refuge of dispossessed Harātīs, after the Aūzbeg conquest; that there `Āqil married Shād Bāī-qarā and that `Ādil went on to Bābur. Moreover Khāfī Khān makes a statement which (if correct) would allow `Ādil's father Mahdī to be a grandson of Ḥusain Bāī-qarā; this statement is that when Bābur defeated the Aūzbegs in 916 AH. (1510 AD.), he freed from their captivity two sons (descendants) of his paternal uncle, named Mahdī Sl. and Sulṯān Mīrzā. [Leaving the authenticity of the statement aside for a moment, it will be observed that this incident is of the same date and place as another well-vouched for, namely that Bābur then and there killed Mahdī Sl. Aūzbeg and Ḥamza Sl. Aūzbeg after defeating them.] What makes in favour of Khāfī Khān's correctness is, not only that Bābur's foe Mahdī is not known to have had a son `Ādil, but also that his "Sulṯān Mīrzā" is not a style so certainly suiting Ḥamza as it does a Shabān sulṯān, one whose father was a Shabān sulṯān, and whose mother was a Mīrzā's daughter. Moreover this point of identification is pressed by the correctness, according to oriental statement of relationship, of Khāfī Khān's "paternal uncle" (of Bābur), because this precisely suits Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā with whose family these Shabān sulṯāns allied themselves. On the other hand it must be said that Khāfī Khān's statement is not in the English text of the Tārīkh-i-rashīdī, the book on which he mostly relies at this period, nor is it in my husband's MS. [a copy from the Rampūr Codex]; and to this must be added the verbal objection that a modicum of rhetoric allows a death to be described both in Turkī and Persian, as a release from the captivity of a sinner's own acts (f. 160). Still Khāfī Khān may be right; his statement may yet be found in some other MS. of the T. R. or some different source; it is one a scribe copying the T. R. might be led to omit by reason of its coincidences. The killing and the release may both be right; `Ādil's Mahdī may be the Shabān sulṯān inference makes him seem. This little crux presses home the need of much attention to the lacunae in the Bābur-nāma, since in them are lost some exits and some entries of Bābur's dramatis personae, pertinently, mention of the death of Mahdī with Ḥamza in 916 AH., and possibly also that of `Ādil's Mahdī's release.

[1025] A chār-ṯāq may be a large tent rising into four domes or having four porches.

[1026] Ḥ.S. iii, 367.

[1027] This phrase, common but not always selected, suggests unwillingness to leave the paternal roof.

[1028] Abū'l-ghāzī's History of the Mughūls, Désmaisons, p. 207.

[1029] The appointment was made in 933 AH. (1527 AD.) and seems to have been held still in 934 AH. (ff. 329, 332).

[1030] This grandson may have been a child travelling with his father's household, perhaps Aūlūgh Mīrzā, the oldest son of Muḥammad Sulṯān Mīrzā (A. A. Blochmann, p. 461). No mention is made here of Sulṯānīm Begīm's marriage with `Abdu'l-bāqī Mīrzā (f. 175).

[1031] Abū'l-qāsim Bābur Shāhrukhī presumably.

[1032] The time may have been 902 AH. when Mas`ūd took his sister Bega Begīm to Herī for her marriage with Ḥaidar (Ḥ.S. iii, 260).

[1033] Khwāja Aḥmad Yāsawī, known as Khwāja Ātā, founder of the Yāsawī religious order.

[1034] Not finding mention of a daughter of Abū-sa`id named Rābī`a-sulṯān, I think she may be the daughter styled Āq Begīm who is No. 3 in Gul-badan's guest-list for the Mystic Feast.

[1035] This man I take to be Ḥusain's grandfather and not brother, both because `Abdu'l-lāh was of Ḥusain's and his brother's generation, and also because of the absence here of Bābur's usual defining words "elder brother" (of Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā). In this I have to differ from Dr. Rieu (Pers. Cat. p. 152).

[1036] So-named after his ancestor Sayyid Barka whose body was exhumed from Andikhūd for reburial in Samarkand, by Tīmūr's wish and there laid in such a position that Tīmūr's body was at its feet (Z̤afar-nāma ii, 719; Ḥ.S. iii, 82). (For the above interesting detail I am indebted to my husband.)

[1037] Qīzīl-bāsh, Persians wearing red badges or caps to distinguish them as Persians.

[1038] Yādgār-i-farrukh Mīrān-shāhī (Ḥ.S. iii, 327). He may have been one of those Mīrān-shāhīs of `Irāq from whom came Ākā's and Sulṯānīm's husbands, Aḥmad and `Abdu'l-bāqī (ff. 164, 175_b_).

[1039] This should be four (f. 169_b_). The Ḥ.S. (iii, 327) also names three only when giving Pāpā Āghācha's daughters (the omission linking it with the B.N.), but elsewhere (iii, 229) it gives an account of a fourth girl's marriage; this fourth is needed to make up the total of 11 daughters. Bābur's and Khwānd-amīr's details of Pāpā Āghācha's quartette are defective; the following may be a more correct list:—(1) Begīm Sulṯān (a frequent title), married to Abā-bikr Mīrān-shāhī (who died 884 AH.) and seeming too old to be the one [No. 3] who married Mas`ūd (Ḥ.S. iii, 229); (2) Sulṯān-nizhād, married to Iskandar Bāī-qarā; (3) Sa`ādat-bakht also known as Begīm Sulṯān, married to Mas'ūd Mīrān-shāhī (Ḥ.S. iii, 327); (4) Manauwar-sulṯān, married to a son of Aūlūgh Beg Kābulī (Ḥ.S. iii, 327).

[1040] This "after" seems to contradict the statement (f. 58) that Mas`ūd was made to kneel as a son-in-law (kūyādlīk-kā yūkūndūrūb) at a date previous to his blinding, but the seeming contradiction may be explained by considering the following details; he left Herī hastily (f. 58), went to Khusrau Shāh and was blinded by him,—all in the last two months of 903 AH. (1498 AD.), after the kneeling on Ẕū'l-qa`da 3rd, (June 23rd) in the Ravens'-garden. Here what Bābur says is that the Begīm was given (bīrīb) after the blinding, the inference allowed being that though Mas`ūd had kneeled before the blinding, she had remained in her father's house till his return after the blinding.

[1041] The first W.-i-B. writes "Apāq Begīm" (I.O. 215 f. 136) which would allow Sayyid Mīrzā to be a kinsman of Apāq Begīm, wife of Ḥusain Bāī-qarā.

[1042] This brief summary conveys the impression that the Begīm went on her pilgrimage shortly after Mas`ūd's death (913 AH. ?), but may be wrong:—After Mas`ūd's murder, by one Bīmāsh Mīrzā, dārogha of Sarakhs, at Shaibāq Khān's order, she was married by Bīmāsh M. (Ḥ.S. iii, 278). How long after this she went to Makka is not said; it was about 934 AH. when Bābur heard of her as there.

[1043] This clause is in the Ḥai. MS. but not in the Elph. MS. (f. 131), or Kehr's (Ilminsky, p. 210), or in either Persian translation. The boy may have been 17 or 18.

[1044] This appears a mistake (f. 168 foot, and note on Pāpā's daughters).

[1045] f. 171b.

[1046] 933 AH.-1527 AD. (f. 329).

[1047] Presumably this was a yīnkālīk marriage; it differs from some of those chronicled and also from a levirate marriage in not being made with a childless wife. (Cf. index s.n. yīnkālīk.)

[1048] Khwānd-amīr says that Bega Begīm was jealous, died of grief at her divorce, and was buried in a College, of her own erection, in 893 AH. (1488 AD. ḤS. iii, 245).

[1049] Gulistān Cap. II, Story 31 (Platts, p. 114).

[1050] i.e. did not get ready to ride off if her husband were beaten by her brother (f. 11 and note to Ḥabība).

[1051] Khadīja Begī Āghā (Ḥ.S. ii, 230 and iii, 327); she would be promoted probably after Shāh-i-gharīb's birth.

[1052] He was a son of Badī`u'z-zamān.

[1053] It is singular that this honoured woman's parentage is not mentioned; if it be right on f. 168b (q.v. with note) to read Sayyid Mīrzā of Apāq Begīm, she may be a sayyida of Andikhūd.

[1054] As Bābur left Kābul on Ṣafar 1st (Nov. 17th 1525 AD.), the Begīm must have arrived in Muḥarram 932 AH. (Oct. 18th to Nov. 17th).

[1055] f. 333. As Chandīrī was besieged in Rabī`u'l-ākhar 934 AH. this passage shews that, as a minimum estimate, what remains of Bābur's composed narrative (i.e. down to f. 216b) was written after that date (Jan. 1528).

[1056] Chār-shambalār. Mention of another inhabitant of this place with the odd name, Wednesday (Chār-shamba), is made on f. 42b.

[1057] Mole-marked Lady; most MSS. style her Bī but Ḥ.S. iii, 327, writes Bībī; it varies also by calling her a Turk. She was a purchased slave of Shahr-bānū's and was given to the Mīrzā by Shahr-bānū at the time of her own marriage with him.

[1058] As noted already, f. 168b enumerates three only.

[1059] The three were almost certainly Badī`u'z-zamān, Ḥaidar, son of a Tīmūrid mother, and Muz̤affar-i-ḥusain, born after his mother had been legally married.

[1060] Seven sons predeceased him:—Farrukh, Shāh-i-gharīb, Muḥ. Ma`ṣūm, Ḥaidar, Ibrāhīm-i-ḥusain, Muḥ. Ḥusain and Abū-turāb. So too five daughters:—Āq, Bega, Āghā, Kīchīk and Fāṯima-sulṯān Begīms. So too four wives:—Bega-sulṯān and Chūlī Begīms, Zubaida and Laṯīf-sulṯān Āghāchas (Ḥ.S. iii, 327).

[1061] Chākū, a Barlās, as was Tīmūr, was one of Tīmūr's noted men.

At this point some hand not the scribe's has entered on the margin of the Ḥai. MS. the descendants of Muḥ. Barandūq down into Akbar's reign:—Muḥ. Farīdūn, bin Muḥ. Qulī Khān, bin Mīrzā `Alī, bin Muḥ. Barandūq Barlās. Of these Farīdūn and Muḥ. Qulī are amīrs of the Āyīn-i-akbarī list (Blochmann, pp. 341, 342; Ḥ.S. iii, 233).

[1062] Enforced marches of Mughūls and other nomads are mentioned also on f. 154b and f. 155.

[1063] Ḥ.S. iii, 228, 233, 235.

[1064] beg kīshī, beg-person.

[1065] Khwānd-amīr says he died a natural death (Ḥ.S. iii, 235).

[1066] f. 21. For a fuller account of Nawā'i, J. Asiatique xvii, 175, M. Belin's article.

[1067] i.e. when he was poor and a beg's dependant. He went back to Herī at Sl. Ḥusain M.'s request in 873 AH.

[1068] Niẕāmī's (Rieu's Pers. Cat. s.n.).

[1069] Farīdu'd-dīn-`at̤t̤ar's (Rieu l.c. and Ency. Br.).

[1070] Gharā'ibu'ṣ-ṣighar, Nawādiru'sh-shahāb, Badā'i`u'l-wasaṯ and Fawā'idu'l-kibr.

[1071] Every Persian poet has a takhalluṣ (pen-name) which he introduces into the last couplet of each ode (Erskine).

[1072] The death occurred in the First Jumāda 906 AH. (Dec. 1500 AD.).

[1073] Niẕāmu'd-dīn Aḥmad bin Tawakkal Barlās (Ḥ.S. iii, 229).

[1074] This may be that uncle of Tīmūr who made the Ḥaj (T. R. p. 48, quoting the Z̤afar-nāma).

[1075] Some MSS. omit the word "father" here but to read it obviates the difficulty of calling Walī a great beg of Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā although he died when that mīrzā took the throne (973 AH.) and although no leading place is allotted to him in Bābur's list of Herī begs. Here as in other parts of Bābur's account of Herī, the texts vary much whether Turkī or Persian, e.g. the Elph. MS. appears to call Walī a blockhead (dūnkūz dūr), the Ḥai. MS. writing n:kūz dūr(?).

[1076] He had been Bābur Shāhrukhī's yasāwal (Court-attendant), had fought against Ḥusain for Yādgār-i-muḥammad and had given a daughter to Ḥusain (Ḥ.S. iii, 206, 228, 230-32; D.S. in Not. et Ex. de Saçy p. 265).

[1077] f. 29b.

[1078] Sic, Elph. MS. and both Pers. trss. but the Ḥai. MS. omits "father". To read it, however, suits the circumstance that Ḥasan of Ya`qūb was not with Ḥusain and in Harāt but was connected with Maḥmūd Mīrānshāhī and Tīrmīẕ (f. 24). Nuyān is not a personal name but is a title; it implies good-birth; all uses of it I have seen are for members of the religious family of Tīrmīẕ.

[1079] He was the son of Ibrāhīm Barlās and a Badakhshī begīm (T.R. p. 108).

[1080] He will have been therefore a collateral of Daulat-shāh whose relation to Fīrūz-shāh is thus expressed by Nawā'i:—Mīr Daulat-shāh Fīrūz-shāh Beg-nīng `amm-zāda-sī Amīr `Alā'u'd-daula Isfārayīnī-nīng aūghūlī dur, i.e. Mīr Daulat-shāh was the son of Fīrūz-shāh Beg's paternal uncle's son, Amir `Alā'u'd-daula Isfārayīnī. Thus, Fīrūz-shāh and Isfārayīnī were first cousins; Daulat-shāh and `Abdu'l-khalīq's father were second cousins; while Daulat-shāh and Fīrūz-shāh were first cousins, once removed (Rieu's Pers. Cat. p. 534; Browne's D.S. English preface p. 14 and its reference to the Pers. preface).

[1081] Tarkhān-nāma, E. & D.'s History of India i, 303; Ḥ.S. iii, 227.

[1082] f. 41 and note.

[1083] Both places are in the valley of the Herī-rūd.

[1084] Badī`u'z-zamān married a daughter of Ẕū'n-nūn; she died in 911 AH. (E. & D. i, 305; Ḥ.S. iii, 324).

[1085] This indicates, both amongst Musalmāns and Hindūs, obedience and submission. Several instances occur in Macculloch's Bengali Household Stories.

[1086] T.R. p. 205.

[1087] This is an idiom expressive of great keenness (Erskine).

[1088] Ḥ.S. iii, 250, kitābdār, librarian; so too Ḥai. MS. f. 174b.

[1089] mutaiyam (f. 7b and note). Mīr Mughūl Beg was put to death for treachery in `Irāq (Ḥ.S. iii, 227, 248).

[1090] Bābur speaks as an eye-witness (f. 187b). For a single combat of Sayyid Badr, Ḥ. S. iii, 233.

[1091] f. 157 and note to bātmān.

[1092] A level field in which a gourd (qabaq) is set on a pole for an archer's mark to be hit in passing at the gallop (f. 18b and note).

[1093] Or possibly during the gallop the archer turned in the saddle and shot backwards.

[1094] Junaid was the father of Niẕāmu'd-dīn `Alī, Bābur's Khalīfa (Vice-gerent). That Khalīfa was of a religious house on his mother's side may be inferred from his being styled both Sayyid and Khwāja neither of which titles could have come from his Turkī father. His mother may have been a sayyida of one of the religious families of Marghīnān (f. 18 and note), since Khalīfa's son Muḥibb-i-`alī writes his father's name "Niẕāmu'd-din `Alī Marghīlānī" (Marghīnānī) in the Preface of his Book on Sport (Rieu's Pers. Cat. p. 485).

[1095] This northward migration would take the family into touch with Bābur's in Samarkand and Farghāna.

[1096] He was left in charge of Jaunpūr in Rabī` I, 933 AH. (Jan. 1527 AD.) but exchanged for Chunār in Ramẓān 935 AH. (June 1529 AD.); so that for the writing of this part of the Bābur-nāma we have the major and minor limits of Jan. 1527 and June 1529.

[1097] Ḥ.S. iii, 227.

[1098] See Appendix H, On the counter-mark Bih-būd on coins.

[1099] Niẕāmu'd-dīn Amīr Shaikh Aḥmadu's-suhailī was surnamed Suhailī through a fāl (augury) taken by his spiritual guide, Kamālu'd-dīn Ḥusain Gāzur-gāhī; it was he induced Ḥusain Kashīfī to produce his Anwār-i-suhailī (Lights of Canopus) (f. 125 and note; Rieu's Pers. Cat. p. 756; and for a couplet of his, Ḥ.S. iii, 242 l. 10).

[1100] Index s.n.

[1101] Did the change complete an analogy between `Alī Jalāīr and his (perhaps) elder son with `Alī Khalīfa and his elder son Ḥasan?

[1102] The Qūsh-begī is, in Central Asia, a high official who acts for an absent ruler (Shaw); he does not appear to be the Falconer, for whom Bābur's name is Qūshchī (f. 15 n.).

[1103] He received this sobriquet because when he returned from an embassy to the Persian Gulf, he brought, from Bahrein, to his Tīmūrid master a gift of royal pearls (Sām Mīrzā). For an account of Marwārīd see Rieu's Pers. Cat. p. 1094 and (re portrait) p. 787.

[1104] Sām Mīrzā specifies this affliction as ābla-i-farang, thus making what may be one of the earliest Oriental references to morbus gallicus [as de Saçy here translates the name], the foreign or European pox, the "French disease of Shakespeare" (H.B.).

[1105] Index s.n. Yūsuf.

[1106] Ramẓān 3rd 918 AH.-Nov. 12th 1512.

[1107] i.e. of the White-sheep Turkmāns.

[1108] His paternal line was, `Abdu'l-bāqī, son of `Us̤mān, son of Sayyidī Aḥmad, son of Mīrān-shāh. His mother's people were begs of the White-sheep (Ḥ.S. iii, 290).

[1109] Sulṯānīm had married Wais (f. 157) not later than 895 or 896 AH. (Ḥ. S. iii, 253); she married `Abdu'l-bāqī in 908 AH. (1502-3 AD.).

[1110] Sayyid Shamsu'd-dīn Muḥammad, Mīr Sayyid Sar-i-barahna owed his sobriquet of Bare-head to love-sick wanderings of his youth (Ḥ.S. iii, 328). The Ḥ.S. it is clear, recognizes him as a sayyid.

[1111] Rieu's Pers. Cat. p. 760; it is immensely long and "filled with tales that shock all probability" (Erskine).

[1112] f. 94 and note. Sl. Ḥusain M. made him curator of Anṣārī's shrine, an officer represented, presumably, by Col. Yate's "Mīr of Gāzur-gāh", and he became Chief Justice in 904 AH. (1498-99 AD.). See Ḥ.S. iii, 330 and 340; JASB 1887, art. On the city of Harāt (C. E. Yate) p. 85.

[1113] mutasauwif, perhaps meaning not a professed Ṣūfī.

[1114] He was of high birth on both sides, of religious houses of T̤abas and Nishāpūr (D.S. pp. 161, 163).

[1115] In agreement with its preface, Dr. Rieu entered the book as written by Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā; in his Addenda, however, he quotes Bābur as the authority for its being by Gāzur-gāhī; Khwānd-amīr's authority can be added to Bābur's (Ḥ.S. 340; Pers. Cat. pp. 351, 1085).

[1116] Dīwān. The Wazīr is a sort of Minister of Finance; the Dīwān is the office of revenue receipts and issues (Erskine).

[1117] a secretary who writes out royal orders (Ḥ.S. iii, 244).

[1118] Count von Noer's words about a cognate reform of later date suit this man's work, it also was "a bar to the defraudment of the Crown, a stumbling-block in the path of avaricious chiefs" (Emperor Akbar trs. i, 11). The opposition made by `Alī-sher to reform so clearly to Ḥusain's gain and to Ḥusain's begs' loss, stirs the question, "What was the source of his own income?" Up to 873 AH. he was for some years the dependant of Aḥmad Ḥājī Beg; he took nothing from the Mīrzā, but gave to him; he must have spent much in benefactions. The question may have presented itself to M. Belin for he observes, "`Alī-sher qui sans doute, à son retour de l'exil, recouvra l'héritage de ses pères, et depuis occupa de hautes positions dans le gouvernement de son pays, avait acquis une grande fortune" (J. Asiatique xvii, 227). While not contradicting M. Belin's view that vested property such as can be described as "paternal inheritance", may have passed from father to son, even in those days of fugitive prosperity and changing appointments, one cannot but infer, from Nawā'i's opposition to Majdu'd-dīn, that he, like the rest, took a partial view of the "rights" of the cultivator.

[1119] This was in 903 AH. after some 20 years of service (Ḥ.S. iii, 231; Ethé I.O. Cat. p. 252).

[1120] Amīr Jamālu'd-dīn `Atā'u'l-lāh, known also as Jamālu'd-dīn Ḥusain, wrote a History of Muhammad (Ḥ.S. iii, 345; Rieu's Pers. Cat. p. 147 & (a correction) p. 1081).

[1121] Amongst noticeable omissions from Bābur's list of Herī celebrities are Mīr Khwānd Shāh ("Mirkhond"), his grandson Khwānd-amīr, Ḥusain Kashifī and Muinu'd-dīn al Zamjī, author of a History of Harāt which was finished in 897 AH.

[1122] Sa'du`d-dīn Mas`ūd, son of `Umar, was a native of Taft in Yazd, whence his cognomen (Bahār-i-`ajam); he died in 792 AH.-1390 AD. (Ḥ.S. iii, 59, 343; T.R. p. 236; Rieu's Pers. Cat. pp. 352, 453).

[1123] These are those connected with grammar and rhetoric (Erskine).

[1124] This is one of the four principal sects of Muḥammadanism (Erskine).

[1125] T.R. p. 235, for Shāh Ismā`īl's murders in Herī.

[1126] Superintendent of Police, who examines weights, measures and provisions, also prevents gambling, drinking and so on.

[1127] f. 137.

[1128] The rank of Mujtahid, which is not bestowed by any individual or class of men but which is the result of slow and imperceptible opinion, finally prevailing and universally acknowledged, is one of the greatest peculiarities of the religion of Persia. The Mujtahid is supposed to be elevated above human fears and human enjoyments, and to have a certain degree of infallibility and inspiration. He is consulted with reverence and awe. There is not always a Mujtahid necessarily existing. See Kaempfer, Amoenitates Exoticae (Erskine).

[1129] muḥaddas̤, one versed in the traditional sayings and actions of Muḥammad.

[1130] Ḥ.S. iii, 340.

[1131] B.M. Or. 218 (Rieu's Pers. Cat. p. 350). The Commentary was made in order to explain the Nafaḥāt to Jāmī's son.

[1132] He was buried by the Mullā's side.

[1133] Amīr Burhānu'd-dīn `Atā'u'l-lāh bin Maḥmūdu'l-ḥusainī was born in Nishāpūr but known as Mashhadī because he retired to that holy spot after becoming blind.

[1134] f. 144_b_ and note. Qāẓī Ikhtiyāru'd-dīn Ḥasan (Ḥ.S. iii, 347) appears to be the Khwāja Ikhtiyār of the Āyīn-i-akbarī, and, if so, will have taken professional interest in the script, since Abū'l-faẓl describes him as a distinguished calligrapher in Sl. Ḥusain M.'s presence (Blochmann, p. 101).

[1135] Saifu'd-dīn (Sword of the Faith) Aḥmad, presumably.

[1136] A sister of his, Apāq Bega, the wife of `Alī-sher's brother Darwīsh-i-`alī kitābdār, is included as a poet in the Biography of Ladies (Sprenger's Cat. p. 11). Amongst the 20 women named one is a wife of Shaibāq Khān, another a daughter of Hilālī.

[1137] He was the son of Khw. Ni`amatu'l-lāh, one of Sl. Abū-sa`īd M.'s wazīrs. When dying aet. 70 (923 AH.), he made this chronogram on his own death, "With 70 steps he measured the road to eternity." The name Āsaf, so frequent amongst wazīrs, is that of Solomon's wazīr.

[1138] Other interpretations are open; wādī, taken as river, might refer to the going on from one poem to another, the stream of verse; or it might be taken as desert, with disparagement of collections.

[1139] Maulānā Jamālu'd-dīn Banā'i was the son of a sabz-banā, an architect, a good builder.

[1140] Steingass's Dictionary allows convenient reference for examples of metres.

[1141] Other jokes made by Banā'i at the expense of Nawā'i are recorded in the various sources.

[1142] Bābur saw Banā'i in Samarkand at the end of 901 AH. (1496 AD. f. 38).

Here Dr. Leyden's translation ends; one other fragment which he translated will be found under the year 925 AH. (Erskine). This statement allows attention to be drawn to the inequality of the shares of the work done for the Memoirs of 1826 by Leyden and by Erskine. It is just to Mr. Erskine, but a justice he did not claim, to point out that Dr. Leyden's share is slight both in amount and in quality; his essential contribution was the initial stimulus he gave to the great labours of his collaborator.

[1143] So of Lope de Vega (b. 1562; d. 1635 AD.), "It became a common proverb to praise a good thing by calling it a Lope, so that jewels, diamonds, pictures, etc. were raised into esteem by calling them his" (Montalvan in Ticknor's Spanish Literature ii, 270).

[1144] Maulānā Saifī, known as 'Arūẓī from his mastery in prosody (Rieu's Pers. Cat. p. 525).

[1145] Here pedantry will be implied in the mullahood.

[1146] Khamsatīn (infra f. 180_b_ and note).

[1147] This appears to mean that not only the sparse diacritical pointing common in writing Persian was dealt with but also the fuller Arabic.

[1148] He is best known by his pen-name Hātifī. The B.M. and I.O. have several of his books.

[1149] Khamsatīn. Hātifī regarded himself as the successor of Niẕāmī and Khusrau; this, taken with Bābur's use of the word Khamsatīn on f. 7 and here, and Saifī's just above, leads to the opinion that the Khamsatīn of the Bābur-nāma are always those of Niẕāmī and Khusrau, the Two Quintets (Rieu's Pers. Cat. p. 653).

[1150] Maulānā Mīr Kamālu'd-dīn Ḥusain of Nishāpūr (Rieu l.c. index s.n.; Ethé's I.O. Cat. pp. 433 and 1134).

[1151] One of his couplets on good and bad fortune is striking; "The fortune of men is like a sand-glass; one hour up, the next down." See D'Herbélot in his article (Erskine).

[1152] Ḥ.S. iii, 336; Rieu's Pers. Cat. p. 1089.

[1153] Āhī (sighing) was with Shāh-i-gharīb before Ibn-i-ḥusain and to him dedicated his dīwān. The words sāḥib-i-dīwān seem likely to be used here with double meaning i.e. to express authorship and finance office. Though Bābur has made frequent mention of authorship of a dīwān and of office in the Dīwān, he has not used these words hitherto in either sense; there may be a play of words here.

[1154] Muḥammad Ṣāliḥ Mīrzā Khwārizmī, author of the Shaibānī-nāma which manifestly is the poem (mas̤nawī) mentioned below. This has been published with a German translation by Professor Vambéry and has been edited with Russian notes by Mr. Platon Melioransky (Rieu's Turkish Cat. p. 74; Ḥ.S. iii, 301).

[1155] Jāmī's Subḥatu'l-abrār (Rosary of the righteous).

[1156] The reference may be to things said by Muḥ. Ṣāliḥ the untruth of which was known to Bābur through his own part in the events. A crying instance of misrepresentation is Ṣāliḥ's assertion, in rhetorical phrase, that Bābur took booty in jewels from Khusrau Shāh; other instances concern the affairs of The Khāns and of Bābur in Transoxiana (f. 124b and index s.nn. Aḥmad and Maḥmūd Chaghatāī etc.; T.R. index s.nn.)

[1157] The name Fat-land (Taṃbal-khāna) has its parallel in Fat-village (Sīmīz-kīnt) a name of Samarkand; in both cases the nick-name is accounted for by the fertility of irrigated lands. We have not been able to find the above-quoted couplet in the Shaibānī-nāma (Vambéry); needless to say, the pun is on the nick-name (taṃbal, fat) of Sl. Aḥmad Taṃbal.

[1158] Muḥ. Ṣāliḥ does not show well in his book; he is sometimes coarse, gloats over spoil whether in human captives or goods, and, his good-birth not-forbidding, is a servile flatterer. Bābur's word "heartless" is just; it must have had sharp prompting from Ṣāliḥ's rejoicing in the downfall of The Khāns, Bābur's uncles.

[1159] the Longer (Ḥ.S. iii, 349).

[1160] Maulānā Badru'd-dīn (Full-moon of the Faith) whose pen-name was Hilālī, was of Astarābād. It may be noted that two dates of his death are found, 936 and 939 AH. the first given by de Saçy, the second by Rieu, and that the second seems to be correct (Not. et Extr. p. 285; Pers. Cat. p. 656; Hammer's Geschichte p. 368).

[1161] B.M. Add. 7783.

[1162] Opinions differ as to the character of this work:—Bābur's is uncompromising; von Hammer (p. 369) describes it as "ein romantisches Gedicht, welches eine sentimentale Männerliebe behandelt"; Sprenger (p. 427), as a mystical mas̤nawī (poem); Rieu finds no spiritual symbolism in it and condemns it (Pers. Cat. p. 656 and, quoting the above passage of Bābur, p. 1090); Ethé, who has translated it, takes it to be mystical and symbolic (I.O. Cat. p. 783).

[1163] Of four writers using the pen-name Ahlī (Of-the-people), viz. those of Turān, Shīrāz, Tarshīz (in Khurāsān), and 'Irāq, the one noticed here seems to be he of Tarshīz. Ahlī of Tarshīz was the son of a locally-known pious father and became a Superintendent of the Mint; Bābur's `āmī may refer to Ahlī's first patrons, tanners and shoe-makers by writing for whom he earned his living (Sprenger, p. 319). Erskine read 'ummī, meaning that Ahlī could neither read nor write; de Courteille that he was un homme du commun.

[1164] He was an occasional poet (Ḥ.S. iii, 350 and iv, 118; Rieu's Pers. Cat. p. 531; Ethé's I.O. Cat. p. 428).

[1165] Ustād Kamālu'd-dīn Bih-zād (well-born; Ḥ.S. iii, 350). Work of his is reproduced in Dr. Martin's _Painting and Painters of Persia_ of 1913 AD.

[1166] This sentence is not in the Elph. MS.

[1167] Perhaps he could reproduce tunes heard and say where heard.

[1168] M. Belin quotes quatrains exchanged by `Alī-sher and this man (J. Asiatique xvii, 199).

[1169] i.e. from his own camp to Bābā Ilāhī.

[1170] f. 121 has a fuller quotation. On the dual succession, see T.R. p. 196.

[1171] Elph. MS. f. 144; W.-i-B. I.O. 215 f. 148_b_ and 217 f. 125_b_; Mems. p. 199.

[1172] News of Ḥusain's death in 911 AH. (f. 163b) did not reach Bābur till 912 AH. (f. 184_b_).

[1173] Lone-meadow (f. 195_b_). Jahāngīr will have come over the `Irāq-pass, Bābur's baggage-convoy, by Shibr-tū. Cf. T. R. p. 199 for Bābur and Jahāngīr at this time.

[1174] Servant-of-the-mace; but perhaps, Qilinj-chāq, swords-man.

[1175] One of four, a fourth. Chār-yak may be a component of the name of the well-known place, n. of Kābul, "Chārikār"; but also the Chār in it may be Hindūstānī and refer to the permits-to-pass after tolls paid, given to caravans halted there for taxation. Raverty writes it Chārlākār.

[1176] Amongst the disruptions of the time was that of the Khānate of Qībchāq (Erskine).

[1177] The nearest approach to kipkī we have found in Dictionaries is kupaki, which comes close to the Russian copeck. Erskine notes that the casbeké is an oval copper coin (Tavernier, p. 121); and that a tūmān is a myriad (10,000). Cf. Manucci (Irvine), i, 78 and iv, 417 note; Chardin iv, 278.

[1178] Muḥarram 912 AH.-June 1506 AD. (Ḥ.S. iii, 353).

[1179] I take Murgh-āb here to be the fortified place at the crossing of the river by the main n.e. road; Bābur when in Dara-i-bām was on a tributary of the Murgh-āb. Khwānd-amīr records that the information of his approach was hailed in the Mīrzās' camp as good news (Ḥ.S. iii, 354).

[1180] Bābur gives the Mīrzās precedence by age, ignoring Muz̤affar's position as joint-ruler.

[1181] mubālgha qīldī; perhaps he laid stress on their excuse; perhaps did more than was ceremonially incumbent on him.

[1182] `irq, to which estrade answers in its sense of a carpet on which stands a raised seat.

[1183] Perhaps it was a recess, resembling a gate-way (W.-i-B. I.O. 215 f. 151 and 217 f. 127_b_). The impression conveyed by Bābur's words here to the artist who in B.M. Or. 3714, has depicted the scene, is that there was a vestibule opening into the tent by a door and that the Mīrzā sat near that door. It must be said however that the illustration does not closely follow the text, in some known details.

[1184] shīra, fruit-syrups, sherbets. Bābur's word for wine is chāghīr (q.v. index) and this reception being public, wine could hardly have been offered in Sunnī Herī. Bābur's strictures can apply to the vessels of precious metal he mentions, these being forbidden to Musalmāns; from his reference to the Tūra it would appear to repeat the same injunctions. Bābur broke up such vessels before the battle of Kanwāha (f. 315). Shāh-i-jahān did the same; when sent by his father Jahāngīr to reconquer the Deccan (1030 AH.-1621 AD.) he asked permission to follow the example of his ancestor Bābur, renounced wine, poured his stock into the Chaṃbal, broke up his cups and gave the fragments to the poor (`Amal-i-ṣāliḥ, Hughes' Dict. of Islām quoting the Hidāyah and Mishkāt, s.nn. Drinkables, Drinking-vessels, and Gold; Lane's Modern Egyptians p. 125 n.).

[1185] This may be the Rabāṯ-i-sanghī of some maps, on a near road between the "Forty-daughters" and Harāt; or Bābur may have gone out of his direct way to visit Rabāṯ-i-sang-bast, a renowned halting place at the Carfax of the Herī-T̤ūs and Nishāpūr-Mashhad roads, built by one Arslān Jazāla who lies buried near, and rebuilt with great magnificence by `Alī-sher Nawā'i (Daulat-shāh, Browne, p. 176).

[1186] The wording here is confusing to those lacking family details. The paternal-aunt begīms can be Pāyanda-sulṯān (named), Khadīja-sulṯān, Apāq-sulṯān, and Fakhr-jahān Begīms, all daughters of Abū-sa`īd. The Apāq Begīm named above (also on f. 168_b_ q.v.) does not now seem to me to be Abū-sa`īd's daughter (Gul-badan, trs. Bio. App.).

[1187] yūkūnmāī. Unless all copies I have seen reproduce a primary clerical mistake of Bābur's, the change of salutation indicated by there being no kneeling with Apāq Begīm, points to a nuance of etiquette. Of the verb yūkūnmāk it may be noted that it both describes the ceremonious attitude of intercourse, i.e. kneeling and sitting back on both heels (Shaw), and also the kneeling on meeting. From Bābur's phrase Begīm bīla yūkūnūb [having kneeled with], it appears that each of those meeting made the genuflection; I have not found the phrase used of other meetings; it is not the one used when a junior or a man of less degree meets a senior or superior in rank (e.g. Khusrau and Bābur f. 123, or Bābur and Badī`u'z-zamān f. 186).

[1188] Musalmāns employ a set of readers who succeed one another in reading (reciting) the Qorān at the tombs of their men of eminence. This reading is sometimes continued day and night. The readers are paid by the rent of lands or other funds assigned for the purpose (Erskine).

[1189] A suspicion that Khadīja put poison in Jahāngīr's wine may refer to this occasion (T.R. p. 199).

[1190] These are jharokha-i-darsān, windows or balconies from which a ruler shews himself to the people.

[1191] Mas`ūd was then blind.

[1192] Bābur first drank wine not earlier than 917 AH. (f. 49 and note), therefore when nearing 30.

[1193] aīchkīlār, French, intérieur.

[1194] The obscure passage following here is discussed in Appendix I, On the weeping-willows of f. 190_b_.

[1195] Here this may well be a gold-embroidered garment.

[1196] This, the tomb of Khwāja `Abdu'l-lāh Anṣari (d. 481 AH.) stands some 2m. north of Herī. Bābur mentions one of its numerous attendants of his day, Kamālu'd-dīn Ḥusain Gāzur-gāhī. Mohan Lall describes it as he saw it in 1831; says the original name of the locality was Kār-zār-gāh, place-of-battle; and, as perhaps his most interesting detail, mentions that Jalālu'd-dīn Rūmī's Maṣnawī was recited every morning near the tomb and that people fainted during the invocation (Travels in the Panj-āb etc. p. 252). Colonel Yate has described the tomb as he saw it some 50 years later (JASB 1887); and explains the name Gāzur-gāh (lit. bleaching-place) by the following words of an inscription there found; "His tomb (Anṣarī's) is a washing-place (gāzur-gāh) wherein the cloud of the Divine forgiveness washes white the black records of men" (p. 88 and p. 102).

[1197] juāz-i-kaghazlār (f. 47_b_ and note).

[1198] The Ḥabību's-siyār and Ḥai. MS. write this name with medial "round hā"; this allows it to be Kahad-stān, a running-place, race-course. Khwānd-amīr and Daulat-shāh call it a meadow (aūlāng); the latter speaks of a feast as held there; it was Shaibānī's head-quarters when he took Harāt.

[1199] var. Khatīra; either an enclosure (qūrūq?) or a fine and lofty building.

[1200] This may have been a usual halting-place on a journey (safar) north. It was built by Ḥusain Bāī-qarā, overlooked hills and fields covered with arghwān (f. 137_b_) and seems once to have been a Paradise (Mohan Lall, p. 256).

[1201] Jāmī's tomb was in the `Īd-gah of Herī (Ḥ.S. ii, 337), which appears to be the Muṣalla (Praying-place) demolished by Amīr `Abdu'r-raḥmān in the 19th century. Col. Yate was shewn a tomb in the Muṣalla said to be Jāmī's and agreeing in the age, 81, given on it, with Jāmī's at death, but he found a crux in the inscription (pp. 99, 106).

[1202] This may be the Muṣalla (Yate, p. 98).

[1203] This place is located by the Ḥ.S. at 5 farsakh from Herī (de Meynard at 25 kilomètres). It appears to be rather an abyss or fissure than a pond, a crack from the sides of which water trickles into a small bason in which dwells a mysterious fish, the beholding of which allows the attainment of desires. The story recalls Wordsworth's undying fish of Bow-scale Tarn. (Cf. Ḥ.S. Bomb. ed. ii, Khatmat p. 20 and de Meynard, Journal Asiatique xvi, 480 and note.)

[1204] This is on maps to the north of Herī.

[1205] d. 232 AH. (847 AD.). See Yate, p. 93.

[1206] Imām Fakhru'd-dīn Raẓī (de Meynard, _Journal Asiatique_ xvi, 481).

[1207] d. 861 AH.-1457 AD. Guhār-shād was the wife of Tīmūr's son Shāhrukh. See Mohan Lall, p. 257 and Yate, p. 98.

[1208] This Marigold-garden may be named after Hārūnu'r-rashīd's wife Zubaida.

[1209] This will be the place n. of Herī from which Maulānā Jalālu'd-dīn Pūrānī (d. 862 AH.) took his cognomen, as also Shaikh Jamālu'd-dīn Abū-sa`īd Pūrān (f. 206) who was visited there by Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā, ill-treated by Shaibānī (f. 206), left Herī for Qandahār, and there died, through the fall of a roof, in 921 AH. (Ḥ.S. iii, 345; Khazīnatu'l-asfiya ii, 321).

[1210] His tomb is dated 35 or 37 AH. (656 or 658 AD.; Yate, p. 94).

[1211] Mālān was a name of the Herī-rūd (Journal Asiatique xvi, 476, 511; Mohan Lall, p. 279; Ferrier, p. 261; etc.).

[1212] Yate, p. 94.

[1213] The position of this building between the Khūsh and Qībchāq Gates (de Meynard, l.c. p. 475) is the probable explanation of the variant, noted just below, of Kushk for Khūsh as the name of the Gate. The Tārīkh-i-rashīdī (p. 429), mentions this kiosk in its list of the noted ones of the world.

[1214] var. Kushk (de Meynard, l.c. p. 472).

[1215] The reference here is, presumably, to Bābur's own losses of Samarkand and Andijān.

[1216] Ākā or Āgā is used of elder relations; a yīnkā or yīngā is the wife of an uncle or elder brother; here it represents the widow of Bābur's uncle Aḥmad Mīrān-shāhī. From it is formed the word yīnkālīk, levirate.

[1217] The almshouse or convent was founded here in Tīmūr's reign (de Meynard, l.c. p. 500).

[1218] i.e. No smoke without fire.

[1219] This name may be due to the splashing of water. A Langar which may be that of Mīr Ghiyās̤, is shewn in maps in the Bām valley; from it into the Herī-rūd valley Bābur's route may well have been the track from that Langar which, passing the villages on the southern border of Gharjistān, goes to Ahangarān.

[1220] This escape ought to have been included in the list of Bābur's transportations from risk to safety given in my note to f. 96.

[1221] The right and wrong roads are shewn by the Indian Survey and French Military maps. The right road turns off from the wrong one, at Daulat-yār, to the right, and mounts diagonally along the south rampart of the Herī-rūd valley, to the Zirrīn-pass, which lies above the Bakkak-pass and carries the regular road for Yaka-aūlāng. It must be said, however, that we are not told whether Yaka-aūlāng was Qāsim Beg's objective; the direct road for Kābul from the Herī-rūd valley is not over the Zirrīn-pass but goes from Daulat-yār by "Āq-zarat", and the southern flank of Koh-i-bābā (bābār) to the Unai-pass (Holdich's Gates of India p. 262).

[1222] circa Feb. 14th 1507, Bābur's 24th birthday.

[1223] The Hazāras appear to have been wintering outside their own valley, on the Ghūr-bund road, in wait for travellers [cf. T.R. p. 197]. They have been perennial highwaymen on the only pass to the north not closed entirely in winter.

[1224] The Ghūr-bund valley is open in this part; the Hazāras may have been posted on the naze near the narrows leading into the Janglīk and their own side valleys.

[1225] Although the verses following here in the text are with the Turkī Codices, doubt cannot but be felt as to their authenticity. They do not fit verbally to the sentence they follow; they are a unique departure from Bābur's plain prose narrative and nothing in the small Hazāra affair shews cause for such departure; they differ from his usual topics in their bombast and comment on his men (cf. f. 194 for comment on shirking begs). They appear in the 2nd Persian translation (217 f. 134) in Turkī followed by a prose Persian rendering (khalāṣa). They are not with the 1st Pers. trs. (215 f. 159), the text of which runs on with a plain prose account suiting the size of the affair, as follows:—"The braves, seeing their (the Hazāras) good soldiering, had stopped surprised; wishing to hurry them I went swiftly past them, shouting 'Move on! move on!' They paid me no attention. When, in order to help, I myself attacked, dismounting and going up the hill, they shewed courage and emulation in following. Getting to the top of the pass, we drove that band off, killing many, capturing others, making their families prisoner and plundering their goods." This is followed by "I myself collected" etc. as in the Turkī text after the verse. It will be seen that the above extract is not a translation of the verse; no translator or even summariser would be likely to omit so much of his original. It is just a suitably plain account of a trivial matter.

[1226] Gulistān Cap. I. Story 4.

[1227] Bābur seems to have left the Ghūr-bund valley, perhaps pursuing the Hazāras towards Janglīk, and to have come "by ridge and valley" back into it for Ushtur-shahr. I have not located Tīmūr Beg's Langar. As has been noted already (q.v. index) the Ghūr-bund narrows are at the lower end of the valley; they have been surmised to be the fissured rampart of an ancient lake.

[1228] Here this may represent a guard- or toll-house (Index s.n.).

[1229] As yūrūn is a patch, the bearer of the sobriquet might be Black Aḥmad the repairing-tailor.

[1230] Second Afghān War, Map of Kābul and its environs.

[1231] I understand that the arrival undiscovered was a result of riding in single-file and thus shewing no black mass.

[1232] or gharbīcha, which Mr. Erskine explains to be the four plates of mail, made to cover the back, front and sides; the jība would thus be the wadded under-coat to which they are attached.

[1233] This prayer is composed of extracts from the Qorān (Méms, i, 454 note); it is reproduced as it stands in Mr. Erskine's wording (p. 216).

[1234] Bābur's reference may well be to Sanjar's birth as well as to his being the holder of Nīngnahār. Sanjar's father had been thought worthy to mate with one of the six Badakhshī begīms whose line traced back to Alexander (T. R. p. 107); and his father was a Barlās, seemingly of high family.

[1235] It may be inferred that what was done was for the protection of the two women.

[1236] Not a bad case could have been made out for now putting a Tīmūrid in Bābur's place in Kābul; viz. that he was believed captive in Herī and that Mīrzā Khān was an effective locum tenens against the Arghūns. Haidar sets down what in his eyes pleaded excuse for his father Muḥ. Ḥusain (T.R. p. 198).

[1237] qūsh, not even a little plough-land being given (chand qulba dihya, 215 f. 162).

[1238] They were sons of Sl. Aḥmad Khān Chaghatāī.

[1239] f. 160.

[1240] Ḥaidar's opinion of Bābur at this crisis is of the more account that his own father was one of the rebels let go to the mercy of the "avenging servitor". When he writes of Bābur, as being, at a time so provoking, gay, generous, affectionate, simple and gentle, he sets before us insight and temper in tune with Kipling's "If...."

[1241] Bābur's distinction, made here and elsewhere, between Chaghatāī and Mughūl touches the old topic of the right or wrong of the term "Mughūl dynasty". What he, as also Ḥaidar, allows said is that if Bābur were to describe his mother in tribal terms, he would say she was half-Chaghatāī, half-Mughūl; and that if he so described himself, he would say he was half-Tīmūrid-Turk, half-Chaghatāī. He might have called the dynasty he founded in India Turkī, might have called it Tīmūriya; he would never have called it Mughūl, after his maternal grandmother.

Ḥaidar, with imperfect classification, divides Chīngīz Khān's "Mughūl horde" into Mughūls and Chaghatāīs and of this Chaghatāī offtake says that none remained in 953 AH. (1547 AD.) except the rulers, i.e. sons of Sl. Aḥmad Khan (T.R. 148). Manifestly there was a body of Chaghatāīs with Bābur and there appear to have been many near his day in the Herī region,—`Alī-sher Nawā`i the best known.

Bābur supplies directions for naming his dynasty when, as several times, he claims to rule in Hindūstān where the "Turk" had ruled (f. 233_b_, f. 224_b_, f. 225). To call his dynasty Mughūl seems to blot out the centuries, something as we should do by calling the English Teutons. If there is to be such blotting-out, Abū'l-ghāzī would allow us, by his tables of Turk descent, to go further, to the primal source of all the tribes concerned, to Turk, son of Japhet. This traditional descent is another argument against "Mughūl dynasty."

[1242] They went to Qandahār and there suffered great privation.

[1243] Bārān seems likely to be the Baian of some maps. Gul-i-bahār is higher up on the Panjhīr road. Chāsh-tūpa will have been near-by; its name might mean Hill of the heap of winnowed-corn.

[1244] f. 136.

[1245] Answer; Visions of his father's sway.

[1246] Elph. MS. f. 161; W.-i-B. I.O. 215 f. 164 and 217 f. 139_b_; Mems. p. 220.

[1247] The narrative indicates the location of the tribe, the modern Ghilzāī or Ghilzī.

[1248] Sih-kāna lies s.e. of Shorkach, and near Kharbīn. Sar-i-dih is about 25 or 30 miles s. of Ghaznī (Erskine). A name suiting the pastoral wealth of the tribe viz. Mesh-khail, Sheep-tribe, is shewn on maps somewhat s. from Kharbīn. Cf. Steingass s.n. Masht.

[1249] yāghrūn, whence yāghrūnchī, a diviner by help of the shoulder-blades of sheep. The defacer of the Elphinstone Codex has changed yāghrūn to yān, side, thus making Bābur turn his side and not his half-back to the north, altering his direction, and missing what looks like a jesting reference to his own divination of the road. The Pole Star was seen, presumably, before the night became quite black.

[1250] From the subsequent details of distance done, this must have been one of those good yīghāch of perhaps 5-6 miles, that are estimated by the ease of travel on level lands (Index s.v. yīghāch).

[1251] I am uncertain about the form of the word translated by "whim". The Elph. and Ḥai. Codices read khūd d:lma (altered in the first to y:lma); Ilminsky (p. 257) reads khūd l:ma (de C. ii, 2 and note); Erskine has been misled by the Persian translation (215 f. 164_b_ and 217 f. 139_b_). Whether khūd-dilma should be read, with the sense of "out of their own hearts" (spontaneously), or whether khūd-yalma, own pace (Turkī, yalma, pace) the contrast made by Bābur appears to be between an unpremeditated gallop and one premeditated for haste. Persian dalama, tarantula, also suggests itself.

[1252] chāpqūn, which is the word translated by gallop throughout the previous passage. The Turkī verb chāpmāq is one of those words-of-all-work for which it is difficult to find a single English equivalent. The verb qūīmāq is another; in its two occurrences here the first may be a metaphor from the pouring of molten metal; the second expresses that permission to gallop off for the raid without which to raid was forbidden. The root-notion of qūīmāq seems to be letting-go, that of chāpmāq, rapid motion.

[1253] i.e. on the raiders' own road for Kābul.

[1254] f. 198_b_.

[1255] The Fifth taken was manifestly at the ruler's disposition. In at least two places when dependants send gifts to Bābur the word [tassaduq] used might be rendered as "gifts for the poor". Does this mean that the pādshāh in receiving this stands in the place of the Imām of the Qorān injunction which orders one-fifth of spoil to be given to the Imām for the poor, orphans, and travellers,—four-fifths being reserved for the troops? (Qorān, Sale's ed. 1825, i, 212 and Hidāyat, Book ix).

[1256] This may be the sum of the separate items of sheep entered in account-books by the commissaries.

[1257] Here this comprehensive word will stand for deer, these being plentiful in the region.

[1258] Three Turkī MSS. write ṣīghīnīb, but the Elph. MS. has had this changed to yītīb, having reached.

[1259] bāsh-sīz, lit. without head, doubtless a pun on Aūz-beg (own beg, leaderless). B.M. Or. 3714 shows an artist's conception of this tart-part.

[1260] Bābā Khākī is a fine valley, some 13 yīghāch e. of Herī (f. 13) where the Herī sulṯāns reside in the heats (_J. Asiatique_ xvi, 501, de Meynard's article; Ḥ.S. iii, 356).

[1261] f. 172_b_.

[1262] aūkhshātā almādī. This is one of many passages which Ilminsky indicates he has made good by help of the Memoirs (p. 261; Mémoires ii, 6).

[1263] They are given also on f. 172.

[1264] This may be Sirakhs or Sirakhsh (Erskine).

[1265] Tūshlīq tūshdīn yūrdī bīrūrlār. At least two meanings can be given to these words. Circumstances seem to exclude the one in which the Memoirs (p. 222) and Mémoires (ii, 7) have taken them here, viz. "each man went off to shift for himself", and "chacun s'en alla de son côté et s'enfuit comme il put", because Ẕū'n-nūn did not go off, and the Mīrzās broke up after his defeat. I therefore suggest another reading, one prompted by the Mīrzās' vague fancies and dreams of what they might do, but did not.

[1266] The encounter was between "Belāq-i-marāl and Rabāṯ-i-`alī-sher, near Bādghīs" (Raverty's Notes p. 580). For particulars of the taking of Herī see Ḥ.S. iii, 353.