Asian and African studies blog

Evidence of the Mughal emperors’ admiration for the Persian lyric poet Ḥāfiẓ of Shiraz (d. 1389) is to be found in several elegant copies of his Dīvān or collected poems, two of which (Or.14139 and Or.7573, see below) featured in the exhibition ‘Mughal India’ [postscript: and are now digitised, follow links below].

The initial page of a Mughal imperial copy of the Dīvān of Ḥāfiẓ which, according to a note by Shah Jahan, was copied by the master calligrapher Sulṭān ʻAlī Mashhadī. Probably dating from the end of the 15th century, the copy was remargined for Jahangir ca.1605. At the head of the page is Awrangzeb’s personal seal (Or.14139, f. 1v)

There exist several commentaries on his Dīvān. Some provide little more than literal definitions of difficult and/or uncommon words and expressions. Others are more profound, and one such was composed for Shah Jahan (ruled 1627-1658). The British Library is fortunate enough to have acquired, five years ago, a manuscript (Or.16039) of this rare text, formerly in the library of the late C.S. Mundy, a British Turcologist.

Decorations added for Jahangir to his pocket sized copy of Hafiz’s Dīvān (Or.7573, f.246v)

Baḥr al-firāsat al-lāfiẓ fī sharḥ Dīvān-i Ḥāfiẓ (‘The Speaking Sea of Insight, in explication of the Collected Poems of Hafiz’) is concerned with the inner meanings of some of the great mystical poet’s more esoteric verses. The author, ʻAbd Allāh Khvīshakī Chishtī, used the penname ʻUbaydī. As his name implies, he was a member of the Chishti Sufi Order, which to this day remains a major spiritual force in the Subcontinent. Verses in praise of Shah Jahan occur in the middle of the author’s preface (folios 2v-3v). In conformity with normal convention, the bayts or couplets are arranged and explained in alphabetical order of the rhyming letters.

Only two other manuscripts of this work are recorded, both being 19th century copies preserved at the Majlis-i Shūrā-yi Millī (National Assembly) Library in Tehran. The British Library manuscript is probably early 18th century and comprises 227 folios but is incomplete: it breaks off about two-thirds of the way through, and lacks the index found in the Tehran volumes.

A pair of kingfishers added for Jahangir (Or.7573, f. 92r)

 
By way of illustrating the content and flavour of ʻUbaydī’s work, here is a small section from the commentary on the famous first ghazal in the Dīvān, which begins with a hemistich in Arabic: Alā yā ayyuhā l-sāqī adir kaʼsan va navilhā / kih ʻishq āsān namūd avval valī uftād mushkilhā (‘Cupbearer, pass a goblet round and fill it up / for love at first seemed easy, but [now] come the problems’)

The beginning of ʻUbaydī's commentary on the Dīvān of Ḥāfiẓ (Or.16039, folio 4v)

Commentary:

Alā: be aware and knowing.  [yā ayyuhā l-sāqī] you who cause everyone to drink [spiritual] wine, [adir kaʼsan] pass around a goblet, [va navilhā] drink and give to drink. It is vital to be aware that certain words - such as sāqī (‘cupbearer’), nāfa (‘musk’), ṭurra (‘tresses’), jaʻd (‘lock of hair’), and so on - which occur in the parlance of the Sufis are to be interpreted according to [one’s own spiritual] standing; one cannot restrict them to a single meaning. As Mawlānā Maḥmūd [Shabistarī, renowned Iranian metaphysician and poet, d. ca. 1320], may God sanctify his spirit, puts it in his Gulshan-i rāz (‘The Flower Garden of Mystic Secrets’):

“The world of inner meanings is boundless.
How could its expressions be thought limited?
How could literal interpretations convey
secrets that spring from mystic tasting (zawq)?”

Sāqī (‘cupbearer’), then, alludes to the spiritual guide (murshid). It also refers the Divine outpouring [of mystical knowledge] and [on a higher level again] to the very Divine Essence (Zāt) Itself. As Jamālī [of Delhi, d. 1535, a much-travelled Sufi sheikh of the Suhravardī order, poet, and companion of the first Mughal emperor Bābur] puts it in Mir’āt al-maʻānī (‘The Mirror of Meanings’):

“Who is the Cupbearer here? The Essential Being Himself,
Who pours wine in the mouths of contingent things.”

It is stated in the Risāla-ʼi Iṣṭilāḥāt (‘Treatise on [Sufi] Terminology’ [the writer does not specify which of these he is citing]) that there are sāqīs of different kinds. The one who bestows wine without any intermediary is the one of whom [God] the Exalted says [in the Qur’ān]: “And their Lord gives them pure [and purifying: ṭahūr] wine to drink.” The wine in question represents love (maḥabbat): and ‘pure wine’ means pure, unalloyed love in which none besides [God Himself] has any share. It is devoid of any impurity in the form of love for aught but God, and it purifies one of base traits of character such as greed, lust, hypocrisy, ostentation, desire for status, and claiming to be astute (kiyāsat). The cupbearers who pour wine as intermediaries are the Prophets; the saints; the greatest religious scholars; and, from among the angels, the cherubim (karūbiyān), the sanctified (rūḥāniyān), and the foremost of those in proximity [to the Divine Presence].

More bird decorations (Or.7573, f.278r)

 
The commentary on the first couplet (bayt) of Hāfiẓ’s famous poem continues over four more pages of the manuscript. The brief excerpt translated illustrates some of the ways in which this controversial poet has been interpreted by authors who espoused the mystical interpretation. Equally interesting, and more intellectually rigorous, are the commentaries on Ḥāfiẓ by Jalāl al-Dīn Davānī (d. 1502), a major philosopher and metaphysician who flourished in Shiraz a few decades after him. Interested readers are referred to Carl Ernst’s article (see below).

Muhammad Isa Waley, Asian and African Studies

Follow us on twitter: @BLAsia_Africa 

Further reading

Ḥāfiẓ, 14th century. Dīvān. (Numerous Persian editions)

— The green sea of heaven: fifty ghazals from the Díwán of Ḥáfiẓ; translated by Elizabeth T. Gray. Ashland, OR: White Cloud Press, 1995

Jamālī, Ḥāmid ibn Fażl Allāh, The Mirror of Meanings = Mirʼāt al-Maʻānī: a Parallel English-Persian Text; edited by Naṣr Allāh Pūrjavādī, translated by A. A. Seyed-Gohrab. Costa Mesa, CA: Mazda Publishers, 2002

Hafiz and the Religion of Love in Classical Persian Poetry, edited by Leonard Lewisohn. London: I.B. Tauris in association with Iran Heritage Foundation, 2010

Shabistarī, Maḥmūd ibn ʻAbd al-Karīm, Garden of Mystery: The Gulshan-i Rāz of Mahmud Shabistari; translated by Robert Darr. Cambridge: Archetype, 2007

Carl Ernst, “Jalāl al-Dīn Davānī’s interpretation of Ḥāfiẓ”, Ḥāfiẓ and the Religion of Love, pp. 197-210

The Barakat Trust has generously awarded the British Library a grant to digitise two of our most treasured Persian manuscripts, Or.6810 and Add.25900, both copies of the Khamsah (‘Five Poems’) by the twelfth century poet Nizami. Both works include paintings by the master-painter of Herat, Bihzad (died 1535/36), who worked at the courts of the Timurid Husayn Bayqara (ruled 1469-1506) and the Safavid Shah Tahmasp (ruled 1524-1576).

Iskandar with the seven sages, dated AH 900 (1495/95), (Or.6810, f. 214r) 

Or.6810 dates from around 1494/95 and was written for Amir ʻAli Farsi Barlas, an amir of the Timurid Sultan Husayn Bayqara. It contains one double page and 20 single miniatures by Bihzad and other artists, and was one of the most precious manuscripts in the Mughal imperial library (see my recent post ‘A jewel in the crown’). It was still in the royal collection at the beginning of the 18th century and was probably taken as loot during the political upheaval which followed Nadir Shah’s conquest and the sack of Delhi in 1739. In December 1782 it was purchased by the collector Richard Johnson working for the East India Company in Lucknow, and was ultimately acquired by the British Museum in 1908.

Iskandar visits the wise man in the cave (Or.6810, f. 273r) 

Add.25900 was copied in 846 (1442) and contains 19 miniatures which were added after it was completed. One is contemporary, dating from 846 (1442), while 14, like those of Or.6810, date from Husayn Bayqara’s reign — f.77v is dated 898 (1492/93). Three of these are ascribed to Bihzad. The final four miniatures are Safavid Tabriz style paintings of around 1535-40. Before being acquired by the British Museum, the manuscript belonged to the Indologist James Robert Ballantyne (1813-1864), Librarian of the India Office Library from 1861 to 1864, who had acquired it in November 1837.

Battle between Iskandar and Dara, ascribed to Bihzad, from the Iskandarnāmah (Add.25900, f.231v)    

When digitised these two manuscripts will be freely available to look on the British Library's digitised manuscripts page: http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts.

Follow us on Twitter to keep in touch with new developments: @BLAsia_Africa. 

Ursula Sims-Williams, Asian and African Studies

Related articles

What were the Mughals favourite books?

Persian manuscripts digitisation project

In the preface to his Zīj-i jadīd-i Muḥammad Shāhī (‘Muhammad Shah's new tables’), which I mentioned in my previous post, Maharaja Jai Singh (1688-1743) explained that the contemporary astronomical tables, based on the Zīj-i Ulugh Beg, the Zīj-i Khāqānī, the explanations written by Mulla Chand in Akbar's reign, and by Mulla Farid in the reign of Shahjahan, were none of them completely accurate. As a result he was commissioned by Muhammad Shah to collect new and more correct data. To achieve this, he wrote, he had astronomical instruments made at Delhi, at first similar to those in Samarkand and subsequently others, larger, which he designed himself. Altogether he built observatories in Delhi, Jaipur, Mathura, Benares, and Ujjain.

Jai Singh’s observatory at Delhi, built in 1724. Pencil drawing from a sketch dated 1826 by a British artist in Delhi (British Library WD 3537)

The observatories in Delhi and Jaipur consist of a number of masonry instruments grouped together in enclosures, usually referred to as Jantar Mantar. These were to some extent inspired by instruments developed in Samarkand by Ulugh Beg (1394-1449), and doubtless Jai Singh hoped to see continued there further work of that kind. By far the most interesting of them is the large sextant enclosed in a chamber in which the sun’s light is admitted through small holes in a brass sheet. At noon the disk of the sun is projected, as in a pinhole camera, onto the scale of the sextant. Since a scale was inscribed on the sextant it was possible not only to examine the disk of the sun, but to determine in this way the true altitude of the sun on any day.

When I was in Jaipur in 1985 I photographed the image of the sun as it was projected on the sextant.

Photo_1

In Photo 1, which shows the largest item there, I have added a label to show two small apertures which allow pinhole images of the sun. The photograph shows a pillar on one side holding up one end of the giant curved sundial; there is another on the opposite side.

Photo_2

Photo 2 is of a model which shows the two apertures clearly; two small dots in the middle of the picture, immediately above the opened doorway.

Photo_3

Photo 3 shows the interior of the large chamber, where one can see the two apertures made in metal plates.

Photo_4

Photo 4 looks in the opposite direction inside the chamber. The large calibrated sextant scale is visible behind the man; there is another on the opposite wall.

Photo_5

Photo 5 shows a close up of the scale. This is not the original calibration, since at some point it was cleaned up by an English engineer.

Photo_6

Photo 6  shows the image of the sun on the scale at noon exactly; the calibration is just visible. This shows how it is possible to get a clear picture of the sun without looking at it directly, which can easily be studied. One can measure the diameter of the disk and fix its altitude over the horizon. This technique goes back to earlier Arabic astronomy, and was of course not original with Jai Singh. I have not myself seen any records of observations made with this instrument except for those made by the Jesuit Father Boudier in Delhi in 1734 (see Mercier, pp. 164-7).

Raymond Mercier, University of Cambridge 

Further reading

R. Mercier, “The astronomical tables of Rajah Jai Singh Sawai”, Indian Journal of History of Science 19 (1984), pp. 143-71

On display in the recent exhibition ‘Mughal India’ was Add.14373, a set of astronomical tables, the Zīj–i jadīd-i Muḥammad Shāhī (‘Muhammad Shah's new tables’), by Maharaja Sawai Jai Singh of Jaipur (1688-1743), which arose largely as a translation of tables by the French astronomer Philippe de La Hire, taken from the 2nd edition of 1727 (see below Tabulae astronomicae). Jai Singh had developed a strong interest in mathematics and astronomy, and was commissioned by Muhammad Shah to collect data based on Islamic, Hindu and European knowledge. After learning what he could from locally available sources he sought the help of the Jesuit missionaries in his effort to get up to date.

Zīj–i jadīd-i Muḥammad Shāhī showing, upper left: table of inclination of Mars, corresponding to the right hand columns of Philippe de La Hire’s table 43, and upper right: second equation of Mars (Add.14373, f159v)  

Table 43 of Philippe de La Hire’s tables (3rd edition, Paris, 1735)

A copy of de La Hire’s work is to be found still in the Library in the Palace in Jaipur and this has bound with it a few pages written in Latin in 1732 by a French visitor of the time, Joseph Dubois. It is clear that Dubois was very much acquainted with Jai Singh’s efforts. During a visit there in 1985 I made a copy of these notes with a translation which I later published (see below “Account...”,  p.157). There we learn that Jai Singh, 

on discovering the Almagest of Father P. [recte G.B.] Riccioli, saw as he had known previously, that there was a great discordance in his native tables, so that I had translated into the language of the Indians the Persian tables ordered by Shahjahan, formerly the Emperor of the whole of East India, which cost 100,000 rupees. Here he found a discordance of up to one degree. As a result a certain Father of the Society of Jesus, of the Portuguese nation, and Rector of the College in Agra of the same Empire, was sent by him (the Ruler) to seek an expert astronomer in Europe. The Father went and returned, and brought with him the tables which I have described, along with other mathematical aids, as a gift from the King of Portugal. A certain young man, educated by the Father in India, and born endowed with great ability, by name Petrus da Silva, also Portuguese, studied astronomy at Riet Clarissima with Father John Baptist Carbone, and came to the Ruler. The Ruler very happily ordered the tables to be transcribed into his script, and orderd all his astronomers to make calculations by them. Now he longs for someone to go to Paris and London to drink of astronomy at the source.

The Father who went to Portugal was the Jesuit Manuel Figueredo, accompanied by Pedro da Silva Leitão, a Portuguese man who had attained a privileged position at the court of Jai Singh.

Portrait of the Portuguese physician and astronomer Pedro da Silva by ʻAqlmand Khān (1920,0917,0.88.2) © Trustees of the British Museum

There are in the Portuguese archives (Arquivo Português Oriental, and Assentos do Conselho do Estado) many references to both Figueredo and da Silva, and we have also a note about the grave in the Christian cemetery in Agra of Pedro da Silva (very likely the same man) showing that he died on 13 November 1791 (List of Inscriptions on Christian Tombs, p. 52).

In the Archives we read that in 1727:

Several days later, in the boats (pallas) from Damão, Father Manuel de Figueredo of the Society of Jesus, missionary to the Court of Agra and Ambassador from the Moghul to the King, arrived at Goa accompanied by two Moor Princes of that Emperor who later came with the Ambassador to Lisbon. The Jesuit Ambassador made his public entrance dressed as a Moghul, and received his first audience in the Royal Hall of the Fortress of Goa, which was conducted by the head or Governor of Goa, and by the Tanadar-mor, showing him all the civil and military honours customary on such occasions, and consigning the letter from the Prince ... (Assentos 5, p. 631)

and:

The Viceroy obtained in 1737 Dec through a Portuguese physician named Pedro da Silva Letão, who assisted the King of Jaipur Rajah Sawai Jaisingh, in his Court,... (Assentos 5, p. 521)

We learn also of others who had come from Lisbon, unnamed, but described in these archives as ‘two mathematician fathers’, who arrived at the court of Jaipur.

While there were many astronomical researches in the earlier Islamic period such scientific activity had slowed down after about the year AD 1000. Important research, however, took place in Maraghah, Damascus and Samarkand in the 13^th, 14^th and 15^th centuries. This constituted a legacy of Islamic work which was transmitted to both East and West. In the Mughal period, for example the work of Ulugh Beg of Samarkand was well-known, and parts of it (mainly the trigonometrical and geographical tables) were included in the Zīj of Jai Singh. The tables of sun, moon and planets, however, were taken over unaltered from de La Hire. By his time European astronomy had undergone quite revolutionary developments at the hands of Copernicus, Galileo, Kepler, Halley, and of course Newton. All of that was entirely unknown not only in Mughal India but in the rest of the Islamic world. The introduction of de La Hire’s tables alone proved to be of little consequence in the development of Mughal astronomy.

Raymond Mercier, University of Cambridge

Further reading

R. Mercier, “The astronomical tables of Rajah Jai Singh Sawai”, Indian Journal of History of Science 19 (1984), pp. 143-71

— “Account by Joseph Dubois of astronomical work under Jai Singh Sawā’ī”, Indian Journal of History of Science 28 (1993), pp. 157-66

Philippe de La Hire,  Tabulae astronomicae... Secunda editio..., Parisiis: Apud Montalant, typographum & bibliopolam ... , 1727

Assentos do Conselho do Estado, Vol. 5 (1696-1750); edited by Panduronga S.S. Pissurlencar. Bastora; Goa, 1957

Arquivo Português Oriental (Nova Ediçâo), Tomo I, Vol. III, Parte V (1737-1739); edited by A.B. de Bragança Pereira. Bastora, India Portuguesa, 1940

List of Inscriptions on Christian Tombs and tablets of historical interest in the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh, E.A.H. Blunt, Allahabad, 1911

Among the most precious and sought after paintings from early modern India are those from the kingdoms of the Deccan.  The Deccan, primarily the upland plateau of peninsular India, was by the time of the Mughals divided into three principal kingdoms, Ahmadnagar, Bijapur and Golconda or Hyderabad (corresponding roughly to the modern states of western Maharashtra, northern Karnataka and northern Andhra Pradesh). The Mughals from the north, in their unremitting ambition to conquer the whole of India, assaulted these independent kingdoms throughout the 17th century. Ahmadnagar was largely incorporated into the Mughal empire by Akbar in 1600, and the remaining two were made to accept Mughal suzerainty by Shah Jahan in 1636. All three were ruled by Shia dynasties and looked to their co-religionists in Iran rather than to the Mughals who were Sunnis. They naturally attracted the ambitions of the strict Sunni Aurangzeb who finally incorporated them directly into the Mughal empire in 1686-87. Much of their distinctive paintings and manuscripts tradition was destroyed in these assaults, rendering what survives even more precious..

Deccani painting is distinguished by glowing and sumptuous colours and a sense of fantasy that remained largely aloof from the Mughal obsession with naturalism in the 17th century. Some of these paintings and manuscripts came into the British Library’s collections very early, including a group of important portraits and a magnificent Prince Hawking from Golconda bought with the Richard Johnson collection by the East India Company for its Library in 1807 that epitomises the sense of romantic fantasy found in Deccani painting.

British Library, A Prince Hawking, Golconda, 1610-20, Johnson Album 67, no. 3

Since it is so distinct, it was not possible to exhibit this material in the Mughal India: Art Culture and Empire exhibition. A rare opportunity has just arisen to acquire an important painting that really enhances the collection.This is an equestrian portrait depicting Ikhlas Khan done in Golconda, 1670-80.

British Library, Ikhlas Khan on horseback, Golconda, 1670-80, Add.Or.5723

Like all Indian miniatures, it is painted in opaque watercolours heightened with gold on paper; and its somewhat damaged condition has led to its earlier being pasted down on card. It has been in a UK private collection since 1931. Both subject and horse are distinctively Deccani, the costume of the former relating to 17th century royal portraits. The rider, clearly of African descent, wears a long white jama (gown), embroidered with flowering sprigs, and a small tight turban of gold brocade. Also of gold brocade are his long patka (waist sash) and dupatta (shawl) wound round his upper body in the Deccani manner. A black belt with gold studs holds the patka in place.  A curved sword or tulvar and a shield are hanging on his left side and a bow with a quiver of arrows on his right. He carries another straight sword (a khandan) slung over his shoulder. The stallions’s wide glinting eye, flaring nostrils, open mouth with lolling tongue, braided mane, tasselled trappings and powerful presence are all captured with great skill. The horse is rearing in the haste and excitement of a typical Indian procession, preceded and followed by attendants carrying standards, royal parasols, and swords as well, as one waving the royal scarf, a sign of royalty. In keeping with the Deccani reluctance to paint naturalistically, the horse and the attendants have no ground to stand on but float around in front of the plain background. Only the row of flowers across the bottom of the page indicates that this procession is happening in some kind of space.

All these accoutrements and the splendour of the gold trappings would appear to reinforce a royal identity for the subject. In spite of this, however, the subject bears no resemblance to any of the Deccani Sultans but a considerable one to the powerful minister Ikhlas Khan of Bijapur. Malik Raihan Habshi, a Habshi or African noble of Abyssinian descent in the service of the Bijapur sultans, was given the title Ikhlas Khan after he contrived the murder of the pro-Mughal minister Khawas Khan in 1635 at the time of Shah Jahan’s advance on the Deccan. He rose to the position of chief minister under Muhammad ‘Adil Shah (reg. 1627-56), so that he held all the reins of power in the Bijapur sultanate. He is known to us from several other paintings, in particular Sultan Muhammad ‘Adil Shah and Ikhlas Khan riding an Elephant, c. 1650. in the collection of Sir Howard Hodgkin, where Ikhlas Khan wears the same belt as here, and The Durbar of Sultan Muhammad ‘Adil Shah in the City Palace Museum, Jaipur, dated 1651. Another rather damaged half-length portrait is also in the Johnson Collection in the British Library showing Ikhlas Khan holding a gold and jewelled staff of office..

British Library, Ikhlas Khan, Bijapur, c. 1650, Johnson Album 26, no. 19

Ikhlas Khan’s depiction in this new painting with the paraphernalia of a ruler would seem to be a reflection of his real power at court. Despite having to submit to Shah Jahan in 1636, Bijapur under his leadership was then free to expand further to the south into Hindu territory in southern Karnataka. His death date does not seem to be recorded.  This portrait does not, however, come from Bijapur but from its neighbour and rival to the east, Golconda or Hyderabad. The last Sultan of Golconda, Abu’l Hasan, had spent much of his life in Bijapur territory before being raised to the Golconda throne in 1672. Thereafter Bijapuri influence can be detected in Golconda painting, which had hitherto largely been under Iranian influence in its painting style. Perhaps the idea of Deccani resistance to Mughal aggression and to the encroaching power of Aurangzeb was the catalyst for the production of this posthumous portrait of a heroic Deccani leader.

Ironically the type of a portrait on a rearing horse had been borrowed from the Mughals, as in the magnificent Aurangzeb on a Rearing Horse currently in the Mughal India exhibition.

British Library, Aurangzeb on a Rearing Horse, Mughal c. 1660-70, Johnson Album 3, no. 4

Africans (Abyssinians or Habshis) from the east coast were known at the various Indian courts since at least the 13th century and several reached high positions as ministers at Delhi and in Bengal. In the 16th century they began to become much more prevalent in the Deccani kingdoms and to assume real power on a regular basis either as generals or ministers. They type is best represented by Malik ‘Ambar, the heroic defender of Ahmadnagar against the aggression of the Mughals in the early 17th century.

J.P. Losty, Curator of Visual Arts (retired)

Further Reading:
Alderman, J.R., “Paintings of Africans in the Deccan” in Robbins and McLeod 2006. 
Robbins, K.X. & McLeod, J., African Elites in India, Mapin, Ahmedabad, 2006
Zebrowski, M., Deccani Painting, Sotheby Publications, University of California Press, London and Los Angeles, 1983

Jesuit missionaries were the first group of Europeans to visit the Mughal court. They initially arrived at the Portuguese colony of Goa in 1542. At the invitation of Akbar (r. 1556-1605), there were altogether three Jesuit missions. The third was headed by Father Jerome Xavier (1549-1617) who arrived in Lahore in 1595 and remained at court until 1615.

Two Jesuit priests dressed in distinctive high blocked black caps and dark robes stand among a crowd bringing gifts to a Mughal prince, possibly Salim. Mughal, 1590–1600 (Johnson Album 8,6)

 

Xavier’s regular reports back to the Provincial in Goa include details of extravagent cultural activities, all aimed at winning converts. In a letter written from Agra on 6 September 1604 (BL Add MS 9854, currently on exhibit in ‘Mughal India’) he writes about affairs in Lahore (see Maclagan, p. 96):

The feasts of Christmas and Easter are kept at Lahor with great solemnity, and the church being so large and beautiful, everything can be well carried out.

Although the Jesuits were unsuccessful in their primary aim to convert Akbar and his son Jahangir to Catholicism, they did achieve some success when, on 5 September 1610, three of Akbar’s grandsons, Tahmuras, Baysunghar and Hushang were baptised (though they reverted to Islam a few years later when relations with the Portuguese deteriorated). On Easter Sunday 1611 they attended Mass, ate Easter eggs with relish and watched entertainments arranged by the Jesuit Fathers. These apparently included the performance of a tight-rope walker and the burning of a figure of Judas, stuffed with fireworks, on the roof of the chapel (see Maclagan, The Jesuits and the Great Mogul, pp. 72-73; 94)

  The concluding chapter, on Christ’s resurrection, and postscript of Jerome Xavier’s Mirʼāt al-Quds (‘Life of Christ’), copied on 8 Ramazan 1027 (29 Aug 1618). Xavier’s translation was made at the request of the Emperor Akbar and was completed at Agra in 1602 with assistance from Mawlavi ʻAbd al-Sattār ibn Qāsim of Lahore (Harley 5455, ff. 214-5)  

Ursula Sims-Williams, Asian and African Studies

Follow us on Twitter @BLAsia_Africa

Further reading:

Gauvin Alexander Bailey, “The Lahore Mirat al-Quds and the Impact of Jesuit Theater on Mughal Painting,” South Asian Studies 13 (1997), pp. 95-108
E. D. Maclagan,  “The Jesuit Missions to the Emperor Akbar”, Journal of the Asiatic Societyof Bengal 65, part 1 (1896), pp. 38-113
E. D. Maclagan, The Jesuits and the Great Mogul. London: Burns, Oates & Washbourne, 1932
Pedro de Moura Carvalho and Wheeler M. Thackston, Mirʼāt al-quds (Mirror of Holiness): a Life of Christ for Emperor Akbar: a Commentary on Father Jerome Xavier's Text and the Miniatures of Cleveland Museum of Art, Acc. no. 2005.145; edited and translated by W. M. Thackston. Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2012

Aurangzeb’s Legal Project: the Fatāwā ‘Ālamgīriyyah

The Fatāwā ‘Ālamgīriyyah is a compendium of Ḥanafi fiqh (Islamic jurisprudence) whose composition was ordered by Emperor Aurangzeb.  Aurangzeb gathered the most prestigious Islamic scholars from the Mughal realms and, according to the historical chronicle, the Ma’ās̲ir-i ‘Alamgīrī, requested that they examine the legal treatises in the imperial library and collect all of the previous rulings of jurists (muftīs) in order to create a standardised reference for judges (qāżīs) throughout the Mughal Empire.  The Fatāwā ‘Ālamgīriyyah took eight years to complete (AH 1078-86/ AD 1667-75), engaged the skills of forty to fifty Islamic legal scholars under the head jurist, Shaykh Niẓām Burhānpūrī, and in its final form occupied over thirty volumes. This self-conscious attempt to update and standardise the norms of Islamic jurisprudence in the Mughal Empire served the practical purpose of creating an authoritative and comprehensive reference for judges, but also supported Aurangzeb’s political discourse of legitimising Mughal rule through championing the shari’a (Islamic law).  Originally composed in Arabic, the Fatāwā was translated into Persian during the Mughal period, and later into Urdu, the language in which it is widely disseminated and read today.  Prior to Ibn ‘Ābidīn’s 19^th-century work on Ḥanafī jurisprudence, the Radd al-Muḥtār ‘alā Durr al-Mukhtār, the Fatāwā ‘Ālamgīriyyah, or as it was known in the Turkish and Arabic-speaking lands of the Ottoman Empire, the Fatāwā Hindiyyah (i.e., the Indian fatwas) was the most comprehensive work in the field.

Beginning of volume 4 of the Fatāwā ‘Ālamgīriyyah: Kitāb al-Shuf‘a (‘the right of pre-emption’). An 18th century copy which belonged formerly to Sir William Jones (RSPA 91, ff 1v-2)

Kitāb al-Shuf‘a (‘The book of the right of pre-emption’)

One volume of this thirty volume work which is currently on display in the exhibition ‘Mughal India’ is the section dealing with shufa‘ or the right of pre-emption. This deals with the sale of property, including land, and specifies who has the right of purchase before other buyers. For instance, the rules of shufa‘ stipulate that the co-owner of a property has the right to purchase the property before an outsider if the other co-owner decides to sell. Another illustration of the type of case dealt with in the Kitāb al-Shufa‘ is the sale of land to neighbouring property owner. If a landowner decides to sell a plot of land, the other landowners who share an adjacent border would have a right to purchase before an outside buyer. Not the most thrilling reading, but vitally important to maintaining law and order among property owners in the vast territories of the Mughal, and later British, empire in the subcontinent.

Sir William Jones: at the intersection of Islamic jurisprudence and colonial administration

This particular copy of the Fatāwā belonged to Sir William Jones (1746-1794), whose name is visible in the illuminated frontispiece pictured in the image above. Sir William Jones was appointed as a judge in the Supreme Court of Bengal in 1783 and is famous for founding the Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal in 1784. Jones had studied Arabic and Persian during his time as an undergraduate at Oxford; unimpressed with the quality of his lectures, he turned to native speakers to teach him. By the time he was appointed judge in the Bengal supreme court, he had already published a number of learned translations from Arabic and Persian (of the Mu‘allaqāt and the history of Nadir Shāh, among other works) as well a study of the Islamic law of inheritance. Jones’ career in many ways embodied the conflicting political currents of the age. On the one hand, he engaged in radical politics - radical for the time, that is, he penned political treatises in favour of universal male suffrage and defended the rights of the Welsh peasantry, as well as voicing support for the American revolution – while on the other hand he played a central role in the colonial administration of India. In addition to Arabic and Persian, he studied Sanskrit once he was in Calcutta and published a translation of the famous play by Kālidāsa, the Abhijñānaśākuntalā (‘The Sign of Shakuntala’), which exercised an enormous impact on the German romantic poets and philosophers of the period. In his capacity as a judge and colonial administrator under William Hastings, he was engaged in a project to codify ‘Indian’ law, an endeavour which echoed Aurangzeb’s original project of imperial legitimation in commissioning the Fatāwa ‘Ālamgīriyyah. As part of this project, he translated the Mānavadharmaśāstra (the Institutes of Hindu law: or, the ordinances of Menu) and wrote a work entitled al-Sirājiyyah, which was a study of Islamic law. The impact of Jones’ translation and linguistic theories was felt acutely throughout the 19^th century, and the roots planted by his scholarship still exercise an influence on many current political and cultural constructions of the past.

Nur Sobers-Khan, Asian and African Studies

Further reading:

M.L. Bhatia, Administrative History of Medieval India: A Study of Muslim Jurisprudence under Aurangzeb. New Delhi: Radha Publications, 1992

S. Moinul Haq, Khafi Khan’s History of ‘Alamgir: Being an English translation of the relevant parts of Muntakhab al-Lubab with notes and an introduction. Karachi: Pakistan Historical Society, 1975

Saqi Mustaʻidd Khan, Maāsir-i-ʿĀlamgiri: A history of the Emperor Aurangzib-ʿĀlamgir (reign 1658-1707 A.D.), translated into English and annotated by Sir Jadunath Sarkar. Calcutta: Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1947

A magnificent 18th century painting in the current exhibition Mughal India: Art, Culture and Empire depicts the celebration of the spring festival of Holi. This Hindu festival typically falls during the month of March and symbolizes fertility and spring harvests. This year, the Holi festival falls on March 27th.

A young nobleman enjoying Holi with his consort
Attributed to the artist Nidhamal, Lucknow, 1760-5
British Library, Add.Or.5700

The Emperor Akbar, one of the greatest rulers of the subcontinent (ruled from 1556-1605) advocated religious tolerance. The peace and well-being of the empire depended on maintaining a balance between the interests of the Hindu majority and those of the Muslim, Christian, Zoroastrian, Jain, Sikh  and other religions. One of Akbar’s greatest political accomplishments was to abolish the poll tax levied on non-Muslims. He also won over the rulers of the Hindu Rajput kingdoms by marrying their daughters into his family. Akbar himself married Princess Manmati; she was the daughter of Raja Bhagwandas of Amber (today Jaipur).

Study of Akbar's head
Attributed to Govardhan, 1600-5
British Library, Add.Or.1039

Akbar and Manmanti's son Jahangir wrote in his memoirs about this religious festival:
‘Their day is Holi, which in their belief is the last day of the year. This day falls in the month of Isfandarmudh, when the sun is in Pisces. On the eve of this day they light fires in all the lanes and streets. When it is daylight they spray powder on each other’s heads and faces for one watch and create an amazing uproar. After that, they wash themselves, put their clothes on, and go to gardens and fields. Since it is an established custom of among the Hindus to burn their dead, the lighting of fires on the last night of the year s a metaphor for burning the old year as though it were a corpse.’ - from the Jahangirnama

Detail from Portrait of Prince Salim (future emperor Jahangir)
Mughal, c. 1620-30
British Library, Add.Or.3854

In our exquisite painting of the celebration of Holi, a young ruler from the Mughal province of Avadh, is featured enjoying a dancing performance on a terrace with his favourite womenfolk, nine of whom sit alongside him. They are sharing several hookahs. Piles of sweetmeats are placed in front of them while attendants behind them bring more. Across the terrace a young woman performs a solo dance to the accompaniment of female voices and male musicians. In the foreground other members of the navab’s entourage enjoy the performance. Two yoginis or female ascetics stand out with their darker skin and pink and green garments. Otherwise everything is coloured red and yellow from the powders (called abira) and liquids that they have all been hurling at each other in the riotous spring festival of Holi. Even the fountains and the lakes have turned red. In the fairytale world of Avadhi painting, all men are young and handsome and all girls young and beautiful. There is little room for the old or not quite so beautiful, so the old duenna beside the women and a grey-haired musician opposite strike a somewhat unexpected note.

Further reading:

Ifran Habib,Akbar and his India, Oxford University Press, Delhi, 1997

Jahangir, Emperor of Hindustan, The Jahangirnama, Memoirs of Jahangir, Emperor of India, trans. and ed. W.M. Thackston, Oxford University Press, New York and Oxford, 1999

Malini Roy 
Visual Arts Curator, British Library