Asian and African studies blog

A particularly enigmatic manuscript in the British Library’s collection is IO [India Office] Islamic 3113A, a sumptuously decorated Qur’an which, according to the detached label that accompanies it, was copied by the Mughal emperor Shah ʻAlam (1643-1712).

The opening pages of the Qurʼan, containing the Sūrat al-Fātiḥah (‘the opening’) and the beginning of the Sūrat al-Baqarah (‘the cow’). The upper panels contain the chapter (sūrah) headings and the lower panels contain Qur’anic verses, on the right: ‘None touch it except the purified’ (Sūrah 59:79) and on the left: ‘It is a revelation from the Lord of the Worlds’ (Sūrah 69:43). (IO Islamic 3113A, ff. 1v-2)

The manuscript consists of 209 folios, each highly decorated with very few repetitions in the design. The beginning of each of the 30 sections (juzʼ) is easily recognisable by its dense illumination whereas the remaining folios are slightly less ornate. The final chapter is followed by a two-line prayer in a different hand, below which is given a date: fī tārīkh sannah 1141 (1728/29). It seems probable that the concluding prayer and the date were added after the manuscript was completed, perhaps by a later owner who might also have done the fairly extensive repairs which have been painted and written over. The paper itself is of an inferior quality.


The Qurʼan is bound in green velvet, worked with silver thread

Accompanying the manuscript is a label claiming that the copyist was Shah ʻAlam, Awrangzeb’s successor who ruled as Bahadur Shah I from 1707 to 1712.

The contemporary historian Mustaʻidd Khan writes in his Maʻāsir-i ʻĀlamgīrī that, while still a boy, prince Muḥammad Muʻaẓẓam Shāh ʻĀlam had acquired a perfect knowledge of the Qurʼan: “He is deeply read in Arabic, and the fluency and elegance of his diction are the wonder of the very Kurán-readers of Arabia.” It would be tempting to link this Qurʼan with him, but in the absence of supporting evidence it can only remain a suggestion. Another puzzling fact is that at the end of the manuscript the date 1141 (1728-29) had been added in a different hand. However Shāh ʻĀlam I (Bahādur Shāh) had died by then and Shāh ʻĀlam II  would have been less than a year old! How the manuscript was acquired by the India Office Library and the identity of the previous owner seem, unfortunately, to be unrecorded.

Below are some examples demonstrating the individual character of the illumination. I hope that by making this Qur’an more generally known readers may be able to let us know of any parallel examples.

The Qur’ān is divided into 30 sections to facilitate a monthly reading schedule. In this manuscript the beginning of each section is easily recognised by the densely decorated margins. The line of gold marks the beginning of section 12 (IO Islamic 3113A, ff 77v-8)

The beginning of Sūrah 51, Sūrat al-Dhāriyāt (‘scatterers’) (IO Islamic 3113A, ff 178v-179)

Ursula Sims-Williams, Asian and African Studies

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Saturday 9 March 2013, 10.00 – 17.00

Conference Centre, British Library

£25/ £15 concessions

Book now

Legendary patrons of the arts and science, the Mughal emperors are remembered through their rich cultural heritage including exquisite paintings and manuscripts, jeweled ornaments and architectural landmarks such as the Taj Mahal and the Red Fort in Delhi.

This study day features presentations and discussions by noted scholars and art historians.  Entry to the exhibition is included in the price.

(There will be the option to exchange your ticket to view the exhibition on an alternative date.)

Chaired by
Dr. Malini Roy (Visual Arts Curator, British Library) and
Ursula Sims-Williams (Lead Curator, Persian Languages, British Library)

10.00 - 10.30    Registration

10.30 - 10.40    Introduction

10.40 - 11.20    The Wooden Audience Hall of Shah Jahan:
                        A Reconstruction from Texts, Images and Real Architecture
                        Professor Ebba Koch
                        (Institute of Art History, University of Vienna)

11.20 - 12.00    A Re-interpretation of the Dara Shikoh Album
                        J.P. Losty (British Library, Retired)

12.00 - 12.40    Flowers in Mughal Art
                        Susan Stronge (Victoria and Albert Museum)

12.40 - 13.00    Discussion

13.00 - 14.00    Lunch Break

14.00 - 14.40    Reading the History of Yogis through Mughal Painting
                        Dr James Mallinson (Independent Scholar)

14.40 - 15.20    Mughal Literature: Private and Public, Sacred and Profane
                        Professor Sunil Sharma (Boston University)

15.20 - 16.00    Discussion

16.00 - 17.00    Visit Mughal India: Art, Culture and Empire (optional)

Tea and coffee will be served during registration.

Portrait of Nadira Banu Begum, attributed to Balchand, 1631-2
From the Dara Shikoh Album, British Library, Add.Or.3129, folio 20

One of the most exciting discoveries made while researching exhibits to be included in Mughal India was an autograph copy of the Mughal Princess Jahanara’s Muʼnis al-arvāḥ (‘The Confidant of Spirits’), a biography of the famous Sufi saint Muʻin al-Din Chishti.

Portrait of a young lady, recentlyidentified as Jahanara and attributed to the painter Lalchand c. 1631-3 (Losty and Roy, p. 132). One of two portraits of the same lady occurring in an album presented in 1051 (1641/42) by Prince Dara Shikoh to his wife Nadira Banu Begum (Add.Or.3129, f. 25v). Images online

Jahanara Begum (1614-81) was the eldest daughter of the emperor Shah Jahan (r. 1628-58). Like her brother Dara Shikoh, the heir to the throne, she was profoundly spiritual, and they were initiated together into the Qadiriya order of Sufiism. At the same time Jahanara was an influential political figure, receiving the title Sahibat al-Zaman (‘Mistress of the Age’) after her mother Mumtaz Mahal’s death in 1631. In 1644 she was given the port of Surat, and she also owned her own ship, the Sahibi, which transported cargo and pilgrims between Surat and Mecca. Revenues from maritime trade made her extremely wealthy. Jahanara paid for the construction of the famous Jamiʻ Masjid in Agra, completed in 1648, and also commissioned a huge mosque and religious complex dedicated to her spiritual teacher Mulla Shah in Srinagar in 1650.

The Jamiʻ Masjid, Agra, built for Jahanara and completed in 1648. Photographed by W. Caney in the 1880s for the Archaeological Survey of India (Photo 1003/(512)

 
   Throughout her life she remained devoted to her father and cared for him after his imprisonment in 1658 until his death eight years later. However she was also the subject of scurrilous rumours, no doubt arising from jealousy. The French physician François Bernier, who was employed at court for several years from 1659, describes how Shah Jahan, realising that a suitor was hiding in Jahanara’s bath-tub, ordered the cauldron to be lit underneath and only left the room when he was sure the victim was dead. On another occasion he is reputed to have poisoned Jahanara’s steward who had been suggested as a potential husband.

Colophon of Muʼnis al-arvāḥ copied by Jahanara who signs herself “Jahanara, a speck of dust at the feet of the sages of Chisht” (Or. 5637, ff. 122-23)

Jahanara’s writings include two Sufi works: the Ṣāḥibīyah, a biography of her teacher Mulla Shah (d. 1661— a possible autograph of Mulla Shah's is also included in the exhibition) and this work, primarily about Muʻin al-Din Chishti (1135–1229) who introduced the Chishti order of Sufism into India. Called the Mu’nis al-arvāḥ (a play on the title of one of Muʻin al-Din Chishti’s own works, the Anīs al-arvāḥ), she completed it on 27 Ram. 1049 (21 Jan 1640). She compiled it from a number of sources (including her brother Dara Shikoh’s own treatise Safīnat al-awliyā), proudly boasting a knowledge superior to her father’s:

It should be known to everyone that the guiding master Khvaja Mu‘inuddin Muhammad [Chishti] (may almighty God protect his secret) was a sayyid, and without doubt was among the offspring of the prophet. There is no disputing this. When the ruler of the age… Shah Jahan (may God preserve his realm), my glorious father, did not have information about the origins of the guiding master, he investigated the matter. I told him repeatedly that the master was a sayyid but he did not believe me until one day he was reading the Akbarnama and his auspicious eyes fell on the part of the where Shaikh Abu al-Fazl describes briefly the reality of the guiding master being a sayyid. From that day on this fact that was clearer than the sun was revealed to the king, shadow of God.

(Mu’nis al-arvāḥ, unpublished translation courtesy of Sunil Sharma)

The suggestion that this manuscript might have been copied by Jahanara herself was first mentioned by William Irvine in a footnote on p. 423 of the 4th volume of his translation of  N. Manucci’s Storia do Mogor (London: Murray, 1907-8), where he writes “I have since given to the British Museum what I believe to be a holograph exemplar.” I read this quite by chance and immediately tried to locate the volume which was only summarily listed in G.M. Meredith-Owens Handlist of Persian manuscripts 1895-1966 (London: British Museum, 1968). Besides the colophon saying that it was copied by Jahanara, this copy ends differently from others (The British Library has two: Or.250 and Add.16733). Comparison with known examples of Jahanara’s handwriting also suggested that it was in fact genuine. 

Ursula Sims-Williams, Asian and African Studies


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Further reading

A. Bokhari, “Imperial Transgressions and Spiritual Investitures: A Begam’s ‘Ascension’ in Seventeenth Century Mughal India”, Journal of Persianate Studies 4 (2011), pp. 86-108
F. Bernier,  Travels in the Mogul Empire, A.D. 1656-1668; translated and annotated by A. Constable. 2nd revised. ed. by V.A. Smith. Oxford: OUP, 1916
J.P. Losty and M. Roy, Mughal India: Art, Culture and Empire. London: British Library, 2012

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Abū’l-Fażl ʻAllāmī (1551-1602)

A recurring figure throughout the exhibition ‘Mughal India’ is Akbar’s influential administrator and adviser, the court historian Abū’l-Fażl.

Abū’l-Fażl ʻAllāmī was the second son of Shaykh Mubārak (1505-1593), a distinguished teacher and scholar who had migrated to Agra in 1543 from Nagaur in Rajastan. His older brother was the court poet Fayżī about whom we’ll be writing in future postings.

A precocious child, Abū’l-Fażl was already by the age of 15 familiar with traditional Islamic philosophy and science. However, not content with this, he actively sought the company of those of other faiths:

Sometimes a sympathy with the padres of Portugal pulled at my skirt. Sometimes a conference with the mubids of Persia, and sometimes a knowledge of the secrets of the Zendavesta [the Zoroastrian sacred scriptures] robbed me of repose, for my soul was alienated from the society both of the sobered and the (spiritually) drunken of my own land.

Abū’l-Fażl ʻAllāmī, Akbarnāmah, vol 3: tr. H. Beveridge. Reprint: Calcutta, 1939, p. 117

At 20 Abū’l-Fażl was contemplating a total withdrawal from society, but instead entered imperial service in 1574. His broad-minded and humanitarian views greatly influenced Akbar’s policies but were strongly opposed by the religious establishment. He took part in Akbar’s religious debates and helped to draft the famous decree (maḥżar) of 1579 which gave Akbar as emperor the right to decide any religious question on which qualified legal interpreters (mujtahidīn) were not in agreement. His prominence, however, led to rivalries and jealousies, and in 1602 Abū’l-Fażl was assassinated at the request of Akbar’s son Salīm (later to become the Emperor Jahāngīr). 

150 years later, Shāh Navāz Khān (1700-1757) wrote in his biographical dictionary, the Maʻāsir al-umarāʼ, that while many had accused Abū’l-Fażl of being an infidel, whether a Hindu, a fire-worshipper, or an atheist, neverthless there were those who regarded him as a follower of ‘Universal Peace’ and a free-thinker who accepted all religions. His works remained extremely popular and were frequently copied right up until the advent of printing. The manuscript illustrated below is a good example.

This painting from a 19th century copy of the Akbarnāmah shows Abū’l-Fażl, in the presence of Akbar, drafting the order (farmān) which established a new ‘Divine Era’. This solar calendar dated from 1556, the beginning of Akbar’s reign, and used the traditional pre-Islamic (Zoroastrian) Persian day and month names. It also introduced 14 festivals corresponding to the Zoroastrian feasts (Add.26203, ff 162v-163)

The Akbarnāmah and Āʼīn-i Akbarī

Abū’l-Fażl is best known for his monumental history the Akbarnāmah which Akbar commissioned in 1589 as an official history of his reign. The first two volumes covered Akbar’s predecessors and birth, followed by the events of his reign up to the the end of the 46th regnal year (1601/1602). A third volume, the Ā’īn-i Akbarī  ‘Regulations of Akbar’, is usually treated as a separate work. It provided an encyclopedic geographical, historical and statistical account of the empire. It was the first work of its kind, based on private memoirs, imperial archives, and sources in many different languages. Although excessively flattering in style, it remained an invaluable reference source until replaced by the gazetteers of the 19th century.

This 18th century copy of the Āʼīn-i Akbarī illustrates one of Akbar’s inventions: a special wheel to be turned by a cow, which cleaned 16 matchlock barrels in quick succession (Add.5645, ff. 60v-61)

Other works by Abū’l-Fażl

An early work which has not survived was Abū’l-Fażl’s commentary on the Āyat al-Kursī  ‘Throne Verse’ (Qurʼān, Surah 2, verse 255). He completed it in 985 (1575/76) and presented it to Akbar apparently with much approval. Another of his works was the ʻIyār-i dānish ‘Criterion of Knowledge’, a ‘simplified’ version in Persian of the popular Arabic stories Kalīlah wa Dimnah (originally derived from the Sanskrit Panchatantra). Although several Persian translations existed already, they were, as Abu'l-Fażl wrote, "full of rhetorical difficulties" and  abounding in "rare metaphors and difficult words" (Āʼīn-i Akbarī, book 1, Ā'īn 34).

The story of ‘The monkey and the turtle’ tells of a cross-species friendship which ends in betrayal as a result of the plotting of the turtle’s jealous wife. The moral is that women are not to be heeded, in case they ruin a good friendship between men. Leaf from the ʻIyār-i dānish dating from c. 1600 (Johnson Album 54, 36)

Abū’l-Fażl also wrote prefaces for other royal commissions: a Persian translation of the Sanskrit epic the Mahābhārata, and the Tārīkh-i Alfī  ‘History of the Millennium’. Examples of both these works are included in the exhibition. Several posthumous collections of his letters have also survived: the Mukātabāt-i ʻAllāmī and the Ruqaʻāt-i Abū'l-Fażl.

Ursula Sims-Williams, Asian and African Studies

Follow us on Twitter @BLAsia_Africa

Further reading

Abū’l-Fażl ʻAllāmī, The Akbarnama; translated by H. Beveridge. 3v. Calcutta: Asiatic Society, 1898-1939.

— The Ain i Akbari; translated by H. Blochmann and H. S. Jarrett. 3v. Calcutta: Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1873-1894.

ʻAbd al-Qādir Badāʾūnī, Muntakhabu-t-tawārīkh; translated by G. Ranking, W. H. Lowe and W Haig. 3 v. Calcutta: Baptist Mission Press, 1898-1925.

All these three translations can be read online at: http://persian.packhum.org/persian/main

Mughal India: Art, Culture and Empire
British Library (till 2 April 2013)

The current exhibition at the British Library explores one of the most powerful and splendid of all the world's great dynasties with Mughal India: Art, Culture and Empire. The 'Great Mogul' seated on a jewel-encrusted throne is one of the most enduring images of India. But apart from this almost mythical ruler, the Mughal dynasty produced a great number of rulers of outstanding ability in statecraft and culture, whether in empire building or patrons of art and architecture.

This exhibition is the first to document the entire period, from the 16th to the 19th century, through more than 200 exquisite manuscripts and the finest paintings drawn almost exclusively from the British Library's extensive heritage collection.