The Bābur-nāma in English (Memoirs of Bābur)
f. 170; Muḥ. _Shīrāzī_'s lith. ed. p. 133). Erskine (p. 228),
as his Persian source dictates, makes the men sink into the
soft ground; de Courteille varies much (ii, 21).
[1298] Ar. _akhmail_, so translated under the known presence
of trees; it may also imply soft ground (Lane p. 813 col. b)
but soft ground does not suit the purpose of _arīqs_
(channels), the carrying on of water to the town.
[1299] The S.A.W. map is useful here.
[1300] That he had a following may be inferred.
[1301] Ḥai. MS. _qāchār_; Ilminsky, p. 268; and both Pers.
trss. _rukhsār_ or _rukhsāra_ (f. 25 and note to _qāchār_).
[1302] So in the Turkī MSS. and the first Pers. trs. (215 f.
170_b_). The second Pers. trs. (217 f. 145_b_) has a gloss of
_ātqū u tika_; this consequently Erskine follows (p. 229) and
adds a note explaining the punishment. Ilminsky has the gloss
also (p. 269), thus indicating Persian and English influence.
[1303] No MS. gives the missing name.
[1304] The later favour mentioned was due to Saṃbhal's
laborious release of his master from Aūzbeg captivity in 917
AH. (1511 AD.) of which Erskine quotes a full account from the
_Tārīkh-i-sind_ (History of India i, 345).
[1305] Presumably he went by Sabzār, Daulatābād, and Washīr.
[1306] f. 202 and note to _Chaghatāī_.
[1307] This will be for the Nīngnahār _tūmān_ of Lamghān.
[1308] He was thus dangerously raised in his father's place of
rule.
[1309] ff. 10_b_, 11_b_. Ḥaidar M. writes, "Shāh Begīm laid
claim to Badakhshān, saying, "It has been our hereditary
kingdom for 3000 years; though I, being a woman, cannot myself
attain sovereignty, yet my grandson Mīrzā Khān can hold it"
(T. R. p. 203).
[1310] _tībrādīlār._ The agitation of mind connoted, with
movement, by this verb may well have been, here, doubt of
Bābur's power to protect.
[1311] _tūshlūq tūshdīn tāghghā yūrūkāīlār._ Cf. 205_b_ for
the same phrase, with supposedly different meaning.
[1312] _qāngshār_ lit. ridge of the nose.
[1313] _bīr aūq ham qūīā-ālmādīlār_ (f. 203_b_ note to
_chāpqūn_).
[1314] This will have been news both of Shaibāq Khān and of
Mīrzā Khān. The Pers. trss. vary here (215 f. 173 and 217 f.
148).
[1315] Index _s.n._
[1316] Māh-chūchūk can hardly have been married against her
will to Qāsim. Her mother regarded the alliance as a family
indignity; appealed to Shāh Beg and compassed a rescue from
Kābul while Bābur and Qāsim were north of the Oxus [_circa_
916 AH.]. Māh-chūchūk quitted Kābul after much hesitation, due
partly to reluctance to leave her husband and her infant of 18
months, [Nāhīd Begīm,] partly to dread less family honour
might require her death (Erskine's _History_, i, 348 and
Gul-badan's _Humāyūn-nāma_).
[1317] Erskine gives the fort the alternative name "Kaliūn",
locates it in the Bādghīs district east of Herī, and quotes
from Abū'l-ghāzī in describing its strong position (_History_
i, 282). Ḥ.S. Tīrah-tū.
[1318] f. 133 and note. Abū'l-faẓl mentions that the
inscription was to be seen in his time.
[1319] This fief ranks in value next to the Kābul _tūmān_.
[1320] Various gleanings suggest motives for Bābur's assertion
of supremacy at this particular time. He was the only Tīmūrid
ruler and man of achievement; he filled Ḥusain _Bāī-qarā_'s
place of Tīmūrid headship; his actions through a long period
show that he aimed at filling Tīmūr Beg's. There were those
who did not admit his suzerainty,—Tīmūrids who had rebelled,
Mughūls who had helped them, and who would also have helped
Sa`īd Khān _Chaghatāī_, if he had not refused to be
treacherous to a benefactor; there were also the Arghūns,
Chīngīz-khānids of high pretensions. In old times the Mughūl
Khāqāns were _pādshāh_ (supreme); Pādshāh is recorded in
history as the style of at least Sātūq-būghra Khān Pādshāh
Ghāzī; no Tīmūrid had been lifted by his style above all
Mīrzās. When however Tīmūrids had the upper hand, Bābur's
Tīmūrid grandfather Abū-sa`īd asserted his _de facto_
supremacy over Bābur's Chaghatāī grandfather Yūnas (T. R. p.
83). For Bābur to re-assert that supremacy by assuming the
Khāqān's style was highly opportune at this moment. To be
Bābur Supreme was to declare over-lordship above Chaghatāī and
Mughūl, as well as over all Mīrzās. It was done when his sky
had cleared; Mīrzā Khān's rebellion was scotched; the Arghūns
were defeated; he was the stronger for their lost possessions;
his Aūzbeg foe had removed to a less ominous distance; and
Kābul was once more his own.
Gul-badan writes as if the birth of his first-born son Humāyūn
were a part of the uplift in her father's style, but his
narrative does not support her in this, since the order of
events forbids.
[1321] The "Khān" in Humāyūn's title may be drawn from his
mother's family, since it does not come from Bābur. To whose
family Māhīm belonged we have not been able to discover. It is
one of the remarkable omissions of Bābur, Gul-badan and
Abū'l-faẓl that they do not give her father's name. The topic
of her family is discussed in my Biographical Appendix to
Gul-badan's _Humāyūn-nāma_ and will be taken up again, here,
in a final Appendix on Bābur's family.
[1322] Elph. MS. f. 172_b_; W.-i-B. I.O. 215 f. 174_b_ and 217
f. 148_b_; Mems. p. 234.
[1323] on the head-waters of the Tarnak (R.'s _Notes_ App. p.
34).
[1324] Bābur has made no direct mention of his half-brother's
death (f. 208 and n. to Mīrzā).
[1325] This may be Darwesh-i-`alī of f. 210; the Sayyid in his
title may merely mean chief, since he was a Mughūl.
[1326] Several of these mutineers had fought for Bābur at
Qandahār.
[1327] It may be useful to recapitulate this Mīrzā's
position:—In the previous year he had been left in charge of
Kābul when Bābur went eastward in dread of Shaibānī, and, so
left, occupied his hereditary place. He cannot have hoped to
hold Kābul if the Aūzbeg attacked it; for its safety and his
own he may have relied, and Bābur also in appointing him, upon
influence his Arghūn connections could use. For these, one was
Muqim his brother-in-law, had accepted Shaibānī's suzerainty
after being defeated in Qandahār by Bābur. It suited them
better no doubt to have the younger Mīrzā rather than Bābur in
Kābul; the latter's return thither will have disappointed them
and the Mīrzā; they, as will be instanced later, stood ready
to invade his lands when he moved East; they seem likely to
have promoted the present Mughūl uprising. In the battle which
put this down, the Mīrzā was captured; Bābur pardoned him; but
he having rebelled again, was then put to death.
[1328] Bāgh-i-yūrūnchqā may be an equivalent of Bāgh-i-safar,
and the place be one of waiting "up to" (_ūnchqā_) the journey
(_yūr_). _Yūrūnchqā_ also means _clover_ (De Courteille).
[1329] He seems to have been a brother or uncle of Humāyūn's
mother Māhīm (Index; A. N. trs. i, 492 and note).
[1330] In all MSS. the text breaks off abruptly here, as it
does on f. 118_b_ as though through loss of pages, and a blank
of narrative follows. Before the later gap of f. 251_b_
however the last sentence is complete.
[1331] Index _s. n. Bābur-nāma_, date of composition and gaps.
[1332] _ibid._
[1333] Jumāda I, 14th 968 AH.-Jan. 31st 1561 AD. Concerning
the book _see_ Elliot and Dowson's _History of India_ vi, 572
and JRAS 1901 p. 76, H. Beveridge's art. _On Persian MSS. in
Indian Libraries_.
[1334] The T. R. gives the names of two only of the champions
but Firishta, writing much later gives all five; we surmise
that he found his five in the book of which copies are not now
known, the _Tārīkh-i Muḥ. `Ārif Qandahārī_. Firishta's five
are `Ali _shab-kūr_ (night-blind), `Alī _Sīstānī_, Naẕar
Bahādur _Aūzbeg_, Ya`qūb _tez-jang_ (swift in fight), and
Aūzbeg Bahādur. Ḥaidar's two names vary in the MSS. of the T.
R. but represent the first two of Firishta's list.
[1335] There are curious differences of statement about the
date of Shaibānī's death, possibly through confusion between
this and the day on which preliminary fighting began near
Merv. Ḥaidar's way of expressing the date carries weight by
its precision, he giving _roz-i-shakk_ of Ramẓān, _i.e._ a day
of which there was doubt whether it was the last of Sha`bān or
the first of Ramẓān (Lane, _yauma'u'l-shakk_). As the sources
support Friday for the day of the week and on a Friday in the
year 915 AH. fell the 29th of Sha`bān, the date of Shaibānī's
death seems to be Friday Sha`bān 29th 915 AH. (Friday December
2nd 1510 AD.).
[1336] If my reading be correct of the Turkī passage
concerning wines drunk by Bābur which I have noted on f. 49
(_in loco_ p. 83 n. 1), it was during this occupation of Kābul
that Bābur first broke the Law against stimulants.
[1337] Mr. R. S. Poole found a coin which he took to be one
struck in obedience to Bābur's compact with the Shāh (B.M.Cat.
of the coins of Persian Shāhs 1887, pp. xxiv _et seq._; T.R.
p. 246 n.).
[1338] It was held by Aḥmad-i-qāsim _Kohbur_ and is referred
to on f. 234_b_, as one occasion of those in which Dost Beg
distinguished himself.
[1339] Schuyler's _Turkistān_ has a good account and picture
of the mosque. `Ubaid's vow is referred to in my earlier
mention of the _Sūlūku'l-mulūk_. It may be noted here that
this MS. supports the spelling _Bābur_ by making the second
syllable rhyme to _pūr_, as against the form _Bābar_.
[1340] _aūrūq._ Bābur refers to this exodus on f. 12_b_ when
writing of Daulat-sulṯān Khānīm.
[1341] It is one recorded with some variation, in Niyāz
Muḥammad _Khukandī's Tārīkh-i-shāhrukhī_ (Kazan, 1885) and
Nalivkine's _Khānate of Khokand_ (p. 63). It says that when
Bābur in 918 AH. (1512 AD.) left Samarkand after defeat by the
Aūzbegs, one of his wives, Sayyida Āfāq who accompanied him in
his flight, gave birth to a son in the desert which lies
between Khujand and Kand-i-badām; that Bābur, not daring to
tarry and the infant being too young to make the impending
journey, left it under some bushes with his own girdle round
it in which were things of price; that the child was found by
local people and in allusion to the valuables amongst which it
lay, called Altūn bīshik (golden cradle); that it received
other names and was best known in later life as Kḥudāyān
Sulṯān. He is said to have spent most of his life in Akhsī; to
have had a son Tīngrī-yār; and to have died in 952 AH. (1545
AD.). His grandson Yār-i-muḥammad is said to have gone to
India to relations who was descendants of Bābur (JASB 1905 p.
137 H. Beveridge's art. _The Emperor Bābur_). What is against
the truth of this tradition is that Gul-badan mentions no such
wife as Sayyida Āfāq. Māhīm however seems to have belonged to
a religious family, might therefore be styled Sayyida, and, as
Bābur mentions (f. 220), had several children who did not live
(a child left as this infant was, might if not heard of, be
supposed dead). There is this opening allowed for considering
the tradition.
[1342] Bābur refers to this on f. 265.
[1343] The _Lubbu't-tawārīkh_ would fix Ramẓān 7th.
[1344] Mr. Erskine's quotation of the Persian original of the
couplet differs from that which I have translated (_History of
India_ ii, 326; _Tārīkh-i-badāyūnī_ Bib. Ind. ed. f. 444).