The Bābur-nāma in English (Memoirs of Bābur)
[2145] _aūstī_; perhaps the reservoir was so built as to
contain the bubbling spring.
[2146] _Chūn jā'ī khẉush karda ām._
[2147] f. 315.
[2148] var. Janwār (Jarrett). It is 25 m. east of Āgra on the
Muttra-Etāwa road (_G. of I._).
[2149] _kūcha-band_, perhaps a barricade at the limit of a
suburban lane.
[2150] This has been mentioned already (f. 327).
[2151] f. 315.
[2152] _i.e._ those professedly held for Bābur.
[2153] Or, according to local pronunciation, Badāyūn.
[2154] This is the old name of Shāhābād in Rāmpūr (_G. of I._
xxii, 197). The _A.-i-A._ locates it in Saṃbal. Cf. E. and
D.'s _History of India_, iv, 384 n. and v. 215 n.
[2155] Perhaps the one in Sītapūr.
[2156] f. 305_b_.
[2157] As the Elphinstone Codex which is the treasure-house of
Humāyūn's notes, has a long _lacuna_ into which this episode
falls, it is not known if the culprit entered in his copy of
the _Bābur-nāma_ a marginal excuse for his misconduct (cf. f.
252 and n.); such excuse was likely to be that he knew he
would be forgiven by his clement father.
[2158] f. 305_b_.
[2159] Kāmrān would be in Qandahār. Erskine notes that the sum
sent to him would be about £750, but that if the coins were
rūpīs, it would be £30,000.
[2160] _qiṯa`_, for account of which form of poem _see_
Blochmann's translations of Saifī's and Jāmī's _Prosody_, p.
86.
[2161] _Rāmpūr Dīwān_ (E. D. Ross' ed. p. 16 and Plate 14_a_).
I am uncertain as to the meaning of ll. 4 and 10. I am not
sure that what in most MSS. ends line 4, _viz._ _aūl dam_,
should not be read as _aūlūm_, death; this is allowed by Plate
14a where for space the word is divided and may be _aūlūm_. To
read _aūlūm_ and that the deserters fled from the death in
Hind they were anxious about, has an answering phrase in "we
still are alive". Ll. 9 and 10 perhaps mean that in the things
named all have done alike. [Ilminsky reads _khāir nafsī_ for
the elsewhere _ḥaz̤z̤-nafsī_.]
[2162] These are 20 attitudes (_rak`ah_) assumed in prayer
during Ramẓān after the Bed-time Prayer. The ablution
(_ghusl_) is the bathing of the whole body for ceremonial
purification.
[2163] This Feast is the `Id-i-fiṯṛ, held at the breaking of
the Ramẓān Fast on the 1st of Shawwāl.
[2164] Erskine notes that this is the earliest mention of
playing-cards he can recall in oriental literature.
[2165] f. 339_b_.
[2166] The two varieties mentioned by Bābur seem to be
_Diospyrus melanoxylon_, the wood of which is called _tindu
abnūs_ in Hindūstānī, and _D. tomentosa_, Hindi, _tindu_
(Brandis _s.nn._). Bārī is 19 m. west of Dūlpūr.
[2167] _mī`ād_, perhaps the time at which the Shaikh was to
appear before Bābur.
[2168] The Pers. trs. makes the more definite statement that
what had to be read was a Section of the Qoran (_wird_). This
was done with remedial aim for the illness.
[2169] As this statement needs comment, and as it is linked to
matters mentioned in the _Rāmpūr Dīwān_, it seems better to
remit remarks upon it to Appendix Q, _Some matters concerning
the Rāmpūr Dīwān_.
[2170] _risāla._ _See_ Appendix Q.
[2171] Elph. MS. _lacuna_; I.O. 215 _lacuna_ and 217 f. 229;
Mems. p. 373. This year's narrative resumes the diary form.
[2172] There is some uncertainty about these names and also as
to which adversary crossed the river. The sentence which, I
think, shews, by its plural verb, that Humāyūn left two men
and, by its co-ordinate participles, that it was they crossed
the river, is as follows:—(Darwīsh and Yūsuf, understood)
_Quṯb Sīrwānī-nī u bīr pāra rājalār-nī bīr daryā aūtūb
aūrūshūb yakshī bāsīb tūrlār_. _Aūtūb_, _aūrūshūb_ and _bāsīb_
are grammatically referable to the same subject, [whatever was
the fact about the crossing].
[2173] _bīr daryā_; W.-i-B. 217 f. 229, _yak daryā_, one
river, but many MSS. _har daryā_, every river. If it did not
seem pretty certain that the rebels were not in the
Miyān-dū-āb one would surmise the river to be "one river" of
the two enclosing the tract "between the waters", and that one
to be the Ganges. It may be one near Saṃbhal, east of the
Ganges.
[2174] var. Shīrwānī. The place giving the cognomen may be
Sarwān, a _thakurāt_ of the Mālwā Agency (_G. of I._). Quṯb of
Sīrwān may be the Quṯb Khān of earlier mention without the
cognomen.
[2175] n.w. of Aligarh (Kūl). It may be noted here, where
instances begin to be frequent, that my translation "we
marched" is an evasion of the Turkī impersonal "it was
marched". Most rarely does Bābur write "we marched", never, "I
marched."
[2176] in the Aligarh (Kūl) district; it is the Sikandara Rao
of the _A.-i-A._ and the _G. of I._
[2177] _Rāmpūr Dīwān_ (E. D. Ross' ed., p. 19, Plate 16_b_).
This _Dīwān_ contains other quatrains which, judging from
their contents, may well be those Bābur speaks of as also
composed in Saṃbal. _See_ Appendix Q, _Some matters concerning
the Rāmpūr Dīwān_.
[2178] These are aunts of Bābur, daughters of Sl. Abū-sa`īd
_Mīrān-shāhī_.
[2179] Sikandarābād is in the Buland-shahr district of the
United Provinces.
[2180] It is not clear whether Bābur returned from Sīkrī on
the day he started for Jalīsīr; no question of distance would
prevent him from making the two journeys on the Monday.
[2181] As this was the rendezvous for the army, it would be
convenient if it lay between Āgra and Anwār; as it was 6 m.
from Āgra, the only mapped place having approximately the name
Jalīsīr, _viz._ Jalesar, in Etah, seems too far away.
[2182] Anwār would be suitably the Unwāra of the _Indian
Atlas_, which is on the first important southward dip of the
Jumna below Āgra. Chandwār is 25 m. east of Āgra, on the
Muttra-Etāwah road (_G. of I._); Jarrett notes that
Tiefenthaler identifies it with Fīrūzābād (_A.-i-A._ ii, 183
n.).
[2183] In the district of Kālpī. The name does not appear in
maps I have seen.
[2184] _āghā_, Anglicé, uncle. He was Sa`īd Khān of Kāshghar.
Ḥaidar M. says Bābā Sl. was a spoiled child and died without
mending his ways.
[2185] From Kālpī Bābur will have taken the road to the s.w.
near which now runs the Cawnpur (Kānhpūr) branch of the Indian
Midland Railway, and he must have crossed the Betwa to reach
Īrij (Irich, _Indian Atlas_, Sheet 69 N.W.).
[2186] Leaving Īrij, Bābur will have recrossed the Betwa and
have left its valley to go west to Bāndīr (Bhander) on the
Pahūj (_Indian Atlas_, Sheet 69 S.W.).
[2187] beneficent, or Muḥassan, comely.
[2188] The one man of this name mentioned in the _B.N._ is an
amīr of Sl. Ḥusain _Bāī-qarā_.
[2189] It seems safe to take Kachwa [Kajwa] as the Kajwarra of
Ibn Batūta, and the Kadwāha (Kadwaia) of the _Indian Atlas_,
Sheet 52 N.E. and of Luard's _Gazetteer_ _of Gwalior_ (i,
247), which is situated in 24° 58' N. and 77° 57' E. Each of
the three names is of a place standing on a lake; Ibn Batūta's
lake was a league (4 m.) long, Bābur's about 11 miles round;
Luard mentions no lake, but the _Indian Atlas_ marks one quite
close to Kadwāha of such form as to seem to have a tongue of
land jutting into it from the north-west, and thus suiting
Bābur's description of the site of Kachwa. Again,—Ibn Batūta
writes of Kajwarra as having, round its lake, idol-temples;
Luard says of Kadwāha that it has four idol-temples standing
and nine in ruins; there may be hinted something special about
Bābur's Kachwa by his remark that he encouraged its people,
and this speciality may be interaction between Muḥammadanism
and Hindūism serving here for the purpose of identification.
For Ibn Batūta writes of the people of Kajwarra that they were
_jogīs_, yellowed by asceticism, wearing their hair long and
matted, and having Muḥammadan followers who desired to learn
their (occult?) secrets. If the same interaction existed in
Bābur's day, the Muḥammadan following of the Hindū ascetics
may well have been the special circumstance which led him to
promise protection to those Hindūs, even when he was out for
Holy-war. It has to be remembered of Chandīrī, the nearest
powerful neighbour of Kadwāha, that though Bābur's capture
makes a vivid picture of Hindūism in it, it had been under
Muḥammadan rulers down to a relatively short time before his
conquest. The _jogīs_ of Kachwa could point to long-standing
relations of tolerance by the Chandīrī Governors; this, with
their Muḥammadan following, explains the encouragement Bābur
gave them, and helps to identify Kachwa with Kajarra. It may
be observed that Bābur was familiar with the interaction of
the two creeds, witness his "apostates", mostly Muḥammadans
following Hindū customs, witness too, for the persistent fact,
the reports of District-officers under the British _Rāj_.
Again,—a further circumstance helping to identify Kajwarra,
Kachwa and Kadwāha is that these are names of the last
important station the traveller and the soldier, as well
perhaps as the modern wayfarer, stays in before reaching
Chandīrī. The importance of Kajwarra is shewn by Ibn Batūta,
and of Kadwāha by its being a _maḥāll_ in Akbar's _sarkār_ of
Bāyawān of the _ṣūba_ of Āgra. Again,—Kadwāha is the place
nearest to Chandīrī about which Bābur's difficulties as to
intermediate road and jungle would arise. That intermediate
road takes off the main one a little south of Kadwāha and runs
through what looks like a narrow valley and broken country
down to Bhamor, Bhurānpūr and Chandīrī. Again,—no bar to
identification of the three names is placed by their
differences of form, in consideration of the vicissitudes they
have weathered in tongue, script, and transliteration. There
is some ground, I believe, for surmising that their common
source is _kajūr_, the date-fruit. [I am indebted to my
husband for the help derived from Ibn Batūta, traced by him in
Sanguinetti's trs. iv, 33, and S. Lee's trs. p. 162.]
(Two places similar in name to Kachwa, and situated on Bābur's
route _viz._ Kocha near Jhansi, and Kuchoowa north of Kadwāha
(Sheet 69 S.W.) are unsuitable for his "Kachwa", the first
because too near Bandīr to suit his itinerary, the second
because too far from the turn off the main-road mentioned
above, because it has no lake, and has not the help in
identification detailed above of Kadwāha.)
[2190] _qūrūghīr_ which could mean also _reserved_ (from the
water?).
[2191] _qāzān._ There seems to have been one only; how few
Bābur had is shewn again on f. 337.
[2192] _Indian Atlas_, Sheet 52 N.E. near a tributary of the
Betwa, the Or, which appears to be Bābur's Burhānpūr-water.
[2193] The bed of the Betwa opposite Chandīrī is 1050 ft.
above the sea; the walled-town (_qūrghān_) of Chandīrī is on a
table-land 250 ft. higher, and its citadel is 230 ft. higher
again (Cunningham's _Archeological Survey Report_, 1871 A.D.
ii, 404).
[2194] The plan of Chandīrī illustrating Cunningham's Report
(_see_ last note) allows surmise about the road taken by
Bābur, surmise which could become knowledge if the names of
tanks he gives were still known. The courtesy of the
Government of India allows me to reproduce that plan [Appendix
R, _Chandīrī_ and _Gwālīāwar]_.
[2195] He is said to have been Governor of Chandīrī in 1513
AD.
[2196] Here and in similar passages the word _m:ljār_ or