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Two Seventeenth-Century Central Asian Travellers to Mughal India

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2009

Richard Foltz
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Extract

Among the few published Central Asian sources of the seventeenth century are two very unusual Persian-language accounts by Central Asians of their stays in Mughal India: the memoirs of Mutribi al-Asamm Samarqandi, and the travelogue of Mahmud b. Amir Wali. Written in stylistically different but distinctly personal voices untypical for their time, these accounts offer the modern reader valuable first-person insight into the minds and outlooks of their authors and shed light on the nature of how Muslims in Asia thought about their world and its boundaries.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society , Volume 6 , Issue 3 , November 1996 , pp. 367 - 377
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 1996

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References

1 Mirzoev, Abdul-Ghani, (ed.), Khatirat-i Mutribi Samarqandi (Karachi, 1977).Google Scholar

2 There exists a sole known copy of the manuscript as a khatima to the Nuskha-yi Ziba-yi Jahangir, a work in the India Office Library, Ethé ii, no. 3023, therein and in Storey mistitled Tarikh-i Jahangiri. The anthology part of this work has been published in an edition by A. G. Mirzoev (Karachi, 1976).

3 Islam, Riazul, (ed.), The Bahr al-Asrar: the Travel Portion (Karachi, 1980).Google Scholar

4 The travelogue attached to volume vi of Mahmud's work exists in two copies, one in the India Office Library, Ethé no. 575, and the other in Tashkent in the library of the Institute of Oriental Studies, Uzbekistan Academy of Sciences. Sections of volume i also exist there, and an edition has been published by the Pakistan Historical Society (Karachi, 1984).

5 I would like to thank Ahmad Mahdavi-Damghani for helping me through the flowery maze of Mahmud's style, and also for clarifying certain passages of Mutribi's language.

6 As early as Kabul Mahmud complains of despair and loneliness, until a friendly stranger offers to feed him out of pity (Mahmud, p. 2). Later, on his first visit to the famed former capital of Agra, he and a temporary travel companion become so exasperated at the lack of instant charity that they decide to leave the town immediately, without having seen anything (Mahmud, pp. 17–18).

7 Much of the biographical information on Mutribi, about whom nothing is said in any contemporary sources known to me, is culled from Mirzoev's Persian introduction to his edition of the Khatirat.

8 “Mutribi,” the author's sobriquet rather than his given name which is unknown to us, means “minstrel,” or “hired musician.”

9 Tiyul or mamlakat. See McChesney, R. D., “The Amirs of Muslim Central Asia,” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient, XXVI (1980), p. 51.Google Scholar

10 Gafurov, B. G., “The Bahr al-Asrar II’, Journal of the Pakistan Historical Society, XIV/2 (1966), p. 99.Google Scholar

11 The manuscript is in the library of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Uzbekistan Academy of Sciences, no. 2253.

12 Mutribi, , p. 17.Google Scholar

13 Mutribi, , p. 32;Google Scholar To this Jahangir somewhat mockingly replies that while 'iraqi horses are more expensive, they are also harder to handle, implying that such a horse might be too much for the elderly Mutribi.

14 Mutribi, , p. 71.Google Scholar

15 His only positive observation about India seems to be that it has very tasty ducks, a fact which previous Central Asian travellers had also noted (Mutribi, , p. 36).Google Scholar

15a See the discussion in Miquel, André, La géographie humaine du monde musulman jusqu'au milieu du 11e siècle (Paris and The Hague, 1972), pp. 127–32.Google Scholar

15b Sachau, E. C., ed. and tr., Alberuni's India (London, 1888; abridged version New York, 1971).Google Scholar

16 Mahmud, , p. 1.Google Scholar It is interesting to compare Mahmud's preconceptions of the grandeur of India with those of Central Asian Muslims in other periods. The ninth-century Central Asian poet Rudaki, considered to be the first great poet of the modern Persian language, wrote: “The thorn that will prick me when I go to India/Is better than staying at home with a bunch of fragrant flowers in my hand” (khari ke be man dar khalad andar safar-i Hind/beh chun be hadar dar kaf-i man daste-i saburi) (Gafurov, 1966, pp. 101–2)Google Scholar. In his memoirs the first Mughal Emperor Babur, no great lover of India, after listing the many defects of the country concedes that it is indeed vast and full of resources, both mineral and human, and that its air during the monsoon season is delightful. (The Bābur-nāma in English, tr. Beveridge, Annette (London, 1921), p. 519.Google Scholar)

17 Islam, Riazul, “The Bahr al-Asrar I,” Journal of the Pakistan Historical Society, XIV/2 (1966), p. 95.Google Scholar

18 Semenov, A. A., ‘K voprosu o kul'turno-politicheskikh sviaziakh Bukhary i ‘Velikomogol'skoi’ Indii v XVII v.,” in Materialy vtorogo soveschaniia arkheologov i etnografov Sredniei Azii (Moscow, 1959), p. 9;Google Scholar Dale, Stephen, Indian Merchants and Eurasian Trade, 1600–1750 (Cambridge, 1994), p. 45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

19 Mahmud, , p. 15.Google Scholar

20 Ibid.

21 Mahmud, , p. 22.Google Scholar

22 It is worth noting that some 14 years earlier Jahangir had taunted an ambassador of Mutribi's countryman Imam Quli Khan about that ruler's alleged pederasty, an exchange which resulted in diplomatic ties between the Uzbeks and Mughals being broken for seven years and renewed only at the instigation of Nur Jahan (Semenov, , 1959, p. 9Google Scholar). Jahangir seems to have revelled in teasing Central Asians about homosexual matters.

23 Mutribi, , p. 39.Google Scholar

24 Later on Jahangir sold Mutribi's son Muhammad Άli a slave boy who turned out to be deaf (Mutribi, , pp. 53–4).Google Scholar The following day when Mutribi came to pay for the slave the Emperor mischievously asked Mutribi about it, and in the end gave him the slave for nothing along with 1,000 rupees for good measure. Mutribi, saving his own face perhaps, goes on to say that the slave served him excellently, and cites a story about a famously pious deaf slave in the Samarqand bazaar.

25 In the Tuzuk-i Jahangiri, the emperor describes in detail his daily intake of wine and opium, as well as his attempts to moderate his addictions. In the end, it was probably this lifestyle that brought on his death. Certain modern South Asian scholars, such as Bani Prasad, have taken issue with the traditional depiction of Jahangir as an intellectual lush ruled by his Persian wife Nur Jahan. While the stereotype is perhaps exaggerated, the examples cited above do draw a fairly vivid portrait of the Emperor's character.

26 The nostalgic mentality of the first six Mughal emperors toward their ancestral lands is more fully explored in my doctoral dissertation, “Uzbek Central Asia and Mughal India: Asian Muslim Society in the 16th and 17th Centuries,” Harvard University 1996.Google Scholar

27 Mutribi, , p. 19.Google Scholar

28 Mutribi, , p. 69.Google Scholar Earlier, in 1620, Jahangir had sent 10,000 rupees to Samarqand with an embassy led by Mir Baraka; half was to go to Dihbidi, Khwaja Salih and half to “the mujawirs attached to the tomb of Timur” (Tuzuk-i Jahangiri, tr. Rogers, A. and Beveridge, H., 2 vols., Calcutta 1909–1914, ii, p. 196).Google Scholar It is quite interesting to note that even decades later Emperor Aurangzeb, on hearing from Sayyid Oghlan of the run-down condition of the Gur-i Amir, issued a firman “on behalf of the souls of the ancestors” for 12 rupees per day (Muhammad Hadi “Maliha” Samarqandi, Mudhakkir al-Ashab, Institute of Oriental Studies, Uzbekistan Academy of Sciences ms. no. 4270, f. 297; cited in Marefat, Roya, Beyond the Architecture of Death, unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Harvard University, 1991, p. 58Google Scholar).

29 Mutribi, , p. 20.Google Scholar Timur's sepulchre is actually of black jade.

30 Mutribi, , p. 23.Google Scholar

31 Mutribi, , p. 32.Google Scholar

32 Mutribi, , p. 33.Google Scholar

33 Mutribi, , p. 43.Google Scholar

34 Mutribi, , p. 28.Google Scholar

35 Mutribi, , pp. 30–1.Google Scholar Jahangir tries here to trick Mutribi, showing him two men, neither of whom is Abu'l Bey, as Mutribi correctly responds. Jahangir then shows his guest a portrait, which Mutribi recognizes as the true personage.

36 Mutribi, , pp. 33–4;Google Scholar Mutribi says the only person in Central Asia worthy of receiving Jahangir's giant sugar block, other than Imam Quli Khan, would be Khwaja Hashem Muhammad Dihbidi, to which Jahangir replies that he himself is one of Dihbidi's followers. Also later on, Jahangir says he will delay his departure for Kashmir until the arrival of Άbd al-Rahim Khwaja Juybari at court (p. 45).

37 Mutribi, , p. 50.Google Scholar Mutribi describes Ustad Άli's style as a blend of Timurid and “Turk” influences.

38 Mutribi, , p. 61.Google Scholar

39 Mutribi, , p. 44;Google Scholar Jahangir recites a couplet and asks Mutribi to reply in matching rhyme and metre (mojavabe). When Mutribi does so, a scoffing attendant says the couplet is not Mutribi's, upon which Mutribi spontaneously comes up with three more, silencing the sceptic. But during a later session it is clear Jahangir, who like most rulers also considered himself a poet, has his own criteria for judging good and bad verse. When Mutribi, in accordance with the Emperor's request, recites a couplet by the late Uzbek ruler Άbdullah Khan, the ever-present scoffing attendant says, “What a stupid couplet!” Jahangir silences him with the words, “If Άbdullah Khan's couplet is stupid, then you are more stupid,” meaning, presumably, that one does not criticise the work of a king (Mutribi, , p. 62).Google Scholar

40 As Mutribi's visit occurred during the final months of the Emperor's life, it is not mentioned in the Tuzuk-i Jahangiri.

41 Mahmud, , pp. 9–10.Google Scholar These would most probably have been unfamiliar to him, as Central Asia was overwhelmingly Sunni.

42 For example at Benares, where he asks them why they are participating in an infidel ritual, to which they respond by raising their hands toward the sky and then pointing to their foreheads – such is their destiny (Mahmud, , pp. 21–3).Google Scholar

43 One imagines that had Mahmud's travels taken him to Ottoman lands, he would have written most extensively about churches, Easter, and Greek or Armenian women.

44 At Lale bar Sang temple in Benares, where the author found himself lost in a crowd of 30,000 chanting worshippers (Mahmud, , p. 23).Google Scholar

45 Mahmud, , p. 25.Google Scholar

46 Mahmud does, however, mention at least one instance where he claims to have converted a Hindu friend to Islam (Mahmud, , pp. 81–2).Google Scholar

47 Mahmud, , pp. 33–4.Google Scholar

48 Mahmud, , p. 32.Google Scholar The aborigine had been captured from Zirbad and was being taken away as a gift for the Mughal Emperor. A dhar' is equal to 41 inches.

49 Mahmud, , p. 22.Google Scholar

50 Mahmud, , p. 80.Google Scholar

51 Mahmud, , p. 29.Google Scholar The scene recalls paintings representing Kali, the Hindu goddess of destruction, who is often portrayed surrounded by human bones and munching body parts.

52 Mahmud, , p. 84.Google Scholar The methods described by Mahmud for determining a true jigar khwar from an innocent are reminiscent of European witch tests: one can either rub pepper in the suspect's eyes to see if it irritates them, or dunk him by the legs into a body of water to see if he floats (Mahmud, , pp. 86–7).Google Scholar

53 For example, his shipwreck (Mahmud, , p. 63)Google Scholar, or when he describes an entire garden of tall trees being completely flattened (pp. 78–9).

54 Mahmud, , p. 28.Google Scholar

55 Mahmud, , pp. 79–80.Google Scholar Baqir Khan, the Mughal governor of Orissa whom Mahmud served for three years, sent these apes as a gift to Jahangir, but Shah Jahan acceded to the throne in the meanwhile and sent the apes back as worthless. This was probably meant as a snub to Baqir Khan, who had supported Jahangir during Shah Jahan's rebellion.

56 Mahmud, , pp. 30–1.Google Scholar

57 Mahmud, , p. 56.Google Scholar

58 Mahmud, , p. 25.Google Scholar One encounters a similar atmosphere in today's youth hostels, where young, shoestringbudget travellers from all over the world meet and swap stories about the “best places” to go, often getting inspired to visit locations they had not thought of before.

59 Mahmud, , p. 37.Google Scholar

60 Mahmud, , p. 39Google Scholar.

61 Mahmud, , p. 40–3.Google Scholar

62 Mahmud, , p. 54.Google Scholar The local governor has temporarily forbidden pilgrimages to Adam's Peak, because of the skunk-lion mentioned above.

63 Mahmud, , p. 61.Google Scholar Strangely, this miracle ceases to occur if the girls should leave their native island.

64 Mahmud, , p. 63.Google Scholar

65 Mahmud, , pp. 65–8.Google Scholar He is assisted in this task by one of his servants, an elderly man who turns out to be a scholar fallen on hard times.

66 Mahmud, , p. 74.Google Scholar

67 Bregel, Iuri, Persidskaya Literatura, ii (Moscow, 1972), p. 1136.Google Scholar Ansar Khan points out that Baqir Khan, having supported Jahangir during Shah Jahan's rebellion, “must have been anxious to ingratiate himself with the new emperor.” Khan, Ansar Z., “Mahmud b. Amir Vali's description of towns, and cities and regions of South Asia in the Bahr al-Asrar,” Journal of the Pakistan Historical Society, XXXVIII/2 (1990), p. 137).Google Scholar It appears the governor was ultimately successful in doing so.

68 Mahmud, , pp. 100–3.Google Scholar

69 My Ph.D. dissertation discusses the cases of a number of Central Asian migrants and visitors to Mughal India from all walks of life, in addition to the factors surrounding such movement.