Empress

by Ruby Lal

  17.Tirmizi, Edicts from the Mughal Harem, xxxiv.

  18.Foster, Embassy of Sir Thomas Roe, cited in chapter 1, 70, 71, 88.

  19.Ibid., 88.

  20.Ibid., 270.

  21.Tuzuk, 1:401.

  22.The reference to Nur Jahan’s vakils in made by Jahangir. Tuzuk, 2:192.

  23.N. R. Khadgawat, A Descriptive List of Farmans, Manshurs and Nishans addressed by the Imperial Mughals to the Princes of Rajasthan (Bikaner: Directorate of the Archives, Govt. of Rajasthan, 1962), 38. Also, Tirmizi, Edicts from the Mughal Harem, Appendix I, 116. “As the aforesaid Rathor is in Surat Singh’s service, the latter is ordered to pay off the said debts, from his own estate, to their people (Kisandas and Baroman) and to deduct the same from his (Rathore’s) salary … He should not disobey the orders and should regard it his duty.”

  24.Ain-i Akbari, 1:212. By the 1580s, Akbar had ordered that Allahu-Akbar be employed as invocation on all his documents.

  25.For the Persian text and other details of these orders, Tirmizi, Edicts from the Mughal Harem, 4–16.

  26.Beveridge, Babur-nama, cited in chapter 2, 43; Thackston, cited in chapter 2, Baburnama, 49.

  27.Tirmizi, Edicts from the Mughal Harem, xvii–xviii.

  28.I take this concept following Gloria Anzaldúa’s Borderlands, in which she reflects on the possibiites that arise out of contradictory human conditions that help enunciate a complex view of social self. Anzaldúa, Borderlands: La Frontera, The New Mestiza (San Francisco: Aunt Lute Books, 2012, 4th ed.), 9, and also the entire introduction.

  29.The location of this coin (that bears the first verse above) is not given by Shujauddin and Shujauddin, The Life and Times of Noor Jahan, cited in chapter 1, 100. The first verse documented by Shujauddin and Shujauddin is close in character to the second. For the latter, see, M. K. Hussain, Catalogue of Coins of the Mughal Emperors (Bombay: Department of Archaeology, Government of Maharashtra, 1968), 10.

  30.As examples, see, R. B. Whitehead, “The Mint Towns of the Mughal Emperors of India,” Journal and Proceedings of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, New Series, 8 (1912): 425–531; R. B. Whitehead, First Supplement to “The Mint Towns of the Mughal Emperors of India,” Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, Numismatic Supplement 25 (July and August 1915); C. R. Singhal, Mint-Towns of the Mughal Emperors of India (Bombay: The Numismatic Society of India, 1953), 33–35.

  31.For a discussion of Reza, Nadira, and Hasan, see Priscilla Soucek, “Persian Artists in Mughal India: Influences and Transformations,” Muqarnas 4 (1987): 166–81.

  32.Beach, Fischer, and Goswamy, Masters of Indian Painting, cited in chapter 1, 228.

  33.Milo Cleveland Beach suggested the date of composition between 1612 and 1615 in The Grand Mogul, cited in chapter 1, 90. The title he used was: Portrait of a Lady with a Rifle. In the catalogue of the Rampur Raza Library, where this painting is held, it is dated 1617, in English, as part of the exhibits where it was included. For a reproduction and the English inscription, see Barbara Schmitz and Ziyaud-Din A. Desai, Mughal and Persian Paintings and Illustrated Manuscripts in The Raza Library, Rampur (New Delhi: Aryan Books International, 2006). The title for Hasan’s painting varies in the writings of art historians: Portrait of Nur Jahan Holding a Musket; Nur Jahan in Hunting Attire. In the most recent edition by Beach et al., Masters of Indian Painting, Nur’s portrait is entitled Portrait of Nur Jahan and the date ascribed is 1612–13. Cf. 214.

  34.Sanam Ali Khan provided these details from the Rampur Raza Library conservation lab’s treatment records. The director of the library sent me a letter with these details, dated November 24, 2013, 2–3.

  35.On the right side of the portrait of Nur is that of Jahangir. Schmidt and Desai consider the latter figure to be a Mughal prince. According to Sanam Ali Khan of the Rampur Raza Library (India), where this painting is held, and according to the Rampur library catalogues, the portrait adjacent to Nur is that of Jahangir. Schmitz and Desai, Mughal and Persian Paintings, 49.

  36.I am grateful to Jos Gommans for looking at this painting, and for his comments on the kind of musket Nur Jahan holds.

  37.Sanam Ali, letter to the author, 2.

  38.Stronge, Painting for the Mughal Emperor, cited in chapter 2, 133.

  39.Both citations by Jahangir in this paragraph are from the Tuzuk, 2:20.

  40.The construction of this inn is discussed in Ellison Banks Findly, “Women’s Wealth and Styles of Giving: Perspectives from Mughal, Jain, and Buddhist Sites,” in Fairchild Ruggles (ed.), Women, Patronage, and Self-Representation in Islamic Societies, cited in chapter 5, 109–12; also, Afshan Bokhari, Gendered Landscapes: Jahan Ara Begum’s (1614–1681) Patronage, Piety and Self Representation in Mughal India (D.Phil. Dissertation, University of Vienna), 230–33.

  ELEVEN: VEILS OF LIGHT

  1.Tuzuk, cited in chapter 1, 2:53.

  2.Iqbalnama-i Jahangiri, cited in chapter 2, 405; Dhakhiratul Khawanin, cited in chapter 2, 14. The small seventeenth-century portrait, attributed to Abul-Hasan, Nur Jahan: Portrait to Be Worn as a Jewel, is held at the Harvard Art Museum. It is reproduced in Thackston, Jahangirnama, cited in chapter 1, 368, as well as in this book. The Harvard museum has more recently expressed some doubt about the exact date, authorship, and subject of the painting. A second 1840–50 painting of Nur Jahan in a jharokha is held at the National Museum, New Delhi, entitled, Nur Jahan. Ebba Koch notes that the jharokha scenes from Jahangir’s time were rare, and when they did appear, they tended to repeat the characteristics of the jharokha paintings from late Akbari period: canopied platform or throne in which the emperor was surrounded by nobles. For a discussion of the development and formalization of the jharokha under Shah Jahan, see Koch, Mughal Art and Imperial Ideology, cited in chapter 8, 133–45.

  3.Iqbalnama-i Jahangiri, 405.

  4.Dhakhiratul Khawanin, 14. Other documents where we note the issue of khutba are: Hadi, Tatimma-i Vaqi’at-I Jahangiri, cited in chapter 1, 398; Maathir-Ul-Umara, cited in chapter 2, 1077.

  5.For an extended discussion of Jahangir’s interest in naturalism and its relation to power, see Lefevre, “Recovering a Missing Voice from Mughal India,” cited in chapter 9, 452–89.

  6.Al-Ghazzali, in his major work, Revival of Religious Sciences, a treatise on Sufism, speaks about the ultimate goal of politics, which is to provide well-being for humans in this world and the other world. He has also a book in Persian, called Naṣhat al-molūk (Counsel for kings), which belongs to the literary genre of “mirrors for princes,” in which he explains the beliefs and principles on which a ruler should act, as well as counsels according to which a ruler should administer his charge. In both these books, he outlines the significant issue of stability.

  7.Faruqui, Princes, cited in chapter 7, 184–85.

  8.Alam, Languages of Political Islam, cited in chapter 3, 95; Faruqui, Princes, 35; Tuzuk, 2:107.

  9.Afzal Husain, The Nobility Under Akbar and Jahangir: A Study of Family Groups (New Delhi: Manohar Publishers, 1999), 166.

  10.Intekhab-i Jahangir Shahi, B.M. Or. 1648, folios 320–22. Elliott and Dowson discuss the identity of the author and have some passages and translations included in their History of India As Told by Its Own Historians, cited in chapter 1, 6:446–52.

  11.As noted earlier, Jahangir wrote of her attachment to his family. Her date of induction into Jahangir’s harem in 1585 and the note about her thirty-three years of service by the emperor establishes that she left the imperial service in 1618, perhaps just after the Mughal cavalcade returned from Malwa and Gujarat. Tuzuk, 2:110–111; Maathir-Ul-Umara, 1078; Tatimma-i Vaqi’at-i Jahangiri, 308.

  12.Tuzuk, 2:110–11.

  13.It is not clear whether Arjumand accompanied the royals and her husband, Shah Jahan, to Kashmir. Tuzuk, 2:112, 113; In the Padshahnama, the epic history of Shah Jahan’s reign, the birth of this prince is recorded on December 18, just before Shah Jahan’s departure with his father, which is noted to be in February 1620; Begley and Desai, Shah Jahan Nama, cited in
chapter 9, 8.

  14.Tuzuk, 2:155–56.

  15.I have used Thackston’s translation of the lines cited above, which is more in keeping with the feel in Persian, and less Victorian as in Beveridge’s rendering of these particular lines. Thackston, Jahangirnama, 327.

  16.Tuzuk, 2:134.

  17.Sabir Hussain, “A Road Less Travelled,” The Hindu, July 14, 2014, http://www.hindu.com/a-road-less-travelled.

  18.The citation is from Thackston, Jahangirnama, 335; cf. Tuzuk, 2:145, 150–51.

  19.For a discussion of this verse and also Subrawardi’s principles of illumination, see, William C. Chittick, The Sufi Path of Knowledge: Ibn al ’Arabi’s Metaphysics of Imagination (Albany: State University of New York, 1989), 401, n19; Mehdi Aminrazavi, Suhrawardi and the School of Illumination (New York: Routledge, 2013), 111.

  20.Tuzuk, 1:3, 10–11: nur-shahi (light of sovereignty), nur-sultani (light of kingship), nur-daulat (light of the court), nur-mihr (light of the sun), and nur-jahani (light of the world).

  21.Shujauddin and Shujauddin, The Life and Times of Nur Jahan, cited in chapter 1, 40.

  22.Tuzuk, 2:174.

  23.Khafi Khan’s Muntakhab-ul-Lubab, cited in chapter 2, 1, 270.

  24.Archibald Constable (ed.), Francois Bernier, Travels in the Mogul Empire, AD 1636–1668 (New Delhi: S. Chand and Co., 1968, rpt.), 413, n2, 414.

  25.Tuzuk, 2:152.

  26.Ibid., 160.

  27.Faruqui, Princes, cited in chapter 7, 35.

  28.Grey, Travels of Pietro Della Valle, cited in chapter 2, 1:55–56; Foster, Embassy of Sir Thomas Roe, cited in chapter 1, 369.

  29.Thackston, Jahangirnama, 353. Thackston’s translation here reads more appropriately compared to the cumbersome tone of Rogers and Beveridge; cf. Tuzuk, 2:186.

  30.Dhakhiratul Khawanin, 19.

  TWELVE: THE LIGHT-SCATTERING GARDEN

  1.The Jats renamed it Ram Bagh upon capturing Agra in the last quarter of the eighteenth century, tradition goes. Ebba Koch, “Notes on the Painted and Sculpted Decoration of Nur Jahan’s Pavilions in the Ram Bagh (Bagh-i Nur Afshan) at Agra,” in Facets of Indian Art: A Symposium Held at the Victoria and Albert Museum (London: The Victoria & Albert Museum, 1986), 53.

  2.Koch, Taj Mahal, cited in chapter 8, 30, 38, 39.

  3.The description of Ram Bagh is based upon my visit in January 2016, with the support of the Archaeological Survey of India team led by Mr. R. K. Singh. Jahangir had been there twice before the celebration of Ladli’s betrothal, after the victory of Kangra in March 1621, and then again, Nur Jahan held celebrations marking the sixteenth year of their reign in 1621.

  4.Ebba Koch, an expert who has studied the ceilings of Nur’s garden pavilions says, they draw an “implicit parallel between the Mughal emperor and his wife and Solomon and his consort Bilqis [Sheba].” Koch, “Ram Bagh,” 59.

  5.Tuzuk, 2:200.

  6.Shahryar was born in 1605, the same year that his father ascended the throne. Nur’s first marriage took place in 1594 and in all probability, Ladli was born before 1605. No record mentions her date of birth, but most note that she was a little girl when she came to Agra along with her mother. She is represented as a small child in Chiterin (Lady artist and her model), a painting housed in Bhartiya Kala Bhavan of the Banaras Hindu University.

  7.For rituals of henna, see Masse, Persian Beliefs and Customs, cited in chapter 2, 52–53.

  8.It was such a veil that Jahangir had put on Shah Jahan’s head, which the latter gave his son. Beach and Koch, King of the World, cited in chapter 8, 66.

  9.Spectacular visual images of the weddings of princes, roughly a decade later, allow us to picture the scene of Ladli and Shahryar’s wedding. Beach and Koch, King of the World. Folios and texts used for the discussion in this paragraph are: “The Presentation of Dara-Shikoh’s Wedding Gifts,” “The Delivery of Presents for Dara-Shikoh’s Wedding,” “The Wedding Procession of Prince Dara-Shikoh,” “Shah Jahan Honoring Prince Awrangzeb at Agra Before His Wedding,” “Shah Jahan Honoring Prince Awrangzeb at His Wedding,” 46, 60, 61, 104, 108.

  10.Single Leaf Portrait of Shahryar, the Walters Art Gallery, Baltimore. Shelf mark: W. 697.

  11.The best descriptions of the codes and decorum around Mughal marriages come from Gulbadan Banu Begum. On the seating arrangements in times of feasts and weddings, notably at the time of the marriage of the Mughal prince Hindal, Gulbadan, Ahval, cited in chapter 2, folio 24b–29a.

  12.Tuzuk, 2:199–200.

  13.Faruqui, Princes, 85, 86, 109.

  14.Tuzuk, 2:205.

  15.Dhakhiratul Khawanin, 19.

  16.Richard C. Foltz, Mughal India and Central Asia (Karachi: OUP, 1998), 132; M. Athar Ali, “Jahangir and the Uzbeks,” Proceedings of the 26th Indian History Congress (1964), 111.

  17.Tuzuk, 2:205.

  18.Ibid., 212–14.

  19.Ibid., 214–15.

  20.Ibid., 216–17.

  21.Ibid., 222.

  22.Ibid. This episode is also reproduced in Dhakhiratul Khawanin, 4; and Maathir-Ul-Umara, 2(2): 1076.

  23.Tuzuk, 2:222–23.

  24.An inscription on the southwest wall bears the date 1626/27 and the name of the calligrapher, ‘Abd-un-Nabi al-Qarshi. Mason marks or signatures, such as a tota, or parrot, appear on the floors outside, in letters and images.

  25.Koch, Taj Mahal, 49, 51, 52.

  26.Cited in Ibid., 52.

  THIRTEEN: FITNA

  1.Ghulam Yazdani (ed.), Muhammad Salih Kanbo, ‘Amal-i Salih (Lahore: n.p., 1967–72), 1:133–34.

  2.Tuzuk, cited in chapter 1, 2:289.

  3.Seen to be destabilizing imperial expansionist plans, Parvez had been dismissed from his Deccan responsibilities in 1616. Instead, Shah Jahan was given the charge, a campaign that became his crowning glory. Parvez was packed off to Allahabad and was barred from court appearance for three years. When Jahangir met the ascetic Jadrup in 1619, the emperor had a change of heart. Nur Jahan had already been facilitating a resolution of sorts between Parvez and his father.

  4.Thackston, Jahangirnama, cited in chapter 1, 387. This translation captures beautifully the emotive quality of Jahangir’s lament. Cf., Tuzuk, 2:248.

  5.Irfan Habib, “The Family of Nur Jahan During Jahangir’s Reign,” cited in chapter 2, 77. For the events sketched in this paragraph, I have drawn information from the following chronicles: Jahangirnama; Iqbalnama-i Jahangiri, cited in chapter 2; Dhakhiratul Khawanin, cited in chapter 2; Maathir-Ul-Umara, cited in chapter 2; ‘Amal-i Salih; and Borah, Baharistan-i Ghaybi, cited in chapter 6. For recent, excellent writing on the subject of princely rebellions, Faruqui, Princes, cited in chapter 7. Specific references to these texts and to other scholarly literature covering these events are below. Dhakhiratul Khawanin, 19–20.

  6.Dhakhiratul Khawanin, 20.

  7.Afzal Husain, Nobility Under Akbar and Jahangir, cited in chapter 11, 165.

  8.Tuzuk 2:250. Rahim’s career in the Deccan had begun as early as Akbar’s reign. Later, while working in prince Parvez’s command there, he had requested additional enforcements from Jahangir on several occasions. Rahim repeatedly sent petitions for help and even threatened to immolate himself along with his family if help was not sent. There was a section of the nobility, opposed to Rahim that had convinced Jahangir that he was in league with the influential forces in the south and that he had deliberately surrendered conquered regions to them. Mahabat went to make an inquiry, and he was asked to bring Rahim back to the court. Parvez was recalled. It was then that the campaign was handed over to Shah Jahan in 1617. Rahim stayed on in the Deccan and came to some understanding with Shah Jahan. For further details, Afzal Husain, Nobility Under Akbar and Jahangir, 37–39, 40.

  9.Dhakhiratul Khawanin, 20.

  10.Faruqui, Princes, 207.

  11.The chronicles composed in Shah Jahan’s time used the word fitna, notably, Kamgar Husaini, Ma’asir-i Jahangiri, ed. Azra Alvi (Bombay, 1978); Begley and Desai, Shah Jahan Nama, cited in chapter 9; and the Dhakhiratul Khawani
n; Maathir-Ul-Umara; and Iqbalnama-i Jahangiri, noted above. For a discussion of fitna and the princely rebellion, Faruqui, Princes, 188–190.

  12.D. A. Spellberg, Politics, Gender, and the Islamic Past: The Legacy of ‘A’isha Bint Abi Bakr (New York: Columbia University Press, 1994), 118.

  13.Fatima Mernissi, The Forgotten Queens of Islam (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993), 66–67.

  14.Spellberg discusses how the idea of fitna comes to be configured around Ayisha. Spellberg, Politics, Gender, and the Islamic Past, especially, 107, 109, 111, 118, 141.

  15.Leslie Peirce, The Imperial Harem: Women and Sovereignty in the Ottoman Empire (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), vii, 267.

  16.Thackston, Jahangirnama, 395.

  17.On details of Shah Jahan’s alliances, Faruqui, Princes, 208–21.

  18.Borah, Baharistan-i Ghaybi, 417.

  19.The time of Shah Jahan’s arrival in Allahabad and Banaras and the details of the Battle of Tons in 1624 are from the eighteenth-century account of Muhammad Hadi. Thackston, Jahangirnama, 425–27; citations on 426.

  FOURTEEN: THE RESCUE

  1.The events of 1626–27 are based upon the encyclopedic bibliographical work of Farid Bhakkari, Dhakhiratul Khawanin, Mu’tamad Khan’s Iqbalnama-i Jahangiri, and the account of Muhammad Hadi, all cited in chapter 2. For the above citation, Thackston, Jahangirnama, cited in chapter 1, 441. In addition, Shirazi, Waqa-i-uz-Zaman, cited in chapter 6. I have also consulted the Aligarh copy, Rotograph 10, Fathnama-i Nur Jahan Begum. Most citations are from the Siddiqi edition.

  2.Fathnama-i Nur Jahan Begum, 102.

  3.Dhakhiratul Khawanin, 42.

  4.Fathnama-i Nur Jahan Begum, 128.

  5.Thackston, Jahangirnama, 440.

  6.Fathnama-i Nur Jahan Begum, 132.

  7.Ibid., 132, 134, 136.

  8.Dhakhiratul Khawanin, 20; Hadi and Mu’tamad Khan both make note of a similar message.

  9.The dates differ. Bhakkari notes March 28 and Hadi has March 18. Shirazi does not give the date, but is clear about the year and general time, spring 1626.