The Adventures of Amir Hamza

by Ghalib Lakhnavi

  Buzurjmehr comforted the emperor and went to see Naushervan. After arranging a private audience with Naushervan, he said to him, “What is it that has weighed you down? You would be well advised to confide in me, so that I may busy myself in finding some cure for it!”

  Naushervan replied, “Dearest Khvaja! I have become enamored of the daughter of the emperor of China, Princess Mehr-Angez, just from hearing of her charms. Claimed by the arrow of her love, I am fully confident that I shall not survive if I do not wed her.”

  Buzurjmehr said, “My dear Prince! One must not become derelict and let go of one’s reason so completely, as it does not behoove the high-minded! What you are out of sorts about, and unnecessarily distressed over, is not something that lies beyond the realm of possibility. Set your mind at ease! I shall take charge of this affair myself and fill your cup of longing with the wine of desire!”

  Comforted by Buzurjmehr’s compassionate words, and with his hopes of union with Mehr-Angez now revived, Naushervan leapt out of his bed. After having a bath and sending for his friends and companions, he changed clothes and sat down to have his meal.

  After speaking with Naushervan, Buzurjmehr went to see the emperor and conveyed to his ears the amorous affliction of the prince. The emperor said, “Khvaja, this matter will not be resolved without your agency.”

  Through their mutual counsel it was decided that Buzurjmehr would go with an embassy to the emperor of China, and undertake to arrange Naushervan’s marriage to Mehr-Angez. Arrangements were made to this effect, and Buzurjmehr proceeded to China at the head of fifty thousand foot soldiers and cavalrymen.

  Now we return to Bakhtak, who, ever since he had come of age and heard about his grandfather, would daily say to his mother, “Whenever I lay eyes on Buzurjmehr, blood rushes into them; and thinking of my poor grandfather, my heart becomes overcast with grief. I shall remain restless until I have avenged his blood. Once Buzurjmehr is in my snare, he will find no escape. I only wait for the day when he falls into my power!” But Naushervan always censured and reproved him.

  OF BUZURJMEHR’S JOURNEY TO CHINA WITH TROOPS AND RETINUE, HIS RETURN WITH PRINCESS MEHR-ANGEZ, AND THE NUPTIALS OF THE SEEKER AND THE SOUGHT

  The singers of the pleasure garden of ecstasy and the melodists of the assembly of discourse thus create a rollicking rumpus by playing the dulcimer16 of delightful verbiage and the lute of enchanting story, and thus warm the nuptial assembly most exquisitely. Having taken leave of his emperor, Khvaja Buzurjmehr proceeded with his retinue in wondrous pomp, state, and grandeur, and traversed league after league, bridging stretch after hazardous stretch, until he entered the frontiers of China.

  The emperor of China was greatly taken with Buzurjmehr’s fine manners and refined ways. When the emperor asked Buzurjmehr the purpose of his visit, he explained the matter in so courteous and refined a manner, that the emperor agreed to Naushervan’s marriage with his daughter with all his heart.

  He then ordered his subjects to commence the preparations for the princess’s departure forthwith, and no sooner were the preparations ordered than Mehr-Angez’s entourage was made ready.

  After a journey of many months, Buzurjmehr arrived near Persia safe and happy. A jubilant and exulting emperor and prince greeted the cavalcade. Imperial arrangements were then set afoot for the nuptials, and at a propitious hour Naushervan was married to Mehr-Angez.

  It is said that when the emperor gracefully broached with Buzurjmehr his heart’s desire to step down in Naushervan’s favor, Buzurjmehr replied, “You may vacate the throne for him after forty days have passed. Until then, give the prince into my power to do with him as I see fit, and have no one interfere in this matter!” The emperor acquiesced to Buzurjmehr’s wishes and gave him the powers he desired.

  Buzurjmehr ordered Naushervan to be shackled and consigned to the jail forthwith, where he remained for forty days. On the forty-first day, pulling a running Naushervan behind his steed, Buzurjmehr brought him to the royal palace and lashed his back with his whip three times so severely that Naushervan cried out from its violence. Then Buzurjmehr unsheathed his sword, and presenting it to Naushervan, lowered his neck and humbly said, “I deserve to be beheaded for this outrage, for such is the punishment for this contumely!” Putting his arms around Buzurjmehr’s neck, Naushervan violently embraced him, and said, “Khvaja! There must be some logic behind what you did, or else you would not have put me through this trial and suffered yourself at my pain!”

  According to Buzurjmehr’s advice, the emperor stepped down from the throne in Naushervan’s favor. But he enjoined Naushervan again and again before his coronation: “Do not take any step without first consulting Buzurjmehr, and do not heed Bakhtak at all or allow him to have any say in the state affairs, lest the empire slip into the hands of ruin and the sun of your prestige become clouded.”

  But when Qubad Kamran died two years later, Bakhtak gained influence in Naushervan’s court and rose to command great authority. There was no audacity or evil but that wretch had forced Naushervan’s hand to commit it, and at Bakhtak’s inciting the emperor let loose all manner of grief and injury on his subjects.

  One day a convict was brought before Naushervan on the charge of banditry. He was the chief of highway robbers and a most bloodthirsty and consummate rascal. Naushervan ordered him to be put to the sword. When the executioner arrived to drag him to the execution ground, the convict submitted: “I understand that I shall be killed and awarded my due punishment. But I have a wondrous gift and knowledge. If I were to be given forty days’ reprieve from death, and besides that grace period the emperor also were to allow me the pleasures of food, wine, and women, I shall impart that knowledge—after forty days have passed—to the one in whom Your Excellency reposes his trust. Then my life would be entirely at your disposal!” Naushervan asked, “What is this knowledge?” The convict replied, “I know the language of all beasts, but I am particularly versed in the speech of birds.”

  Granting him the desired reprieve, Naushervan put the convict under Buzurjmehr’s charge. Buzurjmehr provided him a mansion furnished with every last comfort and amenity that he desired. And there the convict lived in great luxury for forty days.

  On the forty-first day, Buzurjmehr said to the convict, “Now instruct me in the language of animals, as you promised.” The thief replied, “I am a complete stranger to all learning, and never crossed ways with any kind of knowledge. But, all praise to the bountiful God and His amazing ways, even His donkeys feast nobly! It was His will to save me from impending doom, and keep me in food and drink most wonderfully, and thus apportion these pleasures to my lot. I craved that luxury and by this ruse my longing was fulfilled. Now I am at your mercy, to be beheaded, lynched, or put to death in any which way you find seemly!”

  Buzurjmehr laughed heartily upon hearing his speech, and after securing a pledge from him that he would never again rob or steal, set the man free.

  One day Naushervan separated from his hunting party, with only Buzurjmehr and Bakhtak remaining by his side. They came upon two owls perched atop a tree hooting and screeching, and Naushervan asked Buzurjmehr, “What is it that they confer and argue about?” Buzurjmehr replied, “They are discussing the plans for their children’s wedding, and argue regarding the settlement. The boy’s parent says that he will not give his consent unless the girl’s parent agrees to give three wastelands in her daughter’s dowry. He says that only then would he let his son marry her; otherwise he will arrange for his son’s match elsewhere. The girl’s parent replies that if Naushervan were to live and continue in his cruel and audacious ways, he would give Naushervan’s whole empire, not just three wastelands, as a bridal gift.”

  Naushervan said, “Now our despotism has become so widespread that the word of our injustice and tyranny has reached even the animals!” Naushervan took warning from this. Upon his return he had a bell hung from the Court of Justice fitted out with a chain,17 and had it proclaimed throughout the country that any pet
itioner might ring the bell without having himself announced or being routed through mace bearers and functionaries. From that day forward Naushervan’s justice became legendary, and to this day he is remembered by the young and old as Naushervan the Just.

  But why go into these details! After many years the emperor was blessed with a daughter and two sons from Mehr-Angez. He named his daughter Mehr-Nigar, and his sons Hurmuz and Faramurz. They were raised in the imperial custom and their instruction and education was entrusted to Buzurjmehr’s care. Two sons were born to Buzurjmehr. He named the one Daryadil and the other Siyavush, and applied himself to their breeding and supervision. God also sent a son to Bakhtak, who named him Bakhtiarak.

  Storytellers relate that one night the emperor had a dream that a jackdaw came flying from the east and flew off with his crown; then a hawk appeared from the west and killed the jackdaw and restored the crown to his head. Naushervan woke up from the dream and in the morning narrated it to Buzurjmehr, then asked for its interpretation. Buzurjmehr said, “Toward the east there is a city called Khaibar. From those regions a prince by the name of Hashsham bin Alqamah Khaibari will rise against Your Highness. He will rout the imperial armies and claim Your Highness’s crown and throne. Then a youth named Hamza will come from the city of Mecca in the west. He will kill that villain and restore the crown and throne to Your Majesty.”

  Naushervan became jubilant upon hearing these words, and sent Buzurjmehr to Mecca to announce that when the boy was born he should be proclaimed the emperor’s protégé.

  Carrying numerous gifts, jewels, and riches, Khvaja Buzurjmehr repaired to Mecca to seek out that worthy boy, and went searching for signs of his birth in every house.

  OF BUZURJMEHR’S ARRIVAL IN MECCA AND SEARCHING FOR SIGNS OF HAMZA’S BIRTH, AND OF THE BIRTH OF HAMZA, MUOBIL, AND AMAR

  The gazetteers of miscellanies, tale-bearers of varied annals, the enlightened in the ethereal realms of legend writing, and reckoners of the subtle issues of eloquence thus gallop the noble steed of the pen through the field of composition, and spur on the delightful tale. Arriving near Mecca (the hallowed!) Khvaja Buzurjmehr sent a missive to Khvaja Abdul Muttalib, chieftain of the Banu Hashim tribe, which read: “This humble servant has come on a pilgrimage to Mecca. He hopes to enjoy your audience, and awaits permission to partake of your hospitality.”

  Khvaja Abdul Muttalib was most pleased to read Buzurjmehr’s communiqué, and proceeded, together with all the nobles of Mecca, to welcome Buzurjmehr. Buzurjmehr first went with Khvaja Abdul Muttalib to pay homage to Kaaba.18 Then he greeted the elite of Mecca with great propriety, and conferred riches and gold pieces on every last one of them.

  Sending for the town crier, Buzurjmehr had it announced that the next boy born from that date would be raised in the service of the emperor of Persia; and that as soon as he was born, his parents should bring him to the vizier, that he may be named and bequeathed his legacy from the emperor.

  Some fifteen or twenty days had passed since Buzurjmehr’s arrival in Mecca, when on one of his visits, Khvaja Abdul Muttalib said to the vizier, “The Eternal God conferred upon me a firstborn, yesterday!”

  Buzurjmehr immediately had the boy brought to him, and discovered that it was the selfsame boy destined to exact tribute from the emperors of the Seven Climes and humble all the great and mighty on Earth and on Mount Qaf.19 Buzurjmehr kissed the child’s forehead and named him Hamza, and congratulated Khvaja Abdul Muttalib most warmly.

  Khvaja Abdul Muttalib was going to offer sherbet to the assembly according to the Arabian custom when Buzurjmehr said, “Wait a while! Let two others arrive, whose boys shall be your son’s companions and peers.” Even as Buzurjmehr spoke, Abdul Muttalib’s slave Basheer brought in an infant, and said to his master: “Your slave has also been blessed with a son!” Buzurjmehr named the boy Muqbil Vafadar, and conferred a purse of one thousand gold pieces on Basheer, prophesying, “This boy will be an accomplished archer!”

  As Basheer was returning home after seeing Buzurjmehr, he crossed paths with the cameleer, Umayya Zamiri and gave him all the details. Then Umayya went home all excited and happy, and narrated the whole episode to his wife. He said to her, “You keep telling me you are with child; now quickly bear me a son that we may take him to receive gold pieces, and begin a life of luxury.”

  His wife said to him, “Are you mad? I am hardly into my seventh month! Heaven forfend I bear the child now!” Umayya said, “Just begin straining and I am sure the boy will drop! We need him hatched between today and tomorrow. Plenty of good it will do me if he is born two months from now!”

  His wife, who had worked herself into a rage, shouted, “The brains of this wretch have gone woolgathering! How wantonly he forces me into labor!”

  In a fit of rage, Umayya kicked her in the abdomen with such violence that she fell to the floor. The boy burst out of the womb from the impact, and the woman’s spasms ended soon afterward.

  Umayya quickly wrapped up the infant in the sleeves of his coat, took him to Buzurjmehr, and declared, “Propitious fortune has smiled at your slave and blessed him with a son! I have brought him here to present before you.” Khvaja Buzurjmehr laughed when he looked at the boy’s face, and remarked, “This boy will be the prince of all tricksters, unsurpassed in cunning, guile, and deceit. Great and mighty kings and champions of the order of Rustam and Nariman will tremble at his mention and soil their pants from fright upon hearing his name. He will take hundreds, nay, thousands of castles all by himself, and will rout great armies all alone. He will be excessively greedy, most insidious, and a consummate perjurer. He will be cruel, tyrannical, and coldhearted, yet he shall prove a trustworthy friend and confidant to Hamza!”

  After speaking, Buzurjmehr took him into his arms, and the boy fell to screaming and yelping lustily. To quiet him Buzurjmehr gave him his finger to suck. The boy slipped off the ring from Buzurjmehr’s finger into his mouth and fell silent. When Buzurjmehr noticed the ring missing from his finger, he searched the pockets of his robe and, not finding it there, remained purposely quiet. When sherbet was brought for everyone, Buzurjmehr put a few drops in the infant’s mouth, too, and as he opened his mouth the ring fell out of it. Buzurjmehr picked it up, and remarked jestingly to Khvaja Abdul Muttalib, “This is his first theft, and he has chosen me as his first victim!”

  Then Buzurjmehr said, “I name him Amar bil Fatah!” Thereupon he conferred two chests of gold pieces on Umayya, and enjoined him to raise the boy with every care. Umayya first secured the chests of gold coins, then said, “How can I raise him? How does Your Honor propose that I care for him, when his mother died in childbirth!” Buzurjmehr said to Khvaja Abdul Muttalib, “Hamza’s mother died in childbirth too, as did the mothers of these two boys here. It would be best that all three of them stay under your roof. Presently, there shall arrive at your door Aadiya Bano, the mother of Aadi Madi-Karib, whom Prophet Ibrahim has converted to the True Faith in the realm of dreams and sent here to be Hamza’s wet nurse. Go forth to greet her and let her nurse Hamza on her right breast, and Muqbil and Amar on her left.”

  Following Buzurjmehr’s advice, Khvaja Abdul Muttalib gave the three boys into her care and appointed her their wet nurse.

  When six days had passed after Hamza’s birth and he had been bathed, Buzurjmehr said to Khvaja Abdul Muttalib, “Come morning, have Hamza’s cradle removed to the roof of your house and do not despair if it goes missing! The inhabited part of the earth is bounded on all sides by a great sea beside which lies Mount Qaf, the domain of the dormant folk and the jinn, peris, devs, ghols, Shutar-pas, Gao-sars, Gosh-fils, Nim-tans, tasma-pas, Ghur-munhas, and others. The emperor of those dominions is Shahpal bin Shahrukh. His vizier, Abdur Rahman, will send for Hamza’s cradle for his emperor, and have it returned after seven days. Many advantages will be gained from this.” Then Buzurjmehr took his leave and returned to his encampment, and Khvaja Abdul Muttalib began biding his time in anticipation of the augured moment.

  HAMZ
A’S CRADLE IS CARRIED OFF TO MOUNT QAF, AND THAT SUN OF EXCELLENCE SHINES ON THE MOUNT OF BRILLIANCE

  The zephyr-paced sojourner, the stylus of fascinating accounts of the expert chroniclers, and the flying arrowhead—to wit, the pen that must detail the messages of intelligencers—also records a few words concerning events on Mount Qaf, and regales those enamored of fables and legends of the past with some choice phrases from this wondrous tale.

  One day the sovereign lord and potentate of Mount Qaf, Shahpal bin Shahrukh, was giving audience on King Suleiman’s throne. The monarchs who ruled the eighteen realms of Mount Qaf were receiving royal audience, when the porter of the harem presented himself, and communicated the propitious tidings that a princess, like the Sun in beauty, and in nature the like of Jupiter, had risen forth to shine over the emperor’s house by gracing the cradle from her mother’s womb.

  Emperor Shahpal turned to his vizier, Abdur Rahman—a most eminent jinn who had seen the court of Suleiman and served there, and was a past master of all sciences—and asked him to name the girl and cast her horoscope to see what it foretold. As per his sovereign’s wishes, Abdur Rahman named the girl Aasman Peri. Throwing dice, casting the horoscope, relating the shapes together, and rejoicing greatly at what he had deciphered, he conveyed the news to Emperor Shahpal: “My felicitations to Your Honor! This girl will rule the eighteen realms of Mount Qaf. But eighteen years from this day, the mighty jinns shall rise as a body in rebellion. In those days a human will come from the inhabited quarters of the Earth, and will rout those rebels and conquer the occupied countries by his might and return them to Your Majesty’s rule!”