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(a. Resumed account of Bābur’s second attempt on Samarkand.)

When we had dismounted in the Qulba (Plough) meadow,329 behind the Bāgh-i-maidān (Garden of the plain), the Samarkandīs came out in great numbers to near Muḥammad Chap’s Bridge. Our men were unprepared; and before they were ready, Bābā ‘Alī’s (son) Bābā Qulī had been unhorsed and taken into the fort. A few days later we moved to the top of Qulba, at the back of Kohik.330 That day Sayyid Yūsuf,331 having been sent out of the town, came to our camp and did me obeisance.

The Samarkandīs, fancying that our move from the one ground to the other meant, ‘He has given it up,’ came out, soldiers and townsmen in alliance (through the Turquoise Gate), as far as the Mīrzā’s Bridge and, through the Shaikh-zāda’s Gate, as far as Muḥammad Chap’s. We ordered our braves to arm and ride out; they were strongly attacked from both sides, from Muḥammad Chap’s Bridge and from the Mīrzā’s, but God brought it right! our foes were beaten. Begs of the best and the boldest of braves our men unhorsed and brought in. Amongst them Ḥāfiẓ Dūldāī’s (son) Muḥammad Mīskin332 was taken, after his index-finger had been struck off; Muḥammad Qāsim Nabīra also was unhorsed and brought in by his own younger brother, Ḥasan Nabīra.333 There were many other such soldiers and known men. Of the town-rabble, were brought in Diwāna, the tunic-weaver and Kālqāshūq,334 headlong leaders both, in brawl and tumult; they were ordered to death with torture in blood-retaliation for our foot-soldiers, killed at the Lovers’ Cave.335 This was a complete reverse for the Samarkandīs; they came out no more even when our men used to go to the very edge of the ditch and bring back their slaves and slave-women.

The Sun entered the Balance and cold descended on us.336 I therefore summoned the begs admitted to counsel and it was decided, after discussion, that although the towns-people were so enfeebled that, by God’s grace, we should take Samarkand, it might be to-day, it might be to-morrow, still, rather than suffer from cold in the open, we ought to rise from near it and go for winter-quarters into some fort, and that, even if we had to leave those quarters later on, this would be done without further trouble. As Khwāja Dīdār seemed a suitable fort, we marched there and having dismounted in the meadow lying before it, went in, fixed on sites for the winter-houses and covered shelters,337 left overseers and inspectors of the work and returned to our camp in the meadow. There we lay during the few days before the winter-houses were finished.

Meantime Bāī-sunghar Mīrzā had sent again and again to ask help from Shaibānī Khān. On the morning of the very day on which, our quarters being ready, we had moved into Khwāja Dīdār, the Khān, having ridden light from Turkistān, stood over against our camping-ground. Our men were not all at hand; some, for winter-quarters, had gone to Khwāja Rabāt̤ī, some to Kabud, some to Shīrāz. None-the-less, we formed up those there were and rode out. Shaibānī Khān made no stand but drew off towards Samarkand. He went right up to the fort but because the affair had not gone as

Bāī-sunghar Mīrzā wished, did not get a good reception. He therefore turned back for Turkistān a few days later, in disappointment, with nothing done.

Bāī-sunghar Mīrzā had sustained a seven months’ siege; his one hope had been in Shaibānī Khān; this he had lost and he now with 2 or 300 of his hungry suite, drew off from Samarkand, for Khusrau Shāh in Qūndūz.

When he was near Tīrmīẕ, at the Amū ferry, the Governor of Tīrmīẕ, Sayyid Ḥusain Akbar, kinsman and confidant both of Sl. Mas‘ūd Mīrzā, heard of him and went out against him. The Mīrzā himself got across the river but Mīrīm Tarkhān was drowned and all the rest of his people were captured, together with his baggage and the camels loaded with his personal effects; even his page, Muḥammad T̤āhir, falling into Sayyid Ḥusain Akbar’s hands. Khusrau Shāh, for his part, looked kindly on the Mīrzā.

When the news of his departure reached us, we got to horse and started from Khwāja Dīdār for Samarkand. To give us honourable meeting on the road, were nobles and braves, one after another. It was on one of the last ten days of the first Rabī‘ (end of November 1497 AD.), that we entered the citadel and dismounted at the Bū-stān Sarāī. Thus, by God’s favour, were the town and the country of Samarkand taken and occupied.

(b. Description of Samarkand.)338

Few towns in the whole habitable world are so pleasant as Samarkand. It is of the Fifth Climate and situated in lat. 40° 6’ and long. 99°.339 The name of the town is Samarkand; its country people used to call Mā warā’u’n-nahr (Transoxania).

They used to call it Baldat-i-maḥfūẓa because no foe laid hands on it with storm and sack.340 It must have become341 Musalmān in the time of the Commander of the Faithful, his Highness ‘Usmān. Qus̤am ibn ‘Abbās, one of the Companions342 must have gone there; his burial-place, known as the Tomb of Shāh-i-zinda (The Living Shāh, i. e., Fāqīr) is outside the Iron Gate. Iskandar must have founded Samarkand. The Turk and Mughūl hordes call it Sīmīz-kīnt.343 Tīmūr Beg made it his capital; no ruler so great will ever have made it a capital before (qīlghān aīmās dūr). I ordered people to pace round the ramparts of the walled-town; it came out at 10,000 steps.344 Samarkandīs are all orthodox (sunnī), pure-in-the Faith, law-abiding and religious. The number of Leaders of Islām said to have arisen in Mā warā’u’n-nahr, since the days of his Highness the Prophet, are not known to have arisen in any other country.345 From the Mātarīd suburb of Samarkand came Shaikh Abū’l-manṣūr, one of the Expositors of the Word.346 Of the two sects of Expositors, the Mātarīdiyah and the Ash‘ariyah,347 the first is named from this Shaikh Abū’l-manṣūr. Of Mā warā’u’n-nahr also was Khwāja Ismā‘īl Khartank, the author of the Ṣāḥiḥ-i-bukhārī.348 From the Farghāna district, Marghīnān – Farghāna, though at the limit of settled habitation, is included in Mā warā’u’n-nahr, – came the author of the Hidāyat,349 a book than which few on Jurisprudence are more honoured in the sect of Abū Ḥanīfa.

On the east of Samarkand are Farghāna and Kāshghar; on the west, Bukhārā and Khwārizm; on the north, Tāshkīnt and Shāhrukhiya, – in books written Shāsh and Banākat; and on the south, Balkh and Tīrmīẕ.

The Kohik Water flows along the north of Samarkand, at the distance of some 4 miles (2 kuroh); it is so-called because it comes out from under the upland of the Little Hill (Kohik)350 lying between it and the town. The Dar-i-gham Water (canal) flows along the south, at the distance of some two miles (1 sharī‘). This is a large and swift torrent,351 indeed it is like a large river, cut off from the Kohik Water. All the gardens and suburbs and some of the tūmāns of Samarkand are cultivated by it. By the Kohik Water a stretch of from 30 to 40 yīghāch,352 by road, is made habitable and cultivated, as far as Bukhārā and Qarā-kūl. Large as the river is, it is not too large for its dwellings and its culture; during three or four months of the year, indeed, its waters do not reach Bukhārā.353 Grapes, melons, apples and pomegranates, all fruits indeed, are good in Samarkand; two are famous, its apple and its ṣāḥibī (grape).354 Its winter is mightily cold; snow falls but not so much as in Kābul; in the heats its climate is good but not so good as Kābul’s.

In the town and suburbs of Samarkand are many fine buildings and gardens of Tīmur Beg and Aūlūgh Beg Mīrzā.355

In the citadel,356 Tīmūr Beg erected a very fine building, the great four-storeyed kiosque, known as the Gūk Sarāī.357 In the walled-town, again, near the Iron Gate, he built a Friday Mosque358 of stone (sangīn); on this worked many stone-cutters, brought from Hindūstān. Round its frontal arch is inscribed in letters large enough to be read two miles away, the Qu’rān verse, Wa az yerfa‘ Ibrāhīm al Qawā‘id alī akhara.359 This also is a very fine building. Again, he laid out two gardens, on the east of the town, one, the more distant, the Bāgh-i-bulandī,360 the other and nearer, the Bāgh-i-dilkushā.361 From Dilkushā to the Turquoise Gate, he planted an Avenue of White Poplar,362 and in the garden itself erected a great kiosque, painted inside with pictures of his battles in Hindūstān. He made another garden, known as the Naqsh-i-jahān (World’s Picture), on the skirt of Kohik, above the Qarā-sū or, as people also call it, the Āb-i-raḥmat (Water-of-mercy) of Kān-i-gil.363 It had gone to ruin when I saw it, nothing remaining of it except its name. His also are the Bāgh-i-chanār,364 near the walls and below the town on the south,365 also the Bāgh-i-shamāl (North Garden) and the Bāgh-i-bihisht (Garden of Paradise). His own tomb and those of his descendants who have ruled in Samarkand, are in a College, built at the exit (chāqār) of the walled-town, by Muḥammad Sult̤ān Mīrzā, the son of Tīmūr Beg’s son, Jahāngīr Mīrzā.366

Amongst Aūlūgh Beg Mīrzā’s buildings inside the town are a College and a monastery (Khānqāh). The dome of the monastery is very large, few so large are shown in the world. Near these two buildings, he constructed an excellent Hot Bath (ḥammām) known as the Mīrzā’s Bath; he had the pavements in this made of all sorts of stone (? mosaic); such another bath is not known in Khurāsān or in Samarkand.367 Again; – to the south of the College is his mosque, known as the Masjid-i-maqat̤a‘ (Carved Mosque) because its ceiling and its walls are all covered with islīmī368 and Chinese pictures formed of segments of wood.369 There is great discrepancy between the qibla of this mosque and that of the College; that of the mosque seems to have been fixed by astronomical observation.

Another of Aūlūgh Beg Mīrzā’s fine buildings is an observatory, that is, an instrument for writing Astronomical Tables.370 This stands three storeys high, on the skirt of the Kohik upland. By its means the Mīrzā worked out the Kūrkānī Tables, now used all over the world. Less work is done with any others. Before these were made, people used the Aīl-khānī Tables, put together at Marāgha, by Khwāja Naṣīr Tūsī,371 in the time of Hulākū Khān. Hulākū Khān it is, people call Aīl-khānī.372

(Author’s note.) Not more than seven or eight observatories seem to have been constructed in the world. Māmūm Khalīfa373 (Caliph) made one with which the Mamūmī Tables were written. Batalmūs (Ptolemy) constructed another. Another was made, in Hindūstān, in the time of Rājā Vikramāditya Hīndū, in Ujjain and Dhar, that is, the Mālwa country, now known as Māndū. The Hindūs of Hindūstān use the Tables of this Observatory. They were put together 1,584 years ago.374 Compared with others, they are somewhat defective.

Aūlūgh Beg Mīrzā again, made the garden known as the Bāgh-i-maidān (Garden of the Plain), on the skirt of the Kohik upland. In the middle of it he erected a fine building they call Chihil Sitūn (Forty Pillars). On both storeys are pillars, all of stone (tāshdīn).375 Four turrets, like minarets, stand on its four corner-towers, the way up into them being through the towers. Everywhere there are stone pillars, some fluted, some twisted, some many-sided. On the four sides of the upper storey are open galleries enclosing a four-doored hall (chār-dara); their pillars also are all of stone. The raised floor of the building is all paved with stone.

He made a smaller garden, out beyond Chihil Sitūn and towards Kohik, also having a building in it. In the open gallery of this building he placed a great stone throne, some 14 or 15 yards (qārī) long, some 8 yards wide and perhaps 1 yard high. They brought a stone so large by a very long road.376 There is a crack in the middle of it which people say must have come after it was brought here. In the same garden he also built a four-doored hall, know as the Chīnī-khāna (Porcelain House) because its īzāra377 are all of porcelain; he sent to China for the porcelain used in it. Inside the walls again, is an old building of his, known as the Masjid-i-laqlaqa (Mosque of the Echo). If anyone stamps on the ground under the middle of the dome of this mosque, the sound echoes back from the whole dome; it is a curious matter of which none know the secret.

In the time also of Sl. Aḥmad Mīrzā the great and lesser begs laid out many gardens, large and small.378 For beauty, and air, and view, few will have equalled Darwesh Muḥammad Tarkhān’s Chār-bāgh (Four Gardens).379 It lies overlooking the whole of Qulba Meadow, on the slope below the Bāgh-i-maidān. Moreover it is arranged symmetrically, terrace above terrace, and is planted with beautiful nārwān380 and cypresses and white poplar. A most agreeable sojourning place, its one defect is the want of a large stream.

Samarkand is a wonderfully beautified town. One of its specialities, perhaps found in few other places,381 is that the different trades are not mixed up together in it but each has its own bāzār, a good sort of plan. Its bakers and its cooks are good. The best paper in the world is made there; the water for the paper-mortars382 all comes from Kān-i-gil,383 a meadow on the banks of the Qarā-sū (Blackwater) or Āb-i-raḥmat (Water of Mercy). Another article of Samarkand trade, carried to all sides and quarters, is cramoisy velvet.

Excellent meadows lie round Samarkand. One is the famous Kān-i-gil, some 2 miles east and a little north of the town. The Qarā-sū or Āb-i-raḥmat flows through it, a stream (with driving power) for perhaps seven or eight mills. Some say the original name of the meadow must have been Kān-i-ābgīr (Mine of Quagmire) because the river is bordered by quagmire, but the histories all write Kān-i-gil (Mine of clay). It is an excellent meadow. The Samarkand sult̤ans always made it their reserve,384 going out to camp in it each year for a month or two.

Higher up (on the river) than Kān-i-gil and to the s.e. of it is a meadow some 4 miles east of the town, known as Khān Yūrtī (Khān’s Camping-ground). The Qarā-sū flows through this meadow before entering Kān-i-gil. When it comes to Khān Yūrtī it curves back so far that it encloses, with a very narrow outlet, enough ground for a camp. Having noticed these advantages, we camped there for a time during the siege of Samarkand.385

Another meadow is the Būdana Qūrūgh (Quail Reserve), lying between Dil-kushā and the town. Another is the Kūl-i-maghāk (Meadow of the deep pool) at some 4 miles from the town. This also is a round386 meadow. People call it Kul-i-maghāk meadow because there is a large pool on one side of it. Sl. ‘Alī Mīrzā lay here during the siege, when I was in Khān Yūrtī. Another and smaller meadow is Qulba (Plough); it has Qulba Village and the Kohik Water on the north, the Bāgh-i-maidān and Darwesh Muḥammad Tarkhān’s Chār-bāgh on the south, and the Kohik upland on the west.

Samarkand has good districts and tūmāns. Its largest district, and one that is its equal, is Bukhārā, 25 yīghāch387 to the west. Bukhārā in its turn, has several tūmāns; it is a fine town; its fruits are many and good, its melons excellent; none in Mā warā’u’n-nahr matching them for quality and quantity. Although the Mīr Tīmūrī melon of Akhsī388 is sweeter and more delicate than any Bukhārā melon, still in Bukhārā many kinds of melon are good and plentiful. The Bukhārā plum is famous; no other equals it. They skin it,389 dry it and carry it from land to land with rarities (tabarrūklār bīla); it is an excellent laxative medicine. Fowls and geese are much looked after (parwārī) in Bukhārā. Bukhārā wine is the strongest made in Mā warā’u’n-nahr; it was what I drank when drinking in those countries at Samarkand.390

Kesh is another district of Samarkand, 9 yīghāch391 by road to the south of the town. A range called the Aītmāk Pass (Dābān)392 lies between Samarkand and Kesh; from this are taken all the stones for building. Kesh is called also Shahr-i-sabz (Green-town) because its barren waste (ṣahr) and roofs and walls become beautifully green in spring. As it was Tīmūr Beg’s birth-place, he tried hard to make it his capital. He erected noble buildings in it. To seat his own Court, he built a great arched hall and in this seated his Commander-begs and his Dīwān-begs, on his right and on his left. For those attending the Court, he built two smaller halls, and to seat petitioners to his Court, built quite small recesses on the four sides of the Court-house.393 Few arches so fine can be shown in the world. It is said to be higher than the Kisrī Arch.394 Tīmūr Beg also built in Kesh a college and a mausoleum, in which are the tombs of Jahāngīr Mīrzā and others of his descendants.395 As Kesh did not offer the same facilities as Samarkand for becoming a town and a capital, he at last made clear choice of Samarkand.

Another district is Qarshī, known also as Nashaf and Nakhshab.396 Qarshī is a Mughūl name. In the Mughūl tongue they call a kūr-khāna Qarshī.397 The name must have come in after the rule of Chīngīz Khān. Qarshī is somewhat scantily supplied with water; in spring it is very beautiful and its grain and melons are good. It lies 18 yīghāch398 by road south and a little inclined to west of Samarkand. In the district a small bird, known as the qīl-qūyīrūgh and resembling the bāghrī qarā, is found in such countless numbers that it goes by the name of the Qarshī birdie (murghak).399

Khozār is another district; Karmīna another, lying between Samarkand and Bukhārā; Qarā-kūl another, 7 yīghāch400 n.w. of Bukhārā and at the furthest limit of the water.

Samarkand has good tūmāns. One is Soghd with its dependencies. Its head Yār-yīlāq, its foot Bukhārā, there may be not one single yīghāch of earth without its village and its cultivated lands. So famous is it that the saying attributed to Tīmūr Beg, ‘I have a garden 30 yīghāch long,401 must have been spoken of Soghd. Another tūmān is Shāvdār (var. Shādwār), an excellent one adjoining the town-suburbs. On one side it has the range (Aītmāk Dābān), lying between Samarkand and Shahr-i-sabz, on the skirts of which are many of its villages. On the other side is the Kohik Water (i. e. the Dar-i-gham canal). There it lies! an excellent tūmān, with fine air, full of beauty, abounding in waters, its good things cheap. Observers of Egypt and Syria have not pointed out its match.

Though Samarkand has other tūmāns, none rank with those enumerated; with so much, enough has been said.

Tīmūr Beg gave the government of Samarkand to his eldest son, Jahāngīr Mīrzā (in 776 AH. -1375 AD.); when Jahāngīr Mīrzā died (805 AH. -1403 AD.), he gave it to the Mīrzā’s eldest son, Muḥammad Sult̤ān-i-jahāngīr; when Muḥammad Sult̤ān Mīrzā died, it went to Shāh-rukh Mīrzā, Tīmūr Beg’s youngest son. Shāh-rukh Mīrzā gave the whole of Mā warā’u’n-nahr (in 872 AH. -1467 AD.) to his eldest son, Aūlūgh Beg Mīrzā. From him his own son, ‘Abdu’l-lat̤īf Mīrzā took it, (853 AH. -1449 AD.), for the sake of this five days’ fleeting world martyring a father so full of years and knowledge.

The following chronogram gives the date of Aūlūgh Beg Mīrzā’s death: —

Though ‘Abdu’l-lat̤īf Mīrzā did not rule more than five or six months, the following couplet was current about him: —

This chronogram of the death of ‘Abdu’l-lat̤īf Mīrzā is also well done: —

After ‘Abdu’l-lat̤īf Mīrzā’s death, (Jumāda I, 22, 855 AH. – June 22nd. 1450 AD.), (his cousin) ‘Abdu’l-lāh Mīrzā, the grandson of Shāh-rukh Mīrzā through Ibrāhīm Mīrzā, seated himself on the throne and ruled for 18 months to two years.405 From him Sl. Abū-sa‘īd Mīrzā took it (855 AH. -1451 AD.). He in his life-time gave it to his eldest son, Sl. Aḥmad Mīrzā; Sl. Aḥmad Mīrzā continued to rule it after his father’s death (873 AH. -1469 AD.). On his death (899 AH. -1494 AD.) Sl. Maḥmūd Mīrzā was seated on the throne and on his death (900 AH. -1495 AD.) Bāī-sunghar Mīrzā. Bāī-sunghar Mīrzā was made prisoner for a few days, during the Tarkhān rebellion (901 AH. -1496 AD.), and his younger brother, Sl. ‘Alī Mīrzā was seated on the throne, but Bāī-sunghar Mīrzā, as has been related in this history, took it again directly. From Bāī-sunghar Mīrzā I took it (903 AH. -1497 AD.). Further details will be learned from the ensuing history.

(c. Bābur’s rule in Samarkand.)

When I was seated on the throne, I shewed the Samarkand begs precisely the same favour and kindness they had had before. I bestowed rank and favour also on the begs with me, to each according to his circumstances, the largest share falling to Sl. Aḥmad Taṃbal; he had been in the household begs’ circle; I now raised him to that of the great begs.

We had taken the town after a seven months’ hard siege. Things of one sort or other fell to our men when we got in. The whole country, with exception of Samarkand itself, had come in earlier either to me or to Sl. ‘Alī Mīrzā and consequently had not been over-run. In any case however, what could have been taken from districts so long subjected to raid and rapine? The booty our men had taken, such as it was, came to an end. When we entered the town, it was in such distress that it needed seed-corn and money-advances; what place was this to take anything from? On these accounts our men suffered great privation. We ourselves could give them nothing. Moreover they yearned for their homes and, by ones and twos, set their faces for flight. The first to go was Bayān Qulī’s (son) Khān Qulī; Ibrāhīm Begchīk was another; all the Mughūls went off and, a little later, Sl. Aḥmad Taṃbal.

Aūzūn Ḥasan counted himself a very sincere and faithful friend of Khwāja-i-qāẓī; we therefore, to put a stop to these desertions, sent the Khwāja to him (in Andijān) so that they, in agreement, might punish some of the deserters and send others back to us. But that very Aūzūn Ḥasan, that traitor to his salt, may have been the stirrer-up of the whole trouble and the spur-to-evil of the deserters from Samarkand. Directly Sl. Aḥmad Taṃbal had gone, all the rest took up a wrong position.

(d. Andijān demanded of Bābur by The Khān, and also for Jahāngīr Mīrzā.)

Although, during the years in which, coveting Samarkand, I had persistently led my army out, Sl. Maḥmūd Khān406 had provided me with no help whatever, yet, now it had been taken, he wanted Andijān. Moreover, Aūzūn Ḥasan and Sl. Aḥmad Taṃbal, just when soldiers of ours and all the Mughūls had deserted to Andijān and Akhsī, wanted those two districts for Jahāngīr Mīrzā. For several reasons, those districts could not be given to them. One was, that though not promised to The Khān, yet he had asked for them and, as he persisted in asking, an agreement with him was necessary, if they were to be given to Jahāngīr Mīrzā. A further reason was that to ask for them just when deserters from us had fled to them, was very like a command. If the matter had been brought forward earlier, some way of tolerating a command might have been found. At the moment, as the Mughūls and the Andijān army and several even of my household had gone to Andijān, I had with me in Samarkand, beg for beg, good and bad, somewhere about 1000 men.

When Aūzūn Ḥasan and Sl. Aḥmad Taṃbal did not get what they wanted, they invited all those timid fugitives to join them. Just such a happening, those timid people, for their own sakes, had been asking of God in their terror. Hereupon, Aūzūn Ḥasan and Sl. Aḥmad Taṃbal, becoming openly hostile and rebellious, led their army from Akhsī against Andijān.

Tūlūn Khwāja was a bold, dashing, eager brave of the Bārīn (Mughūls). My father had favoured him and he was still in favour, I myself having raised him to the rank of beg. In truth he deserved favour, a wonderfully bold and dashing brave! He, as being the man I favoured amongst the Mughūls, was sent (after them) when they began to desert from Samarkand, to counsel the clans and to chase fear from their hearts so that they might not turn their heads to the wind.407 Those two traitors however, those false guides, had so wrought on the clans that nothing availed, promise or entreaty, counsel or threat. Tūlūn Khwāja’s march lay through Aīkī-sū-ārāsī,408 known also as Rabāt̤ik-aūrchīnī. Aūzūn Ḥasan sent a skirmishing party against him; it found him off his guard, seized and killed him. This done, they took Jahāngīr Mīrzā and went to besiege Andijān.

(e. Bābur loses Andijān.)

In Andijān when my army rode out for Samarkand, I had left Aūzūn Ḥasan and ‘Alī-dost T̤aghāī (Ramẓān 902 AH. – May 1497 AD.). Khwāja-i-qāẓī had gone there later on, and there too were many of my men from Samarkand. During the siege, the Khwāja, out of good-will to me, apportioned 18,000 of his own sheep to the garrison and to the families of the men still with me. While the siege was going on, letters kept coming to me from my mothers409 and from the Khwāja, saying in effect, ‘They are besieging us in this way; if at our cry of distress you do not come, things will go all to ruin. Samarkand was taken by the strength of Andijān; if Andijān is in your hands, God willing, Samarkand can be had again.’ One after another came letters to this purport. Just then I was recovering from illness but, not having been able to take due care in the days of convalescence, I went all to pieces again and this time, became so very ill that for four days my speech was impeded and they used to drop water into my mouth with cotton. Those with me, begs and bare braves alike, despairing of my life, began each to take thought for himself. While I was in this condition, the begs, by an error of judgment, shewed me to a servant of Aūzūn Ḥasan’s, a messenger come with wild proposals, and then dismissed him. In four or five days, I became somewhat better but still could not speak, in another few days, was myself again.

Such letters! so anxious, so beseeching, coming from my mothers, that is from my own and hers, Aīsān-daulat Begīm, and from my teacher and spiritual guide, that is, Khwāja-i-maulānā-i-qāẓī, with what heart would a man not move? We left Samarkand for Andijān on a Saturday in Rajab (Feb. – March), when I had ruled 100 days in the town. It was Saturday again when we reached Khujand and on that day a person brought news from Andijān, that seven days before, that is on the very day we had left Samarkand, ‘Alī-dost T̤aghāī had surrendered Andijān.

These are the particulars; – The servant of Aūzūn Ḥasan who, after seeing me, was allowed to leave, had gone to Andijān and there said, ‘The pādshāh cannot speak and they are dropping water into his mouth with cotton.’ Having gone and made these assertions in the ordinary way, he took oath in ‘Alī-dost T̤aghāī’s presence. ‘Alī-dost T̤aghāī was in the Khākān Gate. Becoming without footing through this matter, he invited the opposite party into the fort, made covenant and treaty with them, and surrendered Andijān. Of provisions and of fighting men, there was no lack whatever; the starting point of the surrender was the cowardice of that false and faithless manikin; what was told him, he made a pretext to put himself in the right.

When the enemy, after taking possession of Andijān, heard of my arrival in Khujand, they martyred Khwāja-i-maulānā-i-qāẓī by hanging him, with dishonour, in the Gate of the citadel. He had come to be known as Khwāja-maulānā-i-qāẓī but his own name was ‘Abdu’l-lāh. On his father’s side, his line went back to Shaikh Burhānu’d-dīn ‘Alī Qīlīch, on his mother’s to Sl. Aīlīk Māẓī. This family had come to be the Religious Guides (muqtadā) and pontiff (Shaikhu’l-islām) and Judge (qāẓī) in the Farghāna country.410 He was a disciple of his Highness ‘Ubaidu’l-lāh (Aḥrārī) and from him had his upbringing. I have no doubt he was a saint (walī); what better witnesses to his sanctity than the fact that within a short time, no sign or trace remained of those active for his death? He was a wonderful man; it was not in him to be afraid; in no other man was seen such courage as his. This quality is a further witness to his sanctity. Other men, however bold, have anxieties and tremours; he had none. When they had killed him, they seized and plundered those connected with him, retainers and servants, tribesmen and followers.

In anxiety for Andijān, we had given Samarkand out of our hands; then heard we had lost Andijān. It was like the saying, ‘In ignorance, made to leave this place, shut out from that’ (Ghafil az īn jā rānda, az ān jā mānda). It was very hard and vexing to me; for why? never since I had ruled, had I been cut off like this from my retainers and my country; never since I had known myself, had I known such annoyance and such hardship.

(f. Bābur’s action from Khujand as his base.)

On our arrival in Khujand, certain hypocrites, not enduring to see Khalīfa in my Gate, had so wrought on Muḥammad Ḥusain Mīrzā Dūghlāt and others that he was dismissed towards Tāshkīnt. To Tāshkīnt also Qāsim Beg Qūchīn had been sent earlier, in order to ask The Khān’s help for a move on Andijān. The Khān consented to give it and came himself by way of the Ahangarān Dale,411 to the foot of the Kīndīrlīk Pass.412 There I went also, from Khujand, and saw my Khān dādā.413 We then crossed the pass and halted on the Akhsī side. The enemy for their part, gathered their men and went to Akhsī.

Just at that time, the people in Pāp414 sent me word they had made fast the fort but, owing to something misleading in The Khān’s advance, the enemy stormed and took it. Though The Khān had other good qualities and was in other ways businesslike, he was much without merit as a soldier and commander. Just when matters were at the point that if he made one more march, it was most probable the country would be had without fighting, at such a time! he gave ear to what the enemy said with alloy of deceit, spoke of peace and, as his messengers, sent them Khwāja Abū’l-makāram and his own Lord of the Gate, Beg Tilba (Fool), Taṃbal’s elder brother. To save themselves those others (i. e. Ḥasan and Taṃbal) mixed something true with what they fabled and agreed to give gifts and bribes either to The Khān or to his intermediaries. With this, The Khān retired.

As the families of most of my begs and household and braves were in Andijān, 7 or 800 of the great and lesser begs and bare braves, left us in despair of our taking the place. Of the begs were ‘Alī-darwesh Beg, ‘Alī-mazīd Qūchīn, Muḥammad Bāqir Beg, Shaikh ‘Abdu’l-lāh, Lord of the Gate and Mīrīm Lāgharī. Of men choosing exile and hardship with me, there may have been, of good and bad, between 200 and 300. Of begs there were Qāsim Qūchīn Beg, Wais Lāgharī Beg, Ibrāhīm Sārū Mīnglīgh Beg, Shīrīm T̤aghāī, Sayyidī Qarā Beg; and of my household, Mīr Shāh Qūchīn, Sayyid Qāsim Jalāīr, Lord of the Gate, Qāsim-‘ajab, ‘Alī-dost T̤aghāī’s (son) Muḥammad-dost, Muḥammad-‘alī Mubashir,415 Khudāī-bīrdī Tūghchī Mughūl, Yārīk T̤aghāī, Bābā ‘Alī’s (son) Bābā Qulī, Pīr Wais, Shaikh Wais, Yār-‘alī Balāl,416 Qāsim Mīr Akhwūr (Chief Equerry) and Ḥaidar Rikābdār (stirrup-holder).

It came very hard on me; I could not help crying a good deal. Back I went to Khujand and thither they sent me my mother and my grandmother and the families of some of the men with me.

That Ramẓān (April-May) we spent in Khujand, then mounted for Samarkand. We had already sent to ask The Khān’s help; he assigned, to act with us against Samarkand, his son, Sl. Muḥammad (Sult̤ānīm) Khānika and (his son’s guardian) Aḥmad Beg with 4 or 5000 men and rode himself as far as Aūrā-tīpā. There I saw him and from there went on by way of Yār-yīlāq, past the Būrka-yīlāq Fort, the head-quarters of the sub-governor (dārogha) of the district. Sl. Muḥammad Sult̤ān and Aḥmad Beg, riding light and by another road, got to Yār-yīlāq first but on their hearing that Shaibānī Khān was raiding Shīrāz and thereabouts, turned back. There was no help for it! Back I too had to go. Again I went to Khujand!

As there was in me ambition for rule and desire of conquest, I did not sit at gaze when once or twice an affair had made no progress. Now I myself, thinking to make another move for Andijān, went to ask The Khān’s help. Over and above this, it was seven or eight years since I had seen Shāh Begīm417 and other relations; they also were seen under the same pretext. After a few days, The Khān appointed Sayyid Muḥammad Ḥusain (Dūghlāt) and Ayūb Begchīk and Jān-ḥasan Bārīn with 7 or 8000 men to help us. With this help we started, rode light, through Khujand without a halt, left Kand-i-badām on the left and so to Nasūkh, 9 or 10 yīghāch of road beyond Khujand and 3 yīghāch (12-18 m.) from Kand-i-badām, there set our ladders up and took the fort. It was the melon season; one kind grown here, known as Ismā‘īl Shaikhī, has a yellow rind, feels like shagreen leather, has seeds like an apple’s and flesh four fingers thick. It is a wonderfully delicate melon; no other such grows thereabout. Next day the Mughūl begs represented to me, ‘Our fighting men are few; to what would holding this one fort lead on?’ In truth they were right; of what use was it to make that fort fast and stay there? Back once more to Khujand!

(f. Affairs of Khusrau Shāh and the Tīmūrid Mīrzās.)418

This year Khusrau Shāh, taking Bāī-sunghar Mīrzā with him, led his army (from Qūndūz) to Chaghānīān and with false and treacherous intent, sent this message to Ḥiṣār for Sl. Mas‘ūd Mīrzā, ‘Come, betake yourself to Samarkand; if Samarkand is taken, one Mīrzā may seat himself there, the other in Ḥiṣār.’ Just at the time, the Mīrzā’s begs and household were displeased with him, because he had shewn excessive favour to his father-in-law, Shaikh ‘Abdu’l-lāh Barlās who from Bāī-sunghar Mīrzā had gone to him. Small district though Ḥiṣār is, the Mīrzā had made the Shaikh’s allowance 1,000 tūmāns of fulūs419 and had given him the whole of Khutlān in which were the holdings of many of the Mīrzā’s begs and household. All this Shaikh ‘Abdu’l-lāh had; he and his sons took also in whole and in part, the control of the Mīrzā’s gate. Those angered began, one after the other, to desert to Bāī-sunghar Mīrzā.

By those words of false alloy, having put Sl. Mas‘ūd Mīrzā off his guard, Khusrau Shāh and Bāī-sunghar Mīrzā moved light out of Chaghānīān, surrounded Ḥiṣār and, at beat of morning-drum, took possession of it. Sl. Mas‘ūd Mīrzā was in Daulat Sarāī, a house his father had built in the suburbs. Not being able to get into the fort, he drew off towards Khutlān with Shaikh ‘Abu’l-lāh Barlās, parted from him half-way, crossed the river at the Aūbāj ferry and betook himself to Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā. Khusrau Shāh, having taken Ḥiṣār, set Bāī-sunghar Mīrzā on the throne, gave Khutlān to his own younger brother, Walī and rode a few days later, to lay siege to Balkh where, with many of his father’s begs, was Ibrāhīm Ḥusain Mīrzā (Bāī-qarā). He sent Naz̤ar Bahādur, his chief retainer, on in advance with 3 or 400 men to near Balkh, and himself taking Bāī-sunghar Mīrzā with him, followed and laid the siege.

Walī he sent off with a large force to besiege Shabarghān and raid and ravage thereabouts. Walī, for his part, not being able to lay close siege, sent his men off to plunder the clans and hordes of the Zardak Chūl, and they took him back over 100,000 sheep and some 3000 camels. He then came, plundering the Sān-chīrīk country on his way, and raiding and making captive the clans fortified in the hills, to join Khusrau Shāh before Balkh.

One day during the siege, Khusrau Shāh sent the Naz̤ar Bahādur already mentioned, to destroy the water-channels420 of Balkh. Out on him sallied Tīngrī-bīrdī Samānchī,421 Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā’s favourite beg, with 70 or 80 men, struck him down, cut off his head, carried it off, and went back into the fort. A very bold sally, and he did a striking deed.

(g. Affairs of Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā and Badī‘u’z-zamān Mīrzā.)

This same year, Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā led his army out to Bast and there encamped,422 for the purpose of putting down Ẕū’n-nūn Arghūn and his son, Shāh Shujā‘, because they had become Badī‘u’z-zamān Mīrzā’s retainers, had given him a daughter of Ẕū’n-nūn in marriage and taken up a position hostile to himself. No corn for his army coming in from any quarter, it had begun to be distressed with hunger when the sub-governor of Bast surrendered. By help of the stores of Bast, the Mīrzā got back to Khurāsān.

Since such a great ruler as Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā had twice led a splendid and well-appointed army out and twice retired, without taking Qūndūz, or Ḥiṣār or Qandahār, his sons and his begs waxed bold in revolt and rebellion. In the spring of this year, he sent a large army under Muḥammad Walī Beg to put down (his son) Muḥammad Ḥusain Mīrzā who, supreme in Astarābād, had taken up a position hostile to himself. While Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā was still lying in the Nīshīn meadow (near Harāt), he was surprised by Badī‘u’z-zamān Mīrzā and Shāh Shujā‘ Beg (Arghūn). By unexpected good-fortune, he had been joined that very day by Sl. Mas‘ūd Mīrzā, a refugee after bringing about the loss of Ḥiṣār,423 and also rejoined by a force of his own returning from Astarābād. There was no question of fighting. Badī‘u’z-zamān Mīrzā and Shāh Beg, brought face to face with these armies, took to flight.

Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā looked kindly on Sl. Mas‘ūd Mīrzā, made him kneel as a son-in-law and gave him a place in his favour and affection. None-the-less Sl. Mas‘ūd Mīrzā, at the instigation of Bāqī Chaghānīānī, who had come earlier into Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā’s service, started off on some pretext, without asking leave, and went from the presence of Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā to that of Khusrau Shāh!

Khusrau Shāh had already invited and brought from Ḥiṣār, Bāī-sunghar Mīrzā; to him had gone Aūlūgh Beg Mīrzā’s son,424 Mīrān-shāh Mīrzā who, having gone amongst the Hazāra in rebellion against his father, had been unable to remain amongst them because of his own immoderate acts. Some short-sighted persons were themselves ready to kill these three (Tīmūrid) Mīrzās and to read Khusrau Shāh’s name in the khut̤ba but he himself did not think this combination desirable. The ungrateful manikin however, for the sake of gain in this five days’ fleeting world, – it was not true to him nor will it be true to any man soever, – seized that Sl. Mas‘ūd Mīrzā whom he had seen grow up in his charge from childhood, whose guardian he had been, and blinded him with the lancet.

Some of the Mīrzā’s foster-brethren and friends of affection and old servants took him to Kesh intending to convey him to his (half) – brother Sl. ‘Alī Mīrzā in Samarkand but as that party also (i. e. ‘Alī’s) became threatening, they fled with him, crossed the river at the Aūbāj ferry and went to Sl. Ḥusain Mīrzā.

A hundred thousand curses light on him who planned and did a deed so horrible! Up to the very verge of Resurrection, let him who hears of this act of Khusrau Shāh, curse him; and may he who hearing, curses not, know cursing equally deserved!

This horrid deed done, Khusrau Shāh made Bāī-sunghar Mīrzā ruler in Ḥiṣār and dismissed him; Mīrān-shāh Mīrzā he despatched for Bāmīān with Sayyid Qāsim to help him.