The Bābur-nāma in English (Memoirs of Bābur)

Chapter IX: Part II: Work on the Hindustan MSS

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BABUR'S ORIGINAL CODEX.

My latest definite information about Babur's autograph MS. comes from the _Padshah-nama_ (Bib. Ind. ed. ii, 4), whose author saw it in Shah-i-jahan's private library between 1628 and 1638. Inference is justified, however, that it was the archetype of the Haidarabad Codex which has been estimated from the quality of its paper as dating _cir._ 1700 (JRAS. 1906, p. 97). But two subsequent historic disasters complicate all questions of MSS. missing from Indian libraries, namely, Nadir Shah's vengeance on Dihli in 1739 and the dispersions and fires of the Mutiny. Faint hope is kept alive that the original Codex may have drifted into private hands, by what has occurred with the Rampur MS. of Babur's Hindustan verses (App. J), which also appears once to have belonged to Shah-i-jahan.

Amongst items of work done during Babur's life are copies of his book (or of the Hindustan section of it) he mentions sending to sons and friends.

The _Tabaqat-i-baburi_ was written during Babur's life by his Persian secretary Shaikh Zainu'd-din of Khawaf; it paraphrases in rhetorical Persian the record of a few months of Hindustan campaigning, including the battle of Panipat.

TABLE OF THE HINDUSTAN MSS. OF THE BABUR-NAMA.[12]

III

During the first decade of Humayun's reign (1530-40) at least
two important codices seem to have been copied.

The earlier (_see_ Table, No. 2) has varied circumstantial
warrant. It meets the need of an archetype, one marginally
annotated by Humayun, for the Elphinstone Codex in which a few
notes are marginal and signed, others are pell-mell,
interpolated in the text but attested by a scrutineer as having
been marginal in its archetype and mistakenly copied into its
text. This second set has been ineffectually sponged over. Thus
double collation is indicated (i) with Babur's autograph MS. to
clear out extra Babur matter, and (ii) with its archetype, to
justify the statement that in this the interpolations were
marginal.—No colophon survives with the much dwindled Elph.
Codex, but one, suiting the situation, has been observed, where
it is a complete misfit, appended to the Alwar Codex of the
second Persian translation, (estimated as copied in 1589). Into
the incongruities of that colophon it is not necessary to
examine here, they are too obvious to aim at deceit; it appears
fitly to be an imperfect translation from a Turki original,
this especially through its odd fashion of entitling "Humayun
Padshah." It can be explained as translating the colophon of
the Codex (No. 2) which, as his possession, Humayun allowably
annotated and which makes it known that he had ordered
`Ali'u-'l-katib to copy his father's Turki book, and that it
was finished in February, 1531, some six weeks after Babur's
death.[15]

The later copy made in Humayun's first decade is Haidar Mirza's
(_infra_).

Muhammad Haidar Mirza _Dughlat's_ possession of a copy of the
Autobiography is known both from his mention of it and through
numerous extracts translated from it in his _Tarikh-i-rashidi_.
As a good boy-penman (p. 22) he may have copied down to 1512
(918) while with Babur (p. 350), but for obtaining a transcript
of it his opportunity was while with Humayun before the
Timurid exodus of 1541. He died in 1551; his Codex is likely to
have found its way back from Kashmir to his ancestral home in
the Kashghar region and there it may still be. (_See_ T.R. trs.
Ney Elias' biography of him).

The Elphinstone Codex[16] has had an adventurous career. The
enigma of its archetype is posed above; it may have been copied
during Akbar's first decade (1556-67); its, perhaps first,
owner was a Bai-qara rebel (d. 1567) from amongst whose
possessions it passed into the Royal Library, where it was
cleared of foreign matter by the expunction of Humayun's
marginal notes which its scribe had interpolated into its text.
At a date I do not know, it must have left the Royal Library
for its fly-leaves bear entries of prices and in 1810 it was
found and purchased in Peshawar by Elphinstone. It went with
him to Calcutta, and there may have been seen by Leyden during
the short time between its arrival and the autumn month of the
same year (1810) when he sailed for Java. In 1813 Elphinstone
in Poona sent it to Erskine in Bombay, saying that he had
fancied it gone to Java and had been writing to `Izzatu'l-lah
to procure another MS. for Erskine in Bukhara, but that all the
time it was on his own shelves. Received after Erskine had
dolefully compared his finished work with Leyden's (tentative)
translation, Erskine sadly recommenced the review of his own
work. The Codex had suffered much defacement down to 908 (1502)
at the hands of "a Persian Turk of Ganj" who had interlined it
with explanations. It came to Scotland (with Erskine?) who in
1826 sent it with a covering letter (Dec. 12th, 1826), at its
owner's desire, to the Advocates' Library where it now is. In
1907 it was fully described by me in the JRAS.

Of two _Waqi'at-i-baburi_ (Pers. trs.) made in Akbar's reign,
the earlier was begun in 1583, at private instance, by two
Mughuls Payanda-hasan of Ghazni and Muhammad-quli of Hisar.
The Bodleian and British Museum Libraries have copies of it,
very fragmentary unfortunately, for it is careful, likeable,
and helpful by its small explanatory glosses. It has the great
defect of not preserving autobiographic quality in its diction.

VII

The later _Waqi'at-i-baburi_ translated by `Abdu'r-rahim Mirza
is one of the most important items in Baburiana, both by its
special characteristics as the work of a Turkman and not of a
Persian, and by the great service it has done. Its origin is
well-known; it was made at Akbar's order to help Abu'l-faẓl in
the Akbar-nāma account of Babur and also to facilitate perusal
of the _Babur-nama_ in Hindustan. It was presented to Akbar, by
its translator who had come up from Gujrat, in the last week of
November, 1589, on an occasion and at a place of admirable
fitness. For Akbar had gone to Kabul to visit Babur's tomb, and
was halting on his return journey at Barik-ab where Babur had
halted on his march down to Hindustan in the year of victory
1525, at no great distance from "Babur Padshah's Stone-heap".
Abu'l-faẓl's account of the presentation will rest on
`Abdu'r-rahim's information (A.N. trs. cap. ci). The diction of
this translation is noticeable; it gave much trouble to Erskine
who thus writes of it (_Memoirs_ Preface, lx), "Though simple
and precise, a close adherence to the idioms and forms of
expression of the Turki original joined to a want of
distinctness in the use of the relatives, often renders the
meaning extremely obscure, and makes it difficult to discover
the connexion of the different members of the sentence.[17] The
style is frequently not Persian.... Many of the Turki words are
untranslated."

Difficult as these characteristics made Erskine's
interpretation, it appears to me likely that they indirectly
were useful to him by restraining his diction to some extent in
their Turki fettering.—This Turki fettering has another aspect,
apart from Erskine's difficulties, _viz_. it would greatly
facilitate re-translation into Turki, such as has been
effected, I think, in the Farghana section of the Bukhara
compilation.[18]

VIII

This item of work, a harmless attempt of Salim (_i.e_. Jahangir
Padshah; 1605-28) to provide the ancestral autobiography with
certain stop-gaps, has caused much needless trouble and
discussion without effecting any useful result. It is this:—In
his own autobiography, the _Tuzuk-i-jahangiri s.a_. 1607, he
writes of a Babur-nama Codex he examined, that it was all in
Babur's "blessed handwriting" except four portions which were
in his own and each of which he attested in Turki as so being.
Unfortunately he did not specify his topics; unfortunately also
no attestation has been found to passages reasonably enough
attributable to his activities. His portions may consist of the
"Rescue-passage" (App. D) and a length of translation from the
_Akbar-nāma_, a continuous part of its Babur chapter but broken
up where only I have seen it, _i.e._ the Bukhara compilation,
into (1) a plain tale of Kanwa (1527), (2) episodes of Babur's
latter months (1529)—both transferred to the first person—and
(3) an account of Babur's death (December 26th, 1530) and
Court.

Jahangir's occupation, harmless in itself, led to an imbroglio
of Langlés with Erskine, for the former stating in the
_Biographie Universelle_ art. Babour, that Babour's
Commentaries "_augmentés par Jahangir_" were translated into
Persian by `Abdu'r-rahim. Erskine made answer, "I know not on
what authority the learned Langlés hazarded this assertion,
which is certainly incorrect" (_Memoirs_, Preface, p. ix). Had
Langlés somewhere met with Jahangir's attestations? He had
authority if he had seen merely the statement of 1607, but
Erskine was right also, because the Persian translation
contains no more than the unaugmented Turki text. The royal
stop-gaps are in Kehr's MS. and through Ilminski reached De
Courteille, whence the biting and thorough analysis of the
three "Fragments" by Teufel. Both episodes—the Langlés and the
Teufel ones—are time-wasters but they are comprehensible in
the circumstances that Jahangir could not foresee the
consequences of his doubtless good intentions.

If the question arise of how writings that had had place in
Jahangir's library reached Bukhara, their open road is through
the Padshah's correspondence (App. Q and references), with a
descendant of Ahrari in whose hands they were close to
Bukhara.[19]

It groups scattered information to recall that Salim (Jahangir)
was `Abdu'r-rahim's ward, that then, as now, Babur's
Autobiography was the best example of classic Turki, and that
it would appeal on grounds of piety—as it did appeal on some
sufficient ground—to have its broken story made good. Also that
for three of the four "portions" Abu'l-fazl's concise matter
was to hand.

My information concerning Baburiana under Shah-i-jahan Padshah
(1628-58) is very meagre. It consists of (1) his attestation of
a signature of Babur (App. Q and photo), (2) his possession of
Babur's autograph Codex (_Padshah-nama_, Bib. Ind. ed., ii, 4),
and (3) his acceptance, and that by his literary entourage, of
Mir Abu-talib _Husaini's_ Persian translation of Timur's
Annals, the _Malfuzat_ whose preparation the _Zafar-nama_
describes and whose link with Babur's writings is that of the
exemplar to the emulator.[20]

The Haidarabad Codex may have been inscribed under Aurang-zib
Padshah (1655-1707). So many particulars about it have been
given already that little needs saying here.[21] It was the
_grande trouvaille_ of my search for Turki text wherewith to
revive Babur's autobiography both in Turki and English. My
husband in 1900 saw it in Haidarabad; through the kind offices
of the late Sayyid Ali _Bilgrami_ it was lent to me; it proved
to surpass, both in volume and quality, all other Babur-nama
MSS. I had traced; I made its merits known to Professor Edward
Granville Browne, just when the E. J. Wilkinson Gibb Trust was
in formation, with the happy and accordant result that the best
prose book in classic Turki became the first item in the
Memorial—_matris ad filium_—of literary work done in the name
of the Turkish scholar, and Babur's very words were safeguarded
in hundred-fold facsimile. An event so important for
autobiography and for Turki literature may claim more than the
bald mention of its occurrence, because sincere autobiography,
however ancient, is human and social and undying, so that this
was no mere case of multiplying copies of a book, but was one
of preserving a man's life in his words. There were, therefore,
joyful red-letter days in the English story of the
Codex—outstanding from others being those on which its merits
revealed themselves (on Surrey uplands)—the one which brought
Professor Browne's acceptance of it for reproduction by the
Trust—and the day of pause from work marked by the accomplished
fact of the safety of the _Babur-nama._

The period from _cir._ 1700, the date of the Haidarabad Codex,
and 1810, when the Elphinstone Codex was purchased by its
sponsor at Peshawar, appears to have been unfruitful in work on
the Hindustan MSS. Causes for this may connect with historic
events, _e.g._ Nadir Shah's desolation of Dihli and the rise of
the East India Company, and, in Baburiana, with the
disappearance of Babur's autograph Codex (it was unknown to the
Scots of 1800-26), and the transfer of the Elphinstone Codex
from royal possession—this, possibly however, an accident of
royal travel to and from Kabul at earlier dates.

The first quarter of the nineteenth century was, on the
contrary, most fruitful in valuable work, useful impulse to
which was given by Dr. John Leyden who in about 1805 began to
look into Turki. Like his contemporary Julius Klaproth
(_q.v._), he was avid of tongues and attracted by Turki and by
Babur's writings of which he had some knowledge through the
`Abdu'r-rahim (Persian) translation. His Turki text-book would
be the MS. of the Asiatic Society of Bengal,[22] a part-copy of
the Bukhara compilation, from which he had the India Office MS.
copied. He took up Turki again in 1810, after his return from
Malay and whilst awaiting orders in Calcutta for departure to
Java. He sailed in the autumn of the year and died in August
1811. Much can be learned about him and his Turki occupations
from letters (_infra_ xiii) written to Erskine by him and by
others of the Scottish band which now achieved such fine
results for Babur's Autobiography.

It is necessary to say something of Leyden's part in producing
the _Memoirs_, because Erskine, desiring to "lose nothing that
might add to Leyden's reputation", has assigned to him an undue
position of collaboration in it both by giving him premier
place on its title-page and by attributing to him the beginning
the translation. What one gleans of Leyden's character makes an
impression of unassumption that would forbid his acceptance of
the posthumous position given to him, and, as his translation
shews the tyro in Turki, there can be no ground for supposing
he would wish his competence in it over-estimated. He had, as
dates show, nothing to do with the actual work of the _Memoirs_
which was finished before Erskine had seen in 1813 what Leyden
had set down before he died in 1811. As the _Memoirs_ is now a
rare book, I quote from it what Erskine says (Preface, p. ix)
of Leyden's rough translation:—"This acquisition (_i.e_. of
Leyden's trs.) reduced me to rather an awkward dilemma. The two
translations (his own and Leyden's) differed in many important
particulars; but as Dr. Leyden had the advantage of translating
from the original, I resolved to adopt his translation as far
as it went, changing only such expressions in it as seemed
evidently to be inconsistent with the context, or with other
parts of the _Memoirs_, or such as seemed evidently to
originate in the oversights that are unavoidable in an
unfinished work.[23] This labour I had completed with some
difficulty, when Mr. Elphinstone sent me the copy of the
_Memoirs of Baber_ in the original Tūrkī (_i.e._ The
Elphinstone Codex) which he had procured when he went to
Peshawar on his embassy to Kabul. This copy, which he had
supposed to have been sent with Dr. Leyden's manuscripts from
Calcutta, he was now fortunate enough to recover (in his own
library at Poona). The discovery of this valuable manuscript
reduced me, though heartily sick of the task, to the necessity
of commencing my work once more."

Erskine's Preface (pp. x, xi) contains various other references
to Leyden's work which indicate its quality as tentative and
unrevised. It is now in the British Museum Library.

XII

Little need be said here about the _Memoirs of Baber_.[24]
Erskine worked on a basis of considerable earlier acquaintance
with his Persian original, for, as his Preface tells, he had
(after Leyden's death) begun to translate this some years
before he definitely accepted the counsel of Elphinstone and
Malcolm to undertake the _Memoirs_. He finished his translation
in 1813, and by 1816 was able to dedicate his complete volume
to Elphinstone, but publication was delayed till 1826. His was
difficult pioneer-work, and carried through with the drawback
of working on a secondary source. It has done yeoman service,
of which the crowning merit is its introduction of Babur's
autobiography to the Western world.

XIII

Amongst Erskine's literary remains are several bound volumes of
letters from Elphinstone, Malcolm, Leyden, and others of that
distinguished group of Scots who promoted the revival of
Babur's writings. Erskine's grandson, the late Mr. Lestocq
Erskine, placed these, with other papers, at our disposal, and
they are now located where they have been welcomed as
appropriate additions:—Elphinstone's are in the Advocates'
Library, where already (1826) he, through Erskine, had
deposited his own Codex—and with his letters are those of
Malcolm and more occasional correspondents; Leyden's letters
(and various papers) are in the Memorial Cottage maintained in
his birthplace Denholm (Hawick) by the Edinburgh Border
Counties Association; something fitting went to the Bombay
Asiatic Society and a volume of diary to the British Museum.
Leyden's papers will help his fuller biography; Elphinstone's
letters have special value as recording his co-operation with
Erskine by much friendly criticism, remonstrance against delay,
counsels and encouragement. They, moreover, shew the estimate
an accomplished man of modern affairs formed of Babur Padshah's
character and conduct; some have been quoted in Colebrooke's
_Life of Elphinstone_, but there they suffer by detachment from
the rest of his Baburiana letters; bound together as they now
are, and with brief explanatory interpolations, they would make
a welcome item for "Babur Padshah's Book-pile".

XIV

In May 1921 the contents of these volumes were completed,
namely, the _Babur-nama in English_ and its supplements, the
aims of which are to make Babur known in English diction
answering to his _ipsissima verba_, and to be serviceable to
readers and students of his book and of classic Turki.

Of writings based upon or relating to Babur's the following
have appeared:—

Denkwurdigkeiten des Zahir-uddin Muhammad Babar—A. Kaiser
(Leipzig, 1828). This consists of extracts translated from the
Memoirs.

An abridgement of the Memoirs—R. M. Caldecott (London, 1844).

History of India—Baber and Humayun—W. Erskine (Longmans,
1854).

Babar—Rulers of India series—Stanley Lane-Poole (Oxford,
1899).

Tuzuk-i-babari or Waqi`at-i-babari (_i.e._ the Persian
trs.)—Elliot and Dowson's History of India, 1872, vol. iv.

Babur Padshah _Ghazi_—H. Beveridge (Calcutta Review, 1899).

Babur's diamond, was it the Koh-i-nur?—H. Beveridge, Asiatic
Quarterly Review, April, 1899.

Was `Abdu'r-rahim the translator of Babur's Memoirs? (_i.e._
the _Babur-nama_)—H. Beveridge, AQR., July and October, 1900.

An Empire-builder of the 16th century, Babur—Laurence F. L.
Williams (Allahabad, 1918).

Notes on the MSS. of the Turki text (_Babur-nāma_)—A. S.
Beveridge, JRAS. 1900, 1902, 1921, 1905, and Part II 1906,
1907, 1908, p. 52 and p. 828, 1909 p. 452 (_see_ Index, _s.n._
A. S. B. for topics).

[For other articles and notes by H. B. _see_ Index _s.n._]

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