The grandeur and glamour of the great Mughals continues to fascinate us, as is evident from the continuous stream of books published in the last 10 years. G.S. Cheema’s Greater Mughals: The First Six Emperors of the House of Babar is not simply “another addition” to the long list for several reasons.
Cheema’s first book, The Forgotten Mughals: A History of the Later Emperors of the House of Babar 1707-1857, delved deeply into the history of the “lesser” Mughals with empathy. He followed through with two more books on the 18th century Hindustan that were indirectly about the Mughals.
G.S. Cheema,
Greater Mughals: The First Six Emperors of the House of Babar
Manohar Publishers & Distributors (2024)
I was struck by the latest book’s title – ‘greater’ Mughals instead of ‘the great’ Mughals. Perhaps the title implied that they were greater than the later Mughals who were mostly forgotten? The second part of the book’s title, “of the House of Babur” also caught my attention. In India’s present political climate, where Babar is the much-maligned progenitor of the Muslim minority population, any reference to the House of Babar is fraught with anxiety. When I opened the book, I saw the insert detailing the family tree of the Timurid Mughals. Amir Taimur (1370-1405) was a Turk. Babar descended directly from Taimur, a Barlas Turk; his mother, though, was a Chaghtai, or Mughal, through descent from Changiz Khan. Cheema makes an important point in reminding us of Babar’s ancestry. He goes on in this interesting pursuit of ancestors by pointing out the difference in physical appearance between Turks and Mongols. His point is that with generations of intermarriages, the terms Turk and Mughal had become interchangeable.
Babar was only 11 years old when his father Umar Shaikh Mirza died. Mirza was only thirty-nine at the time of his accidental death. Babar’s inheritance was insecure. The young prince had been fighting off his relatives to keep a hold on Samarqand, his patrimony. He even accepted conversion to Shiism in exchange of support from the Persian Shah. Eventually, Babar lost Samarqand. He turned towards Hindustan, but not to loot and plunder. Cheema’s account of Babar’s early years in Hindustan is filled with wonderful details culled from primary sources. For example, the first summer in the Agra-Delhi region, when Babar and his followers were rattled by the scathing hot winds and missed musk-melons, grapes and iced waters.
Babar’s death in December 1530 is associated with a fascinating tale first mentioned in Abul Fazal’s Akbarnama and later picked up by British historians. The story is about his son, Humayun’s illness which Babar took on and eventually died from. Cheema’s assessment of Babar’s achievements shed light on the humane qualities that the first Mughal ruler brings to life as a great human being. Ferishta writes that Cheema has described Babar as “a prince with great humanity, who carried his liberality to such excess that it bordered on prodigality. He readily pardoned ingratitude and treason, and seemed to make it a principle to render good for evil.” Babar is the first padshah who can be called a naturalist – he even writes about aquatic animals such as dolphins, crocodiles and alligators.
The chapter on Humayun, titled ‘Humayun’s Misadventures’, is filled with interesting details from his birth, as the son of Babar’s third wife Maham Begum, to his siblings and his loyal followers. It is fascinating to learn about Humayun’s marriage to Hamida Bano, whom he saw while visiting his brother Hindal’s camp. Hamida Bano was 14 years old at the time and was not keen to be married to Humayun, a padshah without a kingdom. Humayun was 33 years old at the time and addicted to opium. The marriage was solemnised at mid-day on August 21, 1541. Eventually, Hamida Bano gave birth to Jalaluddin Muhammad Akbar in 1542. Details such as these have made the book extremely enjoyable.
When it comes to the chapter on Akbar, who was 13 years old at his father’s death, Cheema once again provides us carefully researched facts that have been overlooked or marginalised by previous historians. Akbar’s marriages, the jealousies of his milk-brothers, or kokas, and his foster mothers. The senior foster mother, Jiji Anga, was the wife of one Shamsuddin Muhammad Khan who had saved Humayun from drowning in the Ganga after the disaster at the Battle of Kannauj, Humayun had taken him into personal service and his wife became one of Akbar’s foster mothers. Anga means wet-nurse and she was known as Jiji Anga; her husband was designated Arga. Maham Anga was Akbar’s second foster mother whose son Adham Khan grew so arrogant as to challenge Akbar’s authority.
Group portrait of Mughal rulers, from Babur to Aurangzeb, with the Mughal ancestor Timur seated in the middle. On the left: Shah Jahan, Akbar and Babur, with Abu Sa’id of Samarkand and Timur’s son, Miran Shah. On the right: Aurangzeb, Jahangir and Humayun, and two of Timur’s other offspring Umar Shaykh and Muhammad Sultan. Created c. 1707–12. Photo: CC BY-SA 3.0 igo
Maham Anga was responsible for the overthrow of Akbar’s regent, the talented Bairam Khan. Bairam Khan’s regency lasted four years and after that Maham Anga took over for another four. It wasn’t until 1564 that Akbar became the emperor, with full control over the state of affairs. Cheema has given Akbar’s regime the rightful treatment it deserves. At the same time, he has not overlooked the seminal role that Akbar’s courtiers played in making the period truly extraordinary in Indian history. A chapter devoted to the nine jewels at Akbar’s court provides meticulous details:
“Raja Birbal: His name was Mahesh Das, and he was a Brahmin and a bard (Bhat).”
“Raja Man Singh was the son of Raja Bhagwan Das and the grandson of Raja Bharmal of Amber, who was the father-in-law of the padshah. He was also known as Mirza Raja and Akbar honored him with the additional honorific of farzand, that is son.”
I was curious about how Cheema described Aurangzeb, so I flipped to the closing chapters of the book. Aurangzeb ascended the throne after disposing off his three brothers and took the title of Alamgir or world conqueror. I found that Cheema treads carefully in his account of Aurangzeb. Pages upon pages are spent on describing the battles that Alamgir fought. There are no vignettes that would humanize the ambitious emperor. There is much of interest in Aurangzeb’s early life. Born is 1618, he was the third eldest among the four sons of Shahjahan and Mumtaz Mahal. As an eight-year-old, he was sent as hostage along with his elder brother Dara to Lahore. At the age of fifteen he fought off an elephant single handed. The relationship of Aurangzeb and his siblings as children could have been fleshed out as those details are available. His last years were spent in loneliness as he lost much of what he had gained in his long career as a brave soldier.
As a whole, the book has a lot to offer by the way of history narrated in an approachable style. It should be a valuable addition to our bookshelves.
