[Pramāṇa](https://indike.org/pramana/) › [Indian literature](https://indike.org/pramana/in) › [Dark Ages](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages) › [General histories](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.general) › [Muntakhab al-tawārīkh](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.general.muntakhab-al-tawarikh) › [Muntakhabu-t-tawarikh (Ranking, Lowe, Haig)](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.general.muntakhab-al-tawarikh~en-ranking-lowe-haig) › 30.4 # Muntakhab al-tawarikh 30.4 Muntakhabu-t-tawārīkh (Ranking, Lowe, Haig) 30.4 - **Language:** English ### [30.4.1](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.general.muntakhab-al-tawarikh~en-ranking-lowe-haig.30.4.1) Such priceless blood of my friends has the earth swallowed, that it is my right to demand from the Earth the blood-money for my friends. If it were possible for those who sleep in the dust to arise, I would devote the remainder of my life to secure the existence of my friends. It were a pity that the eye should have its pupil always with it, and yet that its friends should be out of sight! How can one bear to look at others instead of one's friends. My friends are gone; How can I embrace a stranger? How can I clothe any other person in the mantle of my friends? I will place their dust in my eyes (as a collyrium). How can it be right that the dust of my friends' feet should be so little valued? In desire for my friends, even though they sever my head (from my body), still the desire for my friends will never be severed from my head. Oh my King! whenever thou biddest me I will tear my garment of life to the very edge in mourning for my friends. My life has been torn to shreds in a hundred places through grief, how can it be right that I should tear a shred into shreds for the sake of my friends? My friends have gone; of whom are you talking? Once for all bring your speech to an ending and breathe a prayer for my friends. \[Always remember the departed, especially at the time of prayer, Because nothing shows you the way to mercy save the guidance of prayer\]. ### [30.4.2](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.general.muntakhab-al-tawarikh~en-ranking-lowe-haig.30.4.2) O Lord may the illumination of the sun of mercy light upon their souls. May their souls shine like the sun from the beauty of thy light. In the day of battle the Great imam was their leader, May the same Imam be also their leader to the Garden of Paradise. If an angel flies thither in desire for him it becomes a fly, May the wings of the peacock of Paradise drive away the flies from them. The bounty of mercy is the water of life in the gloom of the grave, Oh Lord, in the darkness of the tomb may they have the water of life. \[When the faces become black from the sun of resurrection May the wings of the angels cast protecting shade over their heads\]. When they give into their hands the record of their deeds taken from the book of punishment, May the record bear as its heading the words “A book for the right hand. May the drops of blood which were shed from their throats Become the most costly rubies of their crown of pardon For the thirsty ones whose souls departed for lack of water, May the cloud of mercy rain continuously upon their heads For the captives who were long subjected to hardships, Oh Lord! may the hope of speedy release make their way light for them May the affliction which they suffered in imprisonment, be to those who have escaped from prison (by death) the cause of their eternal salvation, And those who have survived and have returned from that calamity, May they experience the mercy of the Author of good, and may the favour of the Sultan be theirs ### [30.4.3](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.general.muntakhab-al-tawarikh~en-ranking-lowe-haig.30.4.3) Since Muhammad has departed may the event be happy for the king May his son Kaiqubád be most fortunate and his son Kaikhusru be blessed And the opening \[of another threnody\] is as follows: My heart sit silent in sorrow for no trace of joy remains, Grief, do thou take away the world, for no joy is left therein In the following ode too he refers to the same disastrous occurrence: Behold this calamity which has befallen this year on the frontier of Multan, The right wing of the believers has been defeated by the infidel ranks How can I explain that day of resurrection, from the agony of which the Angel of Death would have craved respite. How can I describe the way in which the Ghazis, attacked the front of the Shaibanis, like the Lion of repeated attacks. But what help has anyone against the decree of fate which was ordained by and issued from the Almighty. 2. What was the condition of the battle field ? it was one load of dead bodies, So much blood was spilled and the load was lying upon it. The blood of martyrs, poured out like a libation, was mingled with the earth, The necks of prisoners bound together with ropes in rows, like rose chains. The heads strangled in the tight noose of the saddle-cords, The necks caught in the toils of the head-ropes. Although my head escaped that game of strangulation, Still my neck did not escape that noose of torture. I was taken captive, and for fear lest they should shed my blood ### [30.4.4](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.general.muntakhab-al-tawarikh~en-ranking-lowe-haig.30.4.4) My blood dried up, not a single drop remained in my weak and emaciated body. I was poured out like water running without beginning and without end, and like bubbles thousands of blisters appeared on my feet from much travelling. The skin was separated from my feet by the blisters. Like to the seams of a slipper burst open. ### [30.4.5](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.general.muntakhab-al-tawarikh~en-ranking-lowe-haig.30.4.5) My heart, because of affliction, was as hard as the hilt of a sword From weakness my body was become wood like the handle of a club. Not a breath remained in my windpipe by reason of thirst, My belly was like a drum from the duration of my hunger: My body was stripped naked like a tree in autumn, And like a rose torn into a thousand shreds by the thorns. For sorrow the pupil of my eyes poured forth drops Like the (scattered pearls) of a necklace broken from the neck of a bride. A Qirnas driving me on in front followed along the way 153 seated on a horse, like a leopard on a hill range. Foetor ab isto ore teterrimus axillae odori similis, Capilli oris ejus pubi similes usque ad mentum delapsi. If I lagged behind a step or two through fatigue He would draw at one time his falchion at another his javelin. I kept heaving deep sighs and saying to myself: Alas! I shall never be able to escape from this calamity! A thousand thanks to God Almighty who liberated me With my heart free from arrow wounds and my body unhurt by the sword. When he desired to make my body a brick for the grave, Water and clay built up for me anew my palace of years. But what good to me was my escape from that rope If snapped like the bond between the Muhajir and Ansar? ### [30.4.6](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.general.muntakhab-al-tawarikh~en-ranking-lowe-haig.30.4.6) All those lives were poured out in the dust like roses By the fierce blast of misfortune, this is Autumn not Spring. The world full of roses and the assembly emptied of those who can smell their perfume, How should not my heart turn to blood like the rose bud at this treatment! Not one of my friends of last year remains to me this year, It is evident that “this year” also will become “last year.” Be thou also like me, oh cloud of the newly born spring Now wash thy hands of water, and rain teardrops of blood. Give me a cup, that from the depths of my regret I may empty it of wine, and fill it with bitter tears. Now that the date is 684 (H.) To me in my three and thirtieth year comes the good tidings of the thirty-fourth. Not thirty-four because if my years should be thirty thousand, when one comes to the account of Annihilation neither thirty counts for aught nor a thousand. I am not a poet, even though I were a magician, still then I shall become dust. I am not a Khusru, even were I a Kaikhusru, still at that time my kingdom would be but the grave. And in the preface to the Ghurratu-l-Kamal he writes some epitomised poems relating to this circumstance; ### [30.4.7](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.general.muntakhab-al-tawarikh~en-ranking-lowe-haig.30.4.7) the gist of the matter is that they brought Tughral to nothing, and the prince who used to pray with lamentation and tears at the footstool of the best of all helpers saying Make me of thy mercy a victorious Emperor rose to such power in the districts of Lakhnauti and Chatar La‘l that his head which touched the stars, reached to the starless expanse of the highest heaven, and Malik Shamsu-d Din Dabir, and Qazi Asir desired to retain me by seizing my garments, but the departure from my friends seized me by the collar. I was obliged like Joseph to leave that prison pit and turn my steps to the metropolis, and under the shadow of the standard of the Shadow of God I remained in the city. In those very same months, the Khan-i Buzurg Qaan Malik arrived from the conquest of Damrila, and a rumour came to us that my words had reached him, so that he made enquiries regarding the ripe fruit of my words, unripe fruit as it really was. I laid it before him, and it was honoured with acceptance in his private hall of audience, and I was distinguished by a robe of honour and rewards, and I girded my loins in his service and wore the cap of companionship, and I gave for five years more to the Punjab and Multan water from the sea of my comfortable circumstances, till suddenly, by the potent order of the wise ruler, the star of my glory came into opposition with the inauspicious Mars. ### [30.4.8](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.general.muntakhab-al-tawarikh~en-ranking-lowe-haig.30.4.8) As the time of its decline had arrived when the unlucky cavalcade of those born under the influence of Mars came in sight, and at evening time, the bright sun sank by the revolution of the heaven, a world of brave men struck by arrows had fallen, and the plain of the earth was full of broken cups, and Death itself was saying at that time “Where shall I place my cup and where shall I take my pitcher.” The sky fed upon dust and the sun swallowed a bowl of blood. --- Source: [https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.general.muntakhab-al-tawarikh~en-ranking-lowe-haig.30.4](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.general.muntakhab-al-tawarikh~en-ranking-lowe-haig.30.4) · Pramāṇa