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Muntakhab al-tawarikh 32.3

Muntakhabu-t-tawārīkh (Ranking, Lowe, Haig) 32.3

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English

32.3.1

Verse. When Fate lets fall from the sky a feather, All the wise men became blind and deaf. Casting the advice of his well-wishers behind him, embarked on a boat with certain of his trusted followers and a thousand borrowing feet from the wind and feathers from the stream, and set out for Karra: he sent first Ahmad Chap the Vazir with an armed force and a body of retainers by land. Malik Ahmad Chap was rending his garments but all to no purpose. Verse. If the listener will not turn his ear to counsel, He will reap retribution from the heaven. The Sultan, whose life's boat had been upset by a contrary wind, and had been split on the shore of destruction, arrived at Karra on the 17th of the blessed month of Ramazan: and 'Alau-d-Din, who had kept his forces in readiness, had crossed the river Ganges between Karra and Manikpur and had pitched his camp; then he sent Ilmas Beg to the Sultan, sending by him some valuable jewels, with strict orders to use all the means he could devise and all the craft he could command to separate the Sultan from his army and bring him to further represented saying “my brother is in great fear and awe of the Sultan and is quaking from head to foot; and when he sees even this small body of men, he will be all the more alarmed, and will despair of the Sultan’s clemency.” Accordingly the Sultan ordered this body of retainers to lay aside their arms which they did;

32.3.2

those who were closely attached to the Sultan were greatly agitated at this foolish decision, but the Sultan would not be dissuaded by their objections. When they arrived near the bank of the river, the army of ‘Alau-d-Din was plainly visible drawn up in close order fully armed and equipped, and evidently expecting an engagement. Malik Khurram the Vakildar said to Almas Beg “We left our army behind that we came without our arms, what is this army ready for action?” He replied “my brother wishes to review them, and following his usual course, he wishes to make a proper return to the Sultan, with an eye to future advantage,” and in accordance with the saying “When fate comes the eye is blinded,” the Sultan up to that moment even did not discover the deceit of his nephew, and of his own free will walked deliberately into the jaws of death. and is quite occupied in that service, and he has preparing food for breaking your fast, and to do honor to the arrival of his guest, and is now awaiting the honoured coming of the Sultan, so that he may be distinguished among Dihli and pending the arrival of Arkali Khan from Multan (he was the worthy son of the Sultan and fitted to succeed him in the kingdom) as a temporary measure, with the co-operation of Malika-i-Jahan, seated Qadr Khan the youngest son of the Sultan, upon the throne of Dihli, with the title of Ruknu-d-Din Ibrahim. The Amirs and Maliks of Jalalu-d-Din’s party came one and all to swear allegiance to him at his accession.

32.3.3

He retained the name of King for one month. Malik ‘Alau-d-Din lost no time, but on the very day of the assassination of the Sultan, made open display of the insignia and emblems of royalty, and raising the imperial canopy over his own head was addressed as Sultan and in the middle of the rainy season marching uninterruptedly he made straight for the metropolis of Dihli, and showering dinars and dirhems like rain over the heads of the populace, and pelting the people in the streets great and small with golden missiles from balistae and slings, came to his own garden on the banks of the Jumna and alighted there. Day by day the Amirs of the Jalali faction joined themselves to him and swore allegiance to him, and by the hope of the red gold, all regret for Jalalu-d-Din was completely effaced from their black hearts. Liberality is the alchemy of the copper of faults; Liberality is the remedy for all pain. It is said that by the day when Sultan ‘Alau-d-Din reached Badaon sixty thousand sowars had joined his standard. Malik Ruknu-d-Din Ibrahim seeing that he had not the power to resist him went to Multan to Arkali Khan, with certain chosen Amirs who remained faithful after the massacre (of Jalalu-d-Din), and the whole of the kingdom fell under the dominion of ‘Alau-d-Din.

32.3.4

The kingdom is God’s and greatness is His. The massacre of Sultan Jalalu-d-Din took place on the seventeenth of the month of Ramazan in the year 695 H. (A.D. 1296) and the duration of his reign was seven years and some months. Hast thou seen the acts of the tyrant heaven and its star, Mention it not, what is the heaven, its revolution, or its arched vault? How is it that the revolving heaven has cast the sun of the kingdom headlong into the dust, Dust be on the head of his sun of glory. Sultan Jalalu-d-Din had a taste for poetry, and Amir Khusru after the death of Mu'izzu-d-Din Kaiqubad, came into the service of the Sultan Jalalu-d-Din, and was honoured by being selected as an intimate companion, and was made Qur’an keeper to the Sultan, he was presented every year with the robes of honour which were reserved for the Amirs of the Sultan and were tokens of special distinction and peculiar trust. In this same category were Amir Hasan and Muid Jajarmi and Amir Arslan Katibi and Sa‘d-i-Mantiqi and Baqi-i-Khatib and Qazi Mughis of Hansi, who is one of the most learned men of the time of Jalalu-d-Din and wrote a Ghazal in nineteen metres, of which this is the opening:— Two pearly ears, a stately form, two lovely cheeks, with fresh youth dight, Thy glory is the fairy’s pride, a fairy thou, at glory’s height.

32.3.5

And the rest of the learned men used to keep the Sultan’s assembly embellished and adorned with the jewels of poems and delicate points of learning and philosophy, and the following few verses are the offspring of the Sultan’s genius:— I do not wish those flowing locks of thine to be entangled, I do not wish that rosy cheek of thine (with shame) to burn. I wish that thou one night unclothed may'st come to my embrace, Yes, loud I cry with all my might, I would not have it hidden. And at the time when he was besieging Gwalior he built a pavilion and a lofty dome and wrote this quatrain as an inscription for that building: Quatrain. I whose foot spurns the head of heaven, How can a heap of stone and earth augment my dignity? This broken stone I have thus arranged in order that Some broken heart may haply take comfort from it. And Sa‘d Mantiqi and the other poets he ordered to point out to him the defects and beauties of this composition. They all praised it exceedingly and said: It has no fault, but he replied: You are afraid of hurting my feelings, I will point out its defect in this quatrain: It may be some chance traveller may pass by this spot Whose tattered garment is the satin mantle of the starless sky; Perchance from the felicity of his auspicious footsteps One atom may fall to my lot: this will suffice me.

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