The History of Humāyūn (Gulbadan Begam) 102.2

102.2

Against reading khanam as my lady, with a sense of possession or admission of superiority (as is done by Sir Douglas Forsyth), there are the Turki words formed from it, e.g., khanam ati, honeysuckle, and khanam bujagi, ladybird. Shaham, which has the appearance of being formed from shah like the others by the suffix am or im, is used both for man and woman. Shir-am occurs as a man’s name. Maham was a wife of whom it was said that she was to Babar what ‘Ayisha was to Muhammad, and she was Humayun’s mother. Gul-badan mentions her often, yet no one of the numerous sources I have consulted, sets down her family or the name of her father. At one time it appeared to me probable that she was a Begchik Mughal, because Babar calls Yadgar Begchik taghai when speaking of him in connection with Humayun. Further consideration led to the abandonment of the theory. Uncle Yadgar, Uncle ‘Ali, and Uncle Ibrahim (Chapuk, slashed-face) are named as being three of the eight brothers or half-brothers of Gul-rukh, the mother of KaBnan, and Bega (Sani) Begam is the daughter of Uncle Yadgar. Amongst these eight Begchiks I do not find one named Uncle Muhammad 'Ali, and there is a good deal to lead one to regard a certain Khwaja Muhammad 'Ali taghai as being Maham's brother.