The Cambridge History of India, Vol. IV: The Mughul Period v4.c16.143

v4.c16.143

It is probably from regard for his patron’s reputation that the usually careful chronicler Abu-’l-Fazl refrains from noticing the terrible famine of four years’ duration which began in 1595; but there is other unimpeachable evidence of the calamity, which was followed by a pestilence. Relief measures were confined to the distribution of alms, and failed lamentably to alleviate the sufferings of the people. “In consequence of the dearth of grain and the necessities of ravenous hunger men ate their own kind. The streets and roads were blocked with corpses, and no assistance could be given for their removal.”² From the annual report of the Jesuit missions for 1597 we learn that the pestilence was raging at Lahore in that year, and that the Fathers baptized many children abandoned by their parents.