The Cambridge History of India, Vol. III: Turks and Afghans v3.c28.35

v3.c28.35

¹ The origin and meaning of this epithet, which is applied both to Hasan and to his descendants, the Nizām Shāhī kings of Ahmadnagar, are obscure. As written by Muslim historians it is an Arabic adjective signifying 'of, or connected with, the sea,' but Hasan was in no way connected with the sea and the word is never explained as bearing its obvious etymological signification. It is said to be connected with a Hindi word for a falcon, and to have been given to Hasan owing to his having at one time kept the favourite falcon of Muhammad III, but the derivation is unconvincing and fanciful, and the story lacks confirmation. I believe it to be a corruption of an adjective *Bhairavī*, regularly formed from Bhairav, the name of Hasan's father, and Arabicized in accordance with a custom not uncommon in India.