[IO Islamic 2450] احوال عمارات مستقرّ الخلافة

Aḥwâl-i-’Imârât-i-Mustaḳirr-alkhilâfah.

This manuscript is now IO Islamic 731 in the India Office collections.

[metadata: Hermann Ethé, Catalogue of Persian Manuscripts in the Library of the India Office, 2 vols. (Oxford: India Office, 1903): volume 1, number 2450 here with notations and hyperlinks].

731

Aḥwâl-i-’Imârât-i-Mustaḳirr-alkhilâfah (احوال عمارات مستقرّ الخلافة).

A topographical and historical account of the principal public buildings, mausoleums, mosques, and gardens of Akbarâbâd, i.e. Âgra, especially those built by Akbar and Shâhjahân, compiled, from various sources, by a pupil of Âgra Government College, Sil Ćand (سيلچند), see fol. 6b, l. 4, and colophon, at the request of Mr. James Stephen Lushington (مستر جمس اسفين السكين), comp. ff. 5a, l. 2, and 6a, ll. 7 and 8; and Rieu iii. p. 1031. This gentleman, who was acting collector and magistrate in Âgra, 1825 and 1826, had issued an appeal to the Government College, to supply him with such topographical accounts, and he received besides the present work a smaller treatise on the same subject, by Mânik Ćand, headed احوال شهر اكبرآباد, see Rieu iii. p. 958.

Beginning:سبحان الله ذرّۀ بيتاب را بحضور خورشيد دستگاه عجز طرازى است الخ.

On fol. 4a a eulogium of the Governor-General of India.

Among the numerous chapters we mention as the most interesting ones;

Fortress of Âgra, with a table of inscriptions, on fol. 24a.

Môtî Masjid, with illustration, on fol. 30b.

Tâj Maḥall, with illustration, on fol. 51b sq.

Letters and firmâns of Shâhjahân, ‘Âlamgir, Dârâ Shukûh, etc., on fol. 59b sq.

Mausoleum of I’timâd-aldaulah, with illustration, on fol. 104a.

Account of Nûr Jahân Begam, on fol. 120a.

Akbar’s mausoleum at Sikandra, with illustration, on fol. 193b.

Mosque at Fatḥpûr, with illustration, on fol. 210b, last line sq.

This Kitâb-i-’Imârat (كتاب عمارت), as it is styled in the colophon (another title given to it is حالات اكبرآباد, see Rieu, loc. cit.), was transcribed from the original copy of Sîl Ćand, who was a student at the Madrasah Âgra, by وسشن ضلع, for Mr. James Davidson (مستر جمس ديودسن); no date. The copy was purchased of Madden & Co., 1st of August, 1843. Special works on the topography of the Tâj Maḥall are noticed in Rieu i. p. 430 and iii. p. 958b; Mehren, Cat., p. 47, and W. Pertsch, Berlin Cat., p. 520.

No. 2450, ff. 218, ll. 17; Nasta’lîḳ; five excellent full-page illustrations and a table of inscriptions; size, 93/4 in. by 6 in.