Mughal Empire

The Mughal Empire was an early modern empire in South Asia. At its peak, it stretched from the outer edges of the Indus River Basin in the west, northern Afghanistan in the northwest, and Kashmir in the north, to the highlands of present-day Assam and Bangladesh in the east, and the uplands of the Deccan Plateau in South India.

The empire was founded in 1526 by Babur, a Timurid prince from the Fergana Valley in Central Asia. While ruling Kabul, he invaded and defeated the Sultan of Delhi, Ibrahim Lodi, in the First Battle of Panipat, and he settled in the plains of northern India. Babur's son, Humayun, was forced into exile in the Safavid Empire in Persia during the Mughal interregnum caused by Sher Shah Suri. Humayun restored Mughal rule in parts of India before he died in 1556. Under his son, Akbar, the Mughals re-established themselves across northern India, and by 1605 they had captured large territories north of the Godavari river. Akbar set up the subah system between 1572 and 1580, which created a Mughal imperial structure that lasted through the reigns of Jahangir, Shah Jahan, and Aurangzeb. Aurangzeb is regarded as the sixth and final of the Great Mughals. During his reign, the empire reached its largest size through attempts to expand into South India and North-East India. After Aurangzeb died in 1707, a series of rulers could not keep central power strong.

After Aurangzeb's death, his son, Bahadur Shah I, reversed his father's strict religious policies and tried to reform the government. However, after his death in 1712, the dynasty fell into political rivalry and growing challenges to central authority. The Mughals did not follow primogeniture, so rival princes and their supporters contested the throne under the principle of takht ya takhta. In 1719, four emperors took the throne one after another as figureheads under the Sayyid brothers, who acted as kingmakers. During the reign of Muhammad Shah, the empire was weakened by groups such as the Sikh Confederacy and the Maratha Confederacy, the latter of which claimed to pursue Hindavi Swarajya. Some Muslim gentry also pulled away from central control, including the Nizam of Hyderabad, the Nawab of Bengal, the Nawab of Awadh, the Nawab of Carnatic, and the Rohilla Pathans. Nader Shah's invasion of India and the Battle of Karnal in 1739 further weakened Mughal royal power.

Later emperors, including Alamgir II and Shah Alam II, tried to rebuild royal power through alliances, but with harmful results. By 1760, their territory was reduced to the area in and around Old Delhi. After the Afghan Durrani Empire defeated the Marathas at the Third Battle of Panipat in 1761, Shah Alam II was forced to leave Old Delhi for the Oudh State. In 1764, he led a coalition that included the Nawabs of Awadh and Bengal and the Benares State against the British East India Company at the Battle of Buxar. The British won. The resulting Treaty of Allahabad in 1765 gave the Company diwani rights in Bengal, Bihar, and Orissa on behalf of the Mughal emperor. The Maratha leader Mahadaji Shinde was later formally granted the office of Vakil-i-Mutlaq, or imperial regent, in 1784. This arrangement ended with the Second Anglo-Maratha War. In 1857, after the Indian Rebellion, the United Kingdom formally dissolved the Mughal Empire, as a punishment for the nominal leadership of the rebels by the Mughal Emperor Bahadur Shah Zafar.

Although the empire was built and maintained through military warfare, it did not harshly suppress the cultures and peoples it ruled. Instead, it brought them together and kept them content through new administrative practices and by including diverse ruling groups, such as the Rajputs. This made its rule more efficient, centralised, and standardised. The empire's wealth came mainly from agricultural taxes, introduced by the third Mughal emperor, Akbar. These taxes were paid in a well-regulated silver currency and allowed peasants and artisans to enter larger markets. The relative peace of much of the 17th century helped India's economic growth. Among the Mughal elite, conspicuous consumption led to greater support for painting, literature, textiles, and architecture, especially under Shah Jahan. Several Mughal sites in South Asia are UNESCO World Heritage Sites, including Agra Fort, Fatehpur Sikri, Red Fort, Humayun's Tomb, Lahore Fort, Shalamar Gardens, and the Taj Mahal, which has been described as "the jewel of Muslim art in India, and one of the universally admired masterpieces of the world's heritage".

Name

The word Mughal (also spelled Mogul or Moghul in English) is the Indo-Persian form of Mongol. However, the early followers of the dynasty were Chagatai Turks, not Mongols. In India, the name was used for them because of its link to the Mongols, and to tell them apart from the Afghan elite who ruled the Delhi Sultanate. In the West, the terms Grand Mughal and Mughal were used for the emperor and, by extension, the whole empire. The term is still disputed by Indologists. In the view of Marshall Hodgson, the dynasty should be called Timurid or Indo-Timurid.

The closest thing to an official name for the empire was Hindustan, which was recorded in the Ain-i-Akbari. Mughal records also called the empire the "dominion of Hindustan," the "country of Hind," and the "Sultanate of al-Hind." The name appears in a memorial inscription of Emperor Aurangzeb. Emperor Bahadur Shah Zafar called it the "Land of Hind" (Hindostān) in Hindustani. The Mughal name for their dynasty was Gurkani, which referred to their descent from the Turco-Mongol conqueror Timur. Timur took the title Gūrkān, meaning "son-in-law," after marrying a Chinggisid princess.

History

See also: Mughal dynasty

Main articles: Babur and Humayun

Main articles: Akbar, Jahangir, Shah Jahan, and Aurangzeb

Main article: Decline of the Mughal Empire

The Mughal Empire was founded by Babur (reigned 1526–1530), a Central Asian ruler. He was descended from Timur on his father's side and from Genghis Khan on his mother's side. After losing his lands in Central Asia, Babur turned to India. In 1526, his forces defeated Ibrahim Lodi, Sultan of Delhi, in the First Battle of Panipat. Babur used firearms and cannons, which helped him win even though his army was smaller. Later, his son Humayun was forced into exile in Persia, but he returned and restored some Mughal rule. Akbar later extended the empire across much of India and encouraged trade and culture. Shah Jahan's reign brought the splendour of the Mughal court to its peak, as shown by the Taj Mahal. Aurangzeb brought the empire to its greatest size, but his long wars in the Deccan were costly, and the empire's strength began to weaken.

After Aurangzeb, the Mughal dynasty entered a period of political conflict, and the empire slowly broke apart. Many regional leaders became independent, and the Marathas gained large areas of central India. In 1739, Nader Shah sacked Delhi, which further weakened Mughal power. Later, the British East India Company gained control over much of former Mughal India. After the Indian Rebellion of 1857, which the last Mughal emperor, Bahadur Shah Zafar, nominally led, he was removed from power and exiled to Rangoon, Burma.

Administration and state

Main article: Government of the Mughal Empire

The Mughal Empire had a highly centralised government, and most of it was set up during the rule of the third Mughal emperor, Akbar. The emperor led the central government, and four ministries worked under him. The finance ministry, led by a diwan, collected taxes and handed out assignments. The military ministry, led by a mir bakhshi, managed the army, the messenger service, and the mansabdari system. The law and religious ministry, led by the sadr as-sudr, appointed judges and managed charities. A fourth ministry, led by the mir saman, looked after the royal household and public works. The diwan was the most important of these officials and often acted as the wazir (prime minister). The empire was split into provinces called subah, each run by a subadar. Provinces were divided into sarkars, which were divided into groups of villages called parganas. The imperial capital moved between several cities, including Agra, Delhi, Lahore, and Fatehpur Sikri. Later, Aurangabad in the Deccan served as a short-term provincial capital, and Kabul was the summer capital of the Mughals from 1526 to 1681. After Aurangzeb, the capital became the walled city of Shahjahanabad (Old Delhi). The imperial camp, used for military trips and royal tours, also worked as a moving capital where administration was carried out.

The Mughal legal system changed over time and depended on the situation. As a Muslim state, the empire used fiqh (Islamic law), with officials such as the qadi (judge), the mufti (legal expert), and the muhtasib (censor and market supervisor). Justice also depended on administrative rules, local customs, and political needs. The empire followed the Sunni Hanafi system of law, using books such as al-Hidayah inherited from the Delhi Sultanate. Later, Emperor Aurangzeb ordered the Fatawa 'Alamgiri, a collection of Hanafi law made to guide the empire. The qadi settled disputes, judged crimes, and handled inheritances, and his seal was needed to make documents official. Cases could also go to the jagirdar (local tax collector), the kotwal (local police), the faujdar (officer over several districts), or the powerful subahdar. Emperor Jahangir set up a "chain of justice" at the Agra Fort that anyone wronged could shake to get the emperor's attention. Village-level groups called panchayats also existed, but little is known about how they worked.

Economy

Main article: Economy of the Mughal Empire

The Mughal economy was large and prosperous. Until 1750, India produced about a quarter of the world's manufacturing output. Mughal India's economy has been described as proto-industrialisation, like that of 18th-century Western Europe before the Industrial Revolution. The Mughals built an extensive road system through a public works department, and they standardised the rupee and dam currencies that Sher Shah Suri had introduced. Their coins were of high purity. The main source of the empire's wealth was agricultural taxes, set up by Akbar and paid in silver. Mughal farming grew, with crops such as cotton, indigo, and sugar cane. Under Akbar, a new land tax called zabt replaced the older tribute system. The irrigation systems built by the government helped farmers grow more food. Textiles, especially cotton cloth such as muslins, were the empire's largest industry. Much of this cloth was made in the Bengal region, around Dhaka.

Many goods from Mughal India were in demand in Europe, and Europeans bought them with precious metals. Because of this, the Mughals minted most of their gold coins from bullion brought in from abroad. Wages for manual labour were kept low, and slavery existed but was mostly limited to household servants. Bengal was especially rich. It was probably the wealthiest province of the empire, and it had a large shipbuilding industry. In 1717, Bengal gained de facto independence under Murshid Quli Khan, the first Nawab of Bengal. The British East India Company seized control of the province in 1757.

Demographics

See also: Demographics of India § History

See also: Mughal people

India's population grew quickly under the Mughal Empire. Between 1500 and 1700, it rose by between 60% and 253%, faster than at any earlier time in Indian history. By the time of Aurangzeb's reign, the empire had 455,698 villages. The table below compares population estimates for the Mughal Empire with the total population of South Asia, including the regions of modern India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh, and with the world population.

There was also a notable presence of the Jewish diaspora in the Mughal Empire. Its members traded in jewelry and precious stones. Sarmad Kashani took part in religious activities at the Mughal court.

According to Irfan Habib, cities and towns grew greatly under the Mughal Empire, and about 15% of its people lived in urban areas. This was higher than in Europe at the time and higher than in British India in the 1800s. Under Akbar's reign in 1600, the urban population was up to 17 million. Tim Dyson considers these figures exaggerations and believes urbanisation was less than 9%. The historian Nizamuddin Ahmad (1551–1621) reported that, under Akbar, there were 120 large cities and 3,200 townships. Cities such as Agra (in Agra Subah), Lahore (in Lahore Subah), Dhaka (in Bengal Subah), and Delhi (in Delhi Subah) were among the largest. Cities acted as markets and homes for merchants, artisans, officials, and religious figures, although several were military and political centres rather than centres of manufacturing or trade.

Culture

See also: Indo-Persian culture

Older history books often said the Mughal Empire began as a settled farming society. However, modern historians such as André Wink, Jos J. L. Gommans, Anatoly Khazanov, Thomas J. Barfield, and others have argued that the Mughals came from a nomadic culture. Pius Malekandathil argued that the Mughals did begin as a nomadic people but became more settled over time, as their military traditions show. The Mughal Empire was important in the early-modern and modern history of South Asia. Its influence can still be seen in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan through its cultural contributions:

• The empire brought many smaller regions of South Asia together under one central rule.

• Persian art and literature mixed with Indian art.

• The Mughals created Mughlai cuisine, which mixed the cooking styles of South Asia, Iran, and Central Asia.

• They created Mughal clothing, jewellery, and fashion, using rich fabrics such as muslin, silk, brocade, and velvet.

• Persian influenced Old Hindi, which led to the development of the Hindustani language.

• Mughal gardening brought Iranian-style waterworks and plant growing to the region.

• Hammams (bathhouses) were introduced to the Indian subcontinent.

• Mughal and Indian architecture developed and improved, and later influenced Rajput and Sikh palace building. The Taj Mahal is a famous Mughal landmark.

• The Pehlwani style of Indian wrestling developed by combining Indian malla-yuddha and Persian varzesh-e bastani.

• Maktab schools were built, where young people learned the Quran and Islamic law, such as the Fatawa 'Alamgiri, in their own languages.

• Hindustani classical music developed, along with instruments such as the sitar.

Customs

Royal marriages in the Mughal Empire were recorded with reports of extravagant gifts. When a son of Emperor Akbar, Salim, married the daughter of a ruler of Bijapur, Raja Bhagwant Das gave many horses, 100 elephants, male and female slaves of Abyssinian, Caucasian, and native Indian origins, and gold and silver utensils as dowry.

Architecture

Main articles: Mughal architecture and Yakhchāl

The Mughals made a major contribution to the Indian subcontinent with their own architectural style. It came from earlier Indo-Islamic architecture, Iranian and Central Asian architecture (especially Timurid architecture), and also from Hindu architecture. Mughal architecture is known for bulbous domes, ogive arches, carefully arranged and polished façades, and hard red sandstone and marble.

William Dalrymple mentioned that during the final days of the fall of Delhi in 1857, an ice house existed in Delhi. Emperor Shah Jahan recorded building an ice house in Sirmaur, north of Delhi.

Many monuments were built during the Mughal era, especially by Shah Jahan, including the Taj Mahal, a UNESCO World Heritage Site described as "the jewel of Muslim art in India and one of the universally admired masterpieces of the world's heritage". It attracts 7–8 million unique visitors a year. The palaces, tombs, gardens, and forts built by the dynasty still stand in Agra, Aurangabad, Delhi, Dhaka, Fatehpur Sikri, Jaipur, Lahore, Kabul, Sheikhupura, and many other cities in India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh, such as:

Art and literature

Main articles: Mughal painting and Mughal clothing

Mughal art, mainly small painted pictures and luxury objects, borrowed ideas from Iran, India, China, and Renaissance Europe. Mughal emperors often hired Iranian bookbinders, painters, and calligraphers from the Safavid court, since their styles were related. Early painting projects showed historical events and court life in books, but later works included single images and portraits of nature and animals. For example, Emperor Jahangir hired Ustad Mansur to paint unusual plants and animals from across the empire.

Akbar and Jahangir had many literary works illustrated, including the Razmnama, a Persian translation of the Hindu epic the Mahabharata, and historical books about the dynasty, such as the Baburnama, Akbarnama, and Tuzk-e-Jahangiri. Decorated albums (muraqqa) were made with calligraphy and paintings. Aurangzeb (1658–1707) was not a keen supporter of painting, mostly for religious reasons. Around 1668 he moved away from court ceremonies and probably commissioned no more paintings.

Language

Main articles: Persian language in the Indian subcontinent, Persian and Urdu, and Hindustani language

The Mughals were of Turko-Mongol origin, but their rule brought Persian back to prominence in the Indian subcontinent. By the end of the 16th century, few people at court understood Turki (Chagatai). Persian became the official and court language, and it was used by nearly all educated people in Mughal India. Historian Muzaffar Alam argues that the Mughals used Persian on purpose to unite their diverse empire under one Indo-Persian political culture. Persian strongly influenced South Asian languages. One of them, now called Hindustani, developed in the capital, Delhi, in the late Mughal era. Shah Jahan began using it in the Mughal court for his dastans (prose stories), and it replaced Persian as the everyday language of the Muslim elite. The poet Mir Taqi Mir wrote, "Urdu was the language of Hindustan by the authority of the King."

Military

Further information: Army of the Mughal Empire, Mughal weapons, and Mughal artillery

See also: Gunpowder empires and History of gunpowder: India and the Mughal Empire

Mughal India was one of the three Islamic gunpowder empires, along with the Ottoman Empire and Safavid Persia. When Babur was invited by Daulat Khan, a governor of Lahore working for the Lodi rulers, to help him rebel against the Lodi Sultan Ibrahim Khan, Babur already knew how to use firearms and field artillery. He had learned a standard Ottoman battle formation from the Ottoman expert Ustad Ali Quli, which placed guns and gunpowder soldiers in the centre and mounted archers on the sides. Babur used this formation at the First Battle of Panipat in 1526. The Afghan and Rajput forces loyal to the Delhi Sultanate had more soldiers, but they lacked gunpowder weapons and were defeated. Guns made of bronze were later found at Calicut and Diu. Fathullah Shirazi, a Persian scholar and engineer who worked for Akbar, developed an early gun with several gun barrels that fired hand cannons. Unlike the polybolos and repeating crossbows used earlier in ancient Greece and China, this gun used gunpowder. It may be seen as a version of a volley gun.

By the 17th century, Indians were making many kinds of firearms, and large guns could be seen in Tanjore, Dacca, Bijapur and Murshidabad. Akbar was the first to use metal cylinder rockets, called bans, especially against war elephants at the battle of Sanbal. In 1657, the Mughal Army used rockets during the siege of Bidar. Prince Aurangzeb's forces fired rockets and grenades as they climbed the walls. A rocket struck the large gunpowder store of Sidi Marjan, who was fatally wounded. After twenty-seven days of hard fighting, the Mughals captured Bidar. The historian James Riddick Partington described Indian rockets and explosive mines as formidable weapons, made with bamboo rods and iron points. Their path was rather unpredictable, and mines with gunpowder charges were used in the times of Akbar and Jahangir.

Science

A new curriculum for the madrasas stressed the importance of uloom-i-muqalat (Rational Sciences) and added new subjects such as geometry, medicine, philosophy, and mathematics. This curriculum produced a series of eminent scholars, engineers, and architects. Mughal astronomers made advances in observational astronomy and produced some Zij treatises, though there seems to have been little concern for theoretical astronomy. Humayun built a personal observatory near Delhi. According to Sulaiman Nadvi, Jahangir and Shah Jahan intended to build observatories too, but were unable to do so. The astronomical instruments used at the Mughal observatories were mainly derived from Islamic astronomy. Later, in the 17th century, Islamic instruments were combined with Hindu computational techniques from Hindu astronomy. During the decline of the Mughal Empire, the Hindu king Jai Singh II of Amber continued this work. In the early 18th century, he built several large observatories called Yantra Mandirs, to rival Ulugh Beg's Samarkand observatory, and to improve on the earlier Hindu computations in the Siddhantas and Islamic observations in Zij-i-Sultani.

See also: History of metallurgy in the Indian subcontinent and Mughal Karkhanas

Karkhanas were workshops where craftsmen produced arms, ammunition, and items for the court and emperor, such as clothes, shawls, jewelry, carpets, tents, and horse harnesses. Most surviving astrolabes from this period were made by seven members of one family based in Lahore. A 2006 metallurgical study of eight astrolabes found that they used high-zinc brass. This required a more advanced process than normal brass, but was easier to work into a thin sheet. The high-zinc process was not used at industrial scale in Europe until the nineteenth century, which suggests it was in use in the Mughal Empire at the start of the seventeenth century. Another remarkable invention of Mughal India was the lost-wax cast, hollow, seamless celestial globe. It was invented in Kashmir by Ali Kashmiri ibn Luqman in 998 AH (1589–90 CE), and twenty other such globes were later produced in Lahore and Kashmir. Before they were rediscovered in the 1980s, metallurgists believed it was technically impossible to produce hollow metal globes without any seams. Two members of the Lahore family of astrolabists, Qaim Muhammad and his son Diya' ad-din Muhammad, were among the makers of seamless celestial globes.

List of emperors

Main article: List of emperors of the Mughal Empire