222 Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. [April, 1910 



speaks l of them as being written in Turki. He also (see the 

 Newal Kishore's lithograph of Ferishta, p. 196) gives a trans- 

 lation of Babar's comparison of his taking of Samarkand with 

 Sultan Husain's taking of Herat, which is certainly not in 

 verbal agreement with 'Abdu-r-Rahim's translation, and seems 

 to be an independent version. Ferishta was born at Astrabad 

 on the shores of the Caspian, presumably therefore Turk! was 

 almost, if not quite, his mother* tongue. 



Secondly. — The story told in the passage in question 

 implies the occurrence of the miraculous, and it is a generally 

 accepted axiom that miracles do not occur. Not only does a 

 certain Khwajah Y'aqub appear to Babar in a dream and 

 announce to him, on the authority of his grandfather, his 

 speedy deliverance, and his future greatness, but Khwajah 

 'Ubaid Ullah Ahrar himself appears in a dream to one of his 

 servants at Andljan, and also apparently to his uncles, and 

 announces that Babar is at Karman * or Karnan. The servants 

 Baba Pargari and Qutluq Muhammad Barlas are persons not 

 mentioned elsewhere in Babar' s Memoirs, for it seems very 

 doubtful if Qutluq the Barlas is the same person as the 

 Khwajah Qutluq Kokaltash mentioned as being at Samarkand 

 in 906. Khwajah Y'aqub also, the alleged son of Khwajah 

 Yahia, and grandson of Khwajah iJbaid Ullah, is, as far as I 

 know, an otherwise unknown person. Khwajah Yahia and his 

 two sons Zechariah and BaqI were killed by the Uzbegs some 

 two years before, and though Yahia had a third son who sur- 

 vived him, his name was not Y'aqub. 3 It also seems to me very 

 improbable that if the story of Babar' s dream were true, 

 Khwand Amir should not have mentioned it. He probably 

 never saw Babar's Memoirs, but he heard of, and has reported, 



- 



the dream which Babar had before taking Samarkand. If th 

 dream in the garden at Karnan really occurred, he would surely 

 have heard of it from Shaikh Zain or others, and if so, he 

 would probably have reported it, as it was much more impor- 

 tant and more intelligible than the Samarkand one. 



Thirdly. — The story told in the passage seems to me to 

 — — — , % — 



l Mohl, J. des Savants, 1840, 221, thinks he must have used the 

 translation, but he gives no reasons for this view. 



* Karnan is not marked on the maps but must be near Ghiva and to 

 the north of Akhsi. 



3 According to the Khazina Asfiya I, 594, Yahia and his two sons 

 Zechariah and Baqi were killed at the village of Kasrab in the Tash 

 kend^ district on 11 Muharram 906, 7 August 1500. The third son was 

 Khwajah Muhammad Amin. See also the Rashahat-i-'ain adhayat of 

 Fakhru-d din „li the son of Husain Wa'iz, Rieu's Cat, I. 353a and 

 Eth6's Cat. I. O. MSS., p. 261, which was written in 909, 1503-04. The 

 account of the martyrdom of K. Yahia and his two sons is given at 

 pp. 277 etc. of the I. O. MS., and it is stated that the life of the third 

 son, Khwaja Muhammad Amin, was spared in order that one son of K. 

 Yahia might survive. 



