1896.] W. Irvine— Later Mughuls (1707-1803). 175 
branches, into which they are divided, derive their names.! Then cross- 
ing the Jamnah, they formed a settlement on the eastern side of the 
upper Duab, half way between Mirath and Saharanpur, in a sandy, un- 
productive piece of country, possibly at that time very sparsely inhabit- 
ed. The etymology of the name Barhah is disputed; perhaps it is 
from the word barah (twelve), with some allusion to the number of their 
villages. From the time of Akbar, the men of this clan of Sayyads 
were famous as military leaders, and by their bravery had acquired a 
traditional right to lead the vanguard of the Imperial troops. Until 
the reign of Farrukhsiyar they seem to have been little distinguished 
outside the profession of arms, and judging from what we know of their 
descendants in the present age, they probably had little love of learn- 
ing. Brave, proud, lavish, they always were ; and in our day, when their 
swords have been perforce beaten into pruning hooks, they have 
succumbed only too completely before the wily money-lender. In 
Muzaffarnagar many is the story current of the ‘Sayyad Sahib’s’ 
reckless improvidence and ignorance of the commonest rule of business. 
In the 18th century a Barhah k& ahmag, or Barhah blockhead, was a 
common saying, and there was a rhyme to the effect that all the asses 
there were Bahadurs, and all the Bahadurs, asses. ® 
1 Chat-Banir is still a large town. Kundlé has a few huts, Tihanpur is a petty 
hamlet, Jagnér uninhabited, (Alan Cadell, Proc. As., Soc. Bengal, 1871, p. 261). I 
find Chat and Banur, two separate places in the N. H. of the Patialah territory, on 
sheet No. 47 of the Indian Atlas, the former about 16 m. N. and the latter 12 m. 
N.N.W. of Ambalah city. 
2 There seems to be no town or village in the Sayyads’ country, or connected 
with them, bearing the name of Barhah. Sir H. M. Elliot (Supp. Glossary, 110) 
speaks of the town of Barhah as one plundered by Safdar Jang in 1748. On a 
subject so peculiarly his own, it is dangerous to contest any of that writer’s state- 
ments, but unless I am much mistaken, the place so plundered was really Marahran 
(now in the Etah district), which lay in the course of Safdar Jang’s march from 
Dihli to Farrukhabad, and also contains a well-known colony of Sayyads. Elphin- 
stone (4th ed. p. 650) makes the same mistake. The Sairu-l-mutakharin, Calcutta 
printed text, II, 32; has, however, Marahrah plainly enough. The error, no doubt, 
began with Mustapha, Seir, III, 83, who reads “ Barr.” 
3 Seir Mutagharin, III, 441, note 261; 
Barha, nahin to, Barha : 
Gadha bahadur, Bahadur gadha. 
Blochmann, Azn, I, 390, 391, Robert J. Leeds, in N. W. Provinces Census Report 
for 1865 (District Muzaffarnagar), Elliot, Supp. Gloss., 50. Blochmann’s hope (Az, I, 
895, note,) of an exhaustive history of the Barhah Sayyads from the pen of one of the 
¢lan is never likely to be gratified. Seven or eight years ago I suggested to one of 
the Jansath family, a retired official of some rank, the need for such a work. Of 
course, he said it should be begun at once, but to this day the only account they can 
produce of their race is the feeble, incomplete, and inaccurate statement, the 
Sayyadu-t-tawarikh, prepared in 1864 by Sayyad Roshan ‘Ali Khan, Miranpuri. 
