II ' 



334 H. G. Baverty — Beply to ' Histy. and Geogr. of Bengal, No. Ill: [No. 3, 



340 of the Bo. As. J., vol. vi. for 1873, Mr. Thomas has again changed in 

 Ms ideas, and says " the first occupation of Bengal by Muhammad Bakht- 

 yar Khilji" was " in 600 a. h." 



I now come to another chief point in this discussion. 



Mr. Blochmann " thought" the name of " Qutbuddin of the Paralyzed 

 Sand," [see Briggs' translation of Firishtah, noticed in note at page 519 

 and 521 of my Translation, which makes a very energetic warrior of him, 

 considering his " Paralyzed Hand"], had been " set at rest" by Mr. Thomas 



but in this I cannot agree any more than in the date 599 and 600 



H. for the conquest of Bengal — and says that my different MSS. " have 

 clearly the same words as the Bibl. Indica Edition of the Tabaqat" : my 

 MSS. run thus : — 



Hfi 



but, in the Calcutta Text, after the word jl, the words «a».*o jl — " of a" or 

 " the hand" — occur, and the Hamilton MS., the worst of the whole num- 

 ber collated, has the same, but the other two MSS. from which the Printed 

 Text is taken have not those words, and another MS. has b j\ — " of a" or 

 " the foot" — but all the rest of the MSS. are as I have given it above, and 

 translated it. 



I fail to see much difference in Mr. Blochmann's "literal translation :" 

 — " Outwardly he had no comeliness, and his little finger [of one hand] 

 possessed an infirmity. For this reason they called him Aibak-i-shall 

 [Aibak with the paralyzed hand] " and my : — "He possessed no outward 

 comeliness, and the little finger [of one hand ?] had a fracture, and on that 

 account he used to be styled T-bak-i-Shil [the ■powerless-fingered']" The 

 only difference is that where I translate «-^| l } had, Mr. Blochmann trans- 

 lates it possessed — a mighty difference truly — and that I translate the 

 word ^^xteS — guftandi which is the imperfect tense of the verb, used also 

 to imply continuity or habitude, and is not the past tense, and that I give 

 to ^xJLX* the meaning of a concrete noun. I see no reason to alter my 

 translation, as lexicographers, who are supposed to know something of the 

 meanings of words, render ^JLX*. a rupture, a fracture, defeat, as well as 

 breaking, brokenness, &c. 



Mr. Blochmann calls the Haft-Iklim " an excellent work," and in this 

 I quite agree with him. Let him look at it, however, and he will find with 

 respect to Kutb-ud-Din, T-bak-i-Shil, that, in it, are the following words — 

 (iJiaSo/o ^ajj \j 3 \ ^ <3uX£ j^^ cu^xii iS ^Jt J (—which I defy any one 

 to translate otherwise than—from, or on this, that his little finger was 

 broken they used to call him I'-bak." Which hand is not stated. 



The author of the Tabakat-i-Akbari, Buda'uni, and even Firishtah, all 

 of whom Mr. Blochmann states [" Contributions ," page 280], must have 



