304 H. Blochmann —Geography and History of Bengal. [No. 3, 
No. 40. The Mahmud Shah (of Dihli) Inscription of Bihar. A. H. 799. 
This inscription belongs to the Khdngah , or cell, of Ziya ul Haq, 
governor of Bihar, who was mentioned in the preceding inscription. The 
slab was found in the cluster of religious buildings known in Bihar as the 
Chhota Takyah, ‘ the small cloister,’ in which there is the tomb of Shah 
Diwan ’Abdul Wahhab, who is said to have died in 1096, A. H. 
As the inscription mentions Mahmud Shah as the reigning king in 
799, it follows that Nu^rat Shah was not acknowledged as opposition king 
by Malik Sarwar of Jaunpur, to whom Bihar then belonged. Vide 
1 Chronicles,’ pp. 31.2 to 317. 
\j 1^0 L« j\ b <Ki 
1. During the reign of the king of the world, Mahmud Shah, Ziya ul 
Haq, governor of the province, built this Khdnqdh. 
2. Seven hundred and ninety-nine years had passed since the Hijrah, when this 
asylum was completed. May it be the refuge of the weak ! (A. D. 1397.) 
Nos. 40 to 42. The Mahmud Shah (of Jaunpur) Inscriptions of Bihar. 
(A. H., 847 and 859.) 
From the preceding inscriptions we see that Bihar, in the 8th century 
of the Hijrah, belonged to the Dihli empire. With the establishment, im¬ 
mediately afterwards, of the Jaunpur kingdom, it was separated from Dihli. 
Bihar with Qanauj, Audh, Karah, Dalamau, Sandela, Bahraich, and Jaunpur, 
had since 796 been in the hands of Malik Sarwar Khwajahsara, who had the 
title of £ Sultan ushsharq,’ or ‘ king of the East.’ He does not appear to have 
struck coins, and the fact that the preceding inscription does not mention 
his name, confirms the statement of the histories that he did not assume the 
ensigns of royalty. He was succeeded by his adopted son Malik Qaran- 
ful,* whose elder brother Ibrahim ascended the throne of Jaunpur in 804, 
under the title of Sultan Shamsuddin Abul Muzaffar Ibrahim Shah. After 
a reign of forty years, he was succeeded by Nayiruddin Mahmud Shah (844 
to 862), to whose reign the following three inscriptions belong. 
The inscriptions do not mention Mahmud’s kunyah ; the coins (Thomas, 
Chronicles, p. 322) do not even give his first name. But as Napiruddin 
Mahmud Shah of Jaunpur is the contemporary of, and has the same name 
* This word is generally derived from the Greek caryophyllum, a clove ; but the 
GhiydsullugTidt derives it more correctly from the Hindi learn, 1 ear,’ and phul, flower, 
because women and eunuchs often put a clove into the lobe of the ear. An ear- 
ornament, resembling the head of a clove, has also the same name. It is possible 
that Malik Qaranful, like Malik Sarwar, was a eunuch. 
