Persian MS 380 (The John Rylands Research Institute and Library, The University of Manchester)

Persian Manuscripts

Summary of Contents: This abridged volume contains the first two sections and part of the third from the Tārīkh-i Firishtah (History of Firishtah), also known as the Gulshan-i Ibrāhīm (ٍRose-garden of Ibrāhīm), a chronicle by historian Muḥammad Qāsim Hindūshāh Astarābādī (fl. ca. 1585–1625), pennamed 'Firishtah' (Angel), together with Persian MS 379. He completed two redactions, one in 1015 (1606–07 CE) and another in 1018 (1609–10 CE) entitled Tārīkh-i Nawras'nāmah, both dedicated to his patron, the ruler of the Deccan Sultanate of Bijapur Ibrāhīm ‘Ādil Shāh II (b. 1570, r. 1580–1627). It features a preface on the pre-Islamic rulers of India followed by the first two and part of the third books devoted to the early Muslim rulers of Ghazna, Lahore, Dehli, and the Deccan, ending with the first 'garden' (rawz̤ah) recounting the history of the rulers of Gulbarga, or the Bahmani dynasty, ending with the marriage of Prince Muḥammad Bahmani with the daughter of daughter of King Sayf al-Dīn Ghūrī in 750 AH (1349–1350 CE).

Author: Firishtah, Muḥammad Qāsim Hindū Shāh Astarābādī فرشته، محمد قاسم هندوشاه استرآبادی

Title: Tārīkh-i Firishtah

Title: Gulshan-i Ibrāhīmī

Title: تاريخ فرشته

Title: گلشن ابراهیمی

Rubric: رب یسر و تمم بالخیر

Incipit: (basmala) برگ ۱پ (folio 1b): پیش وجود همه‌ٔ آیندگان * بیش بقای همه پایندگان | قافله [سابقه] سالار جهان قدم * مرسله پیوند گلوی قلم | داغ نه ناصیه داران پاک * تاج ده تخت نشینان خاک. چون بر حکم «کنت کثیراً و مخفیاً بقلم قدرت رقم ابداع بر صحیفهٔ احوال مصنوعات کشیده بدست عنایت شاهد نورس وجود را از بند عدم آزاد گردانید نسیم جان بخش روح پرور از چمن و نفخت فیه من روحی در احتراز آورده...

Explicit: برگ ۳۴۸ر (folio 348a): ...قواید دولت پر دافت و بخت دختر ملک سیف الدین غوری را با سیر خد شاهزاده محمد عقد نکاح

Colophon: No colophon.

Language(s): Persian

For other copies of this work held in the Rylands, see Persian MS 378 and 379 (2 vols.), 826 (formerly owned by an early translator of the work, Jonathan Scott), and 1014–1016 (3 vols). For a critical Persian edition, see Briggs. For English translations of selections, see Briggs, Scott, and Dow.

Physical Description

Form: codex

Support: Textblock of thin-weight, cross-grained, externally sized and well-polished, natural cream and straw-coloured papers all probably handmade in the Indian subcontinent.

Extent: 348 folios, 2 flyleaves (ff. iv + 348 + i).

Dimensions (leaf): 304 × 195 mm.

Dimensions (written): 258 × 133 mm.

Foliation: Hindu-Arabic numerals written on the upper-left corners of the a sides throughout, which continue from the first volume.

Collation

Undetermined, but possibly primarily quaternions throughout. Catchwords present on the lower-left corners of the b sides throughout.

Condition

Text in fair but stable condition, with moderate water damage and stains throughout.

Layout

Written in 1 column with 20 lines per page. Ruled with a misṭarah hand guide.

Hand(s)

Written clear black nasta‘līq with red subheaders.

Additions:
Inscriptions: The right flyleaf a side (f. ia) bears the Persian title, contents, author's name, with the name of former owner George William Hamilton, likely in the hand of his Muhīn Dās.
Bookplates: Left pastedown: ‘Bibliotheca Lindesiana’ with pencilled shelfmark ‘1/C’, and ‘Hamilton MSS No. 297’, with the name and number crossed out and ‘Persian’ and ‘380’ written aside.

Binding

Probably rebound in Dehli for former owner Colonel George William Hamilton (1807-1868) after his appointment as Commisioner there in 1862 CE.

Resewn all-along on two flat, probably leather thong, supports. Endpapers of comparatively heavy-weight paper added to the beginning and end. Thongs laced into pasteboards, edges trimmed, and chevron endbands twined in red and white silk threads over round cores at head and tail.

Boards decorated with central scalloped mandorlas featuring floral scrollwork designs, detached pendants with arabesques, all blocked directly in gold leaf, with intermediate horizontal cartouches repeatedly tooled with insular dots through the gold. Board margins dyed brown ~1 cm in from the edges, double-ruled in yellow on either side, with another single-rule internal margin, with additional single lines that criss-cross underneath the central decoration. Octagonal paper label bears the title of the work written in nasta‘līq.

318 × 211 × 47 mm.

Binding in fair but stable condition, with extensive abrasion and peeling of the grain layer on the exterior, and a broken upper headcap.

Accompanying Material

A loosed binion tucked insde the right board of the volume bears a table of contents.

History

Origin: Probably completed by an unidentified scribe in the Indian subcontinent; , undated, but probably early–mid 19th c. CE

Provenance and Acquisition

From the collection of Colonel George William Hamilton (1807-1868) who served in India from 1823 to 1867 latterly as Commissioner in Delhi. He acquired over a thousand Indian and Persian manuscripts of which 352 were selected after his death for the British Museum. The remainder were purchased in 1868 by Alexander Lindsay, 25th Earl of Crawford.

Purchased by Enriqueta Rylands, on behalf of the John Rylands Library, in 1901 from James Ludovic Lindsay, 26th Earl of Crawford.

Record Sources

Bibliographical description based on an index created by Reza Navabpour circa 1993, derived from a manuscript catalogue by Michael Kerney, circa 1890s, concisely published as Bibliotheca Lindesiana, Hand-list of Oriental Manuscripts: Arabic, Persian, Turkish, 1898.

Manuscript description by Jake Benson in 2023 with reference to the volume in hand.

Availability

To book an in-person or online appointment to consult the manuscript, visit Using the Special Collections Reading Rooms. For any other enquiries please email uml.special-collections@manchester.ac.uk.

Bibliography

J. Briggs, 'Essay on the Life and Writings of Ferishta'. Transactions of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, Vol. 2, No. 1 (1829): pp. 341–361.

H. M. Elliot and John Dowson, The History of India, As Told by Its Own Historians: The Muhammadan Period, Vol. VI (London: Trübner & Co., 1875), pp. 207–236, no. LI.

H. Ethé, Catalogue of Persian manuscripts in the library of the India Office, Vol. 1 (London: Printed for the India Office by H. Hart, 1903), cols. 113–118, nos. 291–302 [British Library, IO Islamic 1408, etc.].

Firishtah, Ferishta's History of Dekkan from the first Mahummedan conquests. Translated by J. Scott. Shrewsbury: Printed by J. and W. Eddowes for John Stockdale, Picadilly, London, 1794.

Firishtah, Tarikh-i-Ferishta, or, History of the rise of the Mahomedan power in India, till the year A.D. 1612. Translated by Major-General John Briggs. Vols. I, II, III, and IV. London: Printed for Longman, Rees, Orme, Brown, and Green, 1829.

Firishtah, Tarikh-i-Ferishta, or, History of the rise of the Mahomedan power in India, till the year A.D. 1612, by Mahomed Kasim Ferishta, of Astrabad. Edited and collated from various manuscript copies on the spot, and examined with the best maps by Major-General John Briggs, F.R.S. ... assisted by Munshi Mir Kheirat Ali Khan Mushtak of Akberabad, Vols. I and II. Bombay: Lithographed at the Government College Press, 1831.

G. P. Greswell, Bibliotheca Chethamensis: Sive Bibliothecæ Publicæ Mancuniensis Ab Humfredo Chetham Armigero Fundatæ Catalogus, Vol. III (Mancunii: Henricus Smith, 1826), p. 164, no. 7992 [Rylands Persian MS 1013–1015].

G. R. G. Hambly, 'Ferešta, Tārīḵ-e', Encyclopædia Iranica, Vol. IX, Fasc. 5 (2003), pp. 533–534.

D. N. Marshall, Mughals in India: A Bibliographical Survey. Vol. 1. Manuscripts (Bombay: Asia Publishing House, 1962), pp. 145–147, no. 471.

C. Rieu, Catalogue of the Persian manuscripts in the British Museum, Vol. I (London: British Museum, 1879), pp. 225–228 [British Library Add. 6569–6571, &c.].

E. Sachau and H. Ethé, Catalogue of the Persian, Turkish, Hindûstani, and Pushtû manuscripts in the Bodleian Library, Vol. I (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1889), col. 116, no. 217 [Bodleian MS Hunt 265].

C. A. Storey, Persian Literature: A Bio-bibliographical Survey, Vol. I, Pt. 2, Fasc. 3 (London: Luzac & Co., 1953), pp. 445-450, no. 617.

Funding of Cataloguing

Iran Heritage Foundation

The John Rylands Research Institute

Subjects

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