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ABSTRACT
The development of literature in the vernacular in fifteenth-century Gwalior has been attributed to its local rulers’ intentionality at that time. The patronage of the Tomars, a Rajput dynasty, for retellings of the epics in Classical Hindi has been ascribed to a reaction to ‘Muslim’ sovereignty and to a desire to ascertain their ‘son of the soil’ credentials. This paper complicates this commonplace reduction of the motives of patronage, and opens up the study of the complex contemporaneous environment, where other forms of literature were being produced as well. To better situate the emergence of Classical Hindi, this paper presents a contextualized overview of the literary production of two other prominent communities, besides the Hindu Tomar court, namely that of the Jain merchants, and of the Sufis catering to the military garrison. The study of these multiple patrons and audiences suggests that the impetus of vernacularization is not to be reduced to a single court, but emerged from complex interactions between different milieus and extended networks of circulation.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes
1. We use the term “Hindi” here as shorthand for “Classical Hindi,” or what is sometimes called anachronistically “Braj,” sometimes “Gwaliyarī,” or “Madhyadeśīya.”
2. As articulated in particular in Pollock, The Language of the Gods, 19–29 and 410–22.
3. As a caveat, we should add that this description is necessarily limited to what we have documentation for. There is regrettably very little about the “folk” culture, especially that of women, so important for studying the emergence of the vernacular.
4. Kumar, Emergence of the Delhi Sultanate, 31–45.
5. Digby, “Before Timur Came,” 298.
6. Orsini and Sheikh, After Timur Left.
7. Willis, Inscriptions of Gopaksetra; and Singh and Jain, Inscriptions of Gwalior.
8. Brac de la Perrière and Burési, Le Coran de Gwalior.
9. This is the earliest of a set of closely related texts, including a Gwāliyar-Nāmah by Shah Jalāl Hisārī (relating events up to 1645–1646), one by Hīrāman bin Girdhardās Munshi (up to 1668); and one by Khair al-Dīn Muhammad Illāhābādi (up to 1785–1786).
10. This remains the case, even if we discount some of the claims appropriating works of uncertain origins as their patrimony by Gwalior-based historians like the prolific Harihar Nivās Dvivedī in their enthusiasm for boosting their city’s prestige (Bangha, “Early Hindi Epic Poetry,” 373 n 26 and 393 n 92–3).
11. This text was first edited by the Lakshmi Venkateshvar Press in Bombay: Kalyan 1981 VS. Manuscripts are reportedly preserved in Ujjain Vikram Kīrti Mandir (3485) and in the Nāgarī Pracārinī Sabhā in Benares (4262), the latter dated 1487 (1544 VS).
12. Gaurī, Gvāliyar kā rājnaitik evaṃ Sānskṛtik, 191–2; and Dvivedī, Gvāliar ke Tomaron kā itihās, 37.
13. The 1410 “Hindi” inscription is found on a pillar in the Ambikādevī temple in Sihoniyā (Morena) (see Willis, Inscriptions of Gopaksetra, 28). Dvivedī records a Sanskrit one in the same temple from 1405 (Gvāliar ke Tomaron kā itihās, 50 and 65).
14. Horstmann, Der Zusammenhalt der Welt, 4–9.
15. For example, described as the killer of powerful demons, see Pauwels, “The Power-Politics of Desire.”
16. Gayādhara, who is mentioned in Keśavdās’ Kavipriyā, is identified by Dvivedī with the writer of the same name of the Gangola Tāl inscription of Vīr Singh’s successor Uddharana (Gvāliar ke Tomaron kā itihās, 39–41; see also Katare, “Two Gangolātāl, Gwalior, Inscriptions,” 355).
17. The ṣaṭkarma, “six acts” generally refers to the six traditional duties of brahmins, though the term is also current in tantric contexts, referring to “six magical acts”.
18. Text in Katare, “Two Gangolātāl, Gwalior, Inscriptions,” 355.
19. Translated by Poddar, Nayacandrasūri’s Rambhāmañjarī.
20. Mukhtār and Jain, Jainagrantha-praśasti-saṅgraha, 2.5–7.
21. An alternative reading for this compound is “who is protected from the destruction of hordes…”.
22. The sākaṃ in this line is not related to śaka, but rather the indeclinable governing the instrumental “with”. We are grateful to Prof. Richard Salomon for pointing this out and other help with reading the inscriptions.
23. Dvivedī, Mahākavi Viṣṇudās kṛt Mahābhārat, text p. 5, v. 35–7.
24. According to the foreword or praśasti of the work, he also built a major Jain temple of Candraprabha, which was inaugurated with much fanfare. According to Dvivedī this was turned into the grave of Muhammad Ghawth (Gvāliar ke Tomaron kā itihās, 63 fn 2), but apparently, this is based on just one ambiguous line in the chronicle by Kharag Rāy (candraprabhū ke dyoharen rahe shekha sukhamāni in the dohā on p. 95 of the edition, on fol. 42v in the ms.). If one reads the line in context, it however merely means Ghawth stayed in the place upon arrival. It is also not clear that this was in Gwalior town. The whole area southeast of Chunar that includes the Nath temple where the Shaykh stayed before coming to Gwalior is named Chandraprabha (now a Wildlife Sanctuary).
25. It has to be said that the text itself was written in Lāhaṇapura, a town ruled by Sultan Shah and his son Īsappha Khan (De Clercq, “On Jaina Apabhramsa Prasasti’s,” 283).
26. Balbir, “Manuscript Puzzles,” 34, 43; and Doshi, “A Fifteenth Century Jain Manuscript.”
27. For the illustrated 1516 manuscript of the Āraṇyaka Parvan of the Mahābhārata see Khandalavala and Chandra, An Illustrated Āraṇyaka Parvan.
28. Adamjee, Strategies for Visual Narration, 226–7.
29. Gaurī, Gvāliyar kā rājnaitik evaṃ Sānskṛtik, 174; and Dvivedi, Gvāliar ke Tomaron kā itihās, 84–87; based on the Sanskrit court poet Śrīvara’s Rāja-taraṅgiṇī 6.14–15, as given in Chandra and Agrawala, “A Note on Some Cultural Reference”; This instance of gift-giving is also documented in the Tabaqāt-i Akbarī see Delvoye, “Collections of Lyrics in Hindustani,” 51.
30. Sharma, Saṅgītarājah.
31. Sarmadee, Tarjuma-i-mānakutūhala, 10–11.
32. Sharma, Sahasras.
33. Ibid., 182, no. 668.
34. Sarmadee, Tarjuma-i-mānakutūhala.
35. Ibid., 10–11.
36. Trivedi, “Music Patronage in the Indo-Persian,” 73–77.
37. Delvoye, “Indo-Persian Accounts on Music,” see Abū, al-Faz̤l, The Āʼīn-I Akbarī, Vol. 3: 266.
38. Brown, “The Origins and Early Development,” 171–8.
39. Brown 2010, “The Origins and Early Development.”
40. For example, Singh and Jain, Inscriptions of Gwalior, 26.
41. Nahar focuses on Śvetāmbara inscriptions, only listing the main Digambara rock inscriptions from the Fort area. He mentions monks from a.o. the Kharataragaccha, Tapāgaccha, Upakeśagaccha, and Bṛhadgaccha overseeing the consecration of the images (Nahar, Jaina Inscriptions, 72–94). Singh and Jain (Inscriptions of Gwalior) list both Digambara and Śvetāmbara inscriptions. They mention different Digambara lineages, including the Kāṣṭhāsaṅgha and Mūlasaṇgha. For different Digambara monastic lineages of Gwalior, see De Clercq, “Bhaṭṭārakas and Digambara Monastic Lineages.”
42. Note that the Kṛṣṇarṣigaccha, to which Nayacandra Sūri belonged, is not among the lineages mentioned by Nahar, though it is a branch of the mentioned Tapāgaccha.
43. Padmanābha Kāyastha’s Sanskrit Yaśodhara-carita composed at the time of Vīram, under Bhaṭṭāraka Guṇakīrti from the Digambara Kāṣṭhāsaṅgha Māthuragaccha is one notable exception. The same Guṇakīrti figures as a mediator of patronage in several Apabhramsha compositions.
44. The praśastis of Raïdhū’s oeuvre are edited by Rājārām Jain, Raïdhū Sāhitya kā ālocanātmak pariśīlan, 593–663; and Parmanand Jain Shastri, Jain Granth Prashasti Sangrah. In addition, Rājārām Jain edited five of his works, Jain, Raïdhū-granthāvalī; Bhadrabāhu-cāṇakya-candragupta-kathānaka; and Puṇyāsrava-kathā(-kośa), including a Hindi translation. References in this paper are to Jain’s editions.
45. Granoff, “Mountains of Eternity”, has argued that this preoccupation with the kali age, exhibited by Raïdhū may be due to the violence experienced from Mongol invasions.
46. See Costello’s paper in this issue.
47. Note, however, that the location of the composition of this work and its patron is not Gwalior, but Chandwar, ruled by Pratāparudra Cauhān.
48. Jain, Raïdhū-granthāvali, Vol. 1, 352.
49. Gaurī, Gvāliyar kā rājnaitik evaṃ Sānskṛtik, 85; and Singh and Jain, Inscriptions of Gwalior, vol. 1, 42.
50. De Clercq, “Apabhramsha as a Literary Medium.”
51. Bārā Bhāvanā was edited in Jain, Raïdhū Sāhitya kā ālocanātmak pariśīlan, 448–52, based on a single manuscript.
52. See De Clercq, “Bhaṭṭārakas and Digambara Monastic Lineages.”
53. See De Clercq, “Memories of Yoginīpura.”
54. The identity of this town and its rulers is not clear.
55. Ibid.
56. Granoff, “Mountains of Eternity.”
57. See De Clercq, “The Jaina Harivaṃśa and Mahābhārata.”
58. Blayac, “Contextualizing the Gwalior Qur’an,” 116–7.
59. Ibid., 113–25.
60. Alilouche and Qouchani, “Les glosses marginales.”
61. He continued on to Malwa and Gujarat, returning to Daulatabad, where he was born, but later settled in the new capital Gulbarga.
62. ‘Alā al-Dīn received a khillat in gratitude (see Islam, Sufism in South Asia, 265, 314 n. 96 based on Muẖammad Ahmad ‘Alī’s 1427 Siyār-e Muḥammadī).
63. Blayac rejects earlier speculation that the Quran manuscript. was finished by the entourage of Gīsū Darāz, specifying that the exact date of its completion was in July, after the saint had left Gwalior in February, so probably it was meant for local use (Blayac, “Contextualizing the Gwalior Qur’an,” 117).
64. Telang, Hinduī Banāma Dakkhinī, though see doubts cast by Digby, “Before Timur Came,” 334.
65. Mathur, Kulliyāt-i Gwāliyārī, 27. Ghawth trained with Hafiz Jaunpurī in Jaunpur, who was initiated by Shaykh Abdullah Shattar from Samarqand, himself a Kubrawi who settled (after travel in Khurasan and India) in Mandu early in his life (see Kugle, Sufis and Saints’ Bodies, 131, also 302 n 9). Ghawth considered Shaykh Hammīd Zuhūr al Haqq as his spiritual master in his reported miraj or ascension to heaven, who was himself trained by the Shattari Shaykh Qāzan of Bengal (Ibid., 302 n 17).
66. Mathur, Kulliyāt-i Gwāliyārī, 20–25. Ghawth himself ascribes his powers to mystical direct encounter with al-Suhravardi (as written up in his early work al Jawāhir al-Khamsa, see Kugle, Sufis and Saints’ Bodies, 303 n 36).
67. For a historian’s description of the events, see Kugle, “Heaven’s Witness”; Sufis and Saints’ Bodies, 161–2.
68. Mathur, Kulliyāt-i Gwāliyārī, 21–22.
69. Behl and Weightman, Madhumālatī, 1–4. He, however, was part of the retinue of the Suri king Salīm Shāh, whom he praised in his romance, see also Sreenivasan, “Warrior-Tales at Hinterland Courts,” 251.
70. Mathur, Kulliyāt-i Gwāliyārī, 23.
71. Ibid., 24–25.
72. Ibid., 27.
73. Ibid., 26–27; Khānūnī and Ahmad, Kulliyāt-e-Gvāliyarī, 93–94. This Sufi is referred to as having blessed Mān Singh and behind the Quranic inscription to the entrance of the Gujrī Mahal (Khānūnī and Ahmad, Kulliyāt-e-Gvāliyarī, 50). The inscription text is in Singh and Jain, Inscriptions of Gwalior, vol. 2: 449–450, no. 755.
74. Singh and Jain, Inscriptions of Gwalior, vol. 2, 454–8, esp. line 8.
75. Mathur, Kulliyāt-i Gwāliyārī, 27; and Khānūnī and Ahmad, Kulliyāt-e-Gvāliyarī, 94–5.
76. Mathur Kulliyāt-i Gwāliyārī, 28; and Khānūnī and Ahmad, Kulliyāt-e-Gvāliyarī, 95–6.
77. Sarmadee, Tarjuma-i-mānakutūhala, 44–5. This rāga is said to go back to the thirteenth-century Chistīya Amīr Khusro.
78. Granoff, “Mountains of Eternity,” 35–6, 44–7.
79. Pāṇḍav-carit 1.35, Dvivedī, Mahākavi Viṣṇudās kṛt Mahābhārat, 5.
80. For more on this martial Sarasvatī, see Pauwels, “The Power-Politics of Desire.”
81. Cunningham, Archaeological Survey of India, Vol. 2, 342.
82. Such conventional utterances of humility are also found in Apabhramsha praśastis. See De Clercq, “Apabhramsha as a Literary Medium.”
83. Raïdhū, moreover, denoted the language of his Apabhramsha works “Prakrit”, see De Clercq, “Apabhramsha as a Literary Medium.”
84. See Bangha, “Early Hindi Epic Poetry,” 385–6; and De Clercq, “Apabhramsha as a Literary Medium,” 340.