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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 15 March 2011
For upwards of twenty years the late Professor Blochmann's translation of Abul Fazl's monumental work, the Aín-i Akbarí, has remained a splendid fragment, and students have longed in vain for its completion. It is, therefore, cause for congratulation that this has at length been effected. Colonel Jarrett's scholarly translation of the remainder of the work, which has recently appeared, is fully equal in accuracy, while it is superior in grace of language, to that of his predecessor. Only those who have laboured over the intricacies of Abul Fazl's detestable style, at one time turgid and overloaded with meaningless phrases, at another so curt and jejune as to be obscure, can fully appreciate the skill and learning which Colonel Jarrett has brought to bear on the supremely difficult task of rendering his author intelligible to European readers.
page 86 note 1 The following abbreviations are used:—J. Colonel Jarrett's translation. S.M. (i.e. Survey Maps) the official maps of the several districts of Bengal made by the officers of the Revenue Survey. A. of I. the Atlas of India. G. Grant's Analysis. E. Sir H. Elliot's articles. Bl. Professor Blochmann'.s articles. Bea. my articles. Bea. MS. unpublished material in my possession. The numerals indicate for J. and G. the page of their works; for E. the page of vol. ii; for Bl. and Bea. the vol. and page of the J.A.S.B.
page 91 note 1 In a note on p. 168 J. comments on an explanation of this term given by me in a note on p. 83, vol. ii, of Elliot in these words: “Mr. Beames in a note … distinguishes between Haveli and Baldah, the former alluding to the district close to the capital and the latter to that at a distance. It would have been more satisfactory if he had determined the limits of the distance.” The “limits” of a parganah, if by this is meant its extent, are as hard to define as those of an English county. Rutland contains 148 square miles, Yorkshire over 6000. So the Haveli parganah of Purniah is some fifty milea long by twenty broad, while that of Khalífatabad is less than two square miles. The fact seems to be that the parganah in which the capital of each Sarkár lay, no matter how large it might be, was called the Haveli parganah (the ‘home county’ we might say; G. calls it the ‘household county’), because its revenues were devoted to the maintenance of the household (haveli) and establishments of the governor. When the revenue of only a portion of the parganah was so applied, that portion was called haveli, and the other portion, whose revenues were paid into the public treasury, was called ‘baldah,’ or country. This, at any rate, appears to be the original meaning of the terms, though, of course, during the changes and confusion of the Nawábi period the real meaning was often lost sight of.
page 97 note 1 The information thus marked consists of the report of an enquiry made at my request by the Sarishtadar and Record Keeper of the Bardwan Collectorate in 1885.
page 108 note 1 Report of enquiries made at my request by the Record Keeper of the Purniah Collectorate. I was also myself collector of Purniah for four years, and have, therefore, personal knowledge of this neighbourhood.
page 115 note 1 See, however, Bl. xliv, 291 and my remarks on the Haveli below.
page 116 note 1 It is noticeable throughout the Aín that Abul Fazl always transliterates the Sanskrit 
by kh, as in mekh 
, birkhab 
, etc.
page 118 note 1 Report of enquiries made at my request by the Record Keeper of the Nadia Collector's Office. It is surprising how few places this local official can identify. This shows how completely the parganah as a local unit has fallen out of use in Central Bengal.
page 127 note 1 This identification is due to MrBeveridge, , J.A.S.B. lxi, 120Google Scholar. There can be little doubt as to its correctness. Bhaturiya was too important a place to have been omitted from the Aín, and there is no name but this which can indicate it. There is no place called Bhoriya Bazu, and Bhaturiya is just in the right place at the western extremity of the Sarkár.
page 128 note 1 Report of enquiry made at my request by the Record Keeper of the Farídpúr Collector's Office, 1885. Referred to as Bea. MS.
page 128 note 2 “The District of Bákarganj: its History and Statistics,” by Beveridge, H. B.C.S., Magistrate and Collector of Bákarganj. London: Trübner, 1876Google Scholar. Referred to as Bev. Bák.