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VII. The Babar-nama. The material now available for a definitive text of the book

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 February 2017

Extract

At the end of an article on the Elphinstone Codex which appeared in this Journal in January, 1907, I expressed the hope of being able later to offer information from which to judge how it compares in wording with the Haydarābād Codex, the ultimate aim of the whole investigation being the establishment of a definitive text of the Bābār-nāma. Since writing that article I have ascertained, by collating the two manuscripts, that in the matter of wording one cannot be ranked higher than the other because, trifling divergence excepted, they are verbally identical.

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Articles
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 1908

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References

page 74 note 1 The Elphinstone MS. cannot be a copy of the Haydarābād, because it has many notes, written into its text, where the latter has none. The Haydarābād MS. cannot be a copy of the Elphinstone, because it contains material that is not in the latter, and has not been lost but omitted.Google Scholar

page 75 note 1 It is satisfactory to have ascertained their agreement for another reason than that of their service as text-material, viz., that a real warranty has been obtained for the Haydarābād Codex in confirmation of the mainly circumstantial one on which it has been accepted.Google Scholar

page 75 note 2 Erroneously given in January, 1907, as fol. 198.Google Scholar

page 75 note 3 Owing to the inconsistent entry of notes in the Elphinstone Codex, some in the text, some on the margins, my argument might be opposed by the presumption that the quoted note is one copied, not made, where it now is. But if it were copied, the argument would be still valid, since it applies to any replica of Bābar's draft. The Elphinstone Codex is doubly supported in its position as a replica, not only by the Haydarābād Codex, but, as I have quite recently ascertained, by that portion of Dr. Kehr's manuscript which follows the place of the quoted note.Google Scholar

page 76 note 1 i.e. from its fol. 240 to fol. 312, at which place it is left unsupported through loss of pages from the Elphinstone MS.Google Scholar

page 76 note 2 Immediately after the quoted note there occur in the Elphinstone MS. an unusual number of slight mistakes and verbal variants, just what might occur if the handwriting, Bābar's that is, of the archetype were less clear than that of the earlier and presumably professional scribe. It soon, however, shows the advantage of familiarity by returning to its former agreement with its comrade.Google Scholar

page 76 note 3 I am indebted to MrThomas, F. W.for being enabled to examine the manuscript in the I.O. Library.Google Scholar

page 77 note 1 Cf. “Mémoires de Bāber,” vol. ii, pp. 443 ff.Google Scholar and notes; also Z.D.M.G., vol. xxxvii, pp. 141 ff., art. “Bābur und Abū'l-faẓl.”Google Scholar

page 80 note 1 A singular coincidence about the point of junction of these first and second portions will be found mentioned under (f).Google Scholar

page 82 note 1 The missing page is in his second section.Google Scholar

page 82 note 2 See, too, Haydarābād MS., fols. 353 and 310b; Ilminsky, pp. 457 and 403; Memoirs, pp. 395 and 352.Google Scholar AlsoAkbar-nāma, Bib. Ind. ed., vol. i, p. 106,Google Scholar and trans. Beveridge, H., vol. i, p. 260.Google Scholar

page 82 note 3 A discrepancy in the MSS. about bīrlcūt it would be tedious to drawattention to.Google Scholar

page 84 note 1 Ilminsky, , p. 144,Google Scholar line 5; Memoirs, p. 122.Google Scholar

page 84 note 2 The missing narrative is contained in the Haydarābād Codex.Google Scholar

page 87 note 1 The following significant words appear in a few lines of the “Bābar Mirzā” biography: sipāḥ-sālār, Qāsim Qūchīnī, amūr-malik, tawājī beglār, parwāna-beglār, auighūr to describe Turks, tūzūk-rosh, ba daulat wa zafar.Google Scholar

page 87 note 2 “The translation which he executed (the Mīrzā) of the Memoirs of Bābar is extremely close and accurate, and has been much praised for its elegance. But, though simple and concise, a close adherence to the idioms and forms of expression of the Turkī original, joined to a want of distinctness in the use of the relatives, often renders the meaning extremely obscure, and makes it difficult to discover the connection of the different members of the sentence. The style is frequently not Persian, and a native of Persia would find it difficult to assign any sense to some of the expressions. Many of the Turkī words are not translated, sometimes because they had no corresponding term in Persian, and sometimes perhaps from negligence; or, it may be, because they were then familiar to the Turkī nobility of the Court of Agra.’ (Mems., Preface, p. ix.)Google Scholar