schimmel's Deccan Trip

7/29/2019 schimmel's Deccan Trip

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Impressions from a Journey to the Deccan

Author(s): Annemarie SchimmelSource: Die Welt des Islams, New Series, Vol. 20, Issue 1/2 (1980), pp. 104-107Published by: BRILLStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1570490 .

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MITTEILUNGEN

IMPRESSIONS FROM A JOURNEY TO THE DECCAN

In October 1979 I had the opportunity to visit Poona, Madras, Hyderabad, Bidar,Gulbarga, and Bijapur as well as Patna. My experience showed that the Muslimminority in southern India very carefully preserves their cultural heritage, and I hadthe good fortune to be introduced not only to the well-known libraries such as theKhudabakhsh Library in Bankipore/Patna and the Salar Jung Museum in Hyderabadbut also to some private and semi-private libraries which certainly deserve the interestof the Islamicists. These libraries, housed in the Madrasa-yi Muhammadiyya in Madras,the Sayeediya (Sa'idiyya) Library in Hyderabad, and in the homes of various individualsin Hyderabad, form part of the heirloom of one of the leading nawa'it families whocame from Arabia in the Middle Ages, served in various capacities at the Muslimcourts in South India (thus as qadis in Goa; after the annexion by the Portugueseof Goa in Bijapur, further at Mahmud Gawan's madrasa in Bidar), and finally settledpartly in Madras, partly in the Nizam's Hyderabad. The role of some of these scholarsfor South Indian culture has been described by Prof. Mohd. Yousuf Kokan, MadrasUniversity, in his book Arabic and Persian in Carnatic (Madras 1974) and his Urduwork about Imam al-'ulama Qadi Badr ud-daula (1211/1792-1280/1863). This scholarserved as qadi al-quddt of Carnatic State, helped the cause of Urdu in South Indiaand, like some of his descendants, advocated female education. Dr. Kokan took meto the Madrasayi Muhammadiyya in Madras which is supervised by Dr. MuhammadGhauth, a member of the Badr ud-daula family. Among the many thousands ofmanuscripts I saw during my all too short visit, is an autograph of 'Umar Suhrawardiof his 'Awdrif al-ma'drif; dated 608/1211-12; a fine copy of Gami's Laawd'ih,dated889/1484, i.e., during the author's life, and a volume of Gami's matnawis with somefine miniatures on colored, gold sprinkled paper, written by Mir 'Ali al-katib. Anautograph of Gami's gawdmi' al-baydn fi ta/sir al-qur'dn, dated 855/1451 in a fine MS(some pages missing) is preserved in the Sayeediyya library in Hyderabad. In Madras,a 17th century copy of the Diwan of Hafiz with lovely miniatures; a medical work,Ihtiyarat-i badi'i by 'All ibn Husain, dated 984/1576-77 with five interesting minia-tures; a beautiful copy of Amir Husrau's Diwdn dated 830/1436-37; a Risala-yi musiqiby one Saif ud-din 'Abd al-Mu'min al-Bagdadi in a beautiful hand as well as a Koran,written in Kashmir in 1050/1640-41 in a superb tulut with blue and gold caughtmy eyes. The main treasures of the library consist of works on hadit, fiqh, historyand all kinds of Arabic sciences, among them quite a number of unica and autographs.In the related Sayeediya Library, Janbagh Road, Hyderabad, I saw inter alia a copyof Ibn 'Asakir's Tdrih Dimasq in the handwriting of his son, dated 574/1178-79;al-Hatib al-Bagdadi's Kitdb al-asmd al-mubhama, dated 586/1190, and besides theautograph of Gami in his elegant hand autographs of at-Tahawi (808/1405-6) andIbn Hagar al-'Asqalani (839/1435-36). Among the Persian MSS., the Kulliyat ofNi'mat Khan 'All, who participated in Aurangzeb's Deccan wars (d. 1709), wasremarkable for its fine calligraphy and illumination; the Turcologist would enjoy agood copy of Nawa'i's Diwdn, dated 948/1541-42 and a Qissat al-anhiyd Turki, inChagatay Turkish. (Incidentally, Chagatay MSS, particularly by the Moghul prince'All Baht Azfari, 1758-1818, are also preserved in the University Library of Madras,where the prince spent the last years of his life after escaping from Delhi; his Wdqi'dti-Azfari has been published by Madras University). For me, the amazingly great

Die Welt des Islams, XX, 1-2

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number of good copies of Maulana Rumi's Matnawi was particularly interesting;a copy in six volumes with commentary, nicely calligraphed in Ahmadabad in 1152/1739-40 and numerous older copies with and without commentaries were kept inMadras and various places in Hyderabad (cf. also Kokan's Arabic and Persian...about the study of Rimi by various Carnatic authors). A superb manuscript in gubarscript, dated 1085/1674-75 and written by Muhammad ibn 'All in Shiraz is in theJagdish and Kamla Mittal Museum in Hyderabad where numerous masterpieces ofIslamic calligraphy and Indo-Muslim art are preserved.The religious and cultural life of the Muslims in the former Hyderabad State, whichwas incorporated into the Indian Union in 1948, is marked by strong private activitieson the educational sector. Besides the famous Osmania University (founded in 1918)with its immense campus, and the University of Hyderabad one finds still anotherUniversity of al-Azhar type: the Gami'a Nizamiyya, founded in 1875 by MaulanaAnwarullah Khan Fazilat Jung in the center of Hyderabad. Here, classical Islamiceducation is maintained; in an eight years course the boys are introduced to Koranrecitation, sirat, Arabic, Urdu, Persian, and English, further History, Geography,Arithmetic and writing; the higher education, six years, comprises taqsir,fiqh, hadit,kalam, logic, history, and higher Arabic; finally the student can specialized in a twoyears' course in tafsir, hadit, fiqh, kaldm, literature or history. Lodging is availablefor 350 students; the library comprises ca. 25 000 books, including some 2000 manuscripts.A Departfment of ifta issues fatwds. The education is free, and the Arabic bookletoffered to the visitor states that the basis of the finances is at-tawakkul 'ald Allah,'trust in God'. The madrasa issues a journal and has its own publications; it executivecommittee is headed at present by Maulana Sayyid Qutbuddin. al-Husaini, a memberof the Sabiriyya Chishtiyya and saggadanisin of the shrine of Sah Hamuf--a wisespiritual teacher whose discourses deeply impressed me.-Besides, there are special

schools where children can learn Urdu in a short time and Muslim ladies haveorganized an educational society. The tradition of Sufism is still strong, a Sufi Academyhas recently been founded in Hyderabad. We witnessed the 'urs at the tomb ofYusufain where the two saints are buried thanks to whose blessings Aurangzeb'sarmy was able to conquer Golkonda; many scholar and poets, among the greatUrdu poet Nawwab Mirza Dag (d. 1904) have found their last resting place in itsprecincts. Worthy of mention is also the enormous dome of Raju Qattal's tomb(late 17th century), important in history since in his dargdh the cheerful Abu'l-HasanTana Shah was living as a dervish before he was marri'edto 'All Qutbshah's daughterto become the last king of Golkonda; he was then deposed by Aurangzeb in 1687.The tombs of the Qutbshahi kings in Golkonda are well kept, although their onceso colorful tiles have almost completely fallen off. The style of calligraphy on thesarcophagi would deserve a special study.Among the outstanding events in Hyderabad was an evening in a private homewith the recitation of Qasida-yi burda. Although not the whole long Arabic poem byBuSiri but only a small portion of it was recited, the various ways of calling blessingsover the Prophet in alternating solo and chorus made this performance, which lastedabout 80 minutes, highly interesting. Only recently a new Urdu verse translation ofthe Burda has been published in Hyderabad, along with the Arabic text and Gami'sPersian verse translation.Besides Hyderabad, the centers of the old Deccani kingdoms offer the visitor a widerange of information: Gulbarga, where the Bahmanids began their rule in 1347;Bidar, their second residence after 1422 which was then overtaken by the Baridshahishortly before 1500 (the Baridshahi tombs have some interesting calligraphy), andfinally Bijapur, once a city with 1600 mosques, but now consisting of numerous ruins.Still, the city, to whose spiritual history Richard M. Eaton has recently devoted auseful study (Sufis of Bijapur, Princeton Univ. Press 1977) preserves some extremelybeautiful and very well kept monuments: the simple, powerful Great Mosque fromthe mid-16th century excels by its gilded mihrdb; the Gol Gunbad, 'Ali 'Adil Shah's




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106 MITTEILUNGtomb(1656),which has the thirdlargestdome in the world(externaldiameter43.9m)offers a beautifulview of the city from its comfortableminarets,as does the smallsanctuaryof the Chishti saint AminuddinA'la (d. 1675)on ShahpurHillock at thenorthernend of the city close to the formerly mmenselyrich but now completelyruinedtradecenterof Bijapur.Some interestingdocumentsare found in the dargahof the Shattari aint HashimPir nearthe Gol Gunbad(d. 1645).The IbrahimRauza,Ibrahim Adilshah's d. 1626)charmingmausoleum, s excellentlykept; it is one ofthe most fascinatingIslamicbuildings,reflecting, n a certainway, the cheerful dis-position of the music-loving Ibrahim, maecenas of so many artists. Indeed, the Qutb-shahis of Golkonda-Hyderabad and the 'Adilshahis of Bijapur around 1600 were asactive on the cultural sector as their contemporaries Akbar and Jahangir in theMoghul north-west of India.Bidar, the second Bahmanid capital, was chosen for its strategic importance; itsimmense fort is built of the red stone typical for the area west of the Krishna river.Remarkable among the buildings is the fine octogonal mausoleum of the Ni'matullahifamily who came to the Bahmani court shortly before 1430 and introduced Shiainfluences (which were to lead to constant frictions between the Shia 'foreigners' andthe Sunni Deccanis and their Abyssinian soldiers). The tulut inscription on arabesquesat the door of the mausoleum is masterful. The once marvellous inscriptions in tileson and inside the Bahmani tombs are almost completely obliterated. The same is trueof the great four-iwdn madrasa built by Mahmfid Gawan in 1472, where the richtile-work has also completely disappeared. The tomb of this all-powerful minister, whowas treacherously murdered in 1481, is situated outside the town, and is, contrary tothe immense royal mausoleums with their huge domes and their rich decorations,covered only by a simple stone slab; the Nizams have finally put up a memorial stoneat Mahmfd Gawan's tomb.Most interesting was Gulbarga where we reached just after the 'urs of GesudarazBandanawaz, the major Chishti saint of the south, who died there at the age of about100 years in 1422. The fair was still going on, and while the 'urs itself was attended,as I was told, by about 200.000 people, there were still several thousand throngingin the streets to the photographers' shops close to the shrine to have a group-phototaken near the sacred spot. We had the good fortune to listen to exquisite Persianqawwali in the residence of the saggddanisin,a very farsighted leader of his community,who had recently donated land and founded a college for Muslim girls; at the moment83 girls were lucky enough to receive higher education.-The first dwelling place ofGesudaraz, where he stayed after coming from Delhi via Gujarat in 1413-is stillintact, and so is the dargdh of Siraguddin Gunaidi, a saint from Peshawar who wasinstrumental in Hasan Gangu's ascension to the throne as 'Ala'uddin Bahman Shahand remained his spiritual adviser. In the courtyard of his mosque a tree has grownout of the miswak, tooth-brush, of Gesudaraz, and the visitor is given a twig of itfor the sake of blessing. The dargdh, headed by a very spiritual saggadanisin, ownsprecious manuscripts of early Indian Sufi texts as well as several scrolls with thesilsila of the order from Adam to the Adilshahi period. (Similar scrolls are kept inthe shrine of Gesuidaraz; one, which reached only to the time of the Prophet, wasabout 90 feet long). Numerous other shrines with important manuscripts and documentsfor the history of Sufism are found in Gulbarga; there are further the grand tombsof the early Bahmanid rulers with fine stone work at the doors and windows. Fromthe view point of Islamic art, however, the Great Mosque inside the fort is mostimportant;built in 1367, it is the only India mosquewithout a courtyard,and thearray of its softly pointed arches and the immaculate white of its interior make it,in my opinion one of the most beautiful buildings in the Islamic world.'

Excellent photographs of this mosque in: Andreas Volwahsen, Islamisches Indien(Weltkulturen und Baukunst), Miinchen, Hirmer, 1969.




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I have to thank numerous friends in Hyderabad for introducing me to the treasuresof Muslim Deccani culture; besides Mr. and Mrs. Sewitz, Max Mueller Bhavan, whooffered me generous hospitality during my stay, I have to thank particularly Dr.Ziauddin Ahmad Shakeb from the State Archives, who accompanied me through theDeccan; his knowledge of medieval Deccani history was as inspiring as his acquaintancewith the Sufi tradition. Annemarie Schimmel


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schimmel's Deccan Trip

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