Destiny Disrupted by Tamim Ansary

Author:Tamim Ansary
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, pdf
Tags: History
ISBN: 1586488139
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Published: 2009-04-27T00:00:00+00:00

THE MOGHULS (ROUGHLY 900 TO 1273 AH)

The Moghuls were every bit the equal of the Ottomans in wealth and strength. About 20 percent of the world’s current population lives in the territory they once ruled, including all or part of five modern countries, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, and Burma. The man who founded this gigantic empire was an almost exact contemporary of Shah Ismail’s named Babur, which means “tiger,” and in some ways, he was even more remarkable than the prodigious Safavid teenager.

Babur claimed descent from both Timur-i-lang and Chengez Khan. What the blood ties really were, who knows, but Babur took his genealogy seriously; it give him a lifelong sense of mission. His father ruled a little kingdom called Farghana, just north of today’s Afghanistan, and when he died in 1495, Babur inherited this throne. He was twelve years old.

Within a year he had lost his kingdom, which is hardly surprising: he was only twelve, after all! But he regrouped and conquered legendary Samarqand, Timur’s one-time capital—then lost it. He went back to Farghana and took that again. But his enemies won it back. Then he conquered Samarqand a second time, this time with just 240 men—but could not hold it. By the time he was eighteen, Babur had gained and lost two kingdoms twice apiece and found himself on the run through the mountains of Afghanistan with his mother and sisters and a few hundred followers. For three years, he and his band roamed the wilds, looking for a new kingdom: kinging was all he knew, and king was the only job title he was seeking.

I dare say any teenager who holds together a band of adult warriors over many years of homeless exile must have something going for him; and Babur was certainly an intimidating physical specimen. The stories say he could jump across a stream holding a full-grown man tucked under each arm. (They don’t say what the full-grown men thought of this exercise.) Unlike most tough guys, however, Babur was sensitive, artistic, and romantic. He kept a diary throughout his adventures, and late in life penned an autobiography that became a classic of Turkish literature. After his grandson had it translated into the more prestigious Persian, the book achieved a high place in that canon as well. In his book, Babur reveals himself with extraordinary honesty. After a crucial military loss, for example, he tells us he could not help “crying a great deal.” What kind of tough guy admits such a thing? Later he reports on his arranged marriage and his failure to work up any enthusiasm for his wife, despite his earnest efforts. He visits her only every week or two, he says, and then only because his mother nags at him. Then he falls in love—with a boy he sees in the bazaar. “In that frothing up of desire and passions and under the stress of youthful folly, I used to wander bare-headed, bare-footed, through street and lane, orchard and vineyard; I showed civility neither to friend nor stranger, took no care for myself or others.

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