Sult̤ān-nigār Khānīm was the youngest but one of Yūnas Khān’s children. Her they made go forth (chīqārīb īdīlār) to Sl. Maḥmūd Mīrzā; by him she had one child, Sl. Wais (Khān Mīrzā), mention of whom will come into this history. When Sl. Maḥmūd Mīrzā died (900 AH. -1495 AD.), she took her son off to her brothers in Tāshkīnt without a word to any single person. They, a few years later, gave her to Adik (Aūng) Sult̤ān,150 a Qāzāq sult̤ān of the line of Jūjī Khān, Chīngīz Khān’s eldest son. When Shaibānī Khān defeated the Khāns (her brothers), and took Tāshkīnt and Shāhrukhiya (908 AH.), she got away with 10 or 12 of her Mughūl servants, to (her husband), Adik Sult̤ān. She had two daughters by Adik Sult̤ān; one she gave to a Shaibān sult̤ān, the other to Rashīd Sult̤ān, the son of (her cousin) Sl. Sa‘īd Khān. After Adik Sult̤ān’s death, (his brother), Qāsim Khān, Khān of the Qāzāq horde, took her.151 Of all the Qāzāq khāns and sult̤āns, no one, they say, ever kept the horde in such good order as he; his army was reckoned at 300,000 men. On his death the Khānīm went to Sl. Sa‘īd Khān’s presence in Kāshghar. Daulat-sult̤ān Khānīm was Yūnas Khān’s youngest child. In the Tāshkīnt disaster (908 AH.) she fell to Tīmūr Sult̤ān, the son of Shaibānī Khān. By him she had one daughter; they got out of Samarkand with me (918 AH. -1512 AD.), spent three or four years in the Badakhshān country, then went (923 AH. -1420 AD.) to Sl. Sa‘īd Khān’s presence in Kāshghar.152
(k. Account resumed of Bābur’s father’s family.)
In ‘Umar Shaikh Mīrzā’s ḥaram was also Aūlūs Āghā, a daughter of Khwāja Ḥusain Beg; her one daughter died in infancy and they sent her out of the ḥaram a year or eighteen months later. Fāt̤ima-sult̤ān Āghā was another; she was of the Mughūl tūmān-begs and the first taken of his wives. Qarāgūz (Makhdūm sult̤ān) Begīm was another; the Mīrzā took her towards the end of his life; she was much beloved, so to please him, they made her out descended from (his uncle) Minūchihr Mīrzā, the elder brother of Sl. Abū-sa‘īd Mīrzā. He had many mistresses and concubines; one, Umīd Āghāchā died before him. Latterly there were also Tūn-sult̤ān (var. Yun) of the Mughūls and Āghā Sult̤ān.
l. ‘Umar Shaikh Mīrzā’s Amīrs.
There was Khudāī-bīrdī Tūghchī Tīmūr-tāsh, a descendant of the brother of Āq-būghā Beg, the Governor of Hīrī (Herāt, for Tīmūr Beg.) When Sl. Abū-sa‘īd Mīrzā, after besieging Jūkī Mīrzā (Shāhrukhī) in Shāhrukhiya (868AH. -1464AD.) gave the Farghāna country to ‘Umar Shaikh Mīrzā, he put this Khudāī-bīrdī Beg at the head of the Mīrzā’s Gate.153 Khudāī-bīrdī was then 25 but youth notwithstanding, his rules and management were very good indeed. A few years later when Ibrāhīm Begchīk was plundering near Aūsh, he followed him up, fought him, was beaten and became a martyr. At the time, Sl. Aḥmad Mīrzā was in the summer pastures of Āq Qāchghāī, in Aūrā-tīpā, 18 yīghāch east of Samarkand, and Sl. Abū-sa‘īd Mīrzā was at Bābā Khākī, 12 yīghāch east of Hīrī. People sent the news post-haste to the Mīrzā(s),154 having humbly represented it through ‘Abdu’l-wahhāb Shaghāwal. In four days it was carried those 120 yīghāch of road.155
Ḥāfiẓ Muḥammad Beg Dūldāī was another, Sl. Malik Kāshgharī’s son and a younger brother of Aḥmad Ḥājī Beg. After the death of Khudāī-bīrdī Beg, they sent him to control ‘Umar Shaikh Mīrzā’s Gate, but he did not get on well with the Andijān begs and therefore, when Sl. Abū-sa‘īd Mīrzā died, went to Samarkand and took service with Sl. Aḥmad Mīrzā. At the time of the disaster on the Chīr, he was in Aūrā-tīpā and made it over to ‘Umar Shaikh Mīrzā when the Mīrzā passed through on his way to Samarkand, himself taking service with him. The Mīrzā, for his part, gave him the Andijān Command. Later on he went to Sl. Maḥmūd Khān in Tāshkīnt and was there entrusted with the guardianship of Khān Mīrzā (Wais) and given Dīzak. He had started for Makka by way of Hind before I took Kābul (910AH. Oct. 1504AD.), but he went to God’s mercy on the road. He was a simple person, of few words and not clever.
Khwāja Ḥusain Beg was another, a good-natured and simple person. It is said that, after the fashion of those days, he used to improvise very well at drinking parties.156
Shaikh Mazīd Beg was another, my first guardian, excellent in rule and method. He must have served (khidmat qīlghān dūr) under Bābur Mīrzā (Shāhrukhī). There was no greater beg in ‘Umar Shaikh Mīrzā’s presence. He was a vicious person and kept catamites.
‘Alī-mazīd Qūchīn was another;157 he rebelled twice, once at Akhsī, once at Tāshkīnt. He was disloyal, untrue to his salt, vicious and good-for-nothing.
Ḥasan (son of) Yaq‘ūb was another, a small-minded, good-tempered, smart and active man. This verse is his: —
“Return, O Huma, for without the parrot-down of thy lip,
The crow will assuredly soon carry off my bones.”158
He was brave, a good archer, played polo (chaughān) well and leapt well at leap-frog.159 He had the control of my Gate after ‘Umar Shaikh Mīrzā’s accident. He had not much sense, was narrow-minded and somewhat of a strife-stirrer.
Qāsim Beg Qūchīn, of the ancient army-begs of Andijān, was another. He had the control of my Gate after Ḥasan Yaq‘ūb Beg. His life through, his authority and consequence waxed without decline. He was a brave man; once he gave some Aūzbegs a good beating when he overtook them raiding near Kāsān; his sword hewed away in ‘Umar Shaikh Mīrzā’s presence; and in the fight at the Broad Ford (Yāsī-kījīt circa 904AH. – July, 1499AD.) he hewed away with the rest. In the guerilla days he went to Khusrau Shāh (907AH.) at the time I was planning to go from the Macha hill-country160 to Sl. Maḥmūd Khān, but he came back to me in 910AH. (1504AD.) and I shewed him all my old favour and affection. When I attacked the Turkmān Hazāra raiders in Dara-i-khwush (911AH.) he made better advance, spite of his age, than the younger men; I gave him Bangash as a reward and later on, after returning to Kābul, made him Humāyūn’s guardian. He went to God’s mercy about the time Zamīn-dāwar was taken (circa 928AH. -1522AD.). He was a pious, God-fearing Musalmān, an abstainer from doubtful aliments; excellent in judgment and counsel, very facetious and, though he could neither read nor write (ummiy), used to make entertaining jokes.
Bābā Beg’s Bābā Qulī (‘Alī) was another, a descendant of Shaikh ‘Alī Bahādur.161 They made him my guardian when Shaikh Mazīd Beg died. He went over to Sl. Aḥmad Mīrzā when the Mīrzā led his army against Andijān (899AH.),