Medieval India and the Persian Literature
India has attracted many invaders due to its lavishness in so many things like gold, natural resources, human resources, ores, etc. It also has always been rich in cultural diversity, with so many religions, languages, and festivals. A lot of these invaders ruled India, but it was ruled for the longest by the Mughals in the medieval period and then by the Britishers. These foreign rulers brought their culture and tried to incorporate it into Indian culture. Hence, the diversity among the Indian cultures grew.
The Mughals ruled India for about two Centuries (1526 to 1761), but in the beginning, they tried to control the Indians to such an extent that they tried to convert their religion and made them speak the Mughal’s native language.
The Persian language was brought to India by the Mughal empire and was made a part of the Indian learning curriculum. Hence, a lot of literate Indians were able to speak the Persian Language. Persian is also known as Farsi and originally belongs to Southwestern Iran, having grammatical similarities with the European Languages. Persian was appointed as the language of administration by Babur. The most famous Language followed in India before the Mughals were Sanskrit. But because Persian was commercially the most used language, it surpassed the use of Sanskrit. Its words even got incorporated into a few Indian languages like Bengali, Marathi, Gujarati, etc. Sukhandan-e-Fars discovered that the roots of Sanskrit and Persian were related.
However, the Persian language prospered most under the Mughals; it kept on getting consolation during the Turko-Afghan times moreover. The Turko-Afghan rulers supported the Persian researchers, journalists, writers, and rationalists to deliver stupendous works.
During the Archaic Time frame, Hindus and Muslims, whose primary language was not Persian, competed with one another to realize this language of culture, and India produced Persian writing in the entirety of its branches, which contrasted well with the writing of Persia.
One of the earliest Persian researchers in Middle age India was Abu Abd Allah Jafar Ibu Muhammad. He inhabited the court of Samanid Amir Nasr Ibn Ahmed. He wrote in a basic and direct style and gave articulations to earnest sentiments. He is said to have made six idylls and versified Kalila wa-Dimna of Ibnal Muqffa. He additionally composed three verifiable sentiments, of which the most popular are the Wamak and Azra. One more noticeable writer at the Samanid court was Daqiqi, who represented the support of Persian in court. Daqiqi began composing Shahnama, yet it couldn’t be finished on account of his initial homicide.
Other most famous works in literature:
Babarnama, which was a translation of tuzuk I Babur, was penned by Abdul Rahim Khan in PersianAbdul Fazl has composed Akbarnama (history of Akbar) and Ain-I-Akbari (administration book).Many books that were initially written In Sanskrit got translated into Persian as well. Those were:
- The Mahabharata was interpreted under the oversight of Abul Faizi, sibling of Abul Fazal and a court writer of Akbar
- Dara Shikoh deciphered the Bhagavad Gita and Upanishads into the Persian language. His most popular work, Majma-ul-Bahrain
- Badauni was a severe pundit of Akbar. He made an interpretation of Mahabharata into Persian as Razanamah
- Territorial dialects, for example, Bengali, Oriya, Rajasthani and Gujarathi, had likewise evolved during this period
- From the time of Akbar, Hindi writers were appended to the Mughal court. The most compelling Hindi writer was Tulsidas, who composed the Hindi adaptation of the Ramayana, the Ramcharitmanas
- Jaganath Pandithraya, the court writer of Shahjahan, has composed two Sanskrit books, Ganga Lahari and Rasagangadhara
The most remarkable work of this time was Shahnama by Mansur Ibu Hasan, called Firdausi. In his stupendous work, Firdausi has recorded the legends of pre-Islamic Iran. He manages the existence of fifty rulers and records their chivalrous undertakings.
The standing of Firdausi as an artist mostly lies in this work. A J. Arberry quoted that “Firdausi’s Shahnama, can be considered as the best work in Persian writing and verse, both quantitatively and subjectively; for sure one can say that it’s one of the world’s artistic show-stoppers. On the off chance that it wasn’t that I generally follow the more secure course and don’t wish to sound excessive, I would throw all watchfulness away and attest that the Shahnama is the most amazing development in the writing of humankind.”
Conclusion
The painful history of India and the sufferings of the Indians because of invasion and foreign rulers is undeniable, but with outside rulers came a different culture and language that enriched the Indian cultures. This mix of literature gave so many amazing scholars to this country with so many literary classics. This love of literature brought so many scholars of different religions, speaking different languages, into one single roof, giving out so many gems in return. I hope this article helped the learners in some way.
