Rhinoceros in Baburnama
Zahiruddin Muhammad Babur (1483-1530 CE) is in today's India a much controversial historical figure as the founder of the Mughal Empire in 1526, after the First Battle of Panipat that took place between Ibrahim Lodi, the last Lodi ruler of the Delhi Sultanate and him (who fled to Hindustan from Transoxiana which comprised of parts of the present-day Uzbekistan and Tajikistan). His reign in India was brief i.e. from 1526 to 1530. Most of his regnal years were spent in fighting battles. However, he recorded a number of interesting and valuable information about the things he witnessed in his life in Transoxiana, Kabul (Afghanistan), and Hindustan (India) in his memoirs, Baburnama. The autobiography was originally written in his mother tongue, Chagatai which was the spoken Turkic language of the Timurids but unfortunately, it is now an extinct Turkic language. It was during the reign of Akbar, his grandson that the reigning emperor commissioned for the translation of the manuscript into Classical Persian, the language of the Mughal darbar or court. He assigned Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan, the son of his assassinated regent, Bairam Khan, the task of translating Tuzuk-i-Baburi. Tuzuk-i-Baburi or Baburnama is an important primary source not just for the reconstruction of certain aspects of medieval history of India, but it is also a treasure for environmentalists to collate information concerning the birds and beasts of the places he visited in India in the early sixteenth century.
Here is an excerpt from The Baburnama, translated into English by Wheeler M. Thackston, published by the Modern Library, New York. It highlights Babur's keen interest in natural environment and also shows the interaction between humans and their natural surroundings and the efforts of the former to tame the latter for the purpose of resource utilization.
The rhinoceros is also a large animal, the size of three oxen. The statement that is well known in our country, that is, that a rhinoceros can lift an elephant on its horn, is certainly false. It has one horn in the middle of its snout. The horn is longer than a span, and none longer than two spans has been seen. From one large horn a drinking vessel and a set of backgammon pieces were made, and maybe three or four fingers of horn were left over. Its hide is thick. Even if you draw way back with a stiff bow and the arrow hits it right, the arrow will penetrate only four fingers deep. It is said that an arrow will easily pierce some places in its hide. Around its forelegs and hind legs the skin is loose. From a distance it looks like it wearing a veil. It resembles a horse more than it does any other animal. As a horse does not have a large belly, neither does the rhinoceros; as a horse has solid bone in its pastern, so does the rhinoceros; as a horse has a hoof, so does the rhinoceros. It is more rapacious than an elephant and, unlike an elephant, cannot be tamed. There are many of them in the forests around Peshawar and Hashnaghar and in the forests between the Indus River and Bhera. In Hindustan many of them are found along the banks of the Gogra River. Rhinoceros were killed during the Hindustan campaigns in the forests of Peshawar and Hashnaghar. They wield their horns in an amazing way. During hunts they gored a lot of men and horses. During one hunt a page named Maqsud had his horse thrown a spear length by one. Thereafter he was nicknamed Rhinoceros Maqsud.
Fun Fact: Not just Indian spices and textiles were in demand in Europe during the ancient and medieval periods, but the animals found here also created a lot of interests among the elites of European court society. Clara, a female Indian rhinoceros travelled through Europe in the mid eighteenth century. Enchanted by her exotic beauty, Rococo painters drew her images. She also visited the royal court of French King Louis XV (1715-1774 CE).
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