Page:Babar.djvu/24

Rh title, but, like the Dughlát Amírs of Káshghar and Umatipa — Mongols of blue blood — or the Tarkháns of Samarkand, came of a privileged family, and, if not the rose, were so near it that they often plucked its petals. And beyond these, like a cloud on the horizon, gathered the Uzbeg tribes of Turkistán and Otrár, on the lower Iaxartes, — soon to overshadow the heritage of Tímúr, and under their great leader, Shaibáni Khán, to become the most formidable power on the Oxus, — the one power before which even Bábar turned and fled.

In the midst of the confusion and strife of so many jarring interests, the child of eleven suddenly found himself called upon to play the part of king. Of his earlier years hardly anything is known. He was born on the 6th of Muharram, 888, St. Valentine's day, 1483. A courier was at once sent to bear the good news to his mother's father, Yúnus, the Khán of the Mongols, and the grand old chief of seventy years came to Farghána and joined heartily in the rejoicings and feasts with which they celebrated the

1 'Omar Shaikh had three sons and five daughters by five of his wives and concubines:

'OMAR SHAIKH= =Kutluk Nigár Khánum (Mongol, dau. of Yúnus Khán), d. 1505

= Fátima Sultán (Mongol)

= Umaid Aghácha (concubine, of Andiján)

= Aghá Sultán (concubine)

= Sultán Makhdúm Karaguz (concubine)

Khanzáda Begum, b. 1478.

Zahir-ad-dín Muhammad BABAR, b. Feb. 14, 1483.

Jahangir Mirza, b. 1485.

Mihrbánu Begum, b. 1478.

Nasir Mirzá, b. 1487.

Shehrbánu Begum, b. 1491.

Yádgúr Sultán Begum, b. posth. 1494.

Rukhiya Sultán Begum, b. posth. 1494.