Page:Babur-nama Vol 1.djvu/80

 10 FARGHĀNA poet Asiru-d-din is known as Akhsīkītī. After Andijān no township in Farghāna is larger than Akhsī. It is nine yighach¹ by road to the west of Andijān. 'Umar Shaikh Mirzā made it his capital.2 The Saiḥūn River flows below its walled town (qurghān). This stands above a great ravine (buland jar) and it has deep ravines ('umiq jarlar) in place of a moat. When 'Umar Shaikh Mīrzā made it his capital, he once or twice cut other ravines from the outer ones. In all Farghāna no fort is so strong as Akhsī. *Its suburbs extend some two miles further Fol. 5. than the walled town.* People seem to have made of Akhsi the saying (misal), "Where is the village? Where are the trees?"

(Dih kujā? Dirakhtan kujā?) Its melons are excellent; they call one kind Mir Tīmūrī; whether in the world there is another to equal it is not known. The melons of Bukhārā are famous; when I took Samarkand, I had some brought from there and some from Akhsi; they were cut up at an entertainment and nothing from Bukhārā compared with those from Akhsī. The fowling and hunting of Akhsī are very good indeed; aq kiyik abound in the waste on the Akhsī side of the Saiḥūn; in the jungle on the Andijān side bughu-maral,³ pheasant and hare are had, all in very good condition. Again there is Kāsān, rather a small township to the north of Akhsī. From Kāsān the Akhsi water comes in the same way as the Andijān water comes from Aush. Kāsān has excellent air and beautiful little gardens (baghcha). As these gardens all lie along the bed of the torrent (sa'i) people call them the "fine front of the coat."4 Between Kāsānīs and Aūshis there is rivalry about the beauty and climate of their townships. MSS. (the Elph. MS. here has a lacuna) the Zafar-nāma (Bib. Ind. i, 44) and Ibn Haukal (Ouseley p. 270); and of those writing the word with the sa'i musallasa (i.e. as Akhsīkis), Yaqut's Dict. i, 162, Reinaud's Abu'l-feda I. ii, 225-6, Ilminsky (p. 5) departing from his source, and I.O. Cat. (Ethé) No. 1029. It may be observed that Ibn Haukal (Ouseley p. 280) writes Banākas for Banākat. For Aşiru'd-din Akhsikiti, see Rieu ii, 563; Daulat Shāh (Browne) p. 121 and Ethé I.O. Cat. No. 1029. 1 Measured on the French military map of 1904, this may be 80 kil. i.e. 50 miles. 2 Concerning several difficult passages in the rest of Bābur's account of Akhsi, see Appendix A. 3 The W.-i-B. here translates būghū-maral by gazawn and the same word is entered, under-line, in the Ḥai. MS. Cf. f. 36 and note and f. 4 and note.
 * postin pesh b:r:h. This obscure Persian phrase has been taken in the following ways:-