Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 11.djvu/888

Rh 848 HINDUSTANI [LITEBATU KE. be given here must be little more than a list of names and dates. 1 The earliest Urdu authors lived and vrote in the Dakkhan, at th~ courts and under tjie patronage of the Muhanmiadan dynasties o: Golkonda and Bljapur, shortly before these dynasties were over thrown by the campaigns of Aurangzeb in the south. ShujiVuddin jlmi, a native of Gujarat, a friend of FaizI and contemporary o: Akbar, is mentioned by the native biographers as the most ancienl Urrm poet after Amir Khusrau. He was tutor of the son of the ivazir of Sultan Abn-1-Hasan Qutb Shah of Golkonda, and several ghazals by him are said to survive. Quli Qutb Shah of Golkonda, who reigned from 1581 to 1586, and his successor Abdullah Qutb Shah, who came to the throne in 1611, have both left collections of verse, including ghazals, ntbd is, masnavls and qasldaJis. And dur ing the reign of the latter Ibn NishatI wrote two works which are still famous as models of composition in Dakhni ; they are masnavis entitled the Tutl-namah, or &quot;Tales of a Parrot,&quot; taidihePhul-ban. The first, written in 1639, is an adaptation of a Persian work by NakhshabI, but derives ultimately from a Sanskrit original entitled the Suka-saptati ; this collection &quot;has been frequently rehandled in Urdu, both in verse and prose, and is the original of the Totd- Kahdnl, one of the first works in Urdu prose, composed in 1801 by Muhammad Haidar-bakhsh Haidari of the Fort William College&quot;. The Phul-ban is a love tale named from its heroine, said to be trans lated from a Persian work entitled the Basdtln. Another famous work which probably belongs to the same place and time is the Story of Kdmrup and Kald by Tahslnuddln, a masnavl which has been published (1836) by M. Garcin de Tassy ; what makes this poem remarkable is that, though the work of a Musalman, its personages are Hindu. Kamriip, the hero, is son of the king of Oudh, alid the heroine, Kala, daughter of the king of Ceylon; the incidents somewhat resemble those of the tale of es-Sindibad in the Thousand and One Nights ; the hero and heroine dream one of the other, and the former sets forth to find his beloved ; his wanderings take him to many strange countries and through many wonderful adventures, ending in a happy marriage. The court of Bijapur was no less distinguished in literature. Ibrahim Adil Shah (1579-1626) was the author of a work in verse on music entitled the Nau-ras or &quot; Nine Savours,&quot; which, however, appears to have been_ in Hindi rather than Urdu ; the three pre faces (dib&jahs) to this poem were rendered into Persian prose by Mania Zuhuri, and, under the name of the Sih nasr-i Zuliurl, are well-known models of style. A successor of this prince, All Adil Shah, had as his court poet a Brahman known poetically as Nus- ratl, who in 1657 composed a masnavl of some repute entitled tlie Gulshan-i Ishq, or &quot; Rose-garden of Love,&quot; a romance relating the history of Prince Manohar and Maclmalati, like the Kdmrup, an Indian theme. The same poet is author of an extremely long mas navl entitled the All-ndmah, celebrating the monarch under whom he lived. These early authors, however, were but pioneers and feelers of the way ; the first generally accepted standard of form, a standard which has suffered little change in two centuries, was established by Wall of Aurangabad (about 1680-1720) and his contemporary and fellow-townsman Sirfij. The former of these is commonly called &quot; the Father of Rekhtali&quot; Bdbd-e Eekhtah ; and all accounts agree that the immense development attained by Urdu poetry in Northern India during the 18th century was due to his example and initiative. Very little is known of Wall s life ; he is believed to have visited Dehli towards the end of the reign of Aurangzeb, and is said to have there received instruction from Shah Gulshan in the art of clothing in a vernacular dress the ideas of the Persian poets. His Kulliydt or complete works have been published by M. Garcin de Tassy, with notes and a translation of selected passages (Paris, 1834-36), and may be commended to readers desirous of con sulting in the original a favourable specimen of Urdu poetical com position. The first of the Dehli school of poets was Zuhuruddln Hatim, who was born in 1699 and died in 1792. In the second year of Muhammad Shah (1719), the dlwdn of Wall reached Dehli, and ex cited the emulation of scholars there. Hatim was the first to imitate it in the Urdu of the north, and was followed by his friends Naji, Mazmun, and Abrii. Two diivdns by him survive. He became the founder of a school, and one of his pupils was Raff us-Sauda, the most distinguished poet of Northern India. Khan Arzu (1689-1756) was another of the fathers of Urdii poetry in the north. This author is chiefly renowned as a Persian scholar, in which language he not only composed much poetry, but one of the best of Persian lexicons, the Sirdju-l-lughdt ; but his compositions in Urdu are also highly esteemed. He was the master of Mir TaqI, who 1 The late M. Garcin de Tassy s Histoire de la Literature Hindouie et Ilindoustanie, and his annual summaries of the progress made from 1850 to 1877, afford all the materials which can be desired on this subject by one who does not care to refer to the original vernacular works ; the peculiarities of the latter can be learned only from long- continued study and familiarity with Oriental modes of thought. ranks next to Sauda as the most eminent Urdu poet. Ami died at Lakhnau (Lucknow), whither he betook himself after the devasta tion of Dehli by Nadir Shah (1739). Another of the early Dehli poets who is considered to have surpassed his fellows was lu amullah khanYaqln, who died during the reign of Ahmad Shah (1748-54), aged only twenty-five. Another was Mir Dard, pupil of the same Shah Gulshan who is said to have instructed Wall ; his damn is not long, but extremely popular, and especially esteemed for the skill with which it develops the themes of spiritualism. In his old age^he became a darwcsh of the Naqshlandl following, and died in Sauda and Mir TaqI are beyond question the most distinguished Urdu poets. The former was born at Dehli about the beginning of the 18th century, and studied under Hatim. He left Dehli after its devastation, and settled at Lakhnau, where the Nawab Asafud- daulah gave him &jdglr of Rs. 6000 a year, and where he died in 1780. His poems are very numerous, and cover all the styles of Urdu poetry ; but it is to his satires that his fame is chiefly due, and in these he is considered to have surpassed all other Indian poets. Mir TaqI was born at Agra, but early removed to Dehli, where he studied under Arzu ; he was still living there at the time of Sauda s death, but in 1782 repaired to Lakhnau, where he like wise received a pension ; he died at a very advanced age in 1810. His works are very voluminous, including no less than six dncdns. Mir is counted the superior of Sauda in the ghazal and masnavl, while the latter excelled him in the satire and qasldah. Sayyid Ahmad, an excellent contemporary authority, and himself one of the best of modern authors in Urdu, says of him in his Asdru-s- Sanddid : &quot; Mlr s language is so pure, and the expressions which he employs so suitable and natural, that to this day all are unani mous in his praise. Although the language of Sauda is also excellent, and he is superior to Mir in the point of his allusions, he is nevertheless inferior to him in style.&quot; The tremendous misfortunes which befell Dehli at the hands of Nadir Shah (1739), Ahmad Shah Durrani (1756), and the Marathas (1759), and the rapid decay of the Mughal empire underthese repeated shocks, transferred the centre of the cultivation of literature from that city to Lakhnau, the capital of the newly founded and flourishing state of Oudh. It has been mentioned how Arzu, Sauda, and Mir betook themselves to this refuge and ended their daysthere; they were followed in their new residence by a school of poets hardly inferior to those who had made Dehli illustrious in the first half of the century. Here they were joined by Mir Hasan (died 1786), Mir Soz (died 1800), and Qalandar-bakhsh Jur at (died 1810), also like themselves refugees from Dehli, and illustrious poets. Mir Hasan was a friend and ^collaborator of Mir Dard, and first established himself at Faizabad and subsequently at Lakhnau ; he excelled in the yhazal, ruld i, masnavl, and marsiyaJi, and is counted the third, with Sauda and Mir TaqI, among the most eminent of Urdu poets. His fame chiefly rests upon a much admired masnavl entitled the SiJiru-J- baydn, or &quot;Magic of Eloquence,&quot; a romance relating the loves of Prince Be-nazlr and the Princess Badr-i Munir ; his masnavl called the Galzdr-i Irani (&quot;Rose-garden of Irani,&quot; the legendary Adite paradise in Southern Arabia), in praise of Faizabad, is likewise highly esteemed. Mir Muhammad! Soz was an elegant poet, remarkable for the success with which he composed in the dialect of the harem called EcJchtl, but somewhat licentious in his verse ; he became a darwesh and renounced the world in his later years. Jur at was also a prolific poet, but, like Soz, his aha-Mls and masnavis are licentious and full of double meanings, lie imitated Sauda in satire with much success ; he also cultivated Hindi poetry, and composed dohrds and kabitts. Miskln was another Lakhnau poet of the same period, whose marsiyahs are especially admired ; one of them, that on the death of Muslim and his two sons, is con sidered a masterpiece of this style of composition. The school of Lakhnau, so founded and maintained during the early years of the century, continued to flourish till the dethronement of the last king, Wajid AH, in 1856. Atash and Nasikh (who died respectively in 1847 and 1841) are the best among the modern poets of the school in the ghazal Mir Anls, a grandson of Mir Hasan, and his contem- riorary Dablr, the former of whom died in December 1875 and the atter a few months later, excelled in the marsiyah. Rajab AH Beg Surur, who died in 1869, was the author of a much-admired romance in rhyming prose entitled the Fasdnah-e Ajdib or &quot; Tale of Mar vels,&quot; besides a dlwdn. The dethroned prince VVajid All himself, noetically styled Akhtar, is no mean poet ; he has published three dlwdns, among them a quantity of poetry in the rustic dialect of Oudh which is philologically of much interest. Though Dehli was thus deserted by its brightest lights of litera- Shah Alam II. (1761-1806) wrote under the name of Aftab, and was the author of a romance entitled Manzum-i Aqdas, besides a dlwdn. His son Sulaiman-shikoh, brother of Akbar Shah II., who had at first, like his brother authors, repaired to Lakhnau, re- urned to Dehli in 1815, and died in 1838 ; he also has left a dlwdn. jastly, his nephew Bahadur Shah II. , the last titular emperor of
 * ure, it did not altogether cease to cultivate the poetic art. Among
 * he last Mughals several princes were themselves creditable poets.