Page:Historic Landmarks of the Deccan.djvu/75

63 any of the kings of the dynasty who actually reigned, Hayat Bakhsh Begam being the only lady so honoured. The explanation of this is that Hayat Bakhsh was something more than an oriental queen-consort. She v/as the daughter of a king, the wife of a king, and the mother of a king, and seems to have been a lady of strong character who held the view that Muhammad Qutb Shah owed his elevation to the throne to his alliance with the daughter of Muhammad Quli rather than to his own descent from Ibrahim. She certainly had great influence over her husband during his comparatively short reign, and after his death practically governed the kingdom till her death, which occurred on February 24, 1667, as appears from her epitaph.

Muhammad Qutb Shah died on February 11, 1626, and was succeeded by his son Abdullah Qutb Shah, then a boy of eleven. Ab- dullah had a long and eventful reign of forty-six years, during which period his chief anxiety was to hold the Mughals, now advanced well into the Deccan, at bay. In 1656 Aurangzib, tiien viceroy of the Dec- can, advanced to Haidarabad and besieged Abdullah in Golconda. He was bought off by a heavy subsidy and promise of future tribute, but the principal condition of the treaty was the marriage of the second daughter of Abdullah, who had no son, to Muhammad Sultan, the eldest son of Aurangzib, and the formal recognition of Muhammad Sultan as heir apparent to the throne of Golconda. The marriage was duly celebrated but the prince predeceased Abdullah Qutb Shah, and the question of his ascending the throne thus never arose.

Abdullah Qutb Shah died on May i, 1672, and was buried in the large tomb beyond the garden to the north-east, which is almost a replica of his mother's tomb. Food is still distributed once a year at his tomb on the anniversary of his death, according to the lunar reckoning.

Abdullah left no son, and his son-in-law Muhammad Sultan, the formally recognized heir apparent, had predeceased him. He was suc- ceeded by another son-in-law, Abul Hasan, who had miarried his third daughter. Abul Hasan Qutb Shah commonly known as Tana Shah, besides being married to the daughter of Abdullah, was descended, either in the male or the female line, from the Qutb Shahi family, and it was this descent that ensured his elevation to the throne.