The Last Mughal: The Fall of Delhi, 1857

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There had been Muslims in India long before the Mughals. The first Muslims arrived in the 8th century. The title (Mirza) descends to all the sons of the family, without exception. In the royal family it is placed after the name instead of before it, thus, Abbas Mirza and Hosfiein Mirza. Mirza is a civil title, and Khan is a military one. The title of Khan is creative, but not hereditary. [5] Jahan's selection of white marble and the overall concept and design of the mausoleum give the building great power and majesty.

The Mughals were responsible for building an extensive road system, creating a uniform currency, and the unification of the country. [10] :185–204 The empire had an extensive road network, which was vital to the economic infrastructure, built by a public works department set up by the Mughals which designed, constructed and maintained roads linking towns and cities across the empire, making trade easier to conduct. [103] a b c Conermann, Stephan (4 August 2015), "Mughal Empire", Encyclopedia of Early Modern History Online, Brill, doi: 10.1163/2352-0272_emho_com_024206, archived from the original on 26 March 2022 , retrieved 28 March 2022 Dalrymple has here written an account of the Indian mutiny such as we have never had before, of the events leading up to it and of its aftermath, seen through the prism of the last emperor's life. He has vividly described the street life of the Mughal capital in the days before the catastrophe happened, he has put his finger deftly on every crucial point in the story, which earlier historians have sometimes missed, and he has supplied some of the most informative footnotes I have ever read. On top of that, he has splendidly conveyed the sheer joy of researching a piece of history, something every true historian knows, telling of his elation at discovering in Burma's national archives all Zafar's prison records, stored in Acrobat PDF files - "something the British Library has so far failed to achieve." Faruqui, Munis D. (2012). The Princes of the Mughal Empire, 1504–1719. Cambridge University Press. pp.268–269. ISBN 978-1-107-02217-1.

The imperial camp, used for military expeditions and royal tours, also served as a kind of mobile, "de facto" administrative capital. From the time of Akbar, Mughal camps were huge in scale, accompanied by numerous personages associated with the royal court, as well as soldiers and labourers. All administration and governance was carried out within them. The Mughal Emperors spent a significant portion of their ruling period within these camps. [95] While there appears to have been little concern for theoretical astronomy, Mughal astronomers made advances in observational astronomy and produced nearly a hundred Zij treatises. Humayun built a personal observatory near Delhi; Jahangir and Shah Jahan were also intending to build observatories, but were unable to do so. The astronomical instruments and observational techniques used at the Mughal observatories were mainly derived from Islamic astronomy. [191] [192] In the 17th century, the Mughal Empire saw a synthesis between Islamic and Hindu astronomy, where Islamic observational instruments were combined with Hindu computational techniques. [191] [192]

a b Dodgson, Marshall G.S. (2009). The Venture of Islam. Vol.3. University of Chicago Press. p.62. ISBN 978-0-226-34688-5. For years, the wealth remained lost and life was a struggle. Fortunately though, eventually Madhav managed to find the chamber and their financial issues were largely resolved. Babur brought a broad-minded, confident Islam from central Asia. His first act after conquering Delhi was to forbid the killing of cows because that was offensive to Hindus.After Aurangzeb, the Mughal capital definitively became the walled city of Shahjahanabad (Old Delhi). [96] Law Police in Delhi under Bahadur Shah II, 1842

a b c Asher, Catherine B.; Talbot, Cynthia (2006), India Before Europe, Cambridge University Press, pp.152–, ISBN 978-0-521-80904-7, archived from the original on 22 September 2023 , retrieved 15 July 2019 The Mughal administration emphasised agrarian reform, which began under the non-Mughal emperor Sher Shah Suri, the work of which Akbar adopted and furthered with more reforms. The civil administration was organised in a hierarchical manner on the basis of merit, with promotions based on performance. [123] The Mughal government funded the building of irrigation systems across the empire, which produced much higher crop yields and increased the net revenue base, leading to increased agricultural production. [103] India's population growth accelerated under the Mughal Empire, with an unprecedented economic and demographic upsurge which boosted the Indian population by 60% [145] to 253% in 200 years during 1500–1700. [146] The Indian population had a faster growth during the Mughal era than at any known point in Indian history prior to the Mughal era. [104] [145] By the time of Aurangzeb's reign, there were a total of 455,698 villages in the Mughal Empire. [147] The introduction of sophisticated Iranian-style waterworks and horticulture through Mughal gardening. [162] The Mughal Empire grew out of descendants of the Mongol Empire who were living in Turkestan in the 15th century. They had become Muslims and assimilated the culture of the Middle East, while keeping elements of their Far Eastern roots.Mughal India was one of the three Islamic gunpowder empires, along with the Ottoman Empire and Safavid Persia. [38] [182] [183] By the time he was invited by Lodi governor of Lahore, Daulat Khan, to support his rebellion against Lodi Sultan Ibrahim Khan, Babur was familiar with gunpowder firearms and field artillery, and a method for deploying them. Babur had employed Ottoman expert Ustad Ali Quli, who showed Babur the standard Ottoman formation—artillery and firearm-equipped infantry protected by wagons in the centre and the mounted archers on both wings. Babur used this formation at the First Battle of Panipat in 1526, where the Afghan and Rajput forces loyal to the Delhi Sultanate, though superior in numbers but without the gunpowder weapons, were defeated. The decisive victory of the Timurid forces is one reason opponents rarely met Mughal princes in pitched battle over the course of the empire's history. [184] In India, guns made of bronze were recovered from Calicut (1504) and Diu (1533). [185] Fathullah Shirazi ( c. 1582), a Persian polymath and mechanical engineer who worked for Akbar, developed an early multi gun shot. As opposed to the polybolos and repeating crossbows used earlier in ancient Greece and China, respectively, Shirazi's rapid-firing gun had multiple gun barrels that fired hand cannons loaded with gunpowder. It may be considered a version of a volley gun. [186] Mughal musketeer, 17th century. A more successful invasion came at the end of the 12th century. This eventually led to the formation of the Delhi Sultanate. Today he lives at the mercy of the villagers who bring him rice and lentils for lunch, in a mud hut of dilapidated condition, covered in cobwebs. The jagirdar (local tax collector) was another kind of official approached, especially for high-stakes cases. Subjects of the Mughal Empire also took their grievances to the courts of superior officials who held more authority and punitive power than the local qadi. Such officials included the kotwal (local police), the faujdar (an officer controlling multiple districts and troops of soldiers), and the most powerful, the subahdar (provincial governor). In some cases, the emperor themself dispensed justice directly. [97] Jahangir was known to have installed a "chain of justice" in the Agra Fort that any aggrieved subject could shake to get the attention of the emperor and bypass the inefficacy of officials. [101]

Asher, Catherine B.; Talbot, Cynthia (2006), India Before Europe, Cambridge University Press, pp.115–, ISBN 978-0-521-80904-7, archived from the original on 22 September 2023 , retrieved 15 July 2019 An innovation was the amount of autonomy he allowed to the provinces. For example, non-Muslims were not forced to obey Islamic law (as was the case in many Islamic lands), and Hindus were allowed to regulate themselves through their own law and institutions. Akbar and Godism Zafar had 16 sons and 31 daughters. Though fate of his sons is known but those of his daughters is largely unknown.Despite evidence that she is related to the 19th century royal family, Sultana goes about her daily life on a basic pension of around 6000 INR per month, within which she has to cover herself and her six children, five daughters and one son.