…At its height the Mogul Empire was the most magnificent in the world. A great power employed in the service of great elegance. But its own affluence in the end proved fatal…
—Shah Jahan (1592-1666) was the fifth Mogul emperor of India. During his reign, from 1628 to 1658, the Mogul Empire reached its zenith in prosperity and luxury. He is remembered as the builder of the Taj Mahal.—click image for source…
There is one aspect of the Mogul ( Moghul) Empire that will gladden the hearts of the Occupy generation: the edifying spectacle of a great world power, embracing 100 million people, whose head of state gets stoned on bhang, an Indian type of cannabis, while immersed in the sound of poetry and sitar music, the smell of sandalwood incense, and the sight of dancing girls swirling amid a 1,000 candle light show. It would do wonders for the Fiscal Cliff, Eurozone Crisis and Currency Wars decision makers to sit and chill the Mogul way.
—”Mu’in al-Din Chishti Holding a Globe” from the Minto album. Painting by Bichitr and calligraphy by Mir’Ali.
Karen Rosenberg writes:
The Persian word muraqqa, in this context, describes portraits of emperors and courtiers, Eastern mystics and Western religious figures; examples of plant and animal life.
Photo: The Trustees of the Chester Beatty Library, Dublin—click image for source…
In other respects, the Mogul style of government was hardly the sort of appeal to our modern, enlightened notions of how a state ought to be run. Most of their principles, in fact, run diametrically contrary to the tenets and watchwords of conventional political thinking. Participatory democracy and power to the people: Rarely has there been an empire less of the people than this one. It was a totalitarian state rules by an autocrat and administered by an elitist class drawn from an alien race of militarist invaders.
Multiculturalism: fortunately for India, a country that can pride itself on possessing every skin color under the sun- the Moguls were refreshingly free of race prejudice, especially when it came to marrying their light-skinned sons to the darker-hued daughters of the local rajahs. But they had no compunctions about importing slaves from Africa. And they were merciless in their treatment of india’s aborigines, the black hill tribes who lived in the least hospitable parts of the country. The Mogul emperor Jahangir had them rounded up like wild animals in great battue huts in which hundreds of beaters would encircle every living thing in an area of forty or fifty square miles- trapped animals to be slaughtered, and human beings to be bartered for horses and dogs at the market in Kabul.
—Akbar – Bulls fighting at court—click image for source…
Feminism and Women’s rights: Not much of a chance here. The Moguls collected women quite indiscriminantly, by the dozens of hundreds. The emperor Akbar kept five thousand women, and their opportunities for self fulfillment and a rewarding life were limited. Sometimes, when he went campaigning, he would take his favorites with him, on elephant back, in bamboo cages. ( to be continued)…
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