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- [00:01]
William Dalrymple
If you want access to bonus episodes, reading lists for every series of Empire, a chat community, discounts for all the books mentioned in the week's podcast ad, free listening and a weekly newsletter, sign up to empire club@www.empirepoduk.com.
- [00:19]
Google Gemini
This episode is brought to you by Google Gemini. With the Gemini app, you can talk live and have a real time conversation with an AI assistant. It's great for all kinds of things, like if you want to practice for an upcoming interview, ask for advice on things to do in a new city, or brainstorm creative ideas. And by the way, this script was actually read by Gemini. Download the Gemini app for iOS and Android today. Must be 18 to use Gemini Live.
- [00:45]
Dutch Bros
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- [01:16]
William Dalrymple
Book your Uber ride in advance 90 days in advance. Perfect for all you forward thinkers and planning gurus. Reserve your Uber ride up to 90 days in advance. Uber Reserve. See Uber app for details.
- [01:39]
Anita Anand
Hello, hello, Ho ho ho and hello, and welcome to this Boxing Day episode of Empire with me, Anita Arden and me, William Durimple.
- [01:48]
William Dalrymple
You sound as if you've been at the Christmas spirits already, Anita.
- [01:51]
Anita Anand
I'm just on the sherry. Even now. Sometimes you need it, William. Sometimes.
- [01:55]
William Dalrymple
What is it about Empire that drives you towards your drinks cabinet?
- [01:59]
Anita Anand
I'm kind of looking at him, but look. We are picking up the baton for our Mughal series that we took a little hiatus for over the Christmas period. We hope you enjoyed the Christmas episodes. They were very, very fun to do. But we're talking about. Well, we're going to largely concentrate on Jahangir, but remember we sort of left Akbar. I was describing a picture in the last Akbar episode which you absolutely refused to accept was him looking sad. And everybody else I've shown it to says he looks sad. Looks sad. He looks bloody miserable. I don't know what you're talking. Look up pencil, charcoal sketch of Akbar and you make up your own mind and then, you know, agree with me as you do that instead. So Akbar is coming to the end of this glorious rule. I mean, just for those who may not have listened to the Akbar episode, just Explain in a nutshell, and I mean a very small nutshell, a tiny nutshell. William Dalrymple, who Akbar was and why he was important.
- [02:58]
William Dalrymple
I was just looking at his picture. There's no way he's looking sad. He's looking. I've put it on your phone.
- [03:04]
Anita Anand
I know how he feels if that's the case. So Akbar was important, you're not going to do it? Akash, you've gone on Christmas mad. Akbar was important because he set up what seemed to be a very tolerant empire where he drew in the influences and indeed the presence of Hindus in his cause.
- [03:22]
William Dalrymple
More than tolerant, sort of pluralistic.
- [03:25]
Anita Anand
Pluralistic, okay. Yeah. And would you go as far as secular? Would you say that?
- [03:29]
William Dalrymple
Not at all. I think it's the wrong word.
- [03:30]
Anita Anand
Pluralistic is the right word.
- [03:32]
William Dalrymple
He was obsessed about religious ideas. So it wasn't secular.
- [03:34]
Anita Anand
Yes. Religions, all sorts of religions. Yes, you're right. Quite right. But you know, we talked about the nine gems that he surrounded himself by these nine advisors who were, you know, both Hindu and Muslim. We talked about the influence of different religions. How he set up an interfaith forum, no less. How he had pictures of the Nativity in his bedroom. So, you know, if you, if you haven't listened to those episodes, do go back because they are interesting and they are things that are not often talked about. When you talk about the Mughals these.
- [04:02]
William Dalrymple
Days and how his age was the greatest period of temple building in North Indian history for 700 years or something.
- [04:10]
Anita Anand
Yeah, well, I suggested that he looked sad because of his kids at the end of the last episode and we are going to look at one particular kid who might have caused him a great deal of grief and that is Jahangir, his son. Not born. Jahangir born Selim, Prince Salim. Tell us a little bit about this young man.
- [04:27]
William Dalrymple
Well, just like you introduced Akbar with the thing that most South Asians will know about him which was Akbar Mbirbal. And the whole story of all the kind of wisdom of Birbal in the court of Akbar. The reason that a generation of South Asians will know Jahangir and his difficult time as Prince Salim with his father Akbar is not so much straight history as the version of the story told by Bollywood. And particularly my favourite film, arguably of all Bollywood, which is Mughalay Azm, which.
- [04:58]
Anita Anand
Translates as the Great Mughal.
- [05:00]
William Dalrymple
The Great Mughal. And starring the beautiful Madhubala who's one of my all time favorite vintage Hindi film actresses. And the story tells the tragic tale of Anakili, the legendary dancing girl who's supposed to have been the mistress of Salim, but also rather caught the eye of his father Akbar.
- [05:21]
Anita Anand
Not necessarily in the best way. Well, hang on, tell this story properly. You're taking all the drama out of it. This is my mother's favourite film and she will not have this. You're not giving it the due respect. So you've got Madhubalah, who you know, William has a crush on, who is absolutely the most beautiful woman of her day. Completely stunning. She's the actress who plays her. And the young prince Salim is played by what you would describe as the, then, you know, De Niro of Bollywood cinema. A man called Dilip Kumar, who falls in love with this completely inappropriate courtesan. And then the father.
- [05:52]
William Dalrymple
And I think there was a real life romance behind it, wasn't there? Which is also part of the sort of cinematic.
- [05:56]
Anita Anand
Isn't it always the way. Isn't it always the way with your leading man? And then you've got the dad played by actually the godfather of Indian cinema, Prithviraj Kapoor, like so The Kapoor family dominate Bollywood for generations. And my mother would like you to know because William's telling it so badly, the love between Salim and Anarkali is gorgeous. It's poetic, it's beautiful. It's like the first flush of love in two young people.
- [06:23]
William Dalrymple
And a lot of the best film music ever made for Bollywood.
- [06:27]
Anita Anand
Oh, absolutely. Real bangers. They are such good songs. But the father of Salim, who is Akbar, is not impressed. Because, you know, you cannot, cannot, cannot have a prince and the heir apparent falling in love with a mere dancing girl. And she's sort of being walled up to separate the two of them.
- [06:46]
William Dalrymple
But it's only a pretend wall.
- [06:48]
Anita Anand
Well, you're not going to give away the bloody. What is wrong with you, honestly.
- [06:51]
William Dalrymple
And one of the greatest film songs in all Bollywood, Mahabat Kijuti. Yes.
- [06:55]
Anita Anand
She sings as she's being walled up and singing about love. And it's sort of a defiant thing.
- [07:01]
William Dalrymple
I have sat in the real Anakili's tomb, which is now the archives of Lo. And I played Muhammad Kajuti to the tomb of the real Alakili. In case she hadn't heard the music, I thought she needed to hear it.
- [07:13]
Anita Anand
I mean, whether she was real or not, I don't think we know for certain. But there is a whole area in Lahore was Anakali.
- [07:19]
William Dalrymple
We think she may well be real, actually.
- [07:21]
Anita Anand
Yeah, it's like the latest scholarship because I know it was sort of a bit wishy washy for a while.
- [07:25]
William Dalrymple
It is disputed, but there definitely was a tomb built by Jahangir when he was emperor for a lover when he was a prince. And it seems to fit this story, which is first told, I think, by Ralph Fitch, the English travel writer at the time.
- [07:39]
Anita Anand
Well, there's a Persian inscription on the actual tomb which reads. And I won't read it in the original Persian, but I'll translate it. Ah, could I behold the face of my love once more? I would give thanks to my God until the day of resurrection.
- [07:51]
William Dalrymple
Yeah, that's good enough for me. That works.
- [07:53]
Anita Anand
Okay, fine. Sold. Done. So that's how most people know the story. The fraught relationship between father and son, you know, Cause he didn't like his girlfriend. But it's much more complicated than that. It is a fraught relationship.
- [08:05]
William Dalrymple
And it's well worth watching the movie.
- [08:06]
Anita Anand
Yeah, it is. It is. Okay, so remind us where we were in Uckburg when we left. We sort of talked about the grandeur, we talk about the architecture. We talked about the jewel houses and their house of books and all of these things. We didn't really talk about family. So tell me a little bit about how that all works.
- [08:23]
William Dalrymple
So I'll tell you about Prince Salim because he is one of my favorite characters in the whole Mogul story. And one of the reasons, I think, that the Moguls continue to fascinate so many historians is the extraordinary accounts they left themselves. We had three episodes on Babur that was powerful by his extraordinary autobiography, the Babunama. And we have a similar autobiography by Jahangir called the Tzuki Jihangiri, and is generally believed not quite to be the equal of his great grandfather's diary, which really is one of the great memoirs of all time. But it's an extraordinary account of an extraordinary man. And today in modern India, Jahangir is often dismissed, as he has been for 40 or 50 years, as this debauched and drunk drunken ruler who handed over all power to his wife. And it's certainly true that at the end he was very addicted to both opium and to alcohol. But the man revealed in his diary is an extraordinary figure that defies all the usual Western stereotypes of what an Indian or a Muslim ruler is like. First and foremost, he was personally enormously curious and intelligent, observant of the world around him, and a keen collector of its curiosities, from, you know, Venetian swords and globes to Safavid silks, jade pebbles and even narwhal teeth. You know, those long, twisty, like, unicorn horns. Unicorn horns, exactly. My aunt had two in her house. And I remember being fascinated by them as a kid. And he was able to take delight in the simple pleasures provided by the landscape through which he passed and the animals and flowers and places and personalities which filled them. There's a lovely passage which I love, as he's crossing the River Bais on his way to Kabul in, I think, 1606, and he records his happiness at seeing the pink and red oleander in full bloom. So he orders his troops to wear nosegays of flowers on the helmet so that soon, he writes, a wonderful flowing flower bed was produced. And that's such a sort of Jungia thing to do, both in that you're ordering people to do something completely pointless for your own aesthetic pleasure. But also the fact that he was able to do that and had that sensibility.
- [10:48]
Anita Anand
Yeah, also. But apart from sensibility, he's like a proper naturalist as well. He's interested in the natural world. I was very entertained to see that he took an active interest in goat and cheetah breeding. Not with each other, but just, you know, it's sort of, you know, medicine, astronomy, you know, all of these things interested him.
- [11:07]
William Dalrymple
As a goat farmer myself, I can tell you don't really need to help goats breed. The difficult thing is to stop goats breeding. And we've just had two baby goats at the farm over Christmas, and very, very sweet they are. Anyway, yeah, he's interested in animal husbandry and the curiosities of the natural world. And he's captivated by, you know, the antics of monkeys and orangutans. And he loves to study black buck, which are the antelope you have around the plains of Delhi, gazelles and elephants. And, you know, he sort of gets all sort of like an 18th century Enlightenment naturalist. He spends months working out the exact gestation period of elephants, how long they take to have bab. And he's equally fascinated by a turkey which arrives from North America, which. It's gobble, he writes, one might have say it had adorned itself with red coral. Isn't that lovely?
- [11:59]
Anita Anand
It is lovely, but it's very weird because, you know, you've got Akbar, who's also interested in science and nature and beauty and has a whimsical side to him, who seems to be just intensely pissed off with his son most of the time.
- [12:12]
William Dalrymple
Well, there are fathers who are like that.
- [12:14]
Anita Anand
Yes, I know, but I mean, just to give it a little bit of context, because we quoted Abel Fazel so many times and Abu Fazl doesn't like Salim either. Because he writes very scathingly about him.
- [12:24]
William Dalrymple
Well, with good reason, as it turns out.
- [12:26]
Anita Anand
Yes. He says sort of, you know, his antics are unacceptable. He talks about Akbar being really irritated by his eldest son, you know, who is the second most powerful man in the realm. Let's not forget, you're the crown prince. You are the second most powerful man in the empire. When Selim does things like he executes three offenders who've annoyed him with some very sadistic devices, that kind of thing pisses off Akbar, who doesn't like that kind of, you know, throwback to the old Mughal days and indeed his own past when he was a more bloodthirsty man.
- [12:57]
William Dalrymple
Well, Abel Fazl is one of the things they fall out about, isn't it? Because Abel Fazl is this sort of. It must have been incredibly irritating for poor Prince Aleem. I'm rather on Prince Aleem's side on this one because Abel Fazl is this sort of classic Delhi courtier, one of.
- [13:12]
Anita Anand
The nine gems, one of the inner coterie of Akbar's court.
- [13:15]
William Dalrymple
But the guy who's written the main account we have of Akbar's inner circle, which is called the Ayniakbari, and he just thinks, quite literally that the sun shines out of Akbar, all parts of Akbar, and he lays it on with a trowel. And I think Prince Salim must have just sort of gagged eventually because he actually organizes the assassination of Abul Faisal as he's passing. He gets one of his friends, who's the young Raja of Orcha in Madhya Pradesh, to waylay him and assassinate him on his way through. And this again causes a major rift between Akbar and his son.
- [13:55]
Anita Anand
Yeah, but I mean, you know, Selim does other things that really pisses dad off. And first of all, let's go right back to the beginning. So he's born on 30 August 1569 at Fatehpur Sikri, this fabulous city that we described in the last episode when we were talking about Akbar. And his father is Akbar. His mother is Maryam Ousmani, the Rajput Hindu princess, sister of Akbar's general, Man Singh. And the name itself, Salim, means healthy because he was a bonnie little lad. He was a beautiful little boy. Everyone commented on his sort of, you know, the great pink cheeks and the big chubby legs. He was a healthy little bonny little thing.
- [14:34]
William Dalrymple
And he came much prayed for because Akbar didn't have an heir for many years and was going to all the shrines, begging various saints and Holy personages.
- [14:43]
Anita Anand
And the Mother Goddess, you know, went on foot to visit the Mother Goddess's shrine. So, you know, really wanted a son.
- [14:50]
William Dalrymple
And without success until he went to Sikri, to the Chistis of Sikri, to Salim Chisti, which is why he was named Salim. Not so much that he was healthy or not just that he was healthy, but because Salim Chisti had helped produce the magical ingredients for his conception. Though not directly, no.
- [15:10]
Anita Anand
But while he's a teenager, you know, he's kind of like a teen on a gapyar. Because they keep telling him to lead expeditions. Akbar wants to groom him to be his success, you know, and keeps trying to send him out to different corners of the realm, distant parts of his empire. But Salim just keeps saying, nah, don't want to. No, don't think so. Don't think so, Peter. Don't think I can do that. And again, this is coming from the bitchy pen of Abulfasal, so, you know, temper it with that, that this is going to be a man that he eventually murders. But he doesn't like it. Abu Salem also tells another story about a quarrel between father and son on a journey to Kashmir. So this would be sort of of fairly early on, you know, when he's sort of still young. Selim had been told to bring the harem forward to join Akbar, but he decided the road was too dangerous, so he came on his own and left the harem behind. And Akwa's response was on the verge of hysterical. We're told he refused to see the prince and laid hectic plans to ride all through the night to get, you know, the harem altogether almost unaccompanied, to try and sort of, you know, get the ladies himself. And Abel Fassel says, you know, there's absolutely no excuse for the prince's behaviour. And he had never seen Akbar so angry in his life. So it was turbulent between father and son.
- [16:25]
William Dalrymple
And then Prince Salim goes down to Allahabad and sort of establishes, not formally, but informally, a second capital there. I've been to that fort and it's one of the largest. No one ever goes to it as a choice because it's a military zone and you have to get permission to go inside. But it's a fort on the scale of the Red Fort in Delhi or Lahore or Agra. And it is on the promontory of rock which separates the two rivers, the Ganges and the Amuna, which meet at the confluence of Priyag. And on the foreshores are all the sadhus at this Holy place, one of the most holy places of Hinduism. And where this year there is going to be. In fact, this month there's going to be a mahakum mela, one of the great gathering of the Hindu holy men. I will be going.
- [17:15]
Anita Anand
So wait a minute. Mahakome mela. Are you gonna go? God, you're a brave man. I wouldn't go. It's gonna be so crowded. Make sure you have like a telephone number written on your arm or something for Olive to come and get you in case you get lost.
- [17:26]
William Dalrymple
Olive is coming to. In fact, Olive is leading the trip because one of her artworks is going to be immersed in the Ganges and worshipped.
- [17:32]
Anita Anand
Oh, wow.
- [17:33]
William Dalrymple
Which is rather special.
- [17:34]
Anita Anand
But Mahaka Mela doesn't happen very often. It happens I don't know how many, every after how many years. But it is a confluence of all of the rivers, isn't it? And everybody sort of comes to worship.
- [17:44]
William Dalrymple
And what's fascinating is that Salim, being the inquisitive boy that he is, not only has kidnapped half of his father's best painters, including the wonderful young superstar of the atelier, Govarden, who he brings with him, but he gets him to go down to the confluence and paint the sadhus there. And. And this results in the oldest set of images that we have anywhere of all the different yoga positions. And this is again, you know, purely the result of Jahangir's curiosity and sort of fascination with this world. He gets Govardant to paint all the different yogis doing their different forms of penance. It's the most wonderful, wonderful manuscript.
- [18:31]
Anita Anand
I know your team, Selim Straight Jahangir.
- [18:33]
William Dalrymple
I like them both, actually, but, well.
- [18:35]
Anita Anand
I mean, others are also less than complimentary about him when he's a young man. I mean, it should be said he's married by the age of 15 to a Rajput princess from Umber. So, you know, he's got this lavish ceremony. He's being set up, you know, bit by bit, his entire life and future is set out before him. And again, you know, like Akbar did, he's forging alliances with the Rajputs through marriage. But his wife. I mean, people are unkind about his first wife as well. They say that, you know, she's neurotic, she's paranoid.
- [19:04]
William Dalrymple
I think she's worse than that. She has severe mental problems.
- [19:07]
Anita Anand
Tango says she's lost her mind. Yes, that's right. I mean, he says, you know, from time to time her mind wandered and her father and brothers all agreed in telling me she was insane. So that might be part of the problem between father and son. That, oh, my God, they've saddled me with a mad woman. Because, you know, it's one of those treaty marriages. But I have actually got someone mad in my eyes.
- [19:25]
William Dalrymple
You can understand why he might go off with Madhubala, given the circumstances.
- [19:29]
Anita Anand
Yeah, she was an actress. It's not real, but it might have been a little bit real with Anarkali. Okay, so we've got the layout for a fractious relationship. After the murder of one of the nine gems of Akbar. Does he just break off relations or does he still, you know, he doesn't disown his son. I get the feeling he starts favoring his other sons, though, thinking this guy is out of bloody control. I might as well look to my other sons. Because he has four sons after Salim. First of all, he starts favoring Salim's younger brothers. But that's not good enough. And then his eyes light upon somebody else. William, tell us who Akbar starts thinking about as the successor.
- [20:05]
William Dalrymple
So with Salim in disgrace, Akbar splits the family by pouring his patronage and love over Salim's son. Who is Khusra, born 1587. And Akbar had always loved this child. He'd always been the favorite grandson. And now he's old enough to favour him over his father. Which, as you can imagine, goes down very badly.
- [20:34]
Anita Anand
So, you know, you've got Prince Salim already simmering because he's been passed over by his father. But what makes it worse is his father loves his own child more. The son of the mad wife. And so this will drive a wedge between Prince Selim and his own son. Which is, like, utterly Shakespearean and actually utterly mogul pre Akbar. When, you know, people's brothers were plotting against them and families were torn apart. You know, you had sort of one bit of stability with Akbar. Who didn't seem to hate many of his relatives that much. But here you have a father and son rift that is going to be problematic. And Khustrow, you know, he's just a kid. What does he know? But with the love and the patronage of his grandfather. Starts building up a household of his own. Not just a household of his own, but a power base of his own. Because people can see which way the wind is blowing. It's blowing towards Khusraw. And so they start gravitating towards him. And that's gonna make Salim even more angry.
- [21:31]
William Dalrymple
I mean, all these mogul stories are so like soap operas. Because it's always father and son and father and grandson. And all this. But to add to Salim's unhappiness at this point, the first wife dies by suicide. And although she'd obviously been unstable, Changi clearly rather loved her, said, what shall I write of her goodness and excellence? She was so loyal to me that she would have sacrificed a thousand sons and brothers for one hair of my head. She wrote constantly advice to Khusrau and tried to reason with him to be loving and loyal to me. When she saw it was of no use and there was no telling where it would end, she decided to take her own life out of zeal, which is an integral part of Rajput culture. While I was away on a hunt on the 26th of Dhul ul Hujjah, 1013, which is the May 5, 1605, with her mind in a state of imbalance, she ate a lot of opium and died soon thereafter. So it's a great sort of tragedy.
- [22:30]
Anita Anand
I mean, my God, there's a heroin overdose, isn't it? But also it's cruel because what he's saying is that she died because of her son. Selim puts the blame firmly at his son's feet, which is very, very hard for a son to hear that, you know, you're the reason your mother killed herself. Instead of. Of perhaps blaming on the fact that she had always all her life been insane, as he even puts it, you know, that her family said she was insane. So that is going to be souring a relationship even more. And Akbar is watching all of this. What is Akbar doing as he's watching this rift that he's created get wider and wider?
- [23:05]
William Dalrymple
Well, I don't think Akbar would have accepted that he created the rift. I think he saw it as his son being difficult and he goes for his. His loyal grandson who's better behaved. But in October 1605, six months after Salim's wife has committed suicide, it becomes clear that Akbar is dying. And in the last three weeks of his life, he's plagued by diarrhea and internal bleeding. And the nobles are worried along with everybody else that there's going to be a complete chaos if he goes without reconciling with Salim. So Salim gets there in time and he visits his dying father on literally his last day. He gets there just in time.
- [23:50]
Anita Anand
Last day on earth. Now, this is the story, this is the way it goes. And, you know, we've come across these stories before, particularly in the Koh I Noor story that somebody makes a deathbed proclamation. And that's what you get here, supposedly. So Akbar has never been too Impressed with Prince Selim beckons him over from his bed. You know, barely able to move, very, very sick, entirely dehydrated because of this terrible diarrhea and internal bleeding. And he motions, he doesn't even speak. He sort of beckons him over, son, come here. And he motions with his hand towards his turban, the royal turban and the royal robes, telling him, these are yours now. Just with emotion, not with words. I mean, it's very much slay Bollywood. Well, like the end of Ranjit's thing where he's not able to speak but supposedly motions about what he wants to do with the Koh I Noor diamond, which then people will argue about forever and ever saying, did he say the words? Did he say the words? Did he actually say the words? You can't just do a pointy thing and say that's what he meant. But Look, Akbar dies October 1605. And people don't question it. They say, okay, this is what is meant to be. He may not have always seen eye to eye with Selim, but he did want Selim to take over. Not to jump a generation, not to go to Selim's son, Khusrow. And Selim becomes Jahangir. The emperor's new name is going to be Jahangir, who comes to the throne on the 24th of October, 1605. So let's take a break here. Join us after the break where we look at Jahangir's empire. And also don't forget, there may be trouble with the sun.
- [25:24]
William Dalrymple
We have one more act for you this evening. I don't even need to say his name.
- [25:29]
Anita Anand
Mr.
- [25:30]
William Dalrymple
I'll do it.
- [25:30]
Bobby
A Complete Unknown is now a Golden Globe in critics choice nominee for best picture.
- [25:34]
William Dalrymple
Bobby, what do you want to be? Whatever it is they don't want me to be.
- [25:38]
Bobby
Timothy Chalamet astonishes as Bob Dylan in one of the best performances of the year. And critics rave. Edward Norton is absolutely fantastic.
- [25:48]
William Dalrymple
70,000 people are here and Bobby is the reason for it. They just want me singing blowing in the wind for the rest of my life. How does it feel?
- [25:58]
Bobby
Don't miss the movie. Critics are healing. Five stars to be on your it's pure cinematic magic.
- [26:05]
William Dalrymple
Turn it down. Hey, Loud.
- [26:08]
Bobby
And named to AFI and the National Board of Reviews top 10 films of the year.
- [26:13]
Anita Anand
Make some noise BD track some mud on carpet.
- [26:18]
Bobby
A Complete Unknown now playing only in theaters. We do under 1799. A middle without parent.
- [26:23]
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- [26:46]
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- [27:19]
William Dalrymple
So welcome back. We are now in the early days of Jahangir's reign and he's inherited a relatively stable realm. I mean compared to what his father succeeded. Remember when Humayun fell down the steps and banged his head. Akbar was only a teenager of 12. There were innumerable enemies. The situation now is completely different. There is a vast empire which goes from Kashmir and Afghanistan in the north, Delhi and Madhya Pradesh down to the Deccan, from Gujarat in the west to Bengal in the east. And it's now beautifully administered. There's a whole new administrative system. Hindu and Muslim are working together in a way they never have since the first Islamic conquests of the 12th century. In all sorts of ways this is a very strong and integrated empire. But as ever with the Mughals, there is family trouble. And each.
- [28:21]
Anita Anand
Yes, I was going to say, I mean, just more on the changing of the name. It's not a whimsical thing. There was actually a reason given and he wanted to avoid any confusion on the international stage because Turkey had recently had a sultan, Selim ii, Selim the.
- [28:35]
William Dalrymple
Grim, as he's memorably named.
- [28:37]
Anita Anand
Selim the Grim indeed. So he doesn't want any confusion. So he, I think himself chooses Jahangir as a name or in consultation with his court.
- [28:44]
William Dalrymple
It means the world.
- [28:45]
Anita Anand
Caesar, Caesar of the world. Not Caesar as in, you know, sort of Latin Caesar, but to seize something, the man who takes the world. So, you know, you've got a new start, a new name, an old realm and also an old enmity. So you mentioned like family problems because Khusrau has by this time amassed quite a powerful retinue. Also has notions above his station, some may say because of his granddaddy. Who's been grooming him to take over. And this is going to be a problem right at the start. So Khusrau rebels in 1606. So just one year after Jahangir, the Caesar of the world, takes over the empire, Khusrau, his little kid, who is, you know, just again, sort of more than a boy at the time, decides that he's going to challenge for the throne. So, you know, what's happened is Jahangir put him away to one side, it's not exactly house arrest, but he is confined. But he escapes.
- [29:47]
William Dalrymple
He escapes Agran and rides to Lahore, doesn't he? He goes all the way to Lahore with his followers. And the rebellion lasts about a month. His followers are defeated. Jahangir proves to be far more militarily capable than anyone suspected. And within a week or so, the rebellion has been crushed and Khusra has been captured and dragged weeping in chains before his father in a garden just outside Lahore. I think even is it the site of Shalimar Bagh, where the garden is today. And the punishment of Khusra's followers is brutal. They're impaled on both sides of the roads. And this is this sort of strange paradox we get with the Mughals, whereby these men who are so aesthetically sensitive and such brilliant writers, are also capable of being torturers and war criminals. That famous line of Rushdie that we read in an earlier episode, that was Babur an esit or a war criminal, he was both. And the same is true of Jahangir. Jahangir, when he's crossed by his son, takes all of Khusraw's young men, all the young gallants who have followed Khusrau into rebellion.
- [31:03]
Anita Anand
They are young, you know, they are the flower of the Mughal kingdom. These are the oys of the Mughal kingdom. And I should say, you know, this sort of putting people on spikes and letting them die that way is particularly awful because.
- [31:15]
William Dalrymple
And then some of them are taken down from their spikes, placed on an elephant and made to receive homage from his supporters as they writhe in agony, then put back onto the spikes. It's all really horrible stuff.
- [31:26]
Anita Anand
Oh, no, it's really, really gruesome. And you know, what you see, or what anybody will see if they witness this horror is the sun, the full sun, sort of shrinking their skin as they die slowly of constriction and suffocation. It's a lot like crucifixion, actually. You don't die of the pa. You don't die of the blood loss you die of the suffocation. I mean, this isn't Jahangir's invention of a torture. It was one that he sort of dug up from age old India. But he is the man who sort of makes it modern for Khusra himself. What he does to Khusra, which is really just cruel, you know, this is his son, he forces him to ride an elephant along this street of stakes and past all his friends, you know, he sees all of his friends and his retinue groaning their last breaths and you know, that is quite the warning to your young son.
- [32:13]
William Dalrymple
And Khusrau then, embittered, now hating his father more than anything, makes another half hearted plan to rebel, is caught, the plot is uncovered and at this point Jahangir partially blinds Khusra to make sure he cannot rule. And that ends Khusrau's rebellion.
- [32:34]
Anita Anand
And Jahangir, yeah, why do you like him then? I mean, I think, you know, he was played by Dilipumar, but he does some pretty, pretty awful things right at the beginning, doesn't he?
- [32:42]
William Dalrymple
I think this is what's so important when you're talking about these guys is to recognize that both things are true, that they are war criminals, that they are brutes, that they are capable of things that we would regard as appallingly brutal. But they're also aesthetes, poets and sensitive men. I mean anywhere in the world you will find this at this period of history. If we look at this is the period of Medici Italy, the same is true there. It's the period of Machiavelli. Machiavelli is exactly like this. Sensitive, deeply aesthetic, but also a brute who understands the nature of power. I don't think he's any different from any other princely lineage anywhere else.
- [33:22]
Anita Anand
But it's a long drawn out end for Khusro because I mean, he doesn't kill him. He remains a prisoner in the royal court. On very rare occasions he's brought into his father's presence, you know, supposedly for a reconciliation. But it doesn't work because the prisoner prince depressed Jahangir. That's what it says is that, you know, Jahangir didn't like to look at him because it made him feel, you know, a bit rubbish. So these visits became less and less frequent. Also Jahangir was irritated because his son didn't look cheerful. So there is this court chronicler who writes at the time, you know, Cehinga was irritated because Khusra's appearance showed no signs of openness and happiness. And he was always Mournful and dejected. I mean, you would be if your father's taking your eye, really, wouldn't you?
- [34:06]
William Dalrymple
And if your father has impaled all your friends. I mean, I don't always love all my friends, but I wouldn't impale.
- [34:13]
Anita Anand
Oh, poor Sam and Adam. Do they know this? Do they know you feel this way about their friends?
- [34:19]
William Dalrymple
Some lovely friends.
- [34:20]
Anita Anand
All right, so Khusra is now out of the way. So is he now secure in his reign? What does he do now that he hasn't got a young pretender who's snapping at his heels?
- [34:29]
William Dalrymple
Well, he is now free to be the kind of amateur scientist that he'd always wanted to be. And so you find all sorts of strange sort of natural. He sort of turns into a sort of Mughal David Attenborough. At this point he talks about a Barbary yew that's been brought from Morocco, a lorikeet from Sumatra, and a zebra which is bought from Ethiopia. Though he's initially skeptical about the zebra and orders that the strangely decorated wild ass should be investigated. Then he said, only after a minute inquiry into the truth did it become clear that the Lord of the world was its creator. One might say that the painter of fate with a strange brush had left it on the page of the world. In other words, he thought that someone had just painted the zebra stripes just to fool him. I kind of say a few more things. I do love all this amateur enlightenment stuff. Go on.
- [35:20]
Anita Anand
All right, you go through that and then I'll talk about human things.
- [35:23]
William Dalrymple
Go on, go for it.
- [35:25]
Anita Anand
I'll give you a couple of them. Attenborough.
- [35:27]
William Dalrymple
Go on. Okay, so he is at his happiest when he's sort of dissecting the windpipes of birds or poking around the belly of a snake which has swallowed a hare. And it is very David Attenborough. He made tests to see whether bitumen could help mend broken bones.
- [35:42]
Anita Anand
I mean, he's a psycho. David Attenborough. David Attenborough's never cut open a pregnant bird.
- [35:47]
William Dalrymple
I'm sure he has.
- [35:47]
Anita Anand
What are you talking about? Some kind of Dexter meets Attenborough. I don't know what Attenboroughs you've been watching. Anyway, carry on.
- [35:54]
William Dalrymple
He has this test to see whether bitumen can help mend broken bones, which he's been told and after trying it out on a chicken, concludes it's just an old wives tale. Then he wants to try and work out this is very kind of contemporary India, whether the heir of Ahmedabad and Mahmudabad was more Noxious, which has got the nastiest smell. So he hangs a sheep carcass up in both and observes the putrefaction and see which decays quicker. And then he compares the liver of a wolf animal lecter.
- [36:27]
Anita Anand
It's the first sign of psychopathy. It's people who torture animals just for their own amusement.
- [36:32]
William Dalrymple
This is not torturing animals, this is studying them. Parents deliver of a wolf with that of a lion to see if it's true that the reason for the courage of the lion is its liver. Because in Mughal and in Islamic culture, people talk about your courage as rather like we talk about the heart being the center of love.
- [36:49]
Anita Anand
I mean, we used to think it was the liver and spleen. We used to think that Elizabethan England was full of treaties about the liver and spleen.
- [36:55]
William Dalrymple
So he takes the liver of a wolf and that of a lion and see which is the larger. And then that he decides that that too is an old wife's test.
- [37:04]
Anita Anand
Process of elimination by eliminating every living thing around him.
- [37:09]
William Dalrymple
That's very unfair, because he is a man who values reason. And for example, he imprisons a Muslim holy man who he thinks is a fake. And when he visits a shrine where miracles are said to occur, his first question is, what is the real state of the case? An investigation to the story of the Philosopher's stone leads him to conclude. My intelligence in no way accepts this story. It appears to be all delusion. So he's sort of like Montaigne or Voltaire or Hume. If only you give him a chance. I think you're very hard on him.
- [37:40]
Anita Anand
I think they were more murdery. They sort of like to cut people open and fill them with bitumen. Yes, very much like them.
- [37:48]
William Dalrymple
One last story. He loves the cranes which come to North India in the winter. And there's a pair which have been captured when they're just one month old. And they travel with Jahangir for five years. And they got their own little enclosure that he always has put up next to his tent. And one day there's a terrific moment of excitement in the diary when the eunuch in charge of the birds reports that they'd mated in his presence. And Hunkier is convinced that this has never been closely observed and recorded. So again, likes of David Attenborough, he goes out, not with his cameraman, but with his artist Mansoor, and he gave orders that he should be placed discreetly so that he can see what he describes as the slightest indication of love place. When that moment comes, he bounds into action. And is taking notes. The female, having straightened its legs, bent down a little. The male then lifted up one of its feet from the ground and placed it on her back. And afterwards a second foot and immediately seating himself on her back, paired with her. Then he came around and stretching out his neck, put his beak on the ground and walked once around the female. It is possible they may have an egg and produce a younger one. I love that.
- [39:01]
Anita Anand
You see, I don't understand. We see this in very different ways. You see, I see psychopathy and animal porn and you see something entirely different. I'm sort of a little bit worried. But look, love is in the air, not just among the cranes, because this is also at the point of his life where he falls in love with the woman Mehrenisa, who will later become Nurjahan. And if you want to know more about Noor Jahan, it's an exquisite story of an exceptionally interesting woman. We've done a whole episode on her, so just have a look at our back catalog.
- [39:29]
William Dalrymple
We did two episodes on her.
- [39:30]
Anita Anand
So, you know, and we'll put it in the show notes or in the newsletter so you know where to find. But yeah, we won't dwell on that story. But he finds the great love of his life. He's met an equal. Not a sort of choppy up psycho equal, but an equal.
- [39:44]
William Dalrymple
You're so unfair.
- [39:45]
Anita Anand
Someone who blinds their children, but, you know, an equal. Not one who gets fed up because the blind children aren't smiley enough, but an equal.
- [39:55]
William Dalrymple
Very much.
- [39:57]
Anita Anand
He's much happier. Yeah. Thank God he's found someone he loves anyway. So that love affair is a huge definition of who Jahangir is and who the world remembers him as being. He is Jahangir with Noor Jahan. They're very much drawn together. So go back and listen to that episode, is what I'm saying.
- [40:13]
William Dalrymple
My final pitch for Jahangir as unrecognized David Attenborough rather than Hannibal Lecter that you're trying to make him out to be is the fact that he has this lovely relationship with, I think, my favorite of all Mughal artists. And we're gonna talk about Mansoor more in the next episode when with the wonderful Sue Strong, we investigate Jahangir's art. All the incredible paintings painted under Jahangir, but just to have a little aperitif on Mansoor. Mansoor is always kept on hand with the emperor to record any of these curiosities. So, for example, when the turkey turns up or the zebra, Mansoor is there busy painting it and occasionally he's not quite fast enough. There's one moment when I was gonna.
- [41:00]
Anita Anand
Say painting like his life depends on it, because it probably does, because it's Jahangir. So there he is as swirl of paint, sweat and terror. Paint faster, paint faster.
- [41:11]
William Dalrymple
Carry on occasion when he doesn't paint fast enough and a particular fine falcon is brought and he's waiting for Mansoor to turn up with his pen and paper and instead the falcon is attacked by a cat due to the carelessness of Mir Shikar, the chief huntsman, and the emperor's beside himself with grief. What can I say of the beauty of this falcon? He writes, there were many beautiful black markings on each wing and back and sides. As it was something so extraordinary, I ordered Mansoor Ustad Mansoor to paint and preserve its likeness. So poor El Mansour has to paint this corpse of this bird that's been attacked by a cat.
- [41:50]
Anita Anand
Not a dead parrot sketch, it's a dead falcon sketch, quite literally. You didn't appreciate my sketch? I thought it was sketch. Painting. Painting.
- [42:00]
William Dalrymple
I got it, I got it.
- [42:01]
Anita Anand
I'm just saying. Go on as you were. Carry on.
- [42:03]
William Dalrymple
The favourite and the weirdest of all Mansoor's paintings are his painting of the lizard. Is it a chameleon? I think that's in a tree.
- [42:12]
Anita Anand
I don't know. Mansur paints it one colour. It keeps changing. It's really difficult. Poor Mansoor. It's like the worst job in the entire realm.
- [42:19]
William Dalrymple
You've been at the sherry again. I think the Christmas sherry's been.
- [42:23]
Anita Anand
It's green. No, it's red.
- [42:24]
William Dalrymple
It's green.
- [42:25]
Anita Anand
Mansoor. God's sake, Mansoor, paint faster.
- [42:30]
William Dalrymple
Anyway, my lovely art historian friend Stuart Kerry Welsh, who died last year, who was a great fan of Manhattan Mansoor, and he wrote a lovely description of Mansoor's image of the chameleon on a branch. And he said the lizard, looming vast as a dinosaur, clutches a springy branch with its tiny fingers and coiled tail while following an appetizing butterfly with its piercing eye. Each pore, wrinkle and toenail is recorded with a passionate attention that transcends mere accuracy. At his best, the artist so sympathized with the subject that he explored its inner as well as its outer nature. And I think both Jahangir and Mansour do this. I think you have this extraordinary pairing of naturalists with these two. So I'm going to remain in my little trench here and resist Anita trying to denigrate the great Jahangir.
- [43:25]
Anita Anand
I think it's an Alternate version to yours, but you'll stand by it. But no, look, I mean, it is. His interest in the natural world does lead to something of. Of a revolution, if you like, in paintings of the natural world. You know, he commissions people to do nature painting. We're going to talk about that in the next episode, actually, in more detail. Susan Strong of A V and A. And I will be much better behaved because we'll have a guest.
- [43:48]
William Dalrymple
I'm sure sue is on my side in this.
- [43:50]
Anita Anand
Well, I'm not going to behave like this when she's here, am I? Because it's us. I'll be very respectful. But he is sort of plunging into opium and booze at this time as well. You know, he may be an Attenborough.
- [44:02]
William Dalrymple
This does become a bit of a problem. It's true.
- [44:04]
Anita Anand
I mean, he's not like Attenborough that he's pissed as a fart most of the time, isn't he?
- [44:09]
William Dalrymple
He does become more so. And what's interesting is, again, very typical Jahangir, is he records his own addiction with this unsparing attention. And he monitors the amount of opium and the amount of drink that he's taking. And so we know exactly what he's drinking and indulging in each day. And then one of his friends, who's a much more advanced opium addict, is dying and he sends in Mansoor to pain the dying aristocrat.
- [44:36]
Anita Anand
Oh, that's an amazing picture.
- [44:37]
William Dalrymple
And you see this man who's been painted several times by other artists when he was at the peak of his beauty and power, and you see him transformed into this hollow cheeked.
- [44:49]
Anita Anand
It reminds me of the Famished Buddha. It's the Famished Buddha kind of look, isn't it? He's exactly that slumped into a couch. You can see his ribcage, you can see his clavicles sticking out, his shirt is open, he's all bones. He's as close to death as you can be without being a skeleton. I mean, it's an amazingly powerful picture.
- [45:07]
William Dalrymple
Anyway, more of this next time when I hope that Anita will not have been at the sherry in the way.
- [45:13]
Anita Anand
She clearly has not been at the sherry. I genuinely have a problem with people blowing their sons and then criticise them for not being chipper about it. Call me mad, call me old fashioned, call me crazy, call me old fashioned. But, you know, in this season of good cheer, I think that's a bit much. Cheer up. What the hell's wrong with you, son? Look, I'm over here. Why are you smiling at me. Why smile at me? Oh yes. You don't know. Because I. I blinded you.
- [45:41]
William Dalrymple
They just.
- [45:41]
Anita Anand
I mean, what's wrong with you?
- [45:42]
William Dalrymple
Just be contrarian.
- [45:45]
Anita Anand
Anyway, till the next time we meet, it's goodbye from me, Anita Anand.
- [45:50]
William Dalrymple
Goodbye from me, William Trimple.