_full_alt_author_running_head (neem stramien B2 voor dit chapter en nul 0 in hierna): 0 _full_alt_articletitle_running_head (oude _articletitle_deel, vul hierna in): Akbar’s Sieges and Construction of Mughal Universal Sovereignty _full_article_language: en indien anders: engelse articletitle: 0

Akbar’s Sieges And Construction Of Mughal Universal Sovereignty 175

Chapter 7 Narratives of Akbar’s Sieges and the Construction of Mughal Universal Sovereignty

Pratyay Nath

The world conqueror, Akbar Ghazi, than whose sword, Of a certainty, there is no key for the fortresses of the world. Nizamuddin Ahmad1 ⸪

History of warfare is a growing field of research for South Asia. As far as the early modern period is concerned, much of the existing body of literature fo- cuses on the Mughal Empire. Historians have concentrated primarily on three themes here – pitched battles, gunpowder technology, and military organisa- tion.2 It is only recently that scholars have started to go beyond these issues and explore other dimensions of the Mughal military experience.3 Only a few

1 ‘Kishwar kushāyī, Akbar ghāzī, ki bī sukhun/ jaz tegh-i u, qilāʿ-i jahān-rā kalīd nīst.’ Khwaja Nizamuddin Ahmad, T̤abaqāt-i Akbarī, ed. Brajendranath De, 3 vols (Calcutta, 1931), 2:248; The Ṭabaqāt-i Akbarī of Khwājah Niẓāmuddīn Aḥmad, trans. Brajendranath De, 3 vols (Delhi, 1992), 2:387. 2 Works that study Mughal battles include Jadunath Sarkar, Military History of India (Delhi, 1970); Kaushik Roy, India’s Historic Battles: From Alexander the Great to Kargil (New Delhi, 2004), pp. 54–79. Prominent studies of technology include Iqtidar Alam Khan, “Early Use of Cannon and Musket in India, ad 1442–1526,” Journal of Economic and Social History of the Orient 24, no. 2 (1981), 146–164; Iqtidar Alam Khan, “Origin and Development of Gunpowder Technology in India, ad 1250–1500,” The Indian Historical Review 4, no. 1 (1977), 20–29; Iqtidar Alam Khan, Gunpowder and Firearms: Warfare in Medieval India (New Delhi, 2004); Iqbal Ghani Khan, “Metallurgy in Medieval India – The Case of Iron Cannons,” Proceedings of the Indian History Congress 1984 45 (1984), 464–471; Irfan Habib, “Akbar and Technology,” Social Scientist 20, no. 9–10 (1992), 3–15; G. N. Pant, Mughal Weapons in the Baburnama (Delhi, 1989). Finally, works on army organisation include William Irvine, The Army of the Indian Moghuls (Delhi, 2004); Abdul Aziz, The Mansabdari System and the Mughal Army (Lahore, 1945). 3 Jos Gommans and Andrew de la Garza have thrown valuable light on several new areas of Mughal warfare, including the nature of imperial frontiers, military mobilisation, hunt-

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2019 | doi:10.1163/9789004395695_008 176 Nath historians have explored sieges – the mode of warfare the present volume is interested in. This is in spite of the fact that siege warfare was very frequent in early modern South Asia and it played a key role in Mughal territorial expan- sion.4 In several cases, scholars have referred to sieges as a part of their broader works on Mughal warfare.5 The richness of these discussions notwithstanding, sieges have not received the kind of detailed attention they deserve. Against this backdrop, the present chapter will look at Mughal sieges through the lens of literary representation.6 The focus will remain on five im- perial sieges – ones that the third Mughal emperor Jalaluddin Muhammad Ak- bar (r. 1556–1605) led in person in course of his long rule spanning almost half a century. These were the sieges of Mankot (1557), Chitor (1567–68), Ranthamb- hor (1569), Surat (1572–73), and Patna (1574). The goal will be to analyse the politics of the narrativisation of these sieges in three imperial court chronicles – Muhammad Arif Qandahari’s Ta⁠ʾrīkh-i Akbarī, Khwaja Nizamuddin Ahmad’s

ing, tactics, logistics, recruitment, and training. See Jos Gommans, Mughal Warfare: Indian Frontiers and High Roads to Empire, 1500–1700 (London, New York, 2002); Andrew de la Garza, The Mughal Empire at War: Babur, Akbar and the Indian Military Revolution, 1500– 1605 (London, New York, 2016). 4 Publications on Mughal forts and sieges include Ayesha Begum, “Mughal Fort Architecture in Bengal with an Introduction to Some Important River Forts,” Journal of Asiatic Society of Bangladesh 47, no. 1 (2002), 1–24; Pratyay Nath, “Siege Warfare in Mughal India, 1519–1538,” in Warfare and Politics in South Asia from Ancient to Modern Times, ed. Kaushik Roy (New Delhi, 2011), pp. 121–144; Pratyay Nath, “Through the Lens of War: Akbar’s Sieges (1567–69) and Mughal Empire-Building in Early Modern North India,” South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies 41, no. 2 (2018), 245–258; Margaret R. Hunt, “The 1689 Mughal Siege of East India Company Bombay: Crisis and Historical Erasure,” History Workshop Journal 84, no. 1 (2017), 149–169. For some of the important works on the history of fortress warfare in early modern South Asia in general, see Stuart Gordon, “Forts and Social Control in the Maratha State,” Modern Asian Studies 13 (1979), 1–17; Jean Deloche, Studies on Fortification in India (Pondicherry, 2007); Richard M. Eaton, Philip B. Wagoner, Power, Memory, Architecture: Contested Sites on India’s Deccan Plateau, c. 1300–1600 (New Delhi, 2014). 5 The interventions of both Jos Gommans and Kaushik Roy fall under this category. Gom­ mans, Mughal Warfare, pp. 136–141; Kaushik Roy, Military Transition in Early Modern Asia, 1400–1750: Cavalry, Guns, Government and Ships (London/New York, 2014), pp. 127–160. Douglas Streusand was the first historian to analyse Akbar’s sieges in considerable detail. Douglas Streusand, The Formation of the Mughal Empire (New Delhi, 1990), pp. 57–64. 6 Very few scholars have worked on the representation and memorialisation of Mughal war and conquests. Important works include Sandhya Sharma, Literature, Culture and History in Mughal North India, 1550–1800 (Delhi, 2011), pp. 158–203; Cynthia Talbot, “Justifying Defeat: A Rajput Perspective on the Age of Akbar,” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 55, no. 2–3 (2012), 329–368; Audrey Truschke, “Setting the Record Wrong: A Sanskrit Vision of Mughal Conquests,” South Asian History and Culture 3, no. 3 (2012), 373–396.