The Story of a Drunken Mughal: Alcohol Culture in Timurid Central Asia Dissertation Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University By Stephanie Honchell, M.A. Graduate Program in History The Ohio State University 2015 Dissertation Committee: Dr. Scott Levi, Advisor Dr. Jane Hathaway Dr. Thomas McDow Copyright by Stephanie Honchell 2015 Abstract This project uses the context of alcohol consumption under the Timurid dynasty in fifteenth-century Central Asia as a prism through which larger cultural and religious trends can be understood and explained. While the assumption that Islam forbids alcohol is often repeated, the issue of alcohol consumption has never been as clear-cut as is often portrayed. In the context of Central Asia, Islamization facilitated rather than hindered the continuation of traditional drinking practices due to the proliferation and flexibility of the Hanafi legal rite and the Maturidist school of theology. As a result, drinking practices did not represent a lack of regard for religious tenets, but instead reflected Islam’s interpretive adaptability. By emphasizing long-term cultural evolution, this project shows how various historical trends converged up to and during the Timurid period and were then disseminated outward, specifically into South Asia with the establishment of the Timurid- Mughal Empire. In addition to shedding light on religious practice, the Timurids’ drinking culture exemplified the ongoing socio-economic shift in the region away from pastoral nomadism. By exploring the changing contexts and occasions of alcohol consumption in fifteenth-century Central Asia, it is possible to identify the distinctive influences of Islamization and sedentarization in shaping cultural practice. As a result, it ii becomes clear that the most significant factor in shaping Timurid culture was not Islam or a turn towards religious orthodoxy, but instead the ongoing shift away from nomadism in favor of a more sedentary lifestyle. iii Acknowledgments As stubbornly independent and self-sufficient as I may imagine myself to be, I am humbly aware of and forever grateful for the many people and organizations that have offered their support and encouragement throughout the process of both my graduate studies and the writing of this dissertation. First and foremost, words cannot express my gratitude to my advisor, Scott Levi, for introducing me to Central Asian history and guiding me through this journey with wisdom, patience, and an inexhaustible sense of humor. Additionally, I thank my secondary advisors, Jane Hathaway and Thomas McDow, whose insights, feedback, and recommendations have proven invaluable in shaping both this work and my perspective as a scholar. I am also greatly indebted to Saeed Honarmand and Javad Abbasi, who both dedicated many hours to helping me trudge through Persian manuscripts. I would also like to thank Jim Bach and professors Ousman Kobo, Carter Findley, Stephen Dale, Alan Gallay, Devin DeWeese, Maria Subtelny, and Thomas Allsen for their support and willingness to offer advice and assistance at every turn. The nature of this project required many trips to archives both in the United States and abroad. I thank Alan Beyerchen and Jennifer Seigel for supporting my project through awards from the Bradley Foundation, which financed research at Indiana iv University in Bloomington and at the British Library in London and the Bodleian Library in Oxford. I also thank Ed Lazzerini at IU, as well as my fellow graduate students Anjali Vijayathil, Meg White, and Nick Walmsley for welcoming me in Bloomington. Research in Uzbekistan was funded by the Office of International Affairs at Ohio State. In Uzbekistan I was enthusiastically welcomed and hosted by Gulchekra Sultanova and Dilara Yunus. I am also incredibly grateful to Paolo Sartori and Thomas Welsford for inviting me to participate in the workshop “Towards a New Social History of 19th- and Early 20th-century Central Asia,” in Vienna in 2012. The insights and perspectives I received from them as well as Florian Schwartz, Andreas Wilde, and the other participants, including my fellow graduate students Jeffrey Eden, James Pickett, and Daniel Beben, were hugely influential in shaping this work. I also thank Thalien Colenbrander and Kathy van Vliet-Leigh at Brill for granting me advance access to Ulrich Rudolph’s book on al-Maturidi. I must also thank my colleagues and boon companions at Ohio State, especially (though not limited to) Jason Drake, Dan Vandersommers, Karen Stringer, Abby Schreiber, Libby Marvel, Saba Nasseri, Catalina Hunt, Isacar Bolaños, Hannah Ewing, and Brent Harbaugh. It is only through their friendship and patience that I have emerged from this process with any semblance of sanity, and for that I am forever indebted to them. I have also been blessed to teach an incredible group of students at both Ohio State and Fort Lewis College, whose enthusiasm and hard work continually reinforced my dedication to complete my Ph.D. v My family has unconditionally supported me throughout my life, and they each had a hand in shaping me into the woman I am today. I would especially like to thank Kay Honchell, Sue Lafferty, and Janet Day for inspiring me with their strength and encouragement. Todd Day for his dry sense of humor and quiet support and Amanda Day for being the most amazing, beautiful, and supportive little sister I could ask for. Lastly, the two men who have truly inspired me by shaping my understanding of the world and who have instilled in me a general refusal to worry about what other people think: my father Roger Honchell and the illustrious physicist and bongo player Richard Feynman. It is to their memories that I humbly dedicate this dissertation. That being said, any inaccuracies, inconsistencies, or errors of interpretation are the fault of an adorable little Tibetan spaniel named Moonshine, who sat by my side as I wrote every page and gladly accepts responsibility for any and all of my shortcomings. vi Vita 2002-2004 ......................................................New York University 2006-2008 ......................................................B.A. History, University of Louisville 2008-2010 ......................................................M.A. History, University of Louisville 2010 to present ..............................................Graduate Teaching Associate, Department of History, The Ohio State University 2014 to present……………………………...Visiting Instructor, Department of History, Fort Lewis College Fields of Study Major Field: History vii Table of Contents Abstract……………………………………………………………………………………ii Acknowledgments………………………………………………………………………..iv Vita………………………………………………………………………………………vii Introduction………………………………………………………………………………..1 Chapter 1: Rivers of Wine in Paradise……………………….…………………………..16 Chapter 2: The Silver-Limbed Drinking Tree……………………………………….…..33 Chapter 3: Alcohol in Transition………………………………………….......................61 Chapter 4: Chastise me When you Find me Sober...……………………………….……93 Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………...127 Bibliography……………………………………………………………………………135 Appendix A: I’ll Drink to That: Alcohol in Myth, Reality, and History……………….149 Appendix B: Translation of Shah Rukh’s edict on wine drinking……………………...168 Appendix C: “A Drunken Babur Returns to Camp”……………………………………170 Appendix D: Translation of Babur’s Pledge of Temperance…………...………………171 Appendix E: Timurid Genealogy (simplified)……………....………………………….175 viii INTRODUCTION Drink up your wine and – as you do so – I Will tell a story from the days gone by, A story full of love and trickery, Whose hero lived for war and chivalry. Ferdowsi (940-1020) 1 In the early fifteenth century, the last great nomadic conqueror, Temür, forged an empire spanning large parts of Central Asia, Iran, and Afghanistan. During the century of Timurid rule that followed, a distinct imperial culture evolved featuring an amalgamation of the dynasty’s nomadic, sedentary, Turkic, Mongol, Persian, and Islamic identities. The interaction of these various traditions led to a shift so pervasive that the culture of late Timurid rulers such as Sultan Husayn Bayqara and Muhammad Zahiruddin Babur bore little resemblance to that of the empire’s founders. Timurid imperial culture is often presented as reflecting a turn towards Islamic orthodoxy during the reign of Temür’s son and successor, Shah Rukh. However, this interpretation represents a misunderstanding of both the nature of Islam in Central Asia and of the Timurids themselves. By exploring the changing contexts and occasions of alcohol consumption in fifteenth-century Central Asia, it is possible to identify the distinctive influences that shaped Timurid cultural practice. By doing so, it becomes clear that the most significant 1 Abolqasem Ferdowsi, Shahnameh: The Persian Book of Kings, trans. Dick Davis (New York: Penguin, 2007), 307. 1 factor in shaping Timurid culture was not Islam or Shah Rukh’s supposed turn towards religious orthodoxy, but instead the ongoing shift away from nomadism in favor of a more sedentary lifestyle. This project has three primary goals: to use alcohol culture as a prism to shed light on the nature of religious practice in Central Asia; to incorporate the Islamic world more substantially into the growing field of alcohol history; and, perhaps most importantly, to reassess the legacy of the Timurids, particularly Shah Rukh. The way Central Asians have historically understood, observed,