imported>Gotitbro at 11:27, 5 March 2021

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{{Short description|Historian}}
{{more citations needed|date=July 2016}}{{Infobox person
| name = Firishta
| birth_date = 1560
| death_date = 1620
}}

'''Firishta''' or '''Ferešte''' ({{lang-fa|{{Nastaliq|فِرِشتہ}}}}), full name '''Muhammad Qasim Hindu Shah''' ({{lang-fa|{{Nastaliq|مُحَمَّد قاسِم هِندو شاہ}}}}), was a [[Persians|Persian]]<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Minorsky |first1=V. |title=The Qara-qoyunlu and the Qutb-shāhs (Turkmenica, 10) |journal=Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies |date=1955 |volume=17 |issue=1 |page=52 |doi=10.1017/S0041977X00106342 |quote=Another tendency of Firishta (a Persian of Astarabad) is to underline (...)|jstor=609169}}</ref> historian, who later settled in India and served the Deccan Sultans as their court historian. He was born in 1560 and died in 1620.<ref name="Government of Maharashtra-Ferishta">{{cite web|url=http://www.maharashtra.gov.in/english/gazetteer/WARDHA/his_mediaeval%20period.html#nirmal |title=Medieval Period |publisher=Government of Maharashtra |access-date=2008-08-30 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080528004554/http://www.maharashtra.gov.in/english/gazetteer/WARDHA/his_mediaeval%20period.html |archive-date=May 28, 2008 }}</ref> The name ''Firishta'' means ''angel'' in Persian.{{citation needed|date=July 2016}}

==Life==
Firishta was born at [[Astrabad]] on the shores of the [[Caspian Sea]] to Gholam Ali Hindu Shah. While Firishta was still a child, his father was summoned away from his native country into [[Ahmednagar]], [[India]], to teach [[Persian language|Persian]] to the young prince Miran Husain Nizam Shah, with whom Firishta studied.{{citation needed|date=July 2016}}

In 1587 Firishta was serving as the captain of guards of King [[Murtuza Nizam Shah]] when [[Prince Miran]] overthrew his father and claimed the throne of [[Ahmadnagar Sultanate|Ahmednagar]]. Prince Miran spared the life of his former friend, who then left for [[Adil Shahi dynasty|Bijapur]] to enter the service of King [[Ibrahim Adil Shah II|Ibrahim Adil II]] in 1589.{{citation needed|date=July 2016}}

Having been in military positions until then, Firishta was not immediately successful in [[Adil Shahi dynasty|Bijapur]]. Further exacerbating matters was the fact that Firishta was of [[Shia]] origin and therefore did not have much chance of attaining a high position in the dominantly [[Sunni]] courts of the [[Deccan sultanates]].<ref name="Eliot" /> In 1593 Ibrahim Shah II ultimately implored Firishta to write a history of India with equal emphasis on the history of Deccan dynasties as no work thus far had given equal treatment to all regions of the subcontinent.{{citation needed|date=July 2016}}

==Overview of work==
The work was variously known as the ''[[Tarikh-i Firishta]]'' and the ''Gulshan-i Ibrahimi''. In the introduction, a resume of the history of Hindustan prior to the times of the [[Mughal Empire|Muslim conquest]] is given, and also the victorious progress of [[Arabs]] through the East. The first ten books are each occupied with a history of the kings of one of the provinces; the eleventh book gives an account of the Muslims of [[Malabar Coast|Malabar]]; the twelfth a history of the Muslim [[saints]] of India; and the conclusion treats of the [[geography of India|geography]] and [[climate of India]]. It also includes graphic descriptions of the persecution of Hindus during the reign of [[Sikandar Butshikan]] in [[Kashmir]]. {{citation needed|date=April 2016}}

''Tarikh-i Firishta'' consists primarily of the following books:<ref name="Eliot">{{cite book|url = https://books.google.com/books?id=kirq6aYFMhoC&q=firishta&pg=PA207| title = The History of India, As Told by Its Own Historians|first=Henry Miers|last=Elliot| date = December 2008| author-link = Henry Miers Elliot|publisher =[[BiblioBazaar]]| isbn = 9780559693335|access-date = 2009-02-20}}</ref>{{full citation needed|date=July 2016}}
# The Kings of Ghazni and Lahore
# The Kings of Dehli
# The Kings of Dakhin - divided into 6 chapters:
##Gulbarga
##Bijapur
##Ahmadnagar
##Tilanga
##Birar
##Bidar
# The Kings of Gujarat
# The Kings of Malwa
# The Kings of Khandesh
# The Kings of Bengal and Bihar
# The Kings of Multan
# The Rulers of Sind
# The Kings of Kashmir
# An account of [[Malabar Coast|Malabar]]
# An account of Saints of India
#Conclusion - An account of the climate and geography of India

Contemporary scholars and historians variously write that the works of Firishta drew from ''Tabaqat-i-Akbari'' by Nizamud-din,<ref name="Hasan">{{cite book|url = https://books.google.com/books?id=EUlwmXjE9DQC| title = Kashmir Under the Sultans|first=Mohibbul |last=Hasan| year = 2005|publisher =Aakar Books| isbn = 9788187879497|access-date = 2009-02-20}}</ref> ''Tarikh-i-Rashidi'' by Mirza Haider<ref name="Hasan" />{{full citation needed|date=July 2016}} and Barani's ''Tarikh''.<ref name="Shail">{{cite book|url = https://books.google.com/books?id=zL-7m2MDp2EC| title = Against History, Against State|first=Shail|last= Mayaram| year = 2004|publisher =[[Orient Blackswan]]| isbn = 9788178240961|access-date = 2009-02-20}}</ref>{{full citation needed|date=July 2016}} At least one historian, [[Peter Jackson (historian)|Peter Jackson]], explicitly states that Firishta relied upon the works of Barani and Sarhindi, and that his work cannot be relied upon as a first hand account of events, and that at places in the ''Tarikh'' he is suspected of having relied upon legends and his own imagination.<ref name="Jackson">{{cite book|url = https://books.google.com/books?id=lt2tqOpVRKgC| title = The Delhi Sultanate|first=Peter |last=Jackson| date = 16 October 2003| author-link = Peter Jackson (historian)|publisher =Cambridge University Press| isbn = 9780521543293|access-date = 2009-02-20}}</ref>{{full citation needed|date=July 2016}}

== Legacy ==

According to the scholar [[T. N. Devare]], Firishta's account is the most widely quoted history of the [[Adil Shahi]], but it is the only source for a fabricated story asserting the [[Ottoman Empire|Ottoman]] origin of [[Yusuf Adil Shah]], the founder of the [[Adil Shahi]] dynasty (Devare 67 fn2, 272). Other sources for Deccani history mentioned by Devare are those of Mir Rafi-uddin Ibrahim-i Shirazi, or "Rafi'", [[Mir Ibrahim Lari-e Asadkhani]], and [[Ibrahim Zubayri]], the author of the [[Basatin as-Salatin]] (67, fn 2). Devare observed that the work is "a general history of [[India]] from the earliest period up to Firishta's time written at the behest of [[Ibrahim Adilshah]] II and presented to him in 1015 AH/1606 CE. It seems, however, that it was supplemented by the author himself as it records events up to AH 1033 (1626 CE)" (Devare 272).{{citation needed|date=July 2016}}

On the other hand, ''Tarikh-i-Farishti'' is said to be independent and reliable on the topic of north Indian politics of the period, ostensibly that of Emperor [[Jehangir]] where Firishta's accounts are held credible because of his affiliation with the south Indian kingdom of [[Adil Shahi|Bijapur]].<ref name="Sukumar">{{cite book|url = https://books.google.com/books?id=6pAtbAgnjzoC| title = Bairam Khan|first=Sukumar |last=Ray| year = 1992|publisher =Mirza Beg|page=138| isbn = 9789698120016|access-date = 2009-02-20}}</ref>

Despite his fabricated story of Yusuf's [[Ottoman Empire|Ottoman]] origin, Firishta's account continues to be a very popular story and has found wide acceptance in [[Bijapur district, Karnataka|Bijapur]] today.

In 1768, when the [[East India Company]] officer and Orientalist [[Alexander Dow]] translated Firishta's text into English language, it came to be seen as an authoritative source of historical information by the English.<ref>{{cite book |author=Cynthia Talbot |title=The Last Hindu Emperor: Prithviraj Cauhan and the Indian Past, 1200–2000 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=m3DjCgAAQBAJ |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=2015 |isbn=9781107118560 |page=49 }}</ref>

Firishta's work still maintains a high place and is considered reliable in many respects. Several portions of it have been translated into English; but the best as well as the most complete translation is that published by General [[John Briggs (East India Company officer)|J. Briggs]] under the title of ''[[The History of the Rise of the Mahomedan Power in India]]'' (London, 1829, 4 vols. 8vo). Several additions were made by Briggs to the original work of Firishta, but he omitted the whole of the twelfth book, and various other passages which had been omitted in the copy from which he translated. [[Edward Gibbon]] used Firishta's work as one of the sources of reference for [[Indian history]] in ''[[The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire|Decline and Fall]]''. {{citation needed|date=April 2016}}

==Works==

*{{cite book|last=Firishta|first=Muhammad Qasim Hindu Shah Astarabadi |others=[[Jonathan Scott (orientalist)|Jonathan Scott]] (trans.) |title=Ferishta's History of Dekkan..(Vol. 1) |url=https://archive.org/details/ferishtashistory01firi|year=1794|publisher=John Stocksdale, London}}
*{{cite book|last=Firishta|first=Muhammad Qasim Hindu Shah Astarabadi |author2=Tr. by Jonathan Scott|title=Ferishta's History of Dekkan..(Vol. 2)|url=https://archive.org/stream/ferishtashistory02firi#page/n3/mode/2up|year=1794|publisher=John Stocksdale, London}}

==See also==
* [[List of Muslim historians]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}
*{{EB1911|wstitle=Ferishta, Mahommed Kasim|volume=10|page=274}}
*Devare, T. N. ''A short history of Persian literature; at the Bahmani, the Adilshahi, and the Qutbshahi courts.'' Poona: S. Devare, 1961.

{{Wikiquote}}
{{Authority control}}

[[Category:Medieval Persian writers]]
[[Category:Historians in the Mughal Empire]]
[[Category:17th-century Indian historians]]
[[Category:1560 births]]
[[Category:1620 deaths]]
[[Category:People from Gorgan]]
[[Category:Iranian emigrants to India]]
[[Category:Historians of India]]

Firishta - Revision history

imported>Gotitbro at 11:27, 5 March 2021