Mughal people

Last updated
Mughal
Aquil Hussain Barlas.jpg
Regions with significant populations
Languages
Hindustani (Urdu-Hindi), Punjabi, Bangla
Persian (formerly)
Religion
Islam
Related ethnic groups
Pakistani people, Indian people and Bangladeshi people

The Mughals (also spelled Moghul or Mogul) is a Muslim corporate group from modern-day North India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. [1] They claim to have descended from the various Central Asian Mongolic, [2] [3] Turkic and Persian peoples that had historically settled in the Mughal India. [1] The term Mughal (or Moghul in Persian) literally means Mongol. [4]

Contents

Pakistan

Tanolis Tanolis.jpg
Tanolis

In Pakistan, Mughal people are mostly settled in the provinces of Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. [1]

India

In North India

The Mughals commonly use "Mirza" as their surname. [5] They are also sometimes referred to as Chughtais or Chagatai Türks named after Chagatai Turkic language spoken by the Barlas and other Central Asian tribes. But one of the social groups that are claim to as the Ashraaf. [6] [ full citation needed ]

In Uttar Pradesh

The Sambhal, who claim Turkic descent, identify as a Biradari, literally translating to "brotherhood", which is the word used for a social unit based on kinship such as tribe or clan. [7] The chief of the Biradari is the "Sardar", who is usually an elder man annually elected as the greatest man in the Biradari. Decisions on important matters are taken only after consulting the Biradari, and once taken binding on every member. [8]

Gujarat

The community had traditionally served as soldiers in the armies of the various Indo-Muslim dynasties which ruled the Indian subcontinent. They were and still are a community of small to medium-sized farmers. A good many are also traders. Like other Gujarati Muslims, they have a caste association known as the Jamat, which acts both as a welfare organization and an instrument of social control. [9] In North India, the term Mughal refers Gürkani or Timurids.

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Babur</span> Mughal emperor from 1526 to 1530

Babur was the founder of the Mughal Empire in the Indian subcontinent. He was a descendant of Timur and Genghis Khan through his father and mother respectively. He was also given the posthumous name of Firdaws Makani.

Khan is a historic Mongolic and Turkic title originating among nomadic tribes in the Central and Eastern Eurasian Steppe to refer to a king. It first appears among the Rouran and then the Göktürks as a variant of khagan and implied a subordinate ruler. In the Seljük Empire, it was the highest noble title, ranking above malik (king) and emir (prince). In the Mongol Empire it signified the ruler of a horde (ulus), while the ruler of all the Mongols was the khagan or great khan. It is a title commonly used to signify the head of a Pashtun tribe or clan.

The Barlas were a Mongol and later Turkicized nomadic confederation in Central Asia. With military roots in one of the regiments of the original Mongol army, the Barlas spawned two major imperial dynasties in Asia: the Timurid Empire in Central Asia and Persia; and its later branch, the Mughal Empire in the Indian subcontinent.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Timurid dynasty</span> Turco-Mongol dynasty (1370–1857)

The Timurid dynasty, self-designated as Gurkani, was a Sunni Muslim dynasty or clan of Turco-Mongol origin descended from the warlord Timur. The word "Gurkani" derives from "Gurkan", a Persianized form of the Mongolian word "Kuragan" meaning "son-in-law". This was an honorific title used by the dynasty as the Timurids were in-laws of the line of Genghis Khan, founder of the Mongol Empire, as Timur had married Saray Mulk Khanum, a direct descendant of Genghis Khan. Members of the Timurid dynasty signaled the Timurid Renaissance, and they were strongly influenced by Persian culture and established two significant empires in history, the Timurid Empire (1370–1507) based in Persia and Central Asia, and the Mughal Empire (1526–1857) based in the Indian subcontinent.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Timurid Empire</span> Central Asian Persianate Turco-Mongol empire (1370–1507)

The Timurid Empire was a late medieval, culturally Persianate Turco-Mongol empire that dominated Greater Iran in the early 15th century, comprising modern-day Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, much of Central Asia, the South Caucasus, and parts of contemporary Pakistan, North India and Turkey. The empire was culturally hybrid, combining Turko-Mongolian and Persianate influences, with the last members of the dynasty being "regarded as ideal Perso-Islamic rulers".

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Turco-Mongol tradition</span> 14th-century ethnocultural synthesis in Asia

The Turco-Mongol or Turko-Mongol tradition was an ethnocultural synthesis that arose in Asia during the 14th century among the ruling elites of the Golden Horde and the Chagatai Khanate. The ruling Mongol elites of these khanates eventually assimilated into the Turkic populations that they conquered and ruled over, thus becoming known as Turco-Mongols. These elites gradually adopted Islam, as well as Turkic languages, while retaining Mongol political and legal institutions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Arain</span> Pakistani Punjabi agricultural community

Arain are a large Punjabi Muslim agricultural community with a strong political identity and level of organisation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sart</span> Historical term for settled inhabitants of Central Asia

Sart is a name for the settled inhabitants of Central Asia which has had shifting meanings over the centuries.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Moghulistan</span> Mongol breakaway khanate of the Chagatai Khanate

Moghulistan, also called the Moghul Khanate or the Eastern Chagatai Khanate, was a Mongol breakaway khanate of the Chagatai Khanate and a historical geographic area north of the Tengri Tagh mountain range, on the border of Central Asia and East Asia. That area today includes parts of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and northwest Xinjiang, China. The khanate nominally ruled over the area from the mid-14th century until the late 17th century.

Muslim communities has a system of social stratification arising from concepts other than "pure" and "impure", which are integral to the caste system in India. It developed as a result of relations among foreign conquerors, local upper-caste Hindus convert to Islam and local lower-caste converts (ajlaf), as well as the continuation of the Indian caste system by converts. Non-ashrafs are backward-caste converts. The concept of "pasmanda" includes ajlaf and arzal Muslims; ajlaf status is defined by descent from converts to Islam and by pesha (profession). These terms are not part of the sociological vocabulary in regions such as Kashmir and Uttar Pradesh, and say little about the functioning of Muslim society.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Semu</span> Yuan dynasty caste

Semu is the name of a caste established by the Yuan dynasty. The 31 Semu categories referred to people who came from Central and West Asia. They had come to serve the Yuan dynasty by enfranchising under the dominant Mongol caste. The Semu were not a self-defined and homogeneous ethnic group per se, but one of the four castes of the Yuan dynasty: the Mongols, Semu, the "Han" and the Southerners.

Mirza Muhammad Haidar Dughlat Beg was a Chagatai Turco-Mongol military general, governor of Kashmir, and a historian. He was a Mughal Dughlat prince who wrote in both Chaghatai and Persian languages. Haidar and Babur were cousins on their mother's side, through the line of Genghis Khan. Unlike Babur, Haidar considered himself more of an ethnic Mongol of Moghulistan.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dughlats</span>

The Dughlat clan was a Mongol clan that served the Chagatai khans as hereditary vassal rulers of several cities in western Tarim Basin, in modern Xinjiang, from the 14th century until the 16th century. The most famous member of the clan, Mirza Muhammad Haidar, was a military adventurer, historian, and the ruler of Kashmir (1541–1551). His historical work, the Tarikh-i Rashidi, provides much of the information known about the family.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Darzi</span> Muslim community, found in North India and Pakistan

Tailoring is the English translation of Darzi. In the Indian tradition, it was customary to wrap clothing over the body rather than wear stitched clothes. Used in Hindi and Urdu, the word Darzi comes from the Persian language.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Timur</span> Turco-Mongol conqueror (1336–1405)

Timur, also known as Tamerlane, was a Turco-Mongol conqueror who founded the Timurid Empire in and around modern-day Afghanistan, Iran, and Central Asia, becoming the first ruler of the Timurid dynasty. An undefeated commander, he is widely regarded as one of the greatest military leaders and tacticians in history, as well as one of the most brutal and deadly. Timur is also considered a great patron of art and architecture as he interacted with intellectuals such as Ibn Khaldun, Hafez, and Hafiz-i Abru and his reign introduced the Timurid Renaissance.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Islam in Uttar Pradesh</span>

Islam in Uttar Pradesh is the second largest religion in the state with 38,483,967 adherents in 2011, forming 19 .26% of the total population. Muslims of Uttar Pradesh have also been referred to as Hindustani Musalman. They do not form a unified ethnic community, but are differentiated by sectarian and Baradari divisions, as well as by language and geography. Nevertheless, the community shares some unifying cultural factors. Uttar Pradesh has more Muslims than any Muslim-majority country in the world except Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nigeria, Egypt, Iran, Turkey, Iraq and Afghanistan.

Persian people were one of the major ethnic groups, who accompanied the ethnic Turco-Mongol ruling elite of the Mughal Empire after its invasion of the Indian subcontinent. Throughout the Mughal Empire, a number of ethnic Persian technocrats, bureaucrats, traders, scientists, architects, teachers, poets, artists, theologians and Sufis migrated and settled in different parts of the Indian Subcontinent.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Urdu-speaking people</span> Ethnic group

Native speakers of Urdu are spread across South Asia. The vast majority of them are Muslims of the Hindi–Urdu Belt of northern India, followed by the Deccani people of the Deccan plateau in south-central India, most of the Muhajir people of Pakistan, Muslims in the Terai of Nepal, and Muslims of Old Dhaka in Bangladesh. The historical centres of Urdu speakers include Delhi and Lucknow. Another defunct variety of the language was historically spoken in Lahore for centuries before the name "Urdu" first began to appear. However, little is known about this defunct Lahori variety as it has not been spoken for centuries.

References

  1. 1 2 3 Levin, S. F. (2006). "Mughal" . In Malik, Hafeez; Gankovsky, Yuri V. (eds.). The Encyclopedia of Pakistan. Oxford University Press. ISBN   978-0-19-597735-6.
  2. Сабитов Ж. М., Баймуханов Н. Б. (2015). "Y-STR гаплотипы узбеков, уйгуров, таджиков, пуштунов, хазарейцев, моголов из базы данных Family Tree DNA". The Russian Journal of Genetic Genealogy (in Russian) (2): 22–23.
  3. Liz Wyse and Caroline Lucas (1997). Atlas Of World History. Scotland: Geddes & Grosset.
  4. Collins Compact Dictionary. Glasgow: HarperCollins. 2002. ISBN   0-00-710984-9.
  5. Rajendra K. Sharma. Indian Society, Institutions and Change. p. 71.
  6. Muslim Caste in Uttar Pradesh (A Study of Culture Contact), Ghaus Ansari, Lucknow, 1960
  7. Shenila Khoja-Moolji (2018). Forging the Ideal Educated Girl:The Production of Desirable Subjects in Muslim South Asia. University of California Press. ISBN   978-0-520-97053-3.
  8. Khan Amanat (1938). Agriculture and Live Stock In India Vol-viii. The Imperial Council Agriculture Research. p. 485.
  9. People of India Gujarat Volume XXI Part Three edited by R.B Lal, P.B.S.V Padmanabham, G Krishnan & M Azeez Mohideen pages 1394-1399