Narcotics and Drugs: Pleasure, Intoxication or Simply Therapeutic - North India, Sixteenth - Seventeenth Centuries

Narcotics and Drugs: Pleasure,
Intoxication or Simply Therapeutic—

North India, Sixteenth—
Seventeenth Centuries
Meena Bhargava*
Narcotics,1 in this article, has been used as synonymous with drugs and
drug-like products including mild stimulants and intoxicants like opium,
tobacco, alcohol and alcoholic preparations. All three commodities, of
great commercial significance, were also major items that were chewed
and consumed to generate euphoria, stimulation and intoxication. Seen
as symbols of power and authority, they were considered to be facilitators
of social bonding and social interaction. Consumed by a wide variety of
people, it was around narcotics that hierarchies of class and gender were
built. Although used as a therapy in some instances, narcotics came to be
linked to health hazard, disease and death. With such a diverse trajectory,
narcotics become an integral and an interesting medium to discover and
study the lives of many in pre-colonial India.
1
The term narcotic, derived from benumbing or from numbness or torpor, is in medical
terms applied to substances that are either anodyne in their action (that is, relieve pain) or
soporific (induce sleep). Soporifics also generally act as anodynes and various anodynes
are anti-spasmodic. See, Watt, Dictionary of the Economic Products of India, vol. V: 318.
∗ Department of History, Indraprastha College, Delhi University, Delhi. E-mail:

meena.bhargava@gmail.com
Acknowledgements: I am grateful to anonymous referees for comments that helped me
extensively in restructuring my arguments. This article has also greatly benefited from
Prasun Chatterjees article, The Lives of Alcohol in Pre-Colonial India, MHJ, 8.1, 2005.
The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

SAGE Publications J Los Angeles/London/New Delhi/Singapore/Washington DC
DOI: 10.1177/097194581001500104
104 J Meena Bhargava
The fact that opium, tobacco, alcohol and its varied preparations were
mood-modulating drugsan outcome of several assumptions regarding
the relationship between drugs and human societyis always fraught. It
is alleged that drugs are a natural part of human life and since his
evolution man has used various natural chemical substances for mood-
altering properties or for maintaining the health of his mind. Drugs and
narcotics have tended to create a niche for themselves in almost every
human culture and society. Each one of them has therefore adapted their
chosen drugs to their cultural practices and is confident of the choice of
its drugs as normal and natural even if those of the other societies consider
them as depraved and unnatural. Their use has often been related to a
religious practice, social ritual, spirit medicine or physical medicine.
Whatever the form of narcoticopium, cannabis, cocaine, tobacco,
alcoholman has regularly consumed them to either doctor his body
or mind. The pleasures derived from these narcotics are well known, but
equally established are the dangers and damages that are caused by their
inappropriate or excessive use, for instance, illness, physical or mental
damage, addiction or even death.2 Most societies have their own drug
cultures and invoke taboos and social norms of consumption to prevent
or minimise these risks. Nonetheless, the introduction of a drug in any
society and the process of adaptation to it may often be harmful and
devastating leading to drug epidemics or drug plagues, a phenomenon
that Carl Trocki argues may occur when a society is suddenly over-
whelmed by a wave of use and abuse of a newly introduced addictive drug.3
This argument can be applied to study the use of narcotics in the
Mughal Empire during the sixteenth and the seventeenth centuries.
Seen as an object of desire, intoxication, aphrodisiac and therapy,
narcotics also represented power and authority and were a way of social
interaction and social initiation. But it was around narcotics that the
hierarchies of class and gender also developed. Intoxicants on several
occasions also abetted crime, rebellion, political trickery and conspiracy.
Interesting details on these issues are provided in the Persian-language
court chronicles and the accounts of the foreign travellers that form the
2
Trocki, Opium, Empire and the Global Political Economy: xi; Richards, Opium and
the British Indian Empire: 375.
3
Trocki, Opium, Empire and the Global Political Economy: xixii.
J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

Narcotics and Drugs J 105
major historical source and corroborative evidence for this article. The
information in the court chronicles faces a major limitation in the
sense that they were written at the behest of the emperor and under his
patronage and supervision except perhaps texts like Muntakhab ut-
Tawarikh of Badauni; therefore the narrative that they projected was in
accordance with the desires of the king and the way he wished to chart
his legacy. The accounts of the travellers, although exhaustive in their
details on the production, consumption and commercial exchange of the
narcotics, are marked for their rhetoric, satire and moral overtones and
are often judgemental on the other. Both these sources, however, are
invaluable for constructing social and cultural information and
understanding historical and commercial patterns of the sixteenth and
the seventeenth centuries.
NarcoticsHistorical and Commercial Perspective

Amfion (properly anfiao) is a corruption of the Arabic name afiyun which
the Portuguese had picked up in India and transmitted it to the Dutch.
The Arabic afiyun is again a corruption of the Greek term which the
Arabs had derived from the Greek writers on medicine. Thus, even if the
origin of opium was Greek and not oriental, it was the Arabs that carried
the knowledge of it to the extreme corners of the eastern countriesfirst
Persia and then India and China. It was the Arabs who introduced the
properties of opium to India in the eighth century since the Sanskrit and
all the other vernacular names in India can be traced to afyun, the Sanskrit
term is ahiphena and its Hindi afim. The early Chinese works talk of the
Arab traders exchanging poppy capsules for the merchandise of China
at the beginning of the ninth century and its earliest Chinese name is
a-fu-yung, a representation of the Arabic name.4 This indicates that the
experiences of intoxication were varied, spread over a vast geographical
area, carrying with it a variety of cultural meanings and producing
different impacts on the lives of the people.
The earliest accounts that we have of the uses of opium in India were
by the Portuguese. Emphasising on how its addiction may have led to its
4
Tiele (ed.), The Voyage of John Huyghen Van Linschoten, vol. II: 11213; Crooke
(ed.), Hobson-Jobson: 64041; Watt, Dictionary of the Economic Products of India,
vol. VI, Part I: 24.
The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

commercial importance, Duarte Barbosa writes that in the early sixteenth

century, the Moorish (Muslim) and Gentile (Hindu) merchants of
western India brought opium to exchange for the cargoes of Chinese
junks and the Chinese junks took it as a return freight from Malacca.5
The exact extent of the use of opium is difficult to judge though it can be
conjectured that one of the reasons for its extensive cultivation and
commercial importance could have been its intoxicating and stimulating
qualities and its therapeutic properties.
There has been much scholarly debate as to when opium production
was introduced in the Indian subcontinent; the date ranges from the eighth
to late fourteenth century. Some argue that since the eighth century when
Arab traders first began opium cultivation in western India, opium had
been a staple crop in the subcontinent. It may be plausible to suggest that
with increased contact between western centres of production and
consumption and commercialisation in the Arab world, presumably from
the eighth century onwards, opium seeds arrived, were disseminated and
cultivation and production was started in India. By the fifteenth century,
before the arrival of the Portuguese in Asia via the Cape of Good Hope,
opium cultivation was established in Cambay and Malwa and had emerged
as a profitable commodity in the port-to-port trade from the Malabar
Coast to the Persian Gulf, on one hand, and to Malacca and the Far East,
on the other.6 Understanding the commercial value of opium and that it
could be grown in India, Albuquerque proposed in 1513 CE that its
importation from Arabia should be prohibited or else be made the
monopoly of the Portuguese sovereign. When the supply was cut off in
reprisal for the Portuguese attempt on Aden, Albuquerque recommended
the poppies of Azores to be sown in all the fields of Portugal, because a
shipload would be used yearly in India and cultivators would gain much
since the people of India are lost without it if they do not have it to eat.7
By the sixteenth century or at Akbars accession, opium culture was
widely practiced in the subas of Agra, Awadh and Allahabad particularly
5
Pires, The Suma Oriental of Tome Pires: 513; D Orta, Colloquies on the Simples and
Drugs of India: 330; Barbosa, A Description of the Coasts of East Africa and Malabar: 57.
6
Bose (ed.), Credit, Markets and the Agrarian Economy; Habib, The Agrarian System;
Richards, The Indian Empire and Peasant Production of Opium; Prakash and Lombard
(eds), Commerce and Culture in the Bay of Bengal.
7
Hunter, A History of British India, vol. I: 17273.

in the sarkars of Fatehpur, Allahabad and Ghazipur but also in Benares,

Mirzapur, Jaunpur and Ballia and also in parts of the sarkars of Jalaun,
Hamirpur, Banda, Kanpur, Pratapgarh and Azamgarh but especially in
Malwa, Bihar and Bengal. Grown extensively, almost everywhere in the
Mughal Empire, opium was mentioned in all the dasturs of the zabti
subas in the Ain-i Akbari.8 Established as a cash crop of immense
commercial value, Ain-i Akbari states that no rai were fixed for crops,
such as poppy (also indigo, pan [betel leaf], turmeric, hemp etc.), which
were not counted as produce but their revenue rates were directly fixed
in cash, to be paid in ready money.9 By the middle of the seventeenth
century, India had emerged as a major producer of opium or white poppy
(Papaver somniferum) for the manufacture of opium and was perhaps
the most important of the indigenous medicinal plants. It belongs to the
Papaveraceae family. The three main centres of cultivation were widely
spread in the tracts of (i) Bihar with its headquarters at Patna, the produce
being known as Patna opium and usually considered the best; (ii) Benares
and the North Western Provinces with a central depot at Ghazipur
producing Benares opium; (iii) central and western India and Rajputana,
the produce of which is known as Malwa opium. The product of Bihar
and Benares was collectively called Bengal opium.10
Drugs and drug trades from tobacco to opium during the sixteenth to
the twentieth centuries have contributed significantly to the expansion
of the European empires. Opium, the last in the series of imperial drug
trades, has played a major role in the creation of global capitalist economy
and in the formation of the British Empire.11 The inter-regional trades in
tea, tobacco and opium, argues C.A. Bayly, characterise the second level,
transitional phase in the emergence of modern international order. This
heralded early capitalist expansion, starting in the Atlantic in the
seventeenth century and spreading to the rest of the world by 1830 CE.12
Opium witnessed the same transition achieved earlier by sugar and
8
Watt, Dictionary of the Economic Products of India, vol. VI, Part I: 34; Habib, The
Agrarian System: 49, 50n.
9
Abul Fazl, Ain XI, Land and its Classification and the Proportionate Dues of
Sovereignty, in Ain-i Akbari, vol. II: 71.
10
Dey, The Indigenous Drugs of India: 217.
11
Trocki, Opium, Empire and the Global Political Economy: 8.
12
Bayly, The Birth of the Modern World: 44.

tobacco, from an exotic chemical to a fully capitalist commodity;13 in

fact, the importance of opium trade lay in its magnitude and lucrative
character. Phipps, the compiler of commercial handbooks had suggested
that the extent of the trade in opium can scarcely be matched in any one
article of consumption in any part of the world.14 Jardine is supposed to
have written to a friend in Essex from Canton persuading him to invest
in opium, the safest and most gentlemanlike speculation I am aware
of.15 Produced under government monopoly in India and an important
item of trade and commercial activity,16 opium transformed from a cash
crop to a centralised, systematised state-run industry and a crucial
commodity for the networks that sustained the business world.
Wine was imported into India from early times since it is mentioned
as being taken to Broach and other ports in the Periplus. Drunkenness
has also been referred to in the Mahabharata though the use of wine
is inveighed against in the Dharmasastras on this account.17 Bernier
alleges that during his visit to India in the seventeenth century, wine
that essential part of every entertainment could not be obtained in any
of the shops of Delhi probably because liquor was prohibited by both the
Hindu and Muslim law although he claimed to have drank some in
Ahmedabad and Golconda and in Dutch and English houses which was
not ill-tasted.18 If wine was sometimes found in the Mughal Empire it
was either chiraz or canary, the former sent from Persia to Surat and
then it took 46 days to reach Delhi; canary too was brought to Surat by
the Dutch. But both these wines, as Bernier observes, were so dear that
as we say at home, the taste is destroyed by the cost. However, if taken
in moderation, these wines were excellent preservatives against the
effects of bad air. To say the truth, he adds, few persons in these hot
climates feel a strong desire for wine.19
13
Trocki, Opium, Empire and the Global Political Economy: 58.
14
Phipps, A Practical Treatise on the China and Eastern Trade.
15
Greenberg, British Trade and the Opening of China: 105.
16
Trocki, Opium, Empire and the Global Political Economy; Richards, Opium and the
British Indian Empire; also, The Indian Empire and Peasant Production of Opium;
Prakash, Opium Monopoly in India and Indonesia; Farooqui, Smuggling as Subversion;
also his, Opium City.
17
See Note by Lt. Col. C. Eckford Luard and Father H. Hosten (translators and editors),
Manrique, Travels, vol. I: 55n.
18
Bernier, Travels: 252.
19
Ibid.: 253.

Ironically, the liquor popularly consumed in India was arrack, for its
sale was strictly forbidden and none but the Christians dared to drink
it openly.20 Arrack was harsh and burning spirituous liquor distilled
from molasses mixed with lemon juice, water and nutmeg and also from
sugar and spicy rind of a tree called jagra.21 Arrack in fact was spirit
made out of tari or toddy; sometimes it was also mixed with ganja and
the infusion was so intoxicating that those who took it, particularly in
excess, became like lunatics and out of their senses, though it gave them
strength and vigour if taken in moderation and only as a refreshment.22
Tari was the juice derived from the tarkul tree. When the stalk of a new
leaf came out of a branch, its end was cut off and a vessel hung to it to
receive the outflowing juice. The vessel was filled twice or thrice in a
day. This juice was called tari. When fresh, it was sweet and if it was
distilled at night it was as pleasing to the taste as white wine but if it was
allowed to stand for sometime it turned sub-acid and inebriating,23 and
you feel it ferment in the stomach;24 if left in the sun for the whole day
its taste was altered to such an extent that it became heady, ill-relished
and unwholesome,25 but if taken early, it could produce advantages of
piercing medicinal drink that could cure maladies like the stone.26 In
terms of revenue, tari yielded a considerable amount during the Mughal
period.27 In Kashmir, the liquor that they prepared was called sir, which
was much stronger than bozah, prepared from bread and rice. The people
here mostly drank sir with their food, the oldest was considered to be the
best and when the ingredients were mixed, it was preserved in the jars
for two or three years, after which the scum was taken off and the liquor
was called achi which could be kept for as long as 10 years. It was harsh
and bitter in taste and since bhang was mixed with it, a mouthful was
20
Ibid.
21
Jagra is a coarse sugar made from the sap (not the rind) of various palms. It is
pleasant in taste and generally wholesome if taken moderately but most hurtful to body
and health. Ibid.: 441; Foster (ed.), Edward Terry, 161619, in Early Travels in India: 300.
22
Carre, The Travels of Abbé Carre, vol. I: 227.
23
Abul Fazl, Regarding Fruits, in Ain-i Akbari, vol. I: 75.
24
Tavernier, Travels in India, vol. I: 242.
25
Foster, Edward Terry, 161619, in Early Travels in India: 298.
26
Ibid.
27

sufficient for intoxication; if taken in excess it could cause drowsiness.

It was often used as a substitute for wine.28
It is evident then that the processes of production, consumption and
exchange of opium, wine and other alcoholic drinks were diverse and
they also catered to and fulfilled the demands of different social groups.
Narcotics as Aphrodisiacs
For European travellers, the consumption of opium as aphrodisiac in
pre-colonial India became a subject of satire, of occident versus the
orient, of cultural difference and cultural superiority. Expounding the
aphrodisiac powers of opium, Garcia DOrta and John Linschoten, for
instance, emphasised the differences in oriental and occidental lives,
passions, sense of pleasure and behaviour, in the sense that the Europeans
like the Indians were not irrational and disorderly when under the
intoxicating influence of opium. DOrta observed that the oriental used
opium to assist them in the gratification of lust and lewdness by
increasing their sexual power; some even took large quantities of opium
(though DOrta believed that even those accustomed to opium could not
take more than four or five pesos in weight) despite it being injurious,
producing drowsy and confused state and inflicting heavy addiction.
Citing the example of Gujarat, Bengal and Malabar Coast, he suggested
that both the rich and the poor consumed several doses of opium to
provoke lewdness though some also resorted to it as medical therapy.29
Invoking a sense of difference and yet similarities in oriental lives
but also pointing towards class hierarchy, DOrta narrated the case of a
native noble from Khurasan whom he knew and who everyday ate three
tolas (around 36 grams) of opium though he was a talented man, a great
scribe and a notary but he was always dozing or sleeping; yet if you put
him to business he would speak like a man of sound discretion. Being
rather judgemental, he added that it was impossible for any opium-eater
addicted to the drug to pass a whole day without it and if by some chance
they were unable to procure it, they were like moribund persons until
they obtained it.30 Linschoten too, commenting on the Indian habit of
28
Dwazda Sala Jahangiri, Wakiat-i Jahangiri, cf. Elliot, The History of India, vol.
VI: 37071.
29
D Orta, Colloquies on the Simples and Drugs of India: 330.
30
Manrique, Travels, vol. I: 58.

using amfion, said that those who ate opium could not do without its
daily consumption otherwise he dieth and consumeth himselfe because
when they used opium they ate it daily at least 20 or 30 grains in weight
or more but if for foure or five dayes hee chanceth to leave it, he dieth
without faile; likewise he that hath never eaten it, and will venture at the
first to eate as much as those that dayley use it, it will surely kill him; for
I certainly believe it is a kind of poyson.31 Stressing on its aphrodisiac
appeal, he observed that the Indians used it most for lecherie; not simply
to provoke sleep but when they sleepe (they dreame) they see many
pleasant places and are in the company of goodly women. Warning
against the overuse of opium, Linschoten said that those who used opium
daily became still and sleepe and slow, both in words and workes so
that men know not how to deale with them.32
Many of Akbars nobles like Qazi Yaqub of Manikpur, who had been
Qazi-ul-Quzzat (the Chief Qazi) for several years, took aphrodisiac
electuaries like mercury in large quantities and preferred them over
other intoxicating and stimulating drugs.33 The Mughal emperors were
not far behind in this venture. Shahjahan, even at the age of 65, wanted
to enjoy himself like a youth and with this intent took different stimula-
ting drugs. These addictions had affected his health adversely and on
one occasion in 1657 CE, he was virtually on the verge of death, afflicted
by retention of urine. Ultimately he succumbed to no other cause but
the excessive use of aphrodisiacs, if the Italian traveller, Manucci, is to
be believed.34
Opium was just one of the aphrodisiacs; the other two that were also
in wide use were post and bhang. These drugs in phlegmatic persons
produced deep sleep, laughter and cheerfulness driving away all pangs
of depression. Articulating the sense of cultural difference, Manrique
alluded to the opium-eaters as barbarian and people ignorant of true
and sacred religion, who thought only of pleasures of the flesh, believing
that the highest pitch of human beautitude lies in them. Describing the
people and the life in Bengal during the seventeenth century, he observes
that the men were not generally speaking naturally much addicted to
31
Tiele (ed.), The Voyage of John Huyghen Van Linschoten, vol. II: 113.
32
Ibid.: 114.
33
Al-Badaoni, Muntakhab ut-Tawarikh, vol. III: 126.
34
Manucci, Storia Do Mogor, vol. I: 192, 240.

sexual intercourse but the women surpass them in this, and in order to
secure their services, employ various charms and drinks which they give
to the men. Such drugs and drinks if consumed excessively, in particular,
caused the death of men or at any rate make them mad or ill for life.35
Post also known as koknar36 was an infusion of opium and if it was taken
regularly for over a week, the person suffered from consistent cravings
for it, making him foolishly mad. The consumption of post increased
sexual power enormously but it also adversely affected the body, deprived
the person of physical strength and rendered him impotent after two or
three years, with little energy for any kind of activity.37
Goolees or ghola, yet another intoxicant, was made into small pellets
from bhang and opium, comprising strong drugs and spices. It had the
same effect as wine and to make merrie ... but more especialle to provoke
them to lust.38 Like opium, bhang also produced unconsciousness and
sapped intellectual abilities.
Wine, too, as Abul Fazl tells us in the context of Sultan Baz Bahadur
of Malwa, had left several persons wine-stained and disgraced,
immersed in bestial pleasures, and displaying a cause of increased
folly. Commenting on the social habits and patterns of the time, Abul
Fazl had observed that wine had been prescribed in small quantities
and at fixed times to suit the physical and constitutional capacity and the
temperament of a person and yet many indulged in wine without
distinguishing night from day or day from night.39
NarcoticsBody Therapy or Health Hazard

The representations of opium like any other narcotic drug are diverse
and integral to human health and body. While it was perceived as
invigorating, energetic and stimulating, it was also condemned as toxic
35
Manrique, Travels, vol. I: 60, 66.
36
Post or posto or poust is a Persian word that primarily means an outer covering, crust
or skin but was used to describe the extract or decoction made from the poppy seed. It was
a beverage made from the husks of white poppy and by crushing poppy heads and allowing
them to soak overnight in water. It was then strained and squeezed to get the drink that
was quite inebriating. Bernier, Travels: 10608.
37
Fryer, A New Account of East India and Persia: 92; Manrique, Travels, vol. I: 59.
38
Mundy, The Travels of Peter Mundy, vol. II: 21718.
39
Abul Fazl, Akbar Nama, vol. II: 211.

and lethal, producing adverse health conditions, and yet at times it was
considered to save lives, which made it a popular item of consumption
for its therapeutic values. Opium, in its primary effects medicinally,
is a stimulant and its secondary action narcotic, anodyne and anti-
spasmodic. The narcotic effects are mainly attributable to morphine,
which constitute 912 per cent of raw opium but Indian opium usually
has low percentage of morphine with narcotine being frequently present
in a larger amount.40 The narcotic opium was eaten in most parts of India
in the form of small pills, or a liquid was prepared by maceration in
water or opium infused in water or post and then drunk.41 Commenting
on the use of opium by the common people in the sixteenth century, who
perhaps perceived it as suitable and favourable to health, Abul Fazl
observed that the people of Mahoa gave their children opium to eat till
they were three years old. While speaking about the practice of doping
small children by the high and low, Abul Fazl suggested as if it was a
peculiar custom confined to Malwa but it was a much more widespread
practice.42
Bhang or the dried leaves and small stalks of hemp (Cannabis indica)
caused intoxication either by smoking or when eaten mixed into a
sweetmeat called majun. In Arabic, majun literally means kneaded
but the medical books call it an electuary, that is, a compound of
medicines kneaded with syrup into a soft mass, although it was sold in
the bazaars as an intoxicating confection of hemp leaves. The main
ingredients for making majun were ganja (hemp) leaves, milk, ghee,
poppy seeds, flowers of the thorn-apple (dhatura), the powder of nux
vomica and sugar.43 In some places like Bengal, although true hemp was
found in many places, little was used by the people except the seed oil as
medicine and an intoxicating ingredient which was often mixed with the
tobacco of hookah.44 On the occasion of Hindals marriage Humayun
had recommended the therapeutic value of majun to the young members
of the royal family. When they had expressed their desire to bathe in
40
Mokyr (ed.), The Oxford Encyclopedia of Economic History, vol. IV: 141; Watt,
Dictionary of the Economic Products of India, vol. VI, Part I: 89.
41
Richards, Opium and the British Indian Empire: 37576.
42
Habib, The Agrarian System: 107.
43
Crooke (ed.), Hobson-Jobson: 539.
44
Hamilton, A Geographical, Statistical and Historical Description of Hindostan,
vol. I: 34.

cool tank water, Humayun had advised them that if they ate a pellet of
anise and a bit of comfit (majun), they could keep themselves warm and
skip the harmful effects of cool tank water. Anise was considered a remedy
for cold; and majun although an intoxicant was also taken as a preventive
against chill.45 It was around the consumption of narcotics and their
medicinal properties that authority and power were exerted even as it
revealed the pattern of life in the imperial household.
Providing details on the habits of addiction and intoxication of the
Mughal emperors and the court nobility, the Persian-language texts and
the travel accounts give several references to the many who had
succumbed to the effects of excessive use of narcotics. Narcotics
have been cited as a major source of declining health and mortality in
the sixteenth and the seventeenth centuries. It was Baburs obsessive
alcoholism and drug addiction that have been identified as the main cause
of his several illnesses and his alarming bed-ridden condition thrice,
before the middle of December in 1525 CE. Being a majuni, Babur
reveals in his memoirs that no other drug suited his body except majun.
During his journey to Gwalior in 1528 CE, he took opium to beat the
cold and keep him warm on the moonshine night (Erskine notes that
the Indians and the Persians consider moonshine as cold) and also as a
cure for ear-ache. But not able to tolerate opium, he developed opium
sickness, vomited a great deal and decided to eat majun to gain his
composure and tranquility. On an earlier occasion in 15191520 CE when
he suffered from consistent fever for 10 or 12 days, Mulla Khwaja gave
him narcissus mixed with wine but it had no impact and he had to ulti-
mately take majun. Babur also makes an amazing and rather envir-
onmentally disastrous confession! He threw some majun in water for
the fish which a few of them consumed.46 He gives us no rationale for
doing so: whether it was a step towards repentance or a superstitious
belief to cure or some sort of a panacea for the fish! Yet more significantly,
he gives no evidence of what happened to the fishdid they survive
and/or did the water turn into poison?
Hindals acute intoxication and excessive addiction are mentioned
in almost all texts. His worst lapses into sloth came from 1537 CE after
Gulbadan Begam, Humayun-Nama: 29, 125, 131.

45
Babur, Babur-Nama, vol. I: 399, 40506; Babur, Babur-Nama, vol. II: 608; Gulbadan
46
Begam, Humayun-Nama: 5.

which the decline in his health was rapid. Akbars opium-eating habit
was a matter of great concern when he was seriously ill in 1582 CE
and was bleeding internally. Both the Indian and Greek doctors were
summoned to prescribe treatment, although Akbar remained indifferent
to taking medicines; perhaps he considered opium and wine a more
reliable and an affirmative cure for his illness. Moreover, there was a
difference of opinion between the Indian and the Persian doctors on the
line of treatment for dysentery, from which the emperor was suffering.
The Indian doctors then did not prescribe laxatives as a remedy whereas
the Persian doctors argued incessantly in favour of aperients without
which they felt dysentery could not be cured. Ultimately it was the Greek
doctors who provided the cure, much to the surprise of those around him
since the emperor was an opium-eater and opium-eaters would rather
succumb than recover from such illnesses.47 In fact, opium-chewing and
drinking were a part of his daily routine. Alluding to Akbars drinking
propensities and intoxication Bartoli observes that he often fell asleep at
the religious discussions in the Ibadatkhana because of his
overindulgence in arrack and opium. There was perhaps only one
occasion during Akbars lifetime when he did not take opium, that is,
when he heard the news of Abul Fazls murder; he was so distressed and
disconsolate that he neither shaved nor took opium but spent his time
weeping and lamenting.48
Abul Fazl makes no reference to Akbars alcoholism or whether
drinking was a part of his diurnal activity but Badauni, yet another con-
temporary chronicler of Akbars period, tells us that the emperor per-
mitted wine-drinking and wine-bibbing but only for medicinal reasons
and for healing and strengthening the body and/or if prescribed by
the physicians rather than for a social gathering which was prone to
strife, disturbance and confusion. The emperor, in fact, laid down severe
punishments for excessive drinking, carousals, rows and disorderly
conduct. To maintain proper surveillance, he ordered the establishment
of a wine shop near the palace and placed it under the supervision of a
porters wife, who by birth belonged to the wine-selling class. A woman
placed in a supervisory position invokes the concept of masculinity and
femininity and cultural discrimination, that is, while a woman could serve
47
Abul Fazl, Akbar Nama, vol. III: 579, 58384.
48
Wikaya-i Asad Beg, cf. Elliot, The History of India, vol. VI: 155.

and sell alcohol, she could not be found drinking it since that activity
belonged exclusively to the domain of men. The emperor also announced
a fixed tariff on wine, so that persons who wished to purchase wine as a
remedy for their ailments could do so by getting their names as well as
names of their forefathers registered with the clerk of the shop. This,
however, did not prevent deceit for there were many who gave fictitious
names to obtain wine. Although there is no way of substantiating
Badaunis narrative since Abul Fazl and other chroniclers are silent on
the issue, it clearly indicates that the emperors farman could be violated
and his authority quietly subverted on the issue of alcoholism. It is also
evident that Badauni disapproved of the alcoholic practices for religious
reasons especially since alcohol is considered impure in Islam. That
Badauni was upset by the situation he was put in or was a witness to
such anti-Islamic customs is apparent from his observation: In point of
fact, it was a shop opened for the benefit of drunkards and many believed
that swine-flesh formed a component part of wine but God knows.49
Describing the severities of intoxication and addiction to narcotics,
the sixteenth and the seventeenth century texts give innumerable examples
of nobles and royal princes succumbing to excessive drinking and/or
consumption of opium, with many of them dying of the disorder called
delirium tremens.50 The representation of power and authority can be
noticed in this context when Akbar tried to restrain and exhort his opium-
stricken alcoholic sons and nobles to abandon narcotics to protect them
from its injurious effects, withdraw them from the impurity of this
venomous and treacherous poison and compelled them to abstain from
the ruinous course of inebriety which could lead to complete debility.51
But his authority stood wasted and squandered when Sultan Murad
and Sultan Daniyal continued to indulge in excessive drinking and
remained inebriated. Murad consequently suffered from fits, became
completely insensible and succumbed to it. Daniyal unheeding the counsel
of his father plotted with his personal servants and organised hunting
expeditions to strategise the wine sessions. The foolish sensualists
49
Al-Badaoni, Muntakhab ut-Tawarikh, vol. II: 31011; also see, Chatterjee, The
Lives of Alcohol in Pre-colonial India.
50
Chatterjee, The Lives of Alcohol in Pre-colonial India: 201.
51
Takmila-i Akbarnama of Inayatu-lla, cf. Elliot, The History of India, vol. VI: 1078,
112, 114.

carried wine in gun barrels (the rust of the iron caused by gunpowder
dissolved into the double-distilled spirit which made it poisonous) and
entrails of cows to fulfil the princes demand for wine. Excessive
drinking had disastrous impact on his health: he was afflicted with
physical weakness; his body constitution failed; he got severe body aches
and his brain became entirely upset; his veins and membranes were
benumbed; his trembling limbs had lost their functions and he had
completely lost his appetite, and no other word but wine passed from
his lips. Confined to bed in this state for almost 40 days he died longing
for wine in March 1605 CE.52 Both Murad and Daniyal died of delirium
tremens. Similar was the fate of Rustum (son of Sultan Murad) who had
died in 1598 CE. Acute addiction and intoxication had inflicted him with
epilepsy; he could not digest his food; his abdominal pains were severe;
he was constantly febrile and his strength and senses completely
diminished.53 Mirza Hakim (half-brother of Akbar), the governor of
Kabul, succumbed to his several diseases contracted through wine-
bibbing in 1585 CE.54 Kaikubad, son of Mirza Hakim, had also acquired
the pernicious habit of indulging in intoxicating drugs. To seclude him
from corrupt society and guard him more stringently, Akbar had sent
him into confinement in the fort of Ranthambor in the custody of Raja
Jagannath.55
There are also several instances of Akbars distinguished nobles and
close aides who had developed medical disorders due to excessive
drinking and had succumbed to them. Yusuf Muhammad Khan (eldest
son of Atgah Khan, husband of Akbars favourite foster-mother), a
mansabdar of 5,000, had triumphed on many occasions against the
rebellions and conspiracies of Zaman Shah but he could not restrain
himself from heavy addiction to wine despite developing innumerable
health complications and died. Similarly Mirza Jani Beg, the governor
of Thatta and a mansabdar of 3,500, was held in high esteem by Akbar
52
Abul Fazl, Akbar Nama, vol. III: 1254. It may be observed that although Abul Fazl
had died in 160102, the Akbar Nama was continued after his death by Inayatullah and
was brought to a close with Akbars own death later in 1605.
53
Ibid.: 1125.
54
Tabakat-i Akbari of Nizamu-d din Ahmad Bakshi, cf. Elliot, The History of India,
vol. V: 449.
55
Takmila-i Akbarnama of Inayatu-lla, cf. Elliot, The History of India, vol. VI: 111.

for his pleasing and courteous manners, his religious views and political
wisdom but he had no control over his passion and fondness for wine
since his youth. Although he did not indulge in excesses, his habitual
drinking undermined his health inflicting him with delirium (sarsam)
of which he died ultimately.56 Shaikh Ismail and Shaikh Jamal (his
sister was in the harem of Akbar), both mansabdars in the service of
Akbar, were obsessive drinkers, suffered from grievous ailments and
died. There were some exceptions in the sense that many of the nobles
were addicted to wine but in moderation and generally used it for
medicinal purposes.57
Challenged in his power and legitimacy to assert authority and perhaps
anxious at the loss of control because of the unrestrained inebriation
of his two sons and his mansabdars, Akbar yet again attempted to con-
stitute his authority when he tried to discipline Jahangirs alcoholic ways.
Jahangir, it may be noted, was known for his cups of wine and drunken
state from the age of 15. Before that he had tasted it occasionally, at the
initiative of his mother and wet-nurses who had given him wine as a
remedy for a few infantile ailments or at the behest of his father, who
made him drink a tola of arrack mixed with rosewater as a cure for
cough. Jahangir recounts in his autobiography that he was first introduced
to wine as a stress-buster at his fathers military camp pitched near
Attock, situated on Nil-ab (river Indus) to fight against the Yusufzai
Afghans. He reports that when he was weary and tired and had suffered
many mishaps during a hunting expedition, he was advised by one of the
gunmen, Ustad Shah Quli, that if he had a cup of wine it would relieve
him of the fatigue. Reflecting on his subsequent life and how wine shaped
it, Jahangir wrote that he drank a piyala (cup) and a half small bottle of
yellow wine which he found sweet in taste, pleasant and its quality
agreeable and since then he took to drinking wine that increased from
day to day until the wine made from grapes ceased to intoxicate him. He
then got addicted to arrack and in the course of nine years his potions
increased to 20 piyalas of double distilled spirits, of which he drank 14
during the day and the remainder at nightits weight was equal to six
Hindustani sers equivalent to one and a half maund of Iran.58
56
Abul Fazl, Ain-i Akbari, vol. I: 340, 391.
57
Abul Fazl, Akbar Nama, vol. III: 70607.
58
The Tuzuk-i Jahangiri, vol. I: 30708; Dwazda Sala Jahangiri, Wakiat-i Jahangiri,
cf. Elliot, The History of India, vol. VI: 34142.

The incessant consumption of alcohol many a time aroused feel-

ings of repentance and guilt in Jahangir especially as he developed
several physical disorders under the impact of intoxication. When his
hands began trembling and he could not hold his own cup and the others
had to feed him, he summoned hakim Humam who warned him against
excessive addiction and advised him that unless he improved his ways,
it would be impossible to provide him with any remedy after six months.
Jahangir tried to reduce his consumption of wine; sometimes he drank
only in the evening, sometimes at night and a little during the day and by
his thirtieth year he had resolved to drink only at night and subsequently
only to digest his food.59 But such was his intense weakness for the
intoxicants that he found it difficult to withdraw from the habit. William
Hawkins (Jahangirs attendant for two years) observed that the emperor,
notwithstanding his firm resolution, had five more cups of strong
liquor, and chewed opium after retiring to his private room and only
when he was suitably intoxicated did he go off to sleep. Thomas Roe
too, who visited the court of Jahangir, described the emperor drinking
heartily himself and commanding others to drink, he and his nobles
became as jovial as could be and of a thousand humours.60 Alcohol thus
became a source of social interaction but also an occasion to assert the
emperors authority while keeping the hierarchies intact.61
Jahangirs addiction to wine and opium had affected the immu-
nity system of his body and made it resistant to all forms of medical
therapies. It is reported that once when Jahangir had suffered from severe
headache and fever, the doctors had advised him to abstain from wine.
This had, however, aggravated his fever and only when the physicians
of Multan permitted him to take his usual quantity of wine he found
relief. On yet two other occasions, during his visit to Kashmir and Gujarat,
when he suffered from shortness of breath, probably asthma, because
of the moisture in the air, his cure lay not in goats milk or camels milk
or any other medicine but in wine with, of course, Nur Jahan control-
ling the potations as the weather became hot and humid.62 When he was
59
The Tuzuk-i Jahangiri, vol. I: 30809.
60
Narrative by William Hawkins in Purchass Pilgrims, 1626. Printed by William
Stansby for Henrie Fetherstone, Fourth Edition (First Edition, 1614), London; also, Roe,
The Embassy of Sir Thomas Roe: 86.
61
See Chatterjee, The Lives of Alcohol in Pre-colonial India.
62
Dwazda Sala Jahangiri, Wakiat-i Jahangiri, cf. Elliot, The History of India,
vol. VI: 357, 38081.

again taken ill in Kashmir, afflicted by loss of appetite, he was forced to

abandon opium which had been his companion for almost 40 years but
he insisted on taking a few cups of wine to support his failing digestive
system.63 It is notable that Jahangir formulated his authority and asserted
his power to use opium not only to cure himself but also the mice of the
harem and the injured antelopes during the hunting expeditions!64
It is worth observing that at least on the issue of consumption of
narcotics the Mughal emperors encapsulated failed authority. Such was
the passion for addiction and intoxication that neither the royal princes
nor the mansabdars could abide by the emperors disciplinary orders;
indeed the emperors too found it difficult to sustain their promises for
renunciation notwithstanding their occasional pangs of guilt. Like the
earlier members of the imperial household and the court nobility,
Jahangirs sons and nobles were also struck by the malady of intoxication.
Given to excessive drinking, Prince Parvez suffered from colic and brain
dysfunction. His habit of acute addiction made him unresponsive to
any medical treatment and despite the cauterisation on the head and the
forehead, he fell into coma and succumbed.65 Jalaluddin Masud, a
mansabdar of 400, was notorious for eating opium and was apparently
fed by his mother who allegedly broke it into pieces like cheese. He
suffered from bouts of dysentery and died.66 Another close aide of
Jahangir, Inayat Khan, developed diarrhoea, turned dropsical and exceed-
ingly weak because of which he fainted several times. Jahangir, astonished
to see his skin drawn over bones, instructed Hakim Rukna to treat
him but was disappointed to find that none of the remedies worked.67
Yet another attendant, Sher Khan, who evidently drank four brimming
cups of arrack of double strength every hour died of excessive drinking.68
Same was the fate of Raja Bhao Singh of Ajmer, a mansabdar posted in
Deccan,69 and Maha Singh, grandson of Raja Man Singh,70 but there was
at least one mansabdar, Khan Jahan Lodi (who Jahangir referred to as
63
Ikbal Nama-i Jahangiri of Mutamad Khan, cf. Elliot, The History of India, vol. VI: 435.
64
The Tuzuk-i Jahangiri, vol. II: 66, 110. Also see Divyabhanusinh, The End of a Trail: 42.
65
Ikbal Nama-i Jahangiri of Mutamad Khan, cf. Elliot, The History of India, vol. VI: 429.
66
67
Ibid., vol. II: 43.
68
Ibid., vol. I: 134.
69
Ibid., vol. II: 218.
70
Ibid., vol. I: 377.

his farzand: son), who after his serious illness had abandoned wine, not
keen to defile the fringe of his life with wine.71
NarcoticsAuthority, Social Interaction, Hierarchies

Consumption of narcotics facilitated assertion of authority by the
Mughal emperors, promoted acculturation, social interaction and bonds
of sharing, the experiences of intoxication often breaking inhibitions,
but it also equally represented hierarchies of class and gender and cultural
differences. However, the religious element and the consciousness
that narcotics were considered to be polluting in Islam dominated the
thoughts of the emperors in their moments of introspection and
spirituality. In this context mention may be made of the fondness of the
Mughal emperors for narcotics that they had inherited from their
ancestors, their urge to share unhesitatingly the experiences of inebriation
and sometimes even distributing narcotics amongst the nobles and the
people, to celebrate their happiness and also probably to seek popular
support. It is evident from Timurs farman that he had ordered the
distribution of sharab (commonly used to signify wine but spirits are
included) along with sherbet, sweetmeats and all kinds of bread and
meat, after the khutba was read in his name in the different mosques of
Delhi and the preparations were afoot to hold the court in his name in
Delhi.72 Describing the addictive and convivial tenor of his father, Umar
Shaikh Mirza, Babur wrote that his father was a great drinker when
young although in the following years he had organised wine parties
only once or twice in a week. Later in his life, he preferred majun and
under its influence often used to lose his head.73
Alcoholism, intoxication and addiction thus became significant
features of Mughal legacy. Although the emperors encouraged social
interaction and often practiced virtually no restraint, breaking almost
all barriers on the issue of consumption, their assessment of different
varieties of alcohol created class and cultural differences. While in Kabul,
Babur came across different kinds of wine and decided to taste particu-
larly kafir wine, commonly used by the kafirs of the tumans (subdivisions)
71
Ibid., vol. II: 165.
72
Malfuzat-i Timuri or Tuzak-i Timuri, cf. Elliot, The History of India, vol. III: 444.
73
Babur, Babur-Nama, vol. I: 16.

of Pich and Nijr-au and a type of beer called bir buza made from rice,
millet or barley, largely consumed by the people of Bajaur, Sawad, Kunar
and its vicinity. He observes that the kafir wine was mostly poor, thin
and usually diluted with water but if kept for two or three years it became
clear and sometimes strong. He also found some sort of beer surprisingly
exhilarating but bitter and distasteful. This compelled him to abandon
the idea of drinking beer while in Bajaur; instead he ate majun.74 This
entire description reveals Baburs anxiety to know the ways of the people
of Kabul but then his ultimate decision to eat majun reflects the cultural
difference between him and the common men of Kabul. Eating majun
was an addiction with Babur and being intoxicated gave him such intense
pleasure that he took it whether the occasion was the beginning of an
expedition or a halt or a celebration of a victory or a wine party or any
other pretext. If he found a place charming or blooming with flowers or
if the weather was good, he sat down and ate confection (majun) like
he did during his expedition to Sawad against the Yusufzai Afghans in
January 1519 CE. It was around majun that he shed royal restrictions,
came close to his nobles and junior officials but not without making his
power and legitimacy conspicuous. Describing his march to Sawad, Babur
wrote that when Shah Mansur Yusufzai brought a few well-flavoured
and intoxicating confections (kamali), he ate only one portion and gave
the rest to the others; nonetheless, it produced such remarkable
intoxication that at the evening namaz when the Begs gathered for counsel,
he was not able to go out.75 There does not appear to be an element of
regret in this statement but conveys his assertion and enforcement of
authority even as he revelled in the company of his nobles. He reportedly
ate majun even while riding around the fields to see the harvest (khizan)
or if the crops were good, and he felt happy while his companions who
were fond of wine organised drinking bouts; they then sat under trees
and began to drink and kept up the party till bed time prayers.76
Many a drinking party is recorded in Baburs memoirs with as much
gusto as his battles and negotiations. While this may reflect his intensity
for all forms of narcotics, it was also probably a strategy to garner support
and curb dissent against a practice that was prohibited by Islamic law.
74
Ibid.: 21213, 423.
75
Ibid.: 37273, 410, 416.
76
Tuzak-i Babari or Wakiat-i Babari, cf. Elliot, The History of India, vol. IV: 22526.

Being a Sunni Muslim, he was aware of the Islamic norms against

stimulants but nothing could deprive him of the tranquility induced by
majuni nakliki (influence of confection). Such was his addiction to
majun that even during Ramzan, near mid-day prayers majun was eaten
and the eve of Id-ul-fitr was not considered to have been celebrated
without consuming confection. At the end of every majun session, Babur
announced the sin of majun was committed (irtikab qilib aidi) as if
simply to soothe his conscience and his devoutly religious mind.77 That
Babur was a consistent and jovial toper is evident from his letter to Khwaja
Kalan, his confidante; he wrote, Drinking was a very pleasant thing
with our old friends and companions....78 On some occasions he and his
associates continued to be drunk four times in 24 hours; yet at other
times, the king ate strong majun one day, the next morning he organised
a drinking party in the same tent and continued to drink till the night.
The following morning he again had an early cup and getting intoxicated
went to sleep. About noon day prayers as they assembled to resume their
expedition, he took majun on the road during the course of the journey.
Drinking bouts, in fact, were held frequently, sometimes in sailing rafts,
accompanied by poets and scholars, in festive assemblies and even during
the movements of the imperial army led by the emperor himself, from
one place to another, after Nil-ab had been crossed. Babur confessed
that during the expedition to Hindustan, he was so drunk and intoxicated
at times that on one occasion while crossing the bank of river Indus, they
(at least, that is, what they believed) took torches, mounted the horses,
leaning on one side of the horse and then the other. The next day when
his nobles told him that they had galloped loose rein into the camp
carrying torches, he could not recall it. After reaching his camp, he
vomited a great deal.79 It was occasions such as these and several inter-
active drinking sessions that were used to mould the attitudes of the
nobility but not without fixing hierarchies.
While wine and majun parties provided opportunities for con-
solidating authority, they also became the occasions for prescribing a
code of conduct and behaviour. Narrating his journey to Hindustan, Babur
observed that most people drank on drinking days. Shaikh Zain Khan
77
Babur, Babur-Nama, vol. I: 393, 406, 416; Babur, Babur-Nama, vol. II: 683.
78
79

describes the drinking days as Saturdays, Sundays, Tuesdays and

Wednesdays, and on non-drinking days there were parties for majun.
But Babur, conscious of his paramount power and status, could express
his preferenceseven on non-drinking daysfor majun over wine or
majun and some exhilarating drink other than wine and sometimes he
could summon a party of a variety with some indulging in wine or arrack
or tari or majun. Both Zain Khan and Babur describe his fifth expedition
from Kabul to Hindustan when Babur spent his days (he had to make a
compulsory 20 days halt at a camp in anticipation of Humayuns arrival)
drinking even on those days that were not meant for wine-bibbing; he
indulged in intoxicating drinks, took confection and an exhilarating
drink. Babur found arrack to be pleasant if drunk immediately after being
extracted from date-palm; if it was consumed after two or three days it
was quite exhilarating (kaifiyat) and tari was even more exhilarating
than arrack.80 A regular wine and arrack drinker and a majuni, Babur
was disillusioned with mixed parties that hosted tiryaqi (opium-eaters),
majuni and arrack drinkers, for there was always a conflict between the
latter two since the hilarity of the two differed and never does a majun
party go well with a drinking party. So, he warned his nobles not to upset
the party. Let those who wish to drink arrack, drink arrack; let those
who wish to eat majun, eat majun. The parties appeared smooth and
civil in the beginning but soon there were wild talk and chatter from
all sides mostly in allusion to majun and majunis; there was such a
disgusting uproar and the party became so intolerable that it had to be
broken up.81 If these parties and gathering thus became an occasion
for dispensation of authority, they also represented apprehensions of
dissipation of authority and anxiety of loss of control and therefore the
constant admonitions by the emperor.
As mentioned earlier, while narcotics in the Mughal state induced
acculturation, negotiations, social interaction and entertainment, the
emperor through his authority also often encouraged inclusiveness on
the issue of its consumption but without levelling the hierarchies. Babur,
in particular, exerted his royal powers of persuasion and keenly extended
his passion for narcotics to include all those who refrained from it. He
observed that he had invited Darwish-i Muhammad, a young man and a
80
Khan, Tabaqat-i Baburi: 10; Babur, Babur-Nama, vol. II: 44748, 450, 461, 467, 509.
81

soldier who had not committed the sin (irtqab) of wine and was in
obedience (taib), to taste wine. Reprimanding him affectionately for not
drinking, Babur invoked the example of Qutluq Khwaja Kukuldash who
had long ceased to be a soldier, became a dervish, was old with a white
beard but consumed wine at all parties. Using coercion but apparently
to convince Darwish-i Muhammad, Babur said, Qutluq Khwajas
beard shames you! He a dervish and an old man always drinks wine, you
a soldier, a young man, your beard black, never drink! What does it
mean? Soon, however, Babur changed his stance in a bid to recover his
status, claiming that it was just a joke, that it was not his custom to force
wine on a non-drinker and that he should not feel compelled to drink.
But unlike the emperor, the nobles like Khwaja Muhammad Ali left no
choice for Darwish-i Muhammad and pressed and pressed him till he
drank.82 It could be that the nobles carried out the compulsion to drink
wine to please Babur and win his patronage; it was probably a way of
registering unstinted support to the emperor and enforcing obedience,
even if it was with regard to alcohol.
Alcohol then became an important factor in shaping the attitudes
and behaviour of the court nobility. This prompted the emperor to seek
unusual indulgence at wine and majun parties and at convivial assemblies
and yet appear introspective and religious and spiritual and make
intermittent announcements of renunciation. Babur proclaimed, as I
intend when forty years old to abstain from wine and as I am now some-
what less than one year of being forty, I drink wine most copiously.
However, when 40 arrived, there appeared no signs of the implementa-
tion of this sage resolution; regular wine and majun parties continued
unabated till 1527 CE, when he was again struck with a sudden fit of
penitence and rigorous reform.83 And this time he chose his politically
crucial battle against Rana Sanga to make a public promulgation that he
had decided to cease the sin and abandon wine, although it is apparent
from his description that for him wine was the sin and not majun because
even as he gave up drinking wine he did not forsake confection. Many of
his courtiers also declared their abstinence at the same assembly, since
virtue was to follow the religion of the king. Subsequently a universal
decree was issued throughout the Mughal Empire that no one shall partake
82
Ibid.: 406.
83

of strong drink or engage in its manufacture nor sell it nor buy it nor
convey it or fetch it. The farman warned, Beware of touching it. These
instructions were given quoting Surah II from Quran.84 Religious ardour
and spirituality seemed to have overcome the emperor. But the regret of
renunciation was equally enormous. It appears that Babur longed and
craved for a wine party infinitely and sometimes the craving was so
much that it brought tears to his eyes. He continued to eat majun with
greater intensity and indulged in opium more excessively since they were
outside the fold of sin to gratify his heart and seek cheer and comfort
in his laborious days.85
Babur may have put the fear of God and banned wine-drinking and
wine-bibbing in the later years of his life but these injunctions hardly
inhibited or aroused any apprehensions in the minds of his progeny.
Wine a reason for dissipation of authority continued to provide both
intoxication and joy and also facilitated conspiracies. For example, when
Mirza Kamran heard of the death of Babur he left Kandahar in charge
of Mirza Askari to see how he could advance his political interests. At
that time Mir Yunus Ali was the governor of Lahore. Mirza Kamran
along with Karacha Beg planned a wine-strategy to acquire Lahore.
Mir Yunus Ali was fed copiously with wine rendering him completely
numb and senseless so that he could be put in confinement and Kamran
could occupy Lahore. 86 Fixing class hierarchies and asserting his
sovereign rights as the emperor, Humayun, an avid tiryaqi (opium-eater),
evolved a pattern in how he would consume opium. He made pellets
(habb) of opium for seven days, wrapped them in paper, gave them to
his bodyguards (who would in return feed him) and instructed them
that this is all the opium we shall eat; he often ate the pellets with
rosewater. It appears from Abul Fazls account that Humayun had
drastically cut the intake close to his death and was left with just enough
pellets that lasted till his death.87 Akbar too, like his father, was an
obsessive opium-eater. That he constituted his authority around narcotics
is apparent from the weighing ceremonyperformed twice a year
according to lunar and solar calendaras thanksgiving for the divine
84
Babur, Babur-Nama, vol. II: 55255.
85
Ibid.: 648, 650, 660, 670.
86
Abul Fazl, Akbar Nama, vol. I: 290.
87
Ibid.: 654.

protection. On the occasion of weighing, according to the solar calendar,

makayif (intoxicating drugs particularly opium) formed a significant item
along with 12 other articlesgold, silk, perfumes, copper, saffron,
shirbirini (which contains milk, rice, sugar candy and salt), iron, various
grains, salt, rice and milkagainst which the emperor was weighed.88
Such activities ensured support, moulded attitudes and facilitated tacit
consent of the people which he needed so very urgently to consolidate
his paramountcy.
Passionate about drugs, Jahangir encouraged interaction and fun
around it but he did not let his indulgence overlook his authority or
the social distance and class differentiations. On days he felt happy or if
the weather was pleasant, he ordered to prepare an entertainment of
different kinds of intoxicating drinks. Each amir (noble) and servant
of the court could take a drink of his choice; some took wine, some
mufarrih (exhilarating drink) and some ate opium and its various
preparations.89 Drinking since the age of 18, as Jahangir got accustomed
to wine and spirits he added opium to it for greater stimulation. With
double intoxication of wine and opium, as his brain dried up and his
disposition unsettled, he reduced his potions of wine but began eat-
ing filuniya (variously known as faluha, faluhan, faluniya), a sedative
electuary, sometimes also used for tiryaq (opium) and bhang, in other
words, an intoxicating drug. Jahangir had drunk raw spirit earlier but
as he increased his consumption of faluha, he ordered that spirits
should be mixed with wine of the grapes; two parts wine and one part
spirit. He reduced his drink in seven years to six cups with each cup
weighing 18 miskals and a quarter. Subsequently he substituted faluha
with opium and ate 8 surkhs or rati (equal to 1.75 grams) of opium when
5 gharis (hours) of the day had passed and 6 surkhs after one watch
(hour) of night.90 Under the influence of stupor, Jahangir sometimes made
decisions that he regretted later. He ordered capital punishment for
one of his waqianavises (recorders of events), ordered the castration of
one of the khwasan (page) and had a khidmatgar (servant) beaten to
death. This punishment was meted out when it was reported to Jahangir
88
89
The Tuzuk-i Jahangiri, vol. I: 8, 20, 168, 237, 379.
90
Ibid.: 30810; Dwazda Sala Jahangiri, Wakiat-i Jahangiri, cf. Elliot, The History
of India, vol. VI: 34243.

that the waqianavis was in love with the khwasan and the khwasan was
attached to the khidmatgar.91 It could be that while stupefaction and
intoxication was permissible in the court, any kind of same-sex sexual
overtones, which were against the moralist and patriarchal societal norms,
were not tolerated. However, though Jahangir tried to get rid of his
addictive habits or bring them under control, it did not prevent him
from forbidding all sorts of intoxicating drinks, sharab or rice-spirit
(dilbaharaexhilarating drink), in his empire. He banned both the selling
and making of it. He also, perhaps emulating Shah Abbas of Persia,
prohibited the smoking of tobacco, because of its adverse effects on the
physical and mental health of the consumer. These farmans may have
been inspired by his occasional guilt and spiritual and religious impulses.
For instance, a year before his accession, Jahangir decided that he would
not drink wine on the eve of Friday since those hours were associated
with piety, purity, the learned, dervishes and recluses.92 Fixing categories
and separating the royal from the commoner, Jahangir may have
disallowed the use of alcohol in public but he had different rules of
intoxication for his son Khurram. Notwithstanding the damaging impact
of opium and wine on his body and health, Jahangir did not want Khurram
to be deprived of the pleasures of intoxication. Khurram apparently had
not tasted wine till the age of 24. Urging him to indulge in it, Jahangir
advised that kings and kings sons have drunk wine..., gave him
the permission to drink on all festive occasions but in moderation for
wise men do not consider it right to drink to such an extent as to destroy
the understanding, and it is necessary that from drinking only profit should
be derived. Despite such persuasions, it was with great difficulty that
Khurram agreed to drink.93
The consumption patterns of alcohol and opium indicate that authority
could be constituted and also dissipated around them. Aurangzeb had
attempted to curb the widely prevalent social habit of addiction and
intoxication by stipulating that Quran prohibited Muslims from drinking
any intoxicating spirits, for him it was reprehensible to be absorbed in
worldly affairs and disregard religious matters.... His sons and grandsons,
however, were persistent in not only disobeying the Quranic injunctions94
91
92
The Tuzuk-i Jahangiri, vol. I: 8, 20,168.
93
Ibid.: 30607.
94
Rukaat-i Alamgiri: 15, 86, 12223.

but also subtly eroded the power and legitimacy of the emperors
command. Whatever the apprehensions and religious limitations of
Aurangzeb, intoxication for pleasure and entertainment continued
unabated.
Apart from reflecting on the formulation of power and authority
around narcotics, the travel accounts are particularly significant in
pointing towards hierarchies and class differences over its consumption.
Bernier has suggested that opium was commonly taken by Indian soldiers
on the eve of the battle to give them more courage. Noticing this habit
largely amongst the Rajputs, he was astonished to see them swallow
large quantities of opium, sometimes double the dose of their normal
intake on the day of the battle so that the drug so animates or rather
inebriates them that they rush into the thickest of the combat insensible
of danger. He further added that it is an interesting sight to see them on
the eve of a battle, with the fumes of opium in their heads, embrace and
bid adieu to another, as if certain of death. It was around opium that
Bernier constructed the heroism of the Rajputs and believed that it was
for this reason that the Mughal emperors recruited the Rajputs as their
omrahs and appointed them to important commands in their armies.95
Opium also served to build and consolidate relationships in the courts of
the Rajput rajas, who customarily offered opium to their visitors as a
sign of peace and friendship and also presented it at ceremonial visits
and religious entertainments. To meet their increased requirement of
opium, the Rajputs as great consumers, accustomed to the use of opium
from an early age, began the cultivation of opium in Rajputana by the
end of the eighteenth century.96
Invoking hierarchies and class differences around the consumption
of opium, it was observed that in contrast to the royal use of opium by
the Rajput rajas, the labourer and the working class of Surat used it as a
stimulant and the errand boys before setting out on long journeys took a
portion of opium, which they think fortifies them, and by this means
will keep on running and dozing as it were at the same time with their
eyes open and without feeling the fatigue of the way. As they ran with
dizzy heads, they did not as a rule answer any one who ask where they
95
96
Wright, James Augustus Grant and the Gorakhpur Opium, 17891796: 1.

come from or where they are going but hurry straight on....97 Craftsmen,
too, consumed opium but for a peculiar reason, namely, to steady their
hands and boost their concentration. But while opium could be taken
prior to daring and arduous activities or for therapeutic or medicinal
purpose or simply for inebriation, it was also sometimes taken to
overcome spasms of hunger. Another unusual use of opium was the
feeding of opium to an ass to be eaten by a lion before being hunted by
the Mughal emperor. The opiate ass, intended to produce the soporific
effect, was the last meal of a lion before it was caught in a large net and
then hunted by the emperor.98
In several instances, narcotics became the vehicle of authority. John
Fryer and Peter Mundy recount occasions when post, an infusion of
opium, was given by the Mughal emperors to the royal princes and other
state prisoners confined in the fortress of Gwalior. These were such
prisoners who could not be executed for political and strategic reasons
but the emperor could still assert his power even if it amounted to mis-
use of it, to inflict a silent slow death by doses of post.99 The milk or the
decoction of the milky juice of poppy, that is post, was given to the
prisoners to render them physically weak and brain dead. It was a slow
poison towards starvation, sapping the consumer of the appetite for solid
foods. Bernier observes, it was a drink that emaciates the wretched
victims, who lose their strength and intellect by slow degrees, become
torpid and senseless and at length die. Generally, a large cup of the bev-
erage was given to the prisoner early in the morning and they were not
given anything to eat until the drink was swallowed; the system was to
let the prisoner die of hunger.100 Tavernier traces the system of slow
poisoning by post to the reign of Shah Jahan. All such princes and nobles
deemed to be a political threat were ordered to be imprisoned by Shah
Jahan in the Gwalior fort, given post, left to die a slow death but with
dignity without being deprived of their perquisites. To quote Tavernier,
he allowed them to live and enjoy their revenue. His son Aurangzeb
did just the contrary, that is, when he sent any noble or prince to the
Grose, A Voyage to the East Indies, vol. I: 122; Moreland, Jahangirs India: 62.
97

98
99
Fryer, A New Account of East India and Persia: 92; Mundy, The Travels of Peter
Mundy, vol. II: 247.
100

fortress of Gwalior, he ordered the increase in the dosage of post at the

end of nine or ten days, so that the people may not say that he is a san-
guinary monarch.101 He used this tactic against his younger brother
Murad Baksh, whom he had encouraged to rebel against Shah Jahan and
who as the governor of Gujarat had crowned himself emperor. Aurangzeb
decided to put him to violent death rather than let him languish to slow
poison of post. While Sulaiman Shukoh, son of Dara Shukoh, was drugged
to death in 1662 CE, the emperor was reticent towards his two sons,
Sultan Mahmud and Sultan Mazum. They were imprisoned in the Gwalior
fort but not coerced into drinking post. Mazum, allegedly, was involved
in a secret intrigue against his father when the latter was ill; nonetheless
Aurangzeb was anxious to obtain authentic proof of his sons obedience
and courage.102
It was around the consumption of narcotics that the foreign travellers
narrated their social interaction with the other, their attempts to
understand and familiarise with the oriental practices and yet reinforc-
ing the differences with the occident. Garcia DOrta was amused by
the common use of dhatura by thieves in India since it produced
temporary alienation of mind and violent laughter, allowing the thief to
act unopposed.103 There is, of course, no way of testifying if DOrta was
exaggerating. Manrique mentions his experiences and that of his European
friends of eating bhang but not without articulating the cultural differ-
ences and emphasising the different impact that it produced on the
Europeans. They had been warned that like opium, bhang also produced
unconsciousness and a confused state of mind. Manrique writes that
Bowrey and a few of his friends tried their pint of bhang which produced
strange results. It generally had a merry effect on most of them except
two who I suppose feared it might do them harm not being accustomed
thereto. One of them sat on the floor and wept bitterly the whole after-
noon, the other terrified with fear ran his head into a martaban (jar) and
continued in that posture for four hours or more and lay upon the carpet
highly complimenting each other in high terms; each man fancying
himself no less than the emperor. One was quarrelsome and fought with
one of the wooden pillars of the porch until he had little skin left on the
101
102
103
Crooke (ed.), Hobson-Jobson: 298.

knuckles of his fingers. Myself and one more sat sweating for the space
of three hours in exceeding measure and they had closely fastened all
doors and windows that none of us might run out into the street or any
person come in to behold any of our humors thereby to laugh at us.104
Emphasising on class differences and hierarchies, Abbé Carre puts
the coolies in a separate frame to comment on their intoxication through
tari, arrack and tobacco. He suggests that apart from all else, they virtually
survived on these narcotics and when they drank arrack in excess, they
were uncontrollable and behaved like madmen. His observations were
derived from the examples of eight coolies (six for his palanquins and
two for his luggage) who he had hired during his visit to Chandgala
(probably Chandgad), the headquarters of a subdivision with the same
name in the Belgaum district. He paid them three rupees each without
any obligation to provide them with food, to reach him to Bijapur. While
the coolies carried some rice and dried fish for the journey and the
villagers provided them with fruits, milk and millet on the way, their
greatest support came from tobacco, which they smoked constantly, so
that they devoured more smoke than anything else and besides water,
they drank tari, arrack and kanji (boiled water with little rice).105
All forms of hierarchies, class and cultural differences can be best
illustrated through gender relations. There was wide gender discrimin-
ation and gender inequality on the issue of narcotics. While its consump-
tion is seen as the privilege of men, women are portrayed as objects of
desire, seductive and distracting. It is evident from the convivial assem-
blies organised by Babur that he was addicted to wine and women and
all the fashionable pleasures of courts; whenever he wanted to make
merry, he filled a fountain with wine, sat down with his friends to
drink freely and feast his eyes on the daughters of beauty who danced
before him.106 Women were confined within patriarchal hierarchy, were
expected to be submissive and not aggressive even if their men were
ardent tiryaqi as it is noticed in the case of Humayun. Humayun was
mostly so doped that he had no time for marital obligations. When Bega
Begum (popularly called Haji Begum though Gulbadan Begum called
104
Manrique, Travels, vol. I: 59.
105
Carre, The Travels of Abbé Carre, vol. I: 22627.
106
Dow, The History of Hindostan, vol. II: 136.

her Bega Begum) complained to Humayun that he had not visited her for
a long time, Humayun considered her questioning as not just a violation
of his paramount authority but also his masculine privilege of consuming
opium. He reportedly reprimanded her, I am an opium-eater. If there
should be delay in my comings and goings, do not be angry with me.
Rather write to me a letter and say: whether it pleases you to come or
whether it pleases you not to come....107 If some women dared to cross
the limits of femininity and proscribed patriarchal moral values and
womanly virtues, they were categorised as disgraced. Tavernier writes
that during the Mughal period, considerable revenue was derived from
tari because of its large consumption by public women.108 Some women
are reported to have eaten opium but not for intoxication or pleasure or
entertainment like their male counterparts but to express grief and to
die, thereby sustaining the cultural hegemonic order, with no subversion
of the patriarchal system. Had they behaved otherwise, the texts would
have recorded them differently, perhaps as public women. Jahangirs
first wife (popularly known as Shah Begum), upset by the behaviour of
her son Khusrau and the misconduct of her brother Madho Singh, killed
herself by swallowing tiryaq.109 In yet another instance, a concubine of
Lal Kalawant (a noble) committed suicide by consuming opium when
she heard of the nobles death.110 When Jalaluddin Masuds (a mansabdar
under Jahangir) condition worsened because of excessive addiction to
opium and his death appeared inevitable, his mother consumed opium
and died a few minutes after his death.111 These patterns around women
and consumption of opium indicate that women became the site for
debate and reformulation of tradition. In other words, what was important
was not women but tradition.112
107
Gulbadan Begam, Humayun-Nama: 29.
108
109
110
Ibid.: 150.
111
Ibid.: 141.
112
See Mani, Contentious Traditions.

References
Abul Fazl Allami. 1972. The Akbar Nama, vols I and II, trans. H. Beveridge, New Delhi.
. 1973. The Akbar Nama, vol. III, trans. H. Beveridge, New Delhi.
. 1997. The Ain-i Akbari, vol. I, trans. H. Blochmann, ed. by D.C. Phillot,
New Delhi.
. 1997. The Ain-i Akbari, vol. II, trans. Col. H.S. Jarrett, 2nd ed., corrected and
annotated by Jadunath Sarkar, reprinted, New Delhi.
Al-Badaoni, Abdul Qadir ibn i Muluk Shah. 1973. Muntakhab ut-Tawarikh, vol. II, trans.
W.H. Lowe, reprint, New Delhi.
. 1973. Muntakhab ut-Tawarikh, vol. III, trans. Wolsley Haig, reprint, New Delhi.
Babur, Zahirud-din. 1970. Babur-Nama, trans. Annette Susannah Beveridge, vols I and
II, reprint, New Delhi.
Barbosa, Duarte. 1866. A Description of the Coasts of East Africa and Malabar in the
Beginning of the Sixteenth Century, London.
Bayly, Christopher A. 2004. The Birth of the Modern World, 17801914, Global
Connections and Comparisons, London.
Bernier, Francois. 1968. Travels in the Mogul Empire, A.D. 16561668, revised edition
based upon Irving Brocks translation by Archibald Constable, New Delhi.
Bose, Sugata (ed.). 1994. Credit, Markets and the Agrarian Economy of Colonial India,
Cambridge.
Carre, Abbé. 1947. The Travels of Abbé Carre in India and the Near East, 1672 to 1674,
vol. I, London.
Chatterjee, Prasun. 2005. The Lives of Alcohol in Pre-colonial India, The Medieval
History Journal, vol. 8(1): 189225.
Crooke, William (ed.). 1903. Hobson-Jobson, A Glossary of Colloquial Anglo-Indian Words
and Phrases and of Kindred Terms, Etymological, Historical, Geographical and
Discursive, new edition, London.
Dey, Kanny Lall. 1896. The Indigenous Drugs of India: Short Descriptive Notices of the
Principal Medicinal Products Met with in British India, 2nd ed., Calcutta.
Divyabhanusinh. 1999. The End of a Trail, The Cheetah in India, 3rd ed., New Delhi.
D Orta, Garcia. 1913. Colloquies on the Simples and Drugs of India, trans.
Sir C. Markham, London.
Dow, Alexander. 1985. The History of Hindostan, vol. II, 2nd ed., New Delhi.
Elliot, H.M. 1964. The History of India as Told by Its Own HistoriansThe Muhammadan
Period, ed. John Dowson, vols IIIVI, first Indian edition, Allahabad.
Farooqui, Amar. 1998. Smuggling as Subversion: Colonialism, Indian Merchants and the
Politics of Opium, New Delhi.
. 2006. Opium City: The Making of Early Victorian Bombay, New Delhi.
Foster, William (ed.). 1985. Early Travels in India, 15831619, first Indian edition, New Delhi.
Fryer, John. 1909. A New Account of East India and Persia Being Nine Years Travels,
16721681, ed. William Crooke, vol. I, London.
Greenberg, Michael. 1969. British Trade and the Opening of China, 180042, reprint,
Cambridge.
Grose, John. 1766. A Voyage to the East Indies, Begun in 1750, vol. I, 2nd ed., London.

Gulbadan Begam. 1972. Humayun-Nama, trans. Annette S. Beveridge, New Delhi.

Habib, Irfan. 1999. The Agrarian System of Mughal India, 15561707, 2nd revised edition,
New Delhi.
Hamilton, Walter. 1971. A Geographical, Statistical and Historical Description of
Hindostan and the Adjacent Countries, vol. I, New Delhi.
Hunter, William Wilson. 1899. A History of British India, vol. I (to the overthrow of the
English in the Spice Archipelago), London, New York and Bombay.
Khan, Zain. 1982. Tabaqat-i Baburi, trans. Sayed Hasan Askari, New Delhi.
Mani, Lata. 1998. Contentious Traditions: The Debate on Sati in Colonial India, Berkeley
and Los Angeles.
Manrique, Fray Sebastian. 1927. Travels of Fray Sebastian Manrique, 16291643 (second
series No. 59), vol. I, Oxford.
Manucci, Niccolao. 1906. Storia Do Mogor or Mogul India, 16531708, trans. William
Irvine, vol. I, London.
Mokyr, Joel (ed.). 2003. The Oxford Encyclopedia of Economic History, vol. 4, New York.
Moreland, W.H. 1972. Jahangirs India, The Remonstrantie of Francisco Pelsaert, New Delhi.
Mundy, Peter. 1914. The Travels of Peter Mundy in Europe and Asia, 16081667, vol. II,
Travels in Asia, 162834, second series No. 35, ed. Richard Carnac Temple, London.
Phipps, J. 1836. A Practical Treatise on the China and Eastern Trade, Comprising the
Commerce of Great Britain and India, particularly Bengal and Singapore with China
and Eastern Islands, London and Calcutta.
Pires, Tome. 1944. The Suma Oriental of Tome Pires: An Account of the East from the Red
Sea to Japan, Written in Malacca and India in 15121515, London.
Prakash, Om. 1987. Opium Monopoly in India and Indonesia in the Eighteenth Century,
Indian Economic and Social History Review, vol. 24(1): 6380.
Prakash, Om and Denys Lombard (eds). 1999. Commerce and Culture in the Bay of Bengal,
15001800, New Delhi.
Richards, John F. 1981. The Indian Empire and Peasant Production of Opium in the
Nineteenth Century; Modern Asian Studies, vol. 15(1): 5982.
. 2002. Opium and the British Indian Empire: The Royal Commission of 1895,
Modern Asian Studies, vol. 36(2): 375420.
Roe, Thomas. 1990. The Embassy of Sir Thomas Roe to the Court of the Great Mogul,
16151619, edited from contemporary records by William Foster, New Delhi.
Rukaat-i Alamgiri or Letters of Aurangzeb. 1972. Translated by Jamshid Bilimoria, New Delhi.
Tavernier, Jean-Baptiste. 2001. Travels in India, trans. V. Ball, ed. by William Crooke,
vol. I, New Delhi.
The Tuzuk-i Jahangiri or Memoirs of Jahangir. 1968. edited by Henry Beveridge and
translated by Alexander Rogers, vol. I, 2nd ed., New Delhi.
Tiele, P.A. (ed.). 1885. The Voyage of John Huyghen Van Linschoten to the East Indies,
vol. II, London.
Trocki, Carl A. 1999. Opium, Empire and the Global Political Economy: A Study of the
Asian Opium Trade, 17501950. London and New York.
Watt, George. 1891. Dictionary of the Economic Products of India, vol. V, London.
. 1892. Dictionary of the Economic Products of India, vol. VI, Part I, London.
Wright, H.R.C. April 1960. James Augustus Grant and the Gorakhpur Opium, 1789
1796, Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society: 116.

Narcotics and Drugs: Pleasure, Intoxication or Simply Therapeutic - North India, Sixteenth - Seventeenth Centuries

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

You might also like

Narcotics and Drugs: Pleasure, Intoxication or Simply Therapeutic - North India, Sixteenth - Seventeenth Centuries

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Description:

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Narcotics and Drugs: Pleasure, Intoxication or Simply Therapeutic - North India, Sixteenth - Seventeenth Centuries

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Narcotics and Drugs: Pleasure,

Intoxication or Simply Therapeutic—

∗ Department of History, Indraprastha College, Delhi University, Delhi. E-mail:

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

NarcoticsHistorical and Commercial Perspective

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

commercial importance, Duarte Barbosa writes that in the early sixteenth

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

in the sarkars of Fatehpur, Allahabad and Ghazipur but also in Benares,

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

tobacco, from an exotic chemical to a fully capitalist commodity;13 in

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

sufficient for intoxication; if taken in excess it could cause drowsiness.

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

NarcoticsBody Therapy or Health Hazard

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

Gulbadan Begam, Humayun-Nama: 29, 125, 131.

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The incessant consumption of alcohol many a time aroused feel-

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

again taken ill in Kashmir, afflicted by loss of appetite, he was forced to

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

NarcoticsAuthority, Social Interaction, Hierarchies

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

Being a Sunni Muslim, he was aware of the Islamic norms against

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

describes the drinking days as Saturdays, Sundays, Tuesdays and

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

protection. On the occasion of weighing, according to the solar calendar,

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

Bernier, Travels: 378.

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

fortress of Gwalior, he ordered the increase in the dosage of post at the

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

Gulbadan Begam. 1972. Humayun-Nama, trans. Annette S. Beveridge, New Delhi.

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

You might also like

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

NarcoticsHistorical and Commercial Perspective

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

tobacco, from an exotic chemical to a fully capitalist commodity;13 in

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

NarcoticsBody Therapy or Health Hazard

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

NarcoticsAuthority, Social Interaction, Hierarchies

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J

J The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135

The Medieval History Journal, 15, 1 (2012): 103135 J