"The second volume contains an introduction and a history of the life of Uljáítú from the time of his birth to the present day; to this portion of the second volume will be added a supplement, comprising an account of the daily actions of this prince, written by me, and afterwards continued by the court historians. This second volume also contains a concise history of the Prophets, Sultáns, and Kings of the universe, from the days of Adam to the present time, together with a detailed account of many people, of whom historians have, till now, given little or no description. All that I have said respecting them I have taken from their own books, and from the mouths of the learned men of each nation; it also gives the history of the People of the Book, viz., the Jews and the Christians, and the histories of the Sultáns and most celebrated Princes of each country; also an account of the Ismailís, and many curious and instructive particulars. "The third volume gives, after the preface, a detailed account of the descent of the Prophets, Kings, Khalífas, the Arab tribes, the companions of the Prophet Muhammad, etc., from the time of Adam to the end of the dynasty of the Baní 'Abbás; the genealogy of the ancestors of Muhammad, and of the tribes descended from them; the series of Prophets who have appeared amongst the Baní Isráíl, the Kings of the latter, and an enumeration of their different tribes; the genealogies of the Kaisers and others of the Christian princes, with their names and the number of years of their respective reigns. All these details have been faithfully extracted from the chronicles of these people, and arranged in systematic order. "The fourth volume comprises a preface and a circumstantial account of the limits of each of the seven climates, the division and extent of the vast countries of the globe, the geographical position and description of the greater part of the cities, seas, lakes, valleys, and mountains, with their longitudes and latitudes. In writing this portion of our work, we have not been satisfied merely with extracts from the most esteemed geographical works, but we have, besides, made inquiries from the most learned men, and those who have themselves visited the countries described; we have inserted in our relation, particulars obtained from the learned men of Hind, Chín, Máchín, the countries of the Franks, etc., and others which have been faithfully extracted from works written in the languages of those different countries.” This is the account given by our author himself of his work; it must, however, be remarked, that in the preface to the Tarikh-i Gházání and in many other passages, he speaks of three volumes only, writing, under the head of the second, the matters which here form the contents of the second and third. The easiest way of accounting for this contradiction is to suppose that he subsequently divided this second volume into two portions, on account of its great bulk and disproportion in size to the others. In the preface to the Tarikh-i Gházání the work is divided, as mentioned above, into three volumes, according to the following distribution: The contents of the first volume are the same as given in the preceding description, and it is dedicated to Gházán Khán. It comprises two books and several sections. The second volume contains the history of Uljáítú Sultán (to whom it was dedicated), from his birth to the time when our author wrote; this forms the first division of the volume. The second division comprises two parts, the first of which is again sub-divided into two sections. The first section contains an abridged history of all the Prophets, Khalifas, and of the different races of men, to the year of the Flight, 700. The second section comprises a detailed chronicle of all the inhabitants. of the earth, according to their races, extracted from their various writings, and from the mouths of natives of the different countries. The second part is filled with the remaining portion of the history of Uljáítú, “the Sultán of Islám," as he is styled, and was destined to be continued in chronological order to the time of his death. "The historians who are, or may be, servants of the court, will take care to write this, and add it as a supplement to this second volume." The third volume comprises the description of the Geographical charts, and the various routes from one place to another, taken from the sources already mentioned. "The author has, as far as was in his power, multiplied and verified his researches from all that was previously known on the subject in this country, whether described in books or drawn in charts. To this he has added all that, during this fortunate epoch, the philosophers and wise men of Hind, Chín, Máchín, Farang, and other countries have written, and has entered it all in this third volume, after having fully ascertained its authority." The extended notice which is here given to Rashídu-d dín and the Jámi'u-t-Tawarikh, is not only due to his merits and to the curious sources of his information on Indian subjects, but to the interest which was excited some years ago by the discovery, under very peculiar circumstances, of a large portion of the work which, up to that time, was supposed to be lost. A full account of this curious discovery is given in the sixth volume of the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society. Mr. W. Morley, while engaged in making a catalogue of the Society's MSS., met with an imperfect Arabic MS., which proved to be a portion of the Jámi'u-t Tawarikh. It was written in a beautiful and very old Naskhí hand, with many pictures very creditably executed. He addressed a letter to the Society, giving an account of his discovery, and before the letter was published Professor Forbes accidentally fell in with a much larger portion of the same MS., comprising one half the original volume, of which the Society's fragment formed about one-fifth. The two fragments proved to be parts of the same original, and were thus brought together after many years, perhaps centuries, of separation. This larger portion of the MS. of the Jámi'u-t Tawarikh belonged to Colonel John Baillie, an eminent orientalist. Shortly after his death, his MSS. and books were prepared for transmission to the family seat in Inverness-shire, but before they were actually despatched Professor Forbes obtained a sight of them. He there picked out a fine large historical MS. on the back of which was written, in a distinct Persian hand, “ Táríkh-i Tabari," and as if this were not sufficient, there was a note written in Persian, on a blank page, folio 154, of which the following is a literal translation. "The name of this book is The Tarikh-i Tabari, (the History or Chronicle of Tabarí), the author's autograph. The whole number of leaves, when complete, amounted to 303; now, however, some one has stolen and carried off one half of it, or about 150 leaves. It was written by the author's own hand, in the year of the Hijra 706 (A.D. 1306-7.") This description of the MS. as being the work of Tabarí was, from the date alone, very suspicious and unsatisfactory, and Professor Forbes, in his enquiries, was eventually led to examine the MS. of the Royal Asiatic Society, when the two MSS. proved to be indubitably portions of one and the same book. These discoveries were communicated to the Asiatic Society of Bengal, and a request was made that the Society would interest itself in searching for manuscripts of the work. A circular was in consequence issued to many of the native chiefs and literati of India, but no satisfactory reply was received. Upon that occasion I pointed out to the Society that the work was probably in their own library, for that an anonymous volume purporting to contain precisely the same matter, was brought by Sir J. Malcolm from Persia, and presented to the College of Fort William, as appeared from a notice at the end of Stewart's Catalogue of Típú Sultán's Library. The work was searched for and discovered, in consequence of this information, among those which were transferred from the College to the Asiatic Society.1 It was not till some years afterwards that I had the satisfaction of reading the superb French publication, entitled Collection Orientale, in the preface to the first volume of which I found that the very same enquiry had been suggested by M. Quatremère, in the following passage: "au nombre des MSS. apportés de Perse par le Major Malcolm et offerts par lui au Collége du Fort William, je trouve un ouvrage ayant pour titre 1 See Journal Asiatic Society of Bengal, Vol. X. P. 934. Djami-altawarikh-kadim. Ce livre ferait-il partie du travail de Rashideldin? C'est ce que je n'ai pu vérifier." Had this enquiry then attracted the attention of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, it would have resulted in an earlier discovery of the missing volume; but when at last it was drawn forth from their library, it had become of comparatively little importance, for, in the mean time, a manuscript of the Persian original had been found in the library of the East India House, of which a full description was shortly after given by Mr. Morley in the seventh volume of the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, from which the following extract is taken : - "The MS. in question is of a large folio size, and contains in all 1189 pages; but as numerous spaces have been left for the insertion of paintings, the actual volume of the work is not equal to its apparent extent; the character is a small and tolerably clear Nast'alík; the transcriber was evidently both careless and ignorant, and the text abounds with errors, this is particularly conspicuous in the spelling of the names of places and individuals, the same name being frequently written in two or three different ways in the same page; many considerable omissions also occur in the body of the work, the original from which our MS. was transcribed being, in all probability, damaged or defective in those parts. "The Jámi'u-t Tawarikh consists of a collection of histories (as its name imports), each distinct from the other and complete in itself. Those contained in our MS. occur in the following order:— "I. A general history of Persia and Arabia, from the earliest times to the fall of the Khilafat; this history comprises a preface and two sections. The preface contains an account of Adam and his children, of Núh and his posterity, of the reign of Kaiúmars, the first of the kings of Fárs, and of the tribes of the Arabs, to the time of the prophet Muhammad. This preface mentions that the history was composed in the year of the Flight 700, from various traditional and written authorities. 1 Vie et les ouvrages de Rashideldin, seconde partie, p. lxxxv. |