THROUGH THE EYES OF TRAVELLERS

Perceptions of Society

THEME FIVE

FFRANCOIS BERNIER

Through the eyes of Travellers

• In this chapter we shall see how our knowledge of the past can be enriched through a consideration of descriptions of social life provided by travellers who visited the subcontinent, focusing on the accounts of three men:
• Al-Biruni who came from Uzbekistan (eleventh century)
• Ibn Battuta who came from Morocco, in northwestern Africa (fourteenth century)
• François Bernier, the Frenchman (seventeenth century)

1. Al-biruni and Kitab-ull-Hind

• From Khwarizm to the Punjab
• Al-Biruni was born in 973, in Khwarizm in presentday Uzbekistan. Khwarizm was an important centre of learning, and Al-Biruni received the best education available at the time.
• He was well versed in several languages: Syriac, Arabic, Persian, Hebrew and Sanskrit. Although he did not know Greek, he was familiar with the works of Plato and other Greek philosophers, having read them in Arabic translations.
• In 1017, when Sultan Mahmud invaded Khwarizm, he took several scholars and poets back to his capital, Ghazni; Al-Biruni was one of them. He arrived in Ghazni as a hostage, but gradually developed a liking for the city, where he spent the rest of his life until his death at the age of 70.

Al-biruni

• Alberuni, the great scholar who accopained Sultan Mahmood Ghaznavi to India, and researched on the

religion and customs of the people of India.

• He wrote kitabul Hind. or The Book Of India,

which was one of the earliest encyclopedias about South Asia and its people.

Alberuni even learn Sanskrit to write this book.

The Brahmin scholars respected him so much that they called him Vidya Sagar, or the sea of Knowledge.

Al-biruni

• Al-Biruni spent years in the company of Brahmana priests and scholars, learning Sanskrit, and studying religious and philosophical texts.
• While his itinerary is not clear,

it is likely that he travelled widely in the Punjab and parts of northern India.

Translating Ideas

• Al-biruni’s expertise in several languages allowed him to compare languages and translate texts.
• He translated several Sanskrit works, including Patanjali’s work on grammar, in to Arabic.
• For his Brahmana friends, he translated the works of Euclid (a Greek Mathematician) into Sanskrit.

The Kitab-ul-Hind

• Al-Biruni’s Kitab-ul-Hind, written in Arabic, is simple and lucid.

It is a voluminous text, divided into 80 chapters on subjects such as religion and philosophy, festivals, astronomy, alchemy, manners and customs, social life,

weights and measures, iconography, laws and metrology.

• Kitab-ul-Hind was Translated into

English by E.C.Sachau.

Kitab-ull-Hind

• Al-Biruni, who wrote in Arabic, probably intended his work for peoples living along the frontiers of the subcontinent.
• He was familiar with translations and adaptations of Sanskrit, Pali and Prakrit texts into Arabic – these ranged from fables to works on astronomy and medicine.
• However, he was also critical about the ways in which these texts were written, and clearly wanted to improve on them.

AL-BIRUNI AND THE SANSKRITIC TRADITION

Overcoming barriers to understanding

MAKING SENSE OF AN ALIEN WORLD

Al-Biruni was aware of the problems inherent in the task he had set himself. He discussed several “barriers” that he felt obstructed understanding.

The first amongst these was language. According to him, Sanskrit was so different from Arabic and Persian that ideas and concepts could not be easily translated from one language into another.

Overcoming barriers to understanding

• The second barrier he identified was the difference in religious beliefs and practices.
• The self-absorption and consequent insularity of the local population according to him, constituted the third barrier.
• What is interesting is that even though he was aware of these problems, Al-Biruni depended almost exclusively on the works of Brahmanas, often citing passages from the Vedas, the Puranas, the Bhagavad Gita, the works of Patanjali, the Manusmriti, etc., to provide an understanding of Indian society.

Al-Biruni’s description of the caste system

• Al-Biruni tried to explain the caste system by looking for parallels in other societies.
• He noted that in ancient Persia, four social categories were recognised: those of knights and princes; monks, fire-priests and lawyers; physicians, astronomers and other scientists; and finally, peasants and artisans.
• In other words, he attempted to suggest that social divisions were not unique to India.
• At the same time he pointed out that within Islam all men were considered equal, differing only in their observance of piety.

Al-Biruni’s description of the caste system

• In spite of his acceptance of the Brahmanical description of the caste system, Al-Biruni disapproved of the notion of pollution.
• He remarked that everything which falls into a state of impurity strives and succeeds in regaining its original condition of purity.
• The sun cleanses the air, and the salt in the sea prevents the water from becoming polluted. If it were not so, insisted Al- Biruni, life on earth would have been impossible.
• The conception of social pollution, intrinsic to the caste system, was according to him, contrary to the laws of nature.

Al-Biruni’s description of the caste system

• As we have seen, Al-Biruni’s description of the caste system was deeply influenced by his study of standared Sanskrit texts which laid down the rules governing the system from the point of view of the Brahmanas.
• However, in real life the system was not quite as rigid. For instance, the categories defined as antyaja (literally, born outside the system) were often expected to provide inexpensive labour to both peasants and zamindars. In other words, while they were often subjected to social oppression, they were included within economic networks.

Hindu

• The term ‘Hindu’ was derived from an old Persian word., used 5^th – 6^th centuries BC, to refer to the region east of the river Sindhu (Indus).
• The Arabs continued the Persian usage and called this region, “al-Hind” and its people “Hindi”.
• Later Turks referred the people east of the river Indus as “Hindu”, their land as “Hindusthan”, and their language as “Hindavi”.
• None of these expressions indicated the religious identity of the people.
• It is much later that the term developed as a religious term.

2. Ibn Batuta’s Rihla

Ibn Batuta-An early globe-trotter

• Ibn Battuta’s book of travels, called Rihla,

written in Arabic, provides extremely rich and interesting details about the social and

cultural life in the subcontinent in the 14^th C

• This Moroccan traveler was born in Tangier into one of the most respectable and

educated families known for their expertise in Islamic religious law or shari‘a.

• True to the tradition of his family,

Ibn Battuta received literary and scholastic education when he was quite young.

Batuta…….

• Unlike most other members of his class, Ibn Battuta considered experience gained through travels to be a more important source of knowledge than books.
• He just loved travelling, and went to far-off places, exploring new worlds and peoples.
• Before he set off for India in 1332-33, he had made pilgrimage trips to Mecca, and had already travelled extensively in Syria, Iraq, Persia, Yemen, Oman and a few trading ports on the coast of East Africa.

Batuta…….

• Travelling overland through Central Asia, Ibn Battuta reached Sind in 1333.
• He had heard about Muhammad bin Tughlaq, the Sultan of Delhi, and attracted by his reputation as a generous patron of arts and letters, set off for Delhi, passing through Multan and Uch.
• The Sultan was impressed by his scholarship, and appointed him the qazi or judge of Delhi. He remained in that position for several years, until he fell out of favour and was thrown into prison.
• Once the misunderstanding between him and the Sultan was cleared, he was restored to imperial service, and was ordered in 1342 to proceed to China as the Sultan’s envoy(diplomatic agent) to the Mongol ruler.

Batuta…….

• With the new assignment, Ibn Battuta proceeded to the Malabar coast through central India. From Malabar he went to the Maldives, where he stayed for eighteen months as the qazi, then to Sri Lanka.
• He then went back once more to the Malabar coast and the Maldives, and before resuming his mission to China, visited Bengal and Assam as well.
• He then visited Sumatra, and from there reached the Chinese port town of Zaytun (now known as Quanzhou). He travelled extensively in China, and decided to return home in 1347.
• His account is often compared with that of Marco Polo, who visited China (and also India) from his home base in Venice in the late 13^th C.

Batuta…….

• IbnBattuta recorded in detail his observations about new cultures, peoples, beliefs, values, etc. in his ‘Kitb- ul-Rihla, translated into English by Mahdi Huzain.
• We need to bear in mind that this globe-trotter was travelling in the fourteenth century, when it was much more arduous and hazardous to travel than it is today.
• According to Ibn Battuta, it took forty days to travel from Multan to Delhi and about fifty days from Sind to Delhi. The distance from Daulatabad to Delhi was covered in forty days, while that from Gwalior to Delhi took ten days.

Batuta…..

oTravelling was also more insecure: Ibn Battuta was attacked by bands of robbers several times. In fact he preferred travelling in a caravan along with companions, but this did not deter highway robbers.

​

o While travelling from Multan to Delhi, for instance, his caravan was attacked and many of his fellow travellers lost their lives; those travellers who survived, including Ibn Battuta, were severely wounded.

The “enjoyment of curiosities”

• As we have seen, Ibn Battuta was spent several years travelling through north Africa, West Asia and parts of Central Asia (he may even have visited Russia), the Indian subcontinent and China, before returning to his native land, Morocco.

​

• When he returned, the local ruler issued instructions that his stories be recorded.

In the footsteps of Ibn Batuta……….

• In the centuries between 1400 and 1800 visitors to India wrote a number of travelogues in Persian. At the same time, Indian visitors to Central Asia, Iran and the Ottoman Empire also sometimes wrote about their experiences. These writers followed in the footsteps of al-Biruni and Ibn Batuta.
• Among the best known of these writers were Abdur Razzak Samarqandi, who visited south India in the 1440’s, Mahmud Wali Balkhi, who travelled very widely in the 1620’s, and Sheik Ali Hazin, who came to north India in the 1740’s. Some of these authors were fascinated by India, and one of them-Mahmud Wali Balkhi-even became a sort of sanyasi for a time.
• Most of them saw India as a land of wonders.

.

Abdur Razzak

Marco Polo, Venetian traveller-visited India and China in 13^th c

IBtf BATUTA AtfD EXCITEMEtfT OF THE UtfFAMILIAR

• By the time Ibn Battuta arrived in Delhi in the 14^TH C, the subcontinent was part of a global network of communication that stretched from China in the east to north-west Africa and Europe in the west.
• As we have seen, Ibn Battuta himself travelled extensively through these lands, visiting sacred shrines, spending time with learned men and rulers, often officiating as qazi, and enjoying the cosmopolitan culture of urban centres where people who spoke Arabic, Persian, Turkish and other languages, shared ideas, information and anecdotes.
• These included stories about men noted for their piety, kings who could be both cruel and generous, and about the lives of ordinary men and women; anything that was unfamiliar was particularly highlighted in order to ensure that the listener or the reader was suitably impressed by accounts of distant yet accessible worlds.

The coconut and the paan

• Some of the best examples of Ibn Battuta’s strategies of representation are evident in the ways in which he described the coconut and the paan, two kinds of plant produce that were completely unfamiliar to his audience.

Nuts like a man’s head………!

“These trees are among the most peculiar trees in kind and most astonishing in habit. They look axactly like date-palms, without any difference between them except that the one produces nuts as its fruits and the

other produces dates. The nut of a coconut tree resembles a man’s head, for in it are what look like two eyes and

a mouth, and the inside of it when it is green looks like

the brain, and attached to it is a fibre which looks like hair. They make from this cord with which they sew up ships instead of (using) iron nails, and they (also) make from it cables for vessels”.

Read Ibn Battuta’s description of Paan

“The betel is a tree which is cultivated in the same manner as the grape-vine;….The betel has no fruit and is grown only for the sake of its leaves….The manner of its use is that before eating it one takes areca nut; this is like a nutmeg but is broken up until it is reduced to small pellets, and one places these in his mouth and chews them.

Then he takes the leaves of betel, puts a

little chalk on them, and masticates them along with the betel”.

Ibn Battuta and Indian cities

• Ibn Battuta found cities in the subcontinent full of exciting opportunities for those who had the necessary drive, resources and skills. They were densely populated and prosperous, except for the occasional disruptions caused by wars and invasions. It appears from Ibn Battuta’s account that most cities had crowded streets and bright and colourful markets that were stacked with a wide variety of goods. Ibn Battuta described Delhi as a vast city, with a great population, the largest in India. Daulatabad (in Maharashtra) was no less, and easily rivalled Delhi in size.

Daulathabad

Ibn Battuta and Indian cities

• The bazaars were not only places of economic transactions, but also the hub of social and cultural activities. Most bazaars had a mosque and a temple, and in some of them at least, spaces were marked for public performances by dancers, musicians and singers.
• While Ibn Battuta was not particularly concerned with explaining the prosperity of towns, historians have used his account to suggest that towns derived a significant portion of their wealth through the appropriation of surplus from villages. Ibn Battuta found Indian agriculture very productive because of the fertility of the soil, which allowed farmers to cultivate two crops a year.

Ibn Battuta and Indian cities

• He also noted that the subcontinent was well integrated with inter-Asian networks of trade and commerce, with Indian manufactures being in great demand in both West Asia and Southeast Asia, fetching huge profits for artisans and merchants.
• Indian textiles, particularly cotton cloth, fine muslins, silks, brocade and satin, were in great demand.
• Ibn Battuta informs us that certain varieties of fine muslin were so expensive that they could be worn only by the nobles and the very rich.

A unique system of communication

• The state evidently took special measures to encourage merchants. Almost all trade routes were well supplied with inns and guest houses.
• Ibn Battuta was also amazed by the efficiency of the postal system which allowed merchants to not only send information and remit credit across long distances, but also to dispatch goods required at short notice.
• The postal system was so efficient that while it took fifty days to reach Delhi from Sind, the news reports of spies would reach the Sultan through the postal system in just five days.

FRANCOIS A DOCTOR WITH A DIFFERENCE

European Travellers

• Portugese Travellers – detailed account of India – translated Indian texts to European languages. For eg:- Durate Barbosa, Roberto Nobili.
• Dutch, French and English travellers.
• One of the most famous was the French jeweller Jean- Baptiste Tavernier, who travelled to India at least six times.
• Some of these travellers, like the Italian doctor Manucci, never returned to Europe, and settled down in India.

François Bernier

• François Bernier, a Frenchman, was a doctor, political philosopher and historian.
• Like many others, he came to the Mughal Empire in search of opportunities.
• He was in India for 12 years, from 1656 to 1668, and was closely associated with the Mughal court, as a physician to Prince Dara Shukoh, the eldest son of Emperor Shah Jahan, and later as an intellectual and scientist, with Danishmand Khan, an Armenian noble at the Mughal court.

Comparing “East” and “West”

• Bernier travelled to several parts of the country, and wrote accounts of what he saw, frequently comparing what he saw in India with the situation in Europe.
• He dedicated his major writing to Louis XIV, the king of France, and many of his other works were written in the form of letters to influential officials and ministers.
• In virtually every instance Bernier described what he saw in India as a bleak(boring,empty) situation in comparison to developments in Europe.
• As we will see, this assessment was not always accurate. However, when his works were published, Bernier’s writings became extremely popular.

Bernier…..

• Bernier’s works were published in France in 1670-71 and translated into English, Dutch, German and Italian within the next five years.
• Between 1670 and 1725 his account was reprinted eight times in French, and by 1684 it had been reprinted three times in English.
• This was in marked contrast to the accounts in Arabic and Persian, which circulated as manuscripts and were generally not published before 1800.

BERNIER AND THE “DEGENERATE” EAST

• If Ibn Battuta chose to describe everything that impressed and excited him because of its novelty, François Bernier belonged to a different intellectual tradition.
• He was far more preoccupied with comparing and contrasting what he saw in India with the situation in Europe in general and France in particular, focusing on situations which he considered depressing.
• His idea seems to have been to influence policy-makers and the intelligentsia to ensure that they made what he considered to be the “right” decisions.

BERNIER AND THE “DEGENERATE” EAST

• Bernier’s Travels in the Mughal Empire provides a detailed observations and critical insights.
• He constantly compared Mughal India with contemporary Europe.
• He emphasized the superiority of the European society.

The question of landownership

• According to Bernier, one of the fundamental differences between Mughal India and Europe was the lack of private property in the Indian society.
• He had a firm belief in the virtues of private property.
• Crown ownership of land was harmful for both state and its people.
• He thought that the Mughal Emperor owned all land and distributed it among the nobles.
• He argued that lands under the crown ownership could not be passed on to their children.
• So they were averse to any long-term investment in the sustenance and expansion of production.
• The absence of private property prevented the emergence of the class of

‘improving’ landlords as it was in Western Europe to maintain and improve the land.

• It had ruined the agriculture and oppressed the peasants and the living standards of all sections in the society declined except the ruling aristocracy.

Bernier’s description on the social condition of India

​

• Bernier described Indian society as consisting of undifferentiated masses of a very rich and powerful ruling class.
• There was a wide gape between the poorest of poor and richest of the rich. He says “There is no middle state in India.”

Bernier’s description on the Mughal Emperor and his subjects.

• Bernier described the Mughal Empire as the king of “beggars and barbarians”.
• Its cities and towns were ruined and contaminated with “ill air” and its fields “overspread with bushes “and full of “pestilential marishes”.
• He attributed all these problems to the crown ownership of land.
• Bernier says that there was the practice of crown ownership of land and no private ownership of land or private property.

Bernier’s description on the Mughal Emperor

and his subjects.

• But none of the Mughal official documents show that the state was the sole owner of land.
• According to the official chronicler of Akbar’s reign Abul Fazl, the Mughal Emperor collected only the remunerations from the people for the protection given by the state and no rent was collected.
• Bernier regarded the remuneration as land revenue since it was very high sometimes.

The idea of Oriental despotism

• Bernier’s descriptions of landownership influenced western theorists from the 18th century onwards.
• For instance, the French philosopher Montesquieu used Bernier’s account and developed the idea of Oriental despotism.
• According to this idea in Asia (the Orient or the East) the kings enjoyed absolute authority over his subjects and owned all lands.
• There was no private property. All people except King and nobles struggled for survival.

The Concept of Asiatic mode of production

• Karl Marx further developed the idea of Oriental despotism as Asiatic mode of production.
• Marx observes that before colonialism, surplus production was appropriated by the state.
• This led to the emergence of a society that was composed of a large number of autonomous and egalitarian village communities.
• The imperial court respected these villages as long as the flow of surplus was continued. Marx regarded this as a stagnant system

A more complex social reality

• Bernier’s descriptions occasionally hint at a more complex social reality.
• Artisans had no incentive to improve the quality of their manufactures.
• All profits were appropriated by the state. Manufactures were everywhere declining.
• At the same time he agreed that vast quantities of the world’s precious metals flowed into India, as manufactures were exported in exchange for gold and silver.
• He also mentioned that there existed a prosperous merchant community engaging in long distance trade.

Mughal cities

• During the 17th century about 15 percent of the population lived in towns.
• Bernier described Mughal cities as “camp towns”, which were dependent upon imperial patronage.
• There were all kinds of towns: manufacturing towns, trading towns, port- towns, sacred centres, pilgrimage towns etc.
• The existence of towns indicates the prosperity of merchant communities and professional classes.
• Merchants had a strong community or kin ties and were organized into their own caste –cum- occupational groups.
• In western India these groups were called Mahajans, and their chief, the sheth.
• In urban centres such as Ahmedabad the chief of the merchant community who was called nagarsheth collectively represented the Mahajans.

Urban professional classes

• Urban groups included professional groups such as physicians(hakin or vaid),teachers (pundit or mulla), lawyers(wakil), painters, architects, musicians, calligraphers,etc.
• While some depended on imperial patronage

,many made their living by serving other patrons while still others served ordinary people in crowded markets and bazaars.

WOMEN: Slaves, Sati and Labourers

• Travellers who left written accounts were generally men who were not interested in the condition of women in the subcontinent. Sometimes they took social inequities as natural. For instance, slaves were openly sold in markets, like any other commodity, and were regularly exchanged as gifts.
• When Ibn Battuta reached Sind he purchased “horses, camels and slaves” as gifts for Sultan Muhammad bin Tughlaq.
• When he reached Multan, he presented the governor with, “a slave and horse together with raisins and almonds”. Muhammad bin Tughlaq, informs Ibn Battuta, was so happy with the sermon of a preacher named Nasiruddin that he gave him “a hundred thousand tankas (coins) and two hundred slaves”.

WOMEN: Slaves, Sati and Labourers

• It appears from Ibn Battuta’s account that there was considerable differentiation among slaves.
• Some female slaves in the service of the Sultan were experts in music and dance, and Ibn Battuta enjoyed their performance at the

wedding of the Sultan’s sister.

• Female slaves were also employed by the Sultan to keep a watch on his nobles.

WOMEN: Slaves, Sati and Labourers

• Slaves were generally used for domestic labour, and Ibn Battuta found their services particularly indispensable for carrying women and men on palanquins or dola.
• The price of slaves, particularly female slaves required for domestic labour, was very low, and most families who could afford to do so kept at least one or two of them.

WOMEN: Slaves, Sati and Labourers

• Contemporary European travellers and writers often highlighted the treatment of women as a crucial marker of difference between Western and Eastern societies.
• Not surprisingly, Bernier chose the practice of sati for detailed description. He noted that while some women seemed to embrace death cheerfully, others were forced to die.

WOMEN: Slaves, Sati and Labourers

• However, women’s lives revolved around much else besides the practice of sati. Their labour was crucial in both agricultural and non-agricultural production.
• Women from merchant families participated in commercial activities, sometimes even taking mercantile disputes to the court of law.
• It therefore seems unlikely that women were confined to the private spaces of their homes.

Travelers who wrote detailed accounts regarding Indian social customs and religious practices

• Jesuit Roberto Nobili- He translated Indian texts into European languages
• Duarte Barbosa- He was a Portuguese traveler .He wrote a detailed account of trade and society in south India
• Jean-BaptisteTavernier- He was the famous French jeweller who visited India six times. He was particularly fascinated with the trading conditions in India, and compared India to Iran and the Ottoman Empire.
• Italian doctor Manucci- He wrote detailed accounts regarding Indian social customs and religious practices and settled in India.
• Pelsaert-He visited the subcontinent during the 17th century. He was shocked to see the widespread poverty of the people.
• Abdur Razzaq Samarqandi- He visited south India in the 1440s.and saw India as a land of wonder.

Key words

• Metrology: Metrology is the science of measurement
• Hindu: The term “Hindu” was derived from an old Persian word, used to refer to the region east of the river Sindhu (Indus)

Three travellers of the medieval period:

A Comparative study