ʿInāyat-Allāh Kanbū, Šayḫ d. 1082/1671

Historian

Šayḫ ʿInāyat-Allāh Kanbū spent his early life in the service of the Mughals at Lahore, but later retired from the world and lived as a recluse beside a shrine in Delhi. The historian Muhammad Sālih Kanbū Lāhūrī (see author 152) called ʿInāyat-Allāh his elder brother, but whether the two were actually blood-related is not known for certain. It may have been that Muhammad Sālih simply regarded him as an indispensable patron. ʿInāyat-Allāh completed several historical works, but it was a collection of tales entitled Bahār-i Dāniš that brought him the most fame. He died in 1082/1671 at Delhi.

Works

Bahār-i Dāniš     Bahar-Danush; or Garden of Knowledge

Completed 1061/1651.

Bahār-i Dāniš is a “collection of romantic and lascivious tales dealing with the tricks employed by faithless wives to deceive their doting husbands,” adapted from an earlier Indian source.

Takmilah-yi Akbar-nāmah    

Takmilah-yi Akbar-nāmah is a continuation of Abū al-Fażl’s Akbar-nāmah (see Author 7) as Kanbū narrates the last four years of Akbar’s reign.