“The Cup or Mirror of Jamshíd,” who is confounded by Eastern fabulists with Solomon.* This cup was found filled with the Elixir of Immortality, upon the occasion of digging the foundations of Persepolis, and as it mirrored the whole world, this expression, or some other allusive to it, is not uncommonly applied to works on history; and the Jám-i Jahán-numá, i.e. “the World-reflector,” mentioned in page 158 of this Volume, is a title commonly bestowed upon the same magic mirror. Nizámí tells us that Alexander invented the steel mirror, by which it has been supposed allusion is made to the improved reflectors introduced by the Greeks.
The Jám-i Jam comprises tables of the Princes of the house of Tímúr, beginning with that Emperor; including also the Saiyid and Afghán Dynasties, and ending with Muhammad Bahádur Sháh, the reigning King of Dehlí at the time of publication; giving altogether forty-three reigns. The tables show the name of each King's father and mother, his tribe, date of birth, place of accession, age at the time of accession, Hijra year of accession, chronogram of accession, period of reign, legend on coins, age at time of death, year of death, chronogram of death, honorific title after death, place of burial, and a very brief abstract of important events.
These useful tables were lithographed at Ágra, in the year 1840 A.D., and at the conclusion is given a list of several excellent authorities, from which the compiler drew his information, though it must be confessed that some doubt may reasonably be entertained whether these authorities were really appealed to, for a private correspondence which I have held with the author on the subject has failed to elicit any information with respect either to their contents or their present possessors. Indeed, some which are quoted contain nothing whatever calculated to elucidate the period he had under review.
The author is Munshí Saiyid Ahmad Khán, Munsif of Dehlí, who has also written and lithographed at Dehlí a very good description of the remarkable buildings of that capital, accompanied with lithographed representations of them. In the Preface to the Jám-i Jam, he gives his genealogy, and details the several honours acquired by his fathers. His ancestor in the ninth generation, who came originally from Hirát, was appointed Súbadár of Bídar, which he takes care to inform us is equivalent in the English language to “Governor-General.” Another was a Kází, equivalent to “Sessions Judge.” His maternal grandfather, Khwája Farídu-d dín Ahmad Khán, was sent to condole with the King of Persia when his ambassador, Hájí Khalíl Khán, was killed in an affray at Bombay. The same pride of ancestry is exhibited by his elder brother, Saiyid Muhammad Khán, in the Preface to the excellent copy of Jahángír's Autobiography collated by him; only, instead of construing Súbadár to mean “Governor-General,” he is content with the humbler definition of “Governor.”
SIZE—Large 8vo.