Akhbar ✷ Indian court newsletter
Alam ✷ Standard used by Shi’as as a focus for their Muharram (qv) venerations. Usually tear-shaped or fashioned into the shape of a hand, they are stylised representations of the standards carried by Imam Hussain at the Battle of Kerbala in AD 680. Often highly ornate and beautiful objects, the best of them are among the greatest masterpieces of medieval Indian metalwork
Amir ✷ Nobleman
Angia ✷ A sensuous, halter-neck version of the choli (qv) bodice, usually transparent or semi-transparent, that became very fashionable in Muslim courts in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Fyze Palmer is wearing one under her peshwaz (qv) in her famous portrait by Zoffany
Apsaras ✷ The courtesans and dancing girls of the Hindu gods; heavenly dispensers of erotic bliss
Arrack ✷ Indian absinthe
Arzee ✷ Persian petition
Aseels ✷ Key figures in a zenana (qv). Usually slave girls by origin, they performed a number of essential administrative and domestic tasks within the women’s quarters, including that of wetnurse. In the Nizam’s zenana the senior aseels were important figures of state
Ashur khana ✷ Mourning hall for use during Muharram (qv)
Avatar ✷ An incarnation
Baksheesh ✷ Tip for services rendered
Banka ✷ Mughal gallant
Baradari ✷ A Mughal-style open pavilion with three arches on each side (lit. ‘twelve doors’)
Begum ✷ Indian Muslim noblewoman. A title of rank and respect: ‘Madam’
Betel ✷ Nut used as a mild narcotic in India, and eaten as paan
Bhand ✷ Buffoon, mummer or mimic
Bhisti ✷ Water carrier
Bibi ✷ An Indian wife or mistress
Bibi ghar ✷ ‘Women’s house’ or zenana (qv)
Bidri ✷ The adjectival form of the place-name Bidar, the capital city of the Islamic Deccan in the fifteenth century. It is normally used to designate metalwork produced in Bidar from an alloy in which zinc predominates, usually decorated with silver or brass inlays in floral patterns against a blackened metal background
Biryani ✷ The rice and meat dish which is the particular speciality of Hyderabadi cuisine
Brahmin ✷ The Hindu priestly caste and the top rung of the caste pyramid
Chamars ✷ Untouchables of the sweeper caste
Char bagh ✷ A formal Mughal garden, named after its division into four (char) squares by a cross of runnels and fountains
Chattri ✷ A domed kiosk supported on pillars, often used as a decorative feature to top turrets and minarets (lit. ‘umbrella’)
Choli ✷ Short (and at this period usually transparent) Indian bodice
Chunam ✷ Polished lime plaster
Coss ✷ Mughal measurement of distance amounting to just over two miles
Daftar ✷ Office, or in the Nizam’s palace, chancellery
Dak ✷ Post (sometimes spelt ‘dawke’ in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries)
Deorhi ✷ Courtyard house or haveli
Derzi ✷ Tailor
Devadasi ✷ Temple dancers, prostitutes and courtesans who were given to the great Hindu temples, usually in infancy by their parents (lit. ‘slave girls of the gods’)
Dharamasala ✷ Rest house
Dhobi ✷ Laundryman
Dhoolie ✷ Covered litter
Dhoti ✷ Loincloth
Divan ✷ Book of collected poetry
Diwan ✷ Prime minister, or the vizier in charge of administrative finance
Dragoman ✷ Interpreter or guide in the Ottoman or Persian Empires
Dubash ✷ Interpreter
Dupatta ✷ Shawl or scarf, usually worn with a salvar kemise (lit. ‘two leaves or widths’). Also known as a chunni
Durbar ✷ Court
Fakir ✷ Sufi holy man, dervish or wandering Muslim ascetic (lit. ‘poor’)
Fatiha ✷ The short opening chapter of the Koran, read at ceremonial occasions as an invocation
Firangi ✷ Foreigner
Firman ✷ An order of the emperor or sultan in a written document
Ghazal ✷ Urdu or Persian love lyric
Hakim ✷ Physician
Halwa ✷ Carrot pudding
Hamam ✷ Turkish-style steam bath
Haram ✷ Forbidden
Harkarra ✷ Runner, messenger, newswriter or spy (lit: ‘all-do-er’). In eighteenth-century sources the word is sometimes spelt hircarrah
Havildar ✷ A sepoy (qv) non-commissioned officer, corresponding to a sergeant
Holi ✷ The Hindu spring festival in which participants sprinkle red and yellow powder on one another
Hookah ✷ Waterpipe or hubble bubble
Id ✷ The two greatest Muslim festivals: Id ul-Fitr marks the end of Ramadan, and Id ul-Zuha commemorates the delivery of Isaac. To celebrate the latter a ram or goat is slaughtered, as on the original occasion recorded in both the Old Testament and the Koran
Iftar ✷ The evening meal to break the Ramadan fast
Jagir ✷ Landed estate, granted for service rendered to the state and whose revenues could be treated as income by the jagirdar
Jali ✷ A latticed stone or wooden screen
Jashn ✷ Party or marriage feast
Karkhana ✷ Workshop or factory
Khanazad ✷ Palace-born princes
Khansaman ✷ In the eighteenth century the word meant butler. Today it more usually means cook
Khanum ✷ A junior wife or concubine
Kharita ✷ Sealed Mughal brocade bag used to send letters as an alternative to an envelope
Khilat ✷ Symbolic court dress
Kotwal ✷ The police chief, chief magistrate or city administrator in a Mughal town
Lakh ✷ One hundred thousand
Langar ✷ Free distribution of food during a religious festival
Lathi ✷ Truncheon or stick
Lota ✷ Water pot
Lungi ✷ Indian-type sarong, longer version of the dhoti (qv)
Mahal ✷ Lit. ‘palace’, but often used to refer to sleeping apartments or the zenana wing of a palace or residence
Maistry ✷ (modern Hindi: mistri) A highly skilled foreman or master craftsman. According to Hobson Jobson the word, ‘a corruption of of the Portuguese mestre has spread into the vernaculars all over India and is in constant Anglo-Indian use’
Majlis ✷ Assembly, especially the gatherings during Muharram (qv)
Mansabdar ✷ A Mughal nobleman and office-holder, whose rank was decided by the number of cavalry he would supply for battle—for example, a mansabdar of 2500 would be expected to provide 2500 horsemen when the Nizam went to war
Marqana ✷ Stalactite-type decoration over a mosque or palace gateway
Marsiya ✷ Urdu or Persian lament or dirge for the martyrdom of Hussain, the grandson of the Prophet, sung in the ashur khana (qv) mourning halls during the festival of Muharram (qv)
Masnavi ✷ Persian or Urdu love lyric
Maula ✷ ‘My Lord’
Mehfil ✷ An evening of courtly Mughal entertainment, normally including dancing, the recitation of poetry and the singing of ghazals (qv)
Mihrab ✷ The niche in a mosque pointing in the direction of Mecca
Mir ✷ Title given before a name usually signifying that the holder is a sayyed (qv)
Mirza ✷ Prince or gentleman
Mohalla ✷ A distinct quarter of a Mughal city—i.e. a group of residential lanes, usually entered through a single gate
Muharram ✷ The great Shi’a Muslim festival commemorating the defeat and death of Imam Hussain, the Prophet’s grandson. Celebrated with particular gusto in Hyderabad and Lucknow
Mujtahid ✷ A cleric; one who does ijtehad, the interpretation of religious texts
Munshi ✷ Indian private secretary or language teacher
Mushaira ✷ Poetic symposium
Musnud ✷ The low arrangement of cushions and bolsters which formed the throne of Indian rulers at this period
Nabob ✷ English corruption of the Hindustani nawab, literally ‘deputy’, which was the title given by the Mughal emperors to their regional governors and viceroys. In England it became a term of abuse directed at returned ‘old India hands’, especially after Samuel Foote’s 1779 play The Nabob brought the term into general circulation
Naqqar khana ✷ Ceremonial drum house
Nautch ✷ Indian dance display
Nazr ✷ Symbolic gift given in Indian courts to a feudal superior
Nizam ✷ Part of the title of the first Subedar of the Deccan, Asaf Jah, Nizam ul-Mulk. In the fashion of the time, Asaf Jah became effectively independent of the Mughal government in Delhi, and at his death in 1748 his title was claimed as hereditary by his dynastic successors, starting with his illegitimate younger son and eventual successor, Nizam Ali Khan
Omrah ✷ Nobleman
Palanquin ✷ Indian litter
Peshkash ✷ An offering or present given by a subordinate to a superior. The term was used more specifically by the Marathas as the money paid to them by ‘subordinate’ powers such as the Nizam
Peshwaz ✷ Long, high-waisted gown
Pikdan ✷ Spittoon
Pir ✷ Sufi holy man
Pirzada ✷ Official at a Sufi shrine, often a descendant of the founding saint
Prasad ✷ Temple sweets given to devotees in exchange for offerings—a tradition transferred from Hindu to Islamic practice at the Sufi shrines of the Deccan
Pukka ✷ Proper, correct
Purdah ✷ Lit. ‘a curtain’; used to signify the concealment of women within the zenana (qv)
Qawal ✷ A singer of qawalis (qv)
Qawalis ✷ Rousing hymns sung at Sufi shrines
Qiladar ✷ Fort keeper
Qizilbash ✷ Lit. ‘redheads’. Name given to Saffavid soldiers (and later traders) due to the tall red cap worn under their turbans
Rakhi ✷ Band worn around the wrist as a sign of brotherhood, solidarity or protection
Salatin ✷ Palace-born princes
Sanyasi ✷ Hindu ascetic
Sarpeche ✷ Turban jewel or ornament
Sati ✷ The practice of widow-burning, or the burned widow herself
Sawaree ✷ Elephant stables (and the whole establishment and paraphernalia related to the keeping of elephants)
Sayyed (or f. Sayyida) ✷ A lineal descendant of the Prophet Mohammed. Sayyeds often have the title ‘Mir’
Sepoy ✷ Indian soldier in the service of the East India Company
Shadi ✷ Marriage feast or party
Shamiana ✷ Indian marquee, or the screen formed around the perimeter of a tented area
Shi’a ✷ One of the two principal divisions of Islam, dating back to a split immediately after the death of the Prophet, between those who recognised the authority of the Medinian caliphs and those who followed the Prophet’s son-in-law Ali (Shi’at Ali means ‘the party of Ali’ in Arabic). Though most Shi’ites live in Iran, there have always been a large number in the Indian Deccan, and Hyderabad was for much of its history a centre of Shi’ite culture
Shikar ✷ Hunting
Sirdar ✷ Nobleman
Surahi ✷ Traditional tall, elegant north Indian water and wine cooler/flask
Tawaif ✷ The cultivated and urbane dancing girls and courtesans who were such a feature of late Mughal society and culture
Thali ✷ Tray
’Umbara ✷ Covered elephant howdah
Unani ✷ Ionian (or Byzantine Greek) medicine, originally passed to the Islamic world through Byzantine exiles in Persia and still practised in India today
’Urs ✷ Festival day
Vakil ✷ Ambassador or representative (though in modern usage the word means merely lawyer)
Vilayat ✷ Province, homeland
Yakshi ✷ Female Hindu fertility nymphs, often associated with sacred trees and pools
Zamindar ✷ Landholder or local ruler
Zenana ✷ Harem, or women’s quarters