ʿEŠQ, shaikh ḡolām moḥyĪ-al-dĪn MOBTALĀ

 

ʿEŠQ, shaikh ḡolām moḥyĪ-al-dĪn MOBTALĀ, 18th-19th century author writing in Persian and Urdu. He was born in Meerut, in present day Uttar Pradesh, and later moved to Delhi where he was employed by Nawwāb Najaf Khan (d. 1169/1782; Rieu, Pers. Man. II, p. 723), Amīr-al-Omarāʾ to Shah ʿĀlam II (d. 1221/1806). His father, Neʿmat-Allāh, whose pen name was Neʿamī, is said to have composed a dīvān of poetry in Persian. ʿEšq pursued his education under the direction of his father, who also helped him develop his poetical talent. He died in Ramażān 1241/April 1826 and was buried in Meerut.

Major works of ʿEšq’s that have survived include: a dīvān of Persian poems comprising ḡazals, qaṣīdas, maṯnawīs, and robāʿīs (MS London, British Library, Or. 308); a Persian maṯnawī called Fosūn-e ʿešq; an Urdu translation of Hātefī Herātī’s (d. 927/1522) poem Layī o Majnūn, which ʿEšq completed in 1231 /1815-16 (Aḥmad); Čahār čaman (comp. 1187/1773) and Ṭabaqāt-e soḵan (comp. 1222/1807-8),two taḏkera of poets in Persian. ʿEšq is remembered chiefly for his Ṭabaqāt-e soḵan, which reportedly consists of two sections, the first one dealing with Urdu poets and the second one with Persian poets (Sprenger, pp. 187-88 n. 53). However, the published edition of the work contains only the accounts of Urdu poets from the time of Moḥammad Shah (r. 1719-48) up to the beginning of Akbar II’s reign (1806-37). Whether or not the second section, containing the notices of Persian poets, actually exists remains debatable.

 

Bibliography (for cited works not given in detail see “Short References”):

R. Aḥmad, “Mobtalā kā ēk maḵṭūṭa” Navā-ye adab 14/4, Bombay, October-December 1963, pp. 52-60.

Ḡōllām Moḥyī-al-Dīn ʿEšq (Mobtalā), Ṭabaqāt-e soḵan, facs., Lucknow, 1991.

G. de Tassy, Histoire de la littérature hinduie et hindoustanie II, Paris, 1870, pp. 45-46.

F. Fatḥpūrī, Urdu šoʿārāʾ kē taḏkerē awr taḏkera-nigārī, Lahore, 1972, pp. 242-46.

Golčīn-e Maʿānī, Taḏkerahā I, p. 764; II, pp. 168-69.

N. Hadi, Dictionary of Indo-Persian literature, New Delhi, 1995, p. 263.

Ḥ. Naqvī, Šoʿarāʾ-e Urdu kē tadḵerē, Lucknow, 1976, pp. 641-69.

Abu’l-Qāsem Qodrat-Allāh Khan, Majmūʿa-ye nāḡz, ed. Ḥ. M. Šayrānī, Lahore, 1933, II, p. 401.

A. Sprenger, A Catalogue of the Arabic, Persian and Hindustani Manuscripts of the Libraries of the King of Oudh, Calcutta, 1854.

Storey, I/2, pp. 883-84.

(Munibur Rahman)

Originally Published: December 15, 1998

Last Updated: January 19, 2012

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