The making of a Timurid sovereign: Mughal imperial identity in the Baburnama
Abstract
This paper studies the self-authored memoir of Babur, the Baburnama, to argue that the intended objectives of Babur in composing his memoir was to develop a text based ‘memory space’. The functions and significance of this memory space were manifold, but central to it was the deployment of textual narrative to portray Babur as an embodied link to the past of Timurid glory and an Islamic moral and cosmic order amidst the the local facts of life in the new political constituency in India. By claiming this privileged charismatic role, Babur was attempting to stem the independent impulse among his Chaghatayid and Timurid followers and cohere them into stable ties of service and loyalty around the person of a sacral sovereign. This textual strategy was crucial to the processes of Mughal settlement, acculturation and homemaking in India.