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Indo-Persian culture

“Indo-Persian culture” refers to those Persian aspects that have been integrated into or absorbed into South Asian civilization, and in particular, into the civilization of what we would generally consider to be “northern” India, parts of modern-day Pakistan, as well as cities like Hyderbad located in the Deccan Peninsula.

Introduction: With Persian language and culture being introduced to the subcontinent sometime during or after the tenth century CE and with the Persian language and culture attaining official patronage during the era of the Great Mughals (1526-1707), the influence of Persian literature, and cultural generally, as well as the absorption of Persian language into the northern Indian vernacular has received both scholarly attention and has been the subject also of popular discourse.

Indo-Persian Culture in Contemporary India and Pakistan: The decline of Indo-Persian culture is not only controversial but problematic, particularly since Indo-Persian culture has helped produce certain composite traditions within the subcontinent that survive to this day, of which the Urdu language and literature is notable. The legacy of Indo-Persinate culture moreover can also be seen in much of the Mughal architecture within Lahore, Delhi and Agra, latterly of which the Taj Mahal is world renowned. In many ways, the absorption and assimilation of Persian or Persianate culture within India may be compared to the gradual (if sometimes problematic) absorption of English, British or Western culture generally of which the English language is perhaps the most notable and controversial within both India and Pakistan today. The influence of Persian language moreover may be seen in the considerable proportion of loan words absorbed into the vernaculars of the north and north-west of the subcontinent including Punjabi, Urdu, Hindi, Kashmiri and Pashto as well as by the presence of Dari or “Afghan” Persian.

History of Indo-Persian Culture: With the presence of Muslim culture in the region in the Ghaznavid period, Lahore and Uchh were established as centers of Persian literature. Abu al-Faraj Runi and Masud Sad Salman (d. 1121) were the two earliest major Indo-Persian poets based in Lahore. The earliest of the “great” Indo-Persian poets was Amir Khusrao (d. 1325) of Delhi, who has since attained iconic subcontinent within the subcontinent as, among other things, the “father” of both modern Hindi and Urdu literature.

The Delhi Sultanate and the Mughal Era: Indo-Persian culture flourished to varying degrees alongside Turkish or Turkic culture during the period of the Delhi Sultanate (1206-1526). The invasion of Babur in 1526, the end of the Delhi Sultanate, and the establishment of what would become the Mughal Empire would usher the golden age of Indo-Persian culture with particular reference to the art and architecture of the Mughal era.

The Mughal Era to the British Raj: Persian persisted as the language of the Mughal regime up to and including the year 1707 which marked the death of the Emperor Aurangzeb, generally considered the last of the “Great Mughals”. Thereafter, with the decline of the Mughal empire, the 1739 invasion of Delhi by Nadir Shah and the gradual growth of European power within the subcontinent, Persian or Persianate culture commenced a period of decline although it nevertheless enjoyed patronage and may even have flourished within the many regional “empires” or kingdoms of the subcontinent including that of the Sikh “Maharaja” Ranjit Singh (r. 1799-1837).

Persian as a language of governance and education was abolished in 1839 by the British and the last Mughal emperor Bahadhur Shah Zafar, even if his was rule was purely symbolic or ceremonial, was overthrown in 1857 by the British.

After the British Raj: Given that the Mughals had historically symbolized Indo-Persian culture to one degree or another, the overthrow of Bahadhur Shah Zafar and the institution of the British Raj in 1858 may be considered as marking the end of the Indo-Persian era, even if, after 1857, Persian would still retain an audience and even produce commendable literature such as the philosophical poetry of Muhammad Iqbal (d. 1938).