SIKHS` RELATIONS WITH MUGHAL EMPERORS. The Janam sakhis, traditional, accounts of the life of Guru Nanak (1469-1539), describe a meeting between him and Babar (1483-1530), founder of the Mughal dynasty, who was impressed by the former`s spiritual manner. Four of the Guru`s sabdas included in the Guru Granth Sahib allude

ALAHNIAN, Guru Nanak\'s composition in measure Vadahans in the Guru Granth Sahib. Alahni, generally used in its plural form alahnian, is a dirge wailingly sung in chorus by women mourning the death of a relation. Etymologically, the word means an utterance in praise (of the departed person). The sorrowful

DAULAT RAI, DIWAN, a civil administrator in Sikh times, was the son of Diwan Lakkhi Mall, governor of Dera Isma`il Khan and Bannu. In 1844, Diwan Lakkhi Mall died and Daulat Rai was allowed to succeed him in his office by Wazir Hira Singh on payment of a nazarana

Shah Mohmmad is rightly acclaimed as the national poet of the Punjab in the nineteenth century at least. Though he is said to have composed a kissa, i.e. a narrative poem of love as well, he is best known for his celebrated composition: Jangnama Singhan te Frangian. With the

PANJAB SINGH, son of Sham Singh, a banker in the village of Gharjakh, near Gujrariwala, enlisted in the force of Fateh Singh Kaliarivala as a trooper. After the death of his patron, Fateh Singh, in 1807, in the battle of Naraingarh, he went over to Maharaja Ranjit Singh, who

SLOKAS OF SHAIKH FARID. Baba Shaikh Farid GanjiShakar (1173-1264), the famous Sufi saint born in the Punjab, some of whose compositions are included in the Guru Granth Sahib, was a poet whose Punjabi verses form the first recorded poetry in the Punjabi language. Guru Nanak himself seems to have

AMIR SINGH SANDHANVALIA (d. 1827), a collateral of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, was born the son of Didar Singh Sandhanvalia. In 1784, he, upon the death of his father, succeeded to the family estates which he considerably enlarged. As Mahan Singh and Ranjit Singh rose to power, he seized several

DAYA KAUR, RAM (d. 1823), widow of Gurbakhsh Singh of the Nishanavali principality of the Sikhs who ruled over Ambala, assumed control of the misi and the family estate upon her husband`s death in 1786. She ruled over the territory remarkably well for nearly 37 years. Sir Lepel Griffin

KAHN SINGH, a Kuka leader, was born in 1840 at the village of Hazro in Rawalpindi district, now in Pakistan. His father`s name was Bhai Manna Singh. He was a nephew of Baba Balak Singh, founder of the Kuka faith, after whose death he came to be acknowledged as

PARCHIAN PATSHAI 10 is an anonymous and so far unpublished work, comprising 50 parchts or stories from the life of Guru Gobind Singh (MS. held at the Khalsa College, Amritsar, under MS. No. 2300E). Of the 45 folios, 14 describe in brief the lives of the first nine Gurus; the

SOLDIER AND TRAVELLER: MEMOIRS OF ALEXANDER GARDNER, edited by Major Hugh Pearse, with an introduction by Sir Richard Temple, was first published in 1898 by William Black wood and Sons of Edinburgh and London, and was reprinted by the Languages Department, Punjab, in 1970. Alexander Gardner (1785-1877), a European

AZIZ UDDIN, FAQIR (1780-1845), physician, diplomat, and foreign minister at the court of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, was the eldest son of Ghulam Mohy udDin, a leading physician of Lahore. Of his two brothers, Nur udDin held charge of the city of Lahore and had been governor of Gujrat, and Imam