The Governor of Harāt at this time was Shāh Ismā‘īl’s son T̤ahmāsp, between six and seven years old. His guardian Amīr Khān took chief part in the diplomatic intervention with Bābur, but associated with him was Amīr Ghiyās̤u’d-dīn—the patron of Khwānd-amīr already mentioned—until put to death as an ally of Bābur. The discussion had with Bābur reveals a complexity of motives demanding attention. Nominally undertaken though intervention was on behalf of Shāh Beg, and certainly so at his request, the Persian officers seem to have been less anxious on his account than for their own position in Khurāsān, their master’s position at the time being weakened by ill-success against the Sult̤ān of Rūm. To Bābur, Shāh Beg is written of as though he were an insubordinate vassal whom Bābur was reducing to order for the Shāh, but when Amīr Khān heard that Shāh Beg was hard pressed, he was much distressed because he feared a victorious Bābur might move on Khurāsān. Nothing indicates however that Bābur had Khurāsān in his thoughts; Hindūstān was his objective, and Qandahār a help on the way; but as Amīr Khān had this fear about him, a probable ground for it is provided by the presence with Bābur of Bāī-qarā exiles whose ambition it must have been to recover their former seat. Whether for Harāt, Kābul, or Hindūstān, Qandahār was strength. Another matter not fitting the avowed purpose of the diplomatic intervention is the death of Ghiyās̤u’d-dīn because an ally of Bābur; this makes Amīr Khān seem to count Bābur as Ismā‘īl’s enemy.
Shāh Beg’s requests for intervention began in 926 AH. (1520 AD.), as also did the remonstrance of the Persian officers with Bābur; his couriers followed one another with entreaty that the Amīrs would contrive for Bābur to retire, with promise of obeisance and of yearly tribute. The Amīrs set forth to Bābur that though Shāh Shujā‘ Beg had offended and had been deserving of wrath and chastisement, yet, as he was penitent and had promised loyalty and tribute, it was now proper for Bābur to raise the siege (of 926 AH.) and go back to Kābul. To this Bābur answered that Shāh Beg’s promise was a vain thing, on which no reliance could be placed; please God!, said he, he himself would take Qandahār and send Shāh Beg a prisoner to Harāt; and that he should be ready then to give the keys of the town and the possession of the Garm-sīr to any-one appointed to receive them.
This correspondence suits an assumption that Bābur acted for Shāh Ismā‘īl, a diplomatic assumption merely, the verbal veil, on one side, for anxiety lest Bābur or those with him should attack Harāt,—on the other, for Bābur’s resolve to hold Qandahār himself.
Amīr Khān was not satisfied with Bābur’s answer, but had his attention distracted by another matter, presumably ‘Ubaidu’l-lāh Khān’s attack on Harāt in the spring of the year (March-April 1521 AD.). Negociations appear to have been resumed later, since Khwānd-amīr claims it as their result that Bābur left Qandahār this year.
e. The Tārīkh-i-sind account.
Mīr Ma‘ṣūm is very brief; he says that in this year (his 922 AH.), Bābur went down to Qandahār before the year’s tribute in grain had been collected, destroyed the standing crops, encompassed the town, and reduced it to extremity; that Shāh Beg, wearied under reiterated attack and pre-occupied by operations in Sind, proposed terms, and that these were made with stipulation for the town to be his during one year more and then to be given over to Bābur. These terms settled, Bābur went to Kābul, Shāh Beg to Sīwī.
The Arghūn families were removed to Shāl and Sīwī, so that the year’s delay may have been an accommodation allowed for this purpose.
f. Concerning dates.
There is much discrepancy between the dates of the two historians. Khwānd-amīr’s agree with the few fixed ones of the period and with the course of events; several of Ma‘ṣūm’s, on the contrary, are seriatim five (lunar) years earlier. For instance, events Khwānd-amīr places under 927 AH. Ma‘ṣūm places under 922 AH. Again, while Ma‘ṣūm correctly gives 913 AH. (1507 AD.) as the year of Bābur’s first capture of Qandahār, he sets up a discrepant series later, from the success Shāh Beg had at Kāhān; this he allots to 921 AH. (1515 AD.) whereas Bābur received news of it (f. 233b) in the beginning of 925 AH. (1519 AD.). Again, Ma‘ṣūm makes Shāh Ḥasan go to Bābur in 921 AH. and stay two years; but Ḥasan spent the whole of 925 AH. with Bābur and is not mentioned as having left before the second month of 926 AH. Again, Ma‘ṣūm makes Shāh Beg surrender the keys of Qandahār in 923 AH. (1517 AD.), but 928 AH. (1522 AD.) is shewn by Khwānd-amīr’s dates and narrative, and is inscribed at Chihil-zīna.[1554]