6. Alī Qulī Beg, from Persia entered Akbar's service, and in the war with the Rānā of Chitōr, served under Prince Salīm (Jahāngīr), who gave him the title of Shēr Afgan, 'tiger-thrower', with reverence to his deeds of prowess. The spelling afgan is correct. The word is the radical of the Persian verb afgandan, 'to throw down'.
7. In October, 1605.
8. Properly Kutb-ud-dīn Khan. He was foster-brother of Prince Salīm (Jahāngīr), and his appointment as viceroy alarmed Shēr Afgan, and caused the latter to throw up his appointment in Bengal. The word Kutb (Qutb) cannot stand alone as a name. Kutb (Qutb)-ud-dīn means 'pole-star of religion'.
9. Tāndān, or Tānra. Ancient town, now a petty village, in Mālda District, Bengal, the capital of Bengal after the decadence of Gaur. Its history is obscure, and the very site of the city has not been accurately determined. It is certain that it was in the immediate neighbourhood of Gaur, and south- west of that town beyond the Bhāgīrathī. Old Tāndān has been utterly swept away by the changes in the course of the Pāglā. It was occupied by the Afghan king of Bengal in A.D. 1564, and is not mentioned after 1660. (I.G., 1908.)
10. This narrative, notwithstanding all the minute details with which it is garnished, cannot be accepted as sober history; and I do not know from what source the author obtained it. 'This lady, whose maiden name was Muhr-un-Nisā, or "Seal of Womankind", had attracted the admiration of Jahāngīr when he was crown prince, but Akbar married her to a young Turkomān and settled them in Bengal. After Jahāngīr's accession the husband was killed in a quarrel with the governor of the province, and the wife was placed under the care of one of Akbar's widows, with whom she remained four years, and then married Jahāngīr (1610). There is nothing to justify a suspicion of the Emperor's connivance in the husband's death; nor do Indian historians corroborate the invidious criticisms of "Normal" by European travellers; on the contrary, they portray Nūr-Mahall as a pattern of all the virtues, and worthy to wield the supreme influence which she obtained over the Emperor.' (Lane-Poole, The History of the Moghul Emperors of Hindustan illustrated by their Coins, p. xix.) The authorities on which this statement is founded are given in E. & D., vol. vi, pp. 397 and 402-5. See also Blochmann, Āīn, vol. i, pp. 496, 524. Details of such stories in the various chronicles always differ. Jahāngīr openly rejoiced in the death of Shēr Afgan, and it is by no means clear that he was not responsible for the event. He was not troubled by nice scruples. The first element in the lady's personal name seems to be Mihr, 'sun', not Muhr, 'seal'. The words are identical in ordinary Persian writing.
11. The long interval which elapsed between Shēr Afgan's death and the marriage with the Emperor is a fact opposed to the assumptions which the author adopts that Nūr Mahall was 'nothing loth', and that the death of her first husband was contrived by Jahāngīr.
12. Quaint Sir Thomas Herbert thus expresses himself: 'Meher Metzia [Mihr-un-nisā] is forthwith espoused with all solemnity to the King, and her name changed to Nourshabegem [Nūr Shāh Bēgam], or Nor-mahal, i.e., Light or Glory of the Court; her Father upon this affinity advanced upon all the other Umbraes ['umarā', or nobles]; her brother, Assaph-Chan [Āsaf Khān], and most of her kindred, smiled upon, with the addition of Honours, Wealth, and Command. And in this Sun-shine of content Jangheer [Jahāngīr] spends some years with his lovely Queen, without regarding ought save Cupid's Currantoes' (Travels, ed. 1677, p. 74). Authority exists for the title Āsaf Jāh, as well as for the variant Āsaf Khān.
Coins were struck in the joint names of Jahāngīr and his consort, bearing a rhyming Persian couplet to the effect that
'By command of Jahāngīr the King, from the name of Nūr Jahān his Queen, gold gained a hundred beauties.'
The Queen's administration is censured by some of the European travellers who visited India during Jahāngīr's reign as being venal and inefficient, and she is accused of cruelty and perfidy. She died on the 18th December (N.S.), 1645, and was buried by the aide of Jahāngīr in his mausoleum at Lahore. At her death she was in her 72nd year, according to the Muhammadan lunar reckoning, and would thus have been thirty-four solar years of age when the Emperor married her in 1610 (Beale: Blochmann).