The Farhang-i Jahangiri () is a

Persian Persian may refer to: * People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language ** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples ** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...

dictionary compiled in the 17th century by Mir Jamal al-din Husayn Inju, and commissioned by

Mughal Emperor The emperors of the Mughal Empire, who were all members of the Timurid dynasty (House of Babur), ruled the empire from its inception on 21 April 1526 to its dissolution on 21 September 1857. They were supreme monarchs of the Mughal Empire in ...

Akbar Akbar (Jalal-ud-din Muhammad Akbar, – ), popularly known as Akbar the Great, was the third Mughal emperor, who reigned from 1556 to 1605. Akbar succeeded his father, Humayun, under a regent, Bairam Khan, who helped the young emperor expa ...

. It is one of the most important Persian-language dictionaries produced in

Mughal India The Mughal Empire was an early modern empire in South Asia. At its peak, the empire stretched from the outer fringes of the Indus River Basin in the west, northern Afghanistan in the northwest, and Kashmir in the north, to the highlands of pre ...

, and has been termed a "benchmark" in the genre of Persian dictionary-writing.

Writing

Mir Jamal al-din Husayn Inju hailed from

Shiraz Shiraz (; ) is the List of largest cities of Iran, fifth-most-populous city of Iran and the capital of Fars province, which has been historically known as Pars (Sasanian province), Pars () and Persis. As of the 2016 national census, the popu ...

(in present-day

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) and also known as Persia, is a country in West Asia. It borders Iraq to the west, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia to the northwest, the Caspian Sea to the north, Turkmenistan to the nort ...

), born into a noble

Sayyid ''Sayyid'' is an honorific title of Hasanid and Husaynid lineage, recognized as descendants of the Islamic prophet Muhammad through his daughter Fatima and Ali's sons Hasan ibn Ali, Hasan and Husayn ibn Ali, Husayn. The title may also refer ...

family. He emigrated to Mughal India at an early age, spending the majority of his life in the city of

Agra Agra ( ) is a city on the banks of the Yamuna river in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, about south-east of the national capital Delhi and 330 km west of the state capital Lucknow. With a population of roughly 1.6 million, Agra is the ...

. He rose to a prominent position in the court of the Mughal Emperor Akbar, and began writing the dictionary at the ruler's request in the 1590s. Inju was advised by Akbar to investigate words and idioms from

Middle Persian Middle Persian, also known by its endonym Pārsīk or Pārsīg ( Inscriptional Pahlavi script: , Manichaean script: , Avestan script: ) in its later form, is a Western Middle Iranian language which became the literary language of the Sasania ...

, to understand the nature of the Persian language before it was influenced by

Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...

; this was a major objective of the dictionary.

Muzaffar Alam Muzaffar Alam (born 3 February 1947) is the George V. Bobrinskoy Professor in South Asian Languages and Civilizations at the University of Chicago. Biography Muzaffar Alam is a historian trained at Jamia Millia Islamia (New Delhi), Aligarh Mu ...

interprets this as emblematic of a larger trend of Persian linguistic purification attempts in Mughal India. Richard Eaton views the production of this dictionary as part of efforts by Akbar to associate the Mughal court with Persian culture. The dictionary was completed after twelve years in 1608, by which time Akbar had died and been succeeded by his son

Jahangir Nur-ud-din Muhammad Salim (31 August 1569 – 28 October 1627), known by his imperial name Jahangir (; ), was List of emperors of the Mughal Empire, Emperor of Hindustan from 1605 until his death in 1627, and the fourth Mughal emperors, Mughal ...

; Inju hence named the dictionary in honor of him. In 1622, Inju authored a second edition of the dictionary. The Farhang-i Jahangiri was considered a standard dictionary of Persian in the early 17th century. It was highly influential on subsequent dictionaries such as ''

Farhang-i Rashidi The Farhang-i Rashidi () is a Persian dictionary compiled in 17th-century Mughal India by scholar Abd-al-Rashid Thattawi, in the city of Thatta. The dictionary is one of the major contributions to Persian lexicography from the Mughal era, and is ...

'' and ''

Burhan-i Qati The ''Burhan-i Qati'' () is a Persian dictionary compiled during the 17th century by Muhammad Husayn bin Khalaf Tabrizi. Produced in the Indian city of Hyderabad and dedicated to the seventh Qutb Shahi sultan Abdullah Qutb Shah Abdullah Qutb ...

''. It also inspired the contemporary Iranian poet and lexicographer

Soruri Kashani Soruri Kashani (: died after 1626) was a poet and lexicographer in 16th and 17th century Safavid Iran, who composed the Persian dictionary . Soruri was a native of Kashan. His father Hajji Mohammad was reportedly a shoemaker, which Soruri also wor ...

to write a second edition of his dictionary ''

Farhang-e Soruri The ''Farhang-e Soruri'' (), also known as ''Majma al-fors'' and ''Loghat-e Soruri'', is a Persian dictionary composed by the Safavid poet and lexicographer Soruri Kashani in 1599/1600. It was dedicated to the Safavid ruler Shah Abbas I (). Afte ...

''.

Content

The Farhang-i Jahangiri lists 9,830 words, arranged in alphabetical order. The ordering is unconventional in that it is alphabetised by second letter of the word, then first letter. These words were taken from the works of an extensive number of Persian poets. Each entry provides a definition as well as poetic verses where the word was used. The dictionary used at least 44 Persian dictionaries as sources, as well as Persian technical treatises and oral sources. The dictionary contains an introduction, which includes a discussion of the sources and a detailed study of the Persian language. The dictionary's supplement includes five glossaries.

References

{{Reflist Persian dictionaries Mughal literature 17th-century Indian books 17th-century Persian books