Tabbarok's Mughal tombs for the mind

Alex Tabbarok has a theory about 'Tomb economics'-

The Mughals of Northern India are famous for their tombs, Humayun’s tomb in Delhi, Jahangir’s Tomb in Lahore and, of course, the Taj Mahal. Why so many tombs? Culture surely has something to do with it, although conservative Muslims tend to frown on tombs and ancestor worship as interference with the communication between man and God. Incentives are another reason.

 The Wahhabis certainly oppose grandiose tombs and forbid worship at such places. However, Indian Islam has a Sufi notion of 'barzakh'- a type of life in the grave- and worship at the tombs of Sufi saints- or other notables- is very popular. An English writer- James I's court jester- is buried in Surat. People worship at his grave in the belief that he was a Sufi Pir.

Hindus normally cremate their dead. However holy men are buried because they are said to be in 'samadhi'. Thus, like Muslims and Christians and Jews, they will rise from the dead. Naturally, they will be pleased to do so from a magnificent tomb.

One reason for having an expensive tomb would be to give a locus for the 'waqf'- i.e. Trust- holding land for the benefit of one's descendants. Being able to say that such and such tomb belongs to your ancestor gives you a claim on the revenues of the associated 'taluk'.  Waqfs were important because they were a way to evade the requirements of Islamic inheritance law such that estates were broken up.

In the case of Mughal Emperors, one may as well have a magnificent tomb rather than bequeath an overflowing treasury to your successor- who as likely as not to have killed or imprisoned you, more particularly if he was your son.

However, as elsewhere in the world, a magnificent family mausoleum gave 'soft power' and legitimacy to a dynasty. Below is a picture of the Bhutto mausoleum in their ancestral Larkana, Sindh.

Many capable politicians/ soldiers of fortune/ administrators had no progeny or were not interested in creating a dynasty. Often such people were employed in places they found alien. They had no desire to be buried there. They simply wanted to make enough money to go home though this was unlikely.

Under the Mansabdari system which governed the nobility, the Mughal Emperor didn’t give perpetual grants of land.

But the holder of land could be made the mansab in return for providing soldiers and cavalrymen. A better course would be to simply pay the office holder while discharging judicial and administrative functions at the local level so as to be able to protect the family demense.

On death, all land that had been granted to the noble reverted back to the Emperor, effectively a 100% estate tax.

It was not the land which was granted but the right to collect revenue from it so as to provide soldiers and horsemen to the Emperor.

In other words, land titling for the Mughal nobility was not hereditary.

This is the conventional, Romila Thapar type, view. Yet Muslim Rajput, Jat or other 'Choudhry' type families were marrying into the Mughal aristocracy and their lands were hereditary and of the 'deshmukh' type. Often, the 'Mughal' or other 'Ashraf' immigrant refused a land-grant preferring cash on the grounds that India was dar ul harb- imperfectly Islamicized. But this scruple disappeared in the second generation. Still, it is true that when Empires are expanding and courtiers and soldiers of fortune can rise quickly, then the nobility shows great prodigality in expenditure. Thus, during the Elizabethan Age, many a Squire mortgaged his lands to the hilt and spent it all on a magnificent costume so as to cut a figure at court. This could pay off spectacularly, but- equally- one may end one's days in the Tower waiting for the Executioner's ax.

At the same time there were hereditary aristocracies who lived in comfort, if not opulence, on their Estates but who cut a somewhat awkward figure when they attended Parliament while transacting Estate related business in the Capital, or regional center. In Europe there was a continuous circulation between the Courtly elite and the Squirearchy. But this is also true of the Ashraf aristocracy of India.

Since land could not be handed down to the next generation, there was very little incentive for the Mughal nobility to build palaces or the kind of ancestral homes that are common in Europe.

This is silly. A profligate borrows money to build palaces. At his death it will be seized in any case. However, a peculiarity of the Mughal Empire was that life was healthier and as luxurious on the march and sleeping under elaborate tents of the finest fabrics.

The one exception to the rule, however, was for tombs. Tombs would not revert back to the Emperor. Hence the many Mughal tombs

While the Mughal Emperors were powerful, only their own family members got elaborate tombs. Safdar Jang's tomb, whose architect was Ethiopian, dates from the period when Emperors were figure-heads. There are a couple of exceptions to this rule. The poet Rahim- a Minister of Akbar's- had an elaborate mausoleum as did some other famous artists who established an 'Ustad Shagird' lineage of discipleship. But artists are not always able to protect their Masters' mausoleums from Soldiers. Take Rahim's splendid tomb.  Its marble and sandstone were stolen for Safdar Jang's burial place. There may have been a lot of other such tombs which were pitilessly plundered for building materials. Rahim's great reputation should have kept his tomb safe- at least, it is still standing. How many others have disappeared?

What is certain is that under the British, where hereditary zamindars flourished many beautiful palaces and havelis were built. But it was seldom the case that a family remained wealthy for more than three or four generations. In any case, polygamy and traditional inheritance laws meant that many splendid mansions turned into pestilential slums populated by emaciated descendants of great merchants or landed proprietors. Muslim tombs- generally under the supervision of corrupt or ineffectual Waqf boards- are a favorite target for 'encroachment' and the rapacity of 'land sharks'. Thus, the best investment one can make for one's posterity is to get your idiot son a PhD from an American University. For all earthly glory passes away while a Green Card yields inestimable benefits even unto the seventh generation. Thus the best tombs are tombs for the mind and linked to being able to emigrate to greener pastures.