Abstract
Abstract Even though all state documents in Marwar in the second half of the eighteenth century were issued in Rajasthani, Persian-language documents continued to have an active legal life and were debated, discussed and judged through Rajasthani-language petitions and orders. A close reading of one such dispute highlights tensions over the authority of community versus documents, how new forms of state record-keeping affected the legal use of documents, and how the Rajput king’s practice of customary law led both to the interpolation of shariʿa principles into that law when applied to Muslims and to the restriction of the qazi’s jurisdiction.
Highlights
During the eighteenth century, Rajput kingdoms in the region of western India called Rajasthan became increasingly independent from Mughal rule
A close reading of one such dispute highlights tensions over the authority of community versus documents, how new forms of state record-keeping affected the legal use of documents, and how the Rajput king’s practice of customary law led both to the interpolation of sharia principles into that law when applied to Muslims and to the restriction of the qazi’s jurisdiction
The use and visibility of Persian had shrunk during the eighteenth century in Rajasthan, but it did not fully disappear even as official record-keeping practices in Rajasthani obscured its presence
Summary
Rajput kingdoms in the region of western India called Rajasthan became increasingly independent from Mughal rule. Unlike the Persian hiba-nāma, which was an interpersonal document registered with a qazi, the Rajasthani documents regarding Pirbakhas and Vasal’s dispute were official orders that became part of Marwar state records.
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