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Various
Muslim dynasties ruled much of India from their arrival in the
1100's and 1200's. Most
of them spoke Persian or Turkish.
These were the languages used, in a slightly Indianized form,
for the business of government and court.
Muslim
poets Malik Mahammod Jayasi, Raskhan, Rahim, and others wrote Sufi
and Vaishnava (pertaining to Vishnu) poetry.
The religious and cultural synthesis of Islam and Hinduism
that was a special concern of medieval India finds frequent
expression in their literature.
Bulleh Shah, the most famous Muslim Punjabi poet, popularized
Sufism (Islamic doctrine of divine love) through Punjabi kafi (verse
form). Shah Laatif, a
Sindhi Muslim poet, wrote an important Sufi text, Risalo.
In
the medieval period, Urdu came into being.
Amir Khusrau (1253-1325), a great Sufi poet and an early
architect of India's composite culture, experimented with poetry in
a language that was a mixture of Persian and Hindi.
This was the origin of Urdu.
See KHUSRAU, AMIR.
Urdu
poetry has largely followed Persian forms and metres, but it has
also adopted some of the purely Indian forms.
The ghazal (lyrical couplet), qasidah (ode of praise), and
marsia (elegy) are of Iranian origin.
The poet Sauda (1706-1781) gave rigour and versatility to
Urdu poetry. Dard
(1720-1785) and Mir Taqi Mir (1722-1810) gave Urdu maturity and
ushered it into the modern period of literature.
The
Mughal Empire of the 1500's to the 1700's offered a livelihood to
many poets. Richly
illustrated memoirs of emperors form part of the historical and
artistic heritage of this period
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