Gulchehara Begum (also known as GulChihra or GulShara; c. 1515–1557) was a Mughal princess, daughter of Emperor Zāhir ud-Dīn Mohammad Babur of

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

, and sister of Emperor

Humayun Nasir-ud-Din Muhammad ( fa, ) (; 6 March 1508 – 27 January 1556), better known by his regnal name, Humāyūn; (), was the second emperor of the Mughal Empire, who ruled over territory in what is now Eastern Afghanistan, Pakistan, Northern ...

. Later, her nephew, Prince Jalal-ud-Din Mohammed ascended the imperial throne as Emperor

Akbar Abu'l-Fath Jalal-ud-din Muhammad Akbar (25 October 1542 – 27 October 1605), popularly known as Akbar the Great ( fa, ), and also as Akbar I (), was the third Mughal emperor, who reigned from 1556 to 1605. Akbar succeeded his father, Hum ...

Background

Her name means literally "A Face like Flowers" in Persian. She was a descendant of the lines of highest Central Asian aristocracy:

Timur Timur ; chg, ''Aqsaq Temür'', 'Timur the Lame') or as ''Sahib-i-Qiran'' ( 'Lord of the Auspicious Conjunction'), his epithet. ( chg, ''Temür'', 'Iron'; 9 April 133617–19 February 1405), later Timūr Gurkānī ( chg, ''Temür Kür ...

through his son

Miran Shah Mirza Jalal-ud-din Miran Shah Beg (1366 – 20 April 1408), commonly known as Miran Shah ( fa, میران شاہ), was a son of the Central Asian conqueror Timur, founder of the Timurid Empire. During his father's reign, Miran Shah was initi ...

, and

Genghis Khan ''Chinggis Khaan'' ͡ʃʰiŋɡɪs xaːŋbr />Mongol script: ''Chinggis Qa(gh)an/ Chinggis Khagan'' , birth_name = Temüjin , successor = Tolui (as regent)Ögedei Khan , spouse = , issue = , house = Borjigin , ...

through his son

Chagatai Khan Chagatai Khan ( Mongolian: ''; Čaɣatay''; mn, Цагадай, translit=Tsagadai; chg, , ''Čaġatāy''; ug, چاغاتاي خان, ''Chaghatay-Xan''; zh, 察合台, ''Chágětái''; fa, , ''Joghatây''; 22 December 1183 – 1 July 1242) ...

. Her mother was Dildar Begum and she was the sister of

Hindal Mirza Abu'l-Nasir Muhammad (4 March 1519 – 20 November 1551), better known by the sobriquet Hindal ( Chagatai: "Taker of India"), was a Mughal prince and the youngest son of Emperor Babur, the founder of the Mughal Empire and the first Mughal e ...

and

Gulbadan Begum Gulbadan Begum ( 1523 – 7 February 1603) was a Mughal princess and the daughter of Emperor Babur, the founder of the Mughal Empire. She is best known as the author of ''Humayun-Nama'', the account of the life of her half-brother, Empero ...

.The House of Timur: Genealogy of the Royal Family of India

Early life

When Princess Gulbadan was born her father had been lord in

Kabul Kabul (; ps, , ; , ) is the capital and largest city of Afghanistan. Located in the eastern half of the country, it is also a municipality, forming part of the Kabul Province; it is administratively divided into 22 municipal districts. Acco ...

for sometime; he was master also in

Kunduz , native_name_lang = prs , other_name = , settlement_type = City , image_skyline = Kunduz River valley.jpg , imagesize = 300 , image_alt = , image_caption = , image_ ...

and

Badakhshan Badakhshan is a historical region comprising parts of modern-day north-eastern Afghanistan, eastern Tajikistan, and Taxkorgan Tajik Autonomous County in China. Badakhshan Province is one of the 34 provinces of Afghanistan. Much of historic Ba ...

, had held

Bajaur Bajaur District ( ps, باجوړ ولسوالۍ, ur, ) is a district in Malakand Division of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in Pakistan. Until 2018, it was an agency of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, then during restructuring that merged ...

and Swat since 1519, and Qandahar for a year. During those years he had been styled "padshah", in token of headship of the house of Timur and of his independent sovereignty. Later Babur set out on his last expedition across the

Indus The Indus ( ) is a transboundary river of Asia and a trans-Himalayan river of South and Central Asia. The river rises in mountain springs northeast of Mount Kailash in Western Tibet, flows northwest through the disputed region of Kashmir, ...

to conquer an empire in India.

Marriage

She married Babur's first cousin (a son of his mother's brother Ahmad), Sultan Tukhta-bugha Khan Chaghatai Mughal. The marriage was arranged by Babur, and took place at the end of 1530. She would then be about fourteen years old. She was widowed in 1533, and nothing as to her remarriage is recorded until 1549, when she was over thirty years old. It is improbable that she remained a widow so many years. She also married with Abbas Sultan Uzbeg, just before Humayun set out on his expedition for Balkh. The bridegroom came to suspect that the Timurid army was about to act against his own people and ran away. Probably he did not take Gulchehra with him.

Death

She accompanied Gulbadan and Hamida to India in 1557 and died in the same year.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Begum, Gulchehra 1515 births 1557 deaths Mughal princesses Indian female royalty Mughal nobility 16th-century Indian women writers 16th-century Indian writers Women of the Mughal Empire Timurid dynasty 16th-century Indian women 16th-century Indian people Daughters of emperors