[397] Perhaps a corruption of the older form _Berūlās_. [398] The modern Shahr-i-Sabz. [399] Sheref ud-Dīn affirms that his love of wine was so inveterate that he was not sober for a week in the whole year (_Zafar-Nāmé_ (Calcutta edition), i. p. 41). [400] He was born in A.H. 730. In 748 he became Khān of Jatah; in 754 he was converted to Islām; in 764 he died. His history, and the story of his conversion, is told at some length in the _Tarikh-i-Rashidi_, pp. 5–23. [401] Our readers will have traced for themselves the parallel afforded by France, exhausted by the horrors of the Revolution at the outset of Napoleon’s career. [402] The sources for the biography of Tīmūr are plentiful. The best known, both in the East and in Europe, is the _Zafar-Nāmé_, by Sheref ud-Dīn `Alī, of Yezd. This was completed in 1424 by the order of Ibrāhīm, the son of Shāh Rukh, the son of Tīmūr. It was first translated into French in 1722 by M. Petis de la Croix, whose work was in turn englished shortly afterwards. It is this history that has served as a basis for all European historians, Gibbon included. There is, however, an older biography of Tīmūr, which, owing to its scarcity, is very little known. The only MS. in Europe is in the British Museum. It, too, bears the title of _Zafar-Nāmé_, or _Book of Victory_. It was compiled at Tīmūr’s own order by a certain Nizām Shāmī, and is brought down to A.H. 806, _i.e._ one year before Tīmūr’s death. The MS. itself bears the date of A.H. 838 (1434). Owing to the vast interest attaching to such a contemporary account, Professor Denison Ross has undertaken to prepare an edition of the text for the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences. [403] He had gained the sobriquet “Leng” from a wound which caused him to halt through life, inflicted during the siege of Sīstān (Wolff, _Bokhara_, p. 243). [404] For example, the names Jalā´ir, Berūlās, and Seldūz are those of well-known Turkish tribes. [405] According to the _Zafar-Nāmé_ of Sheref ud-Dīn `Alī Yazdi, and other historians who follow him, Hāji Birlās was the uncle of Tīmūr. The _Zafar-Nāmé_ of Nizām Shāmī, however, states that he was Tīmūr’s brother. [406] He was at this period about twenty-seven years of age, and had served with some distinction under Amīr Kazghan (Wolff, _Bokhara_, p. 245). [407] We refer the reader to Gibbon’s 65th chapter for a striking account of Tīmūr’s wanderings in the desert, and to Petis de la Croix’s translation of the _Zafar-Nāmé_ for Tīmūr’s thrilling adventures with his friend Amīr Husayn. [408] _Bokhara_, p. 244.