Mihr al-Nisa’ Haravi (Mihri)

Mihri Haravi, Mihr al-Nisa’ (fifteenth century), a poetess with the nom de plume Mihri hailing from Herat. A contemporary of the Timurid Shahrukh Mirza (1377-1446), she was a companion of Shahrukh wife, Gawhar Shad Biygum. Her husband, Khwaja ‘Abd al-‘Aziz, was the physician at the royal court. According to some biographical sources, she was a poetess flourishing in the seventeenth century and a companion of Banu Jahan Beygum (d. 1645) and the name of her husband is given as Khwaja Hakim. It is reported by Hakim Shah Muhammad Qazwini in his translation of Majalis al-Nafa’is that Mihri had studied under Mawlana Hakim. Qazwini who had conversed with her states, that she had composed poetry on the model of the majority of poems of Hafiz. Her works include her divan of poetry. The following couplet is by her:

Turn around cups of wine and make haste, o cup-bearer of the lovers!

That the bitter wine creates such sweet passions in the hearts!

Asar-afarinan (5/  320).