The Báb's Journey to Máh-Kú and Chihríq

Nabíl’s Dawn-Breakers describes how the Báb spent most of the last three years of His life in two fortresses in the mountains of Ádhirbayján, in the north-west of Persia.

In Iṣfáhán He had been protected by the governor, Manúchihr Khán. After the governor’s death early in 1847, his successor reported the Báb’s whereabouts to Muḥammad Sháh, who summoned Him to the capital. He was taken north under a mounted escort. At Káshán a believer, Ḥájí Mírzá Jání, received Him in his home for three nights, and the Báb celebrated Naw-Rúz there. The party passed by Qum without entering the city and went on toward Ṭihrán. Short of the capital, a written order from the prime minister, Ḥájí Mírzá Áqásí, sent them instead to the village of Kulayn, where a tent was pitched for the Báb. There a letter from the Sháh reached Him: He was to be taken to the castle of Máh-Kú. He was brought first to Tabríz. During those days Siyyid Ḥusayn-i-Yazdí, who was with Him, asked where He would be sent, and the Báb answered:

For a period of no less than nine months, we shall remain confined in the Jabal-i-Básiṭ, from whence we shall be transferred to the Jabal-i-Shadíd.

Nabíl explains that the numerical values of these names are equal to those of Máh-Kú and Chihríq.

The castle of Máh-Kú stood on the summit of a mountain above the town, near the borders of the Ottoman and Russian empires. Nabíl writes that Ḥájí Mírzá Áqásí chose so remote a place to cut the Báb off from His followers. The townspeople were Kurds of the Sunní branch of Islam, who had long been at odds with the Shí‘ah majority of Persia and especially with its siyyids. The warden, ‘Alí Khán, was very strict: for the first two weeks no one but Siyyid Ḥusayn and his brother was allowed to see the Báb, and no known follower was allowed to stay even one night in the town.

Then ‘Alí Khán came to the Báb one morning in great humility. He said he had seen the Báb at dawn praying beside the river outside the castle, yet had found the gates closed and the Báb in His room. From then on, those whom the Báb wished to see were admitted by day, and a steady stream of pilgrims came from the provinces of Persia. The Kurds of the town had also been won over. Each morning they would look for a place from which they could catch a glimpse of His face and ask His blessing on their day’s work, and in their disputes they would invoke His name.

In the castle the Báb wrote the Persian Bayán, which Nabíl calls the most weighty of all His works. Shaykh Ḥasan-i-Zunúzí testified that people living at the foot of the mountain could clearly hear His voice as He dictated.

After nine months, reports of the warden’s devotion to his Prisoner reached Ḥájí Mírzá Áqásí, who ordered the Báb moved to the castle of Chihríq, in the same province. There the warden, Yaḥyá Khán, had strict orders to admit no one, but he too soon came to love the Báb and refused no one admittance. The Kurds of Chihríq, whom Nabíl describes as even more hostile to the Shí‘ah than those of Máh-Kú, came each morning to look toward His prison and ask His blessing. So many visitors came that they had to lodge in the old town of Chihríq, an hour away, and a number of the leading siyyids, divines and officials of nearby Khuy accepted His Cause.

From Chihríq He was taken to Tabríz in the summer of 1848 to be examined before the Crown Prince and the clergy, and was brought back. In 1850 He was taken from Chihríq to Tabríz for the last time, and was martyred there.

A retelling based on The Dawn-Breakers (Nabíl-i-A'ẓam), Chapters X–XIII, XVII, XVIII and XXIII. For the fuller account, see the original.

Nabíl-i-A'ẓam. (1932). *The Dawn-Breakers: Nabíl's Narrative of the Early Days of the Bahá'í Revelation*. Bahá'í Publishing Trust. https://www.bahai.org/library/other-literature/historical/dawn-breakers/