Shivaji’s father, for one, was named to honour a Muslim saint called Shah Sharif – while Shahji bore the first part of the pir’s name, his brother took the second and was called Sharifji.21 His grandfather, Maloji, was not only a loyal officer of the Nizam Shahs of Ahmadnagar, but his samadhi is, evidently, ‘a completely Islamicate’ structure that still stands in Ellora.22 In the Sivabharata,
