This is an illustration by the Mughal court artists Jagan and Naman to the Akbarnama (Book of Akbar) depicting the arrest of Mu’nim Khan during his flight from the court towards Kabul, in the far north of the Mughal empire (in present-day Afghanistan), in 1562. After the murder of one of Akbar's highest-ranking nobles, Adham Khan (IS.2:29-1896), Mu'nim Khan feared he would be implicated. The emperor sent a letter of forgiveness to him, but Mu'in Khan had to be brought back to Agra under arrest. Here, he is being apprehended by men in service to a local military governor.

The Akbarnama was commissioned by the Mughal emperor Akbar (r.1556–1605) as the official chronicle of his reign. It was written in Persian by his court historian and biographer, Abu’l Fazl, between 1590 and 1596, and the V&A’s partial copy of the manuscript is thought to have been illustrated between about 1592 and 1595. It is generally acknowledged to be the earliest illustrated version of the text, and drew upon the expertise of some of the best royal artists of the time. Many of these are listed by Abu’l Fazl in the third volume of the Akbarnama, the A’in-i Akbari, and some of these names appear in the V&A illustrations, written in red ink beneath the pictures, showing that this was a royal copy made for Akbar himself. After his death, the manuscript remained in the library of his son Jahangir, from whom it was inherited by Shah Jahan.

The V&A purchased the manuscript in 1896 from Frances Clarke, the widow of Major General John Clarke, who bought it in India while serving as Commissioner of Oudh between 1858 and 1862.