Orality and textuality in the Iranian world : patterns of interaction across the centuries /
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The volume demonstrates the cultural centrality of the oral tradition for Iranian studies. It contains contributions from scholars from various areas of Iranian and comparative studies, among which are the pre-Islamic Zoroastrian tradition with its wide network of influences in late antique Mesopotamia, notably among the Jewish milieu; classical Persian literature in its manifold genres; medieval Persian history; oral history; folklore and more. The essays in this collection embrace both the pre-Islamic and Islamic periods, both verbal and visual media, as well as various language communities (Middle Persian, Persian, Tajik, Dari) and geographical spaces (Greater Iran in pre-Islamic and Islamic medieval periods; Iran, Afghanistan and Tajikistan of modern times). Taken as a whole, the essays reveal the unique blending of oral and literate poetics in the texts or visual artefacts each author focuses upon, conceptualizing their interrelationship and function.
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1 online resource (xx, 456 pages) : illustrations (some color) :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004291973 :
1570-078X ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
L'hymnaire manichéen chinois Xiabuzan (Xia bu zan) à l'usage des auditeurs : un manuscrit trouvé à Dunhuang /
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L'Hymnaire manichéen chinois offre un ensemble de 25 hymnes destinées à la pratique de la religion manichéenne par la Section des Auditeurs. Mis au jour à Dunhuang (actuel Gansu) au début du 20ème siècle, après être resté enfoui dans une cache pendant quelque douze siècles, ce rouleau écrit en langue chinoise, comprend plusieurs hymnes transcrites de diverses langues courantes en Asie centrale à l'époque de sa rédaction. Cette traduction apporte une vision nouvelle de la Religion de Lumière, telle qu'elle se vit adoptée par les Chinois, ainsi que de l'ampleur du message du prophète iranien Mani (216-276), aspirant à une portée universelle et destiné à relier entre eux les hommes de tous horizons de par le monde, quelque soit leur origine, leur langue ou leur histoire. L'Hymnaire manichéen chinois presents a collection of twenty-five hymns that were intended for the Manichean religious practice of the class of Auditors. The scroll, which came to light in the early twentieth century in the province of Dunhuang (modern Ganzu) after lying buried for around twelve centuries, contains several hymns transcribed from a variety of languages that were current in Central Asia during the epoch of its redaction. This translation provides a new perspective on the Religion of Light as it was adopted in China, and on the wide reach of the message of the Iranian prophet Mani (216-276) that aimed at universal scope and was meant to unite people from all parts of the world, of whatever origin, language and history.
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Translation into French of a group of hymns in Chinese, originally translated from a variety of Central Asian languages in the 800s and written on a scroll later found in the early 20th century in the province of Dunhuang, modern day Gansu, and held at the British Library under the annotation S 2659. :
1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004380264 :
0929-2470 ;
Āthār-i Fatḥallāh Khān-i Shaybānī. Volume 1 : Jild-i avval Dīwān-i ashʿār, Fatḥ u ẓafar /
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Fatḥallāh Khān Shaybānī (d. 1308/1891) was a major poet of the Qajar era who belonged to the so-called 'return' movement, which wanted to break free from the Sabk-i Hindī or 'Indian style' in poetry, that was popular in Iran since Safavid times. Shaybānī was born in a suburb of Kashan around 1241/1825. Having completed his education there and thanks to his father's connections, he became a companion of the future Nāṣir al-Dīn Shāh Qājār (r. 1264-1313/1848-96). However, due to courtly intrigues he was soon expelled, an expulsion which would last a full 35 years before relations were restored. In that period he served in various official capacities, lastly as the governor of Mashhad. Between assigments, he lived in the countryside near Natanz for around 25 years. Shaybānī's work, here published in full, is characterized by an aversion of undue embellishments, his choice of subjects, his criticism of politics and society, and his concrete suggestions for change. 2 vols; volume 1.
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1 online resource. :
9789004406384
9786002030870
ʿArafāt al-ʿāshiqīn wa-ʿaraṣāt al-ʿārifīn. Volume 5, ʿAyn-Fāʾ /
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In Persian literature, tadhkira ('note', 'memorandum') works are for the most part collections of biographies of poets, combined with selections from their writings. The earliest such work is Dawlatshāh Samarqandī's Tadhkirat al-shuʿarāʾ (completed in 892/1487), which set a standard for posterity. The tadhkira genre was especially popular in the 10th/16th century and following. The present work by Taqī al-Dīn Awḥadī (alive in 1042/1632-33) is a good example of this. Born in Isfahan in 973/1565, as a young man his poetical talent was commended by, among others, the poet ʿUrfī Shīrāzī (d. 999/1591). After some time in the entourage of Shāh ʿAbbās I and a six-year stay in Iraq, he left Persia to try his luck at one of the courts in India. The present work, completed in 1024/1615, was written for a high official at the court of Jahāngīr. It contains about 3500 entries on Persian poets from the earliest times until his own day.
:
1 online resource. :
9789004405547
9789648700848
ʿArafāt al-ʿāshiqīn wa-ʿaraṣāt al-ʿārifīn. Volume 3, Dal-Sīn /
:
In Persian literature, tadhkira ('note', 'memorandum') works are for the most part collections of biographies of poets, combined with selections from their writings. The earliest such work is Dawlatshāh Samarqandī's Tadhkirat al-shuʿarāʾ (completed in 892/1487), which set a standard for posterity. The tadhkira genre was especially popular in the 10th/16th century and following. The present work by Taqī al-Dīn Awḥadī (alive in 1042/1632-33) is a good example of this. Born in Isfahan in 973/1565, as a young man his poetical talent was commended by, among others, the poet ʿUrfī Shīrāzī (d. 999/1591). After some time in the entourage of Shāh ʿAbbās I and a six-year stay in Iraq, he left Persia to try his luck at one of the courts in India. The present work, completed in 1024/1615, was written for a high official at the court of Jahāngīr. It contains about 3500 entries on Persian poets from the earliest times until his own day.
:
1 online resource. :
9789004405233
9789648700831
Bih guzīn-i ʿAlī-nāma : Kuhantarīn manẓūma-yi Shīʿi-yi Fārsī /
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Until the discovery of the Persian ʿAlī-nāma , Ibn Ḥusām's Khawarān-nāma (830/1427) was believed to be the oldest Persian epic poem involving the often wondrous exploits of ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib and the beginnings of Shīʿism. The Khawarān-nāma takes its inspiration from Firdawsī's Shāh-nāma , but then adapted to fit the Shīʿī theme, with ʿAlī and his companions often taking the place of Rustam and other heroes. The ʿAlī-nāma , extant in one manuscript in Konya, is a much older poem on the same subject. Composed by someone using the alias of Rabīʿ, it was completed in 482/1089 in Khurāsān, just seventy years after the completion of Firdawsī's Shāh-nāma . The text is important because long before others, it acknowledges the heroes of the Shāh-nāma , some of whom were actually written into the script. Different from the edition by Omidsalar (2010), this edition only reproduces verses deemed worthy of Rabīʿ, rejecting two-thirds as the work of some unknown 'poetaster'.
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1 online resource. :
9789004405943
9786002030337
Miʿyār al-ashʿār wa-Mizān al-afkār fī sharḥ Miʿyār al-ashʿār /
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Naṣīr al-Dīn Ṭūsī (d. 672/1274) was an influential philosopher, theologian, mathematician and astronomer, besides being the first director of the famous observatory at Marāghah near Tabriz as well as a man of politics. Author of a large number of scholarly works, he is especially famous for such treatises as his Tajrīd al-iʿtiqād on theology, the Zīj-i Īlkhānī on astronomy, the Ḥall mushkilāt al-Ishārāt , his influential commentary on Avicenna's (428/1037) Kitāb al-ishārāt wal-tanbīhāt on philosophy and logic, and his Akhlāq-i Nāṣirī on ethics. The present work contains an edition of a compendium on Persian and Arabic metrics which Ṭūsī says he wrote at the request of some friends, probably at the time of his association with the Ismailis, before the Mongol invasion and the collapse of the Niẓārī state in 654/1256. It is followed by the edition of a detailed commentary on it by the Indian scholar Muḥammad Saʿdallāh Murādābādī (d. 1294/1877). Persian, interspersed with Arabic.
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1 online resource. :
9789004405714
9786002030115
The medieval reception of the Shahnama as a mirror for princes /
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Nasrin Askari explores the medieval reception of Firdausī's Shāhnāma , or Book of Kings (completed in 1010 CE) as a mirror for princes. Through her examination of a wide range of medieval sources, Askari demonstrates that Firdausī's oeuvre was primarily understood as a book of wisdom and advice for kings and courtly elites. In order to illustrate the ways in which the Shāhnāma functions as a mirror for princes, Askari analyses the account about Ardashīr, the founder of the Sasanian dynasty, as an ideal king in the Shāhnāma . Within this context, she explains why the idea of the union of kingship and religion, a major topic in almost all medieval Persian mirrors for princes, has often been attributed to Ardashīr.
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1 online resource (398 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004307919 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Burzū-nāma : Bakhsh-i kuhan /
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Firdawsī's (d. 411/1020) Shāh-nāma , this famous epic poem in celebration of the history of the kings and dynasties of Persia, was not written in a void. Indeed, before him there had been other epic works in Persian, more or less similar to it, by authors otherwise unknown, and now lost: by Masʿūdī Marwazī (before 355/966), by Abu ʼl-Muʾayyad Balkhī (before 352/963), by Abū ʿAlī Balkhī (before 390/1000), and the Shāh-nāma-yi Abū Manṣūrī (346/947). It has been said that Firdawsī may have taken some of his inspiration from this latter work. After Firdawsī, others wrote similar works, in imitation of him: Asadī Ṭūsī's Garshāsp-nāma (completed in 458/1066) and Īrānshāh b. Abi ʼl-Khayr's Bahman-nāma (501/1107-08) are just two examples of this. The present work by Shams al-Dīn Kawsaj (8th/14th century) is another epic poem in Firdawsī's style. The add-on found in some manuscripts, by a later author of lesser talent, is not included here.
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Poetry. :
1 online resource. :
9789004405028
9789648700626
Dīwān-i Imāmī Hirawī /
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Abdallāh Imāmī Hirawī was born Herat where he grew up and received his education. Besides being a poet he possessed a wide knowledge in the sciences of his time and was respected for his learning. Like so many intellectuals and literary figures of his day, Imāmī led an itinerant life, moving from court to court, from patron to patron. Leaving Herat before 627/1229-30, we find him praise the Qarākhitāy rulers of Kirman, religious dignitaries and members of the Atabak court of Yazd, and also Bahāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad (d. 678/1279), the governor of Isfahan, ʿIrāq-i ʿAjam and Yazd. In between literary patrons, Imāmī was also a judge in his hometown of Herat, dying in Isfahan in 686/1287. Praised by the poet laureate of the Atabak rulers of Fārs, Majd al-Dīn Hamgar (d. 686/1287), as being even better than Saʿdī (d. 691/1292), Imāmī's work shows the influence of the Khurāsānī and ʿIrāqī traditions in Persian poetry.
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1 online resource. :
9789004406520
9786002030993
Dīwān-i Ishrāq /
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In early Islamic philosophy, poetry was regarded as a means to transmit the eternal truths of philosophy to the masses and to move them to virtuous conduct by the use of poetical syllogisms. We find this theory for the first time in the works of Abū Naṣr al-Fārābī (d. 339/950). In another application, poetry was used as a didactic tool in the philosophical curriculum, like Avicenna's (d. 428/1037) Urjūza fi ʼl-manṭiq or, much later, Mullā Hādī Sabzavārī's (d. 1289/1873) Manẓūma on logic and philosophy. Finally, there are the many poems which, while philosophical in spirit, were not written to be learned by heart by others but rather from personal motives. Here we can mention some of the Persian poetry ascribed to Avicenna or the philosophical poetry of Nāṣir Khusraw (d. 481/1088). The poems in this collection by Mīr Dāmād (d. 1040/1631), a prominent member of the Isfahan School in philosophy, belong to this latter category.
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Poems :
1 online resource. :
9789004404762
9789648700190
Dīwān-i Munjīk Tirmidhī : Ashʿār-i parākanda /
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Abu ʼl-Ḥasan Munjīk Tirmidhī was a Persian poet of the second half of 4th/10th century. Not much is known about his personal life, just that he sang the praise of some of the members of the ruling Muḥtājid dynasty of Chaghāniyān in Transoxania, a region just north of his hometown of Tirmidh. He was a contemporary of other poets at the Muḥtājid court, such as Daqīqī (d. ca. 365/976) and Farrukhī (d. before 432/1041). Tirmidhī is especially known for his panegyrics and his satire. In Nāṣir Khusraw's (d. 481/1088) Safar-nāma it is stated that Tirmidhī's divan was extant. Today his divan is lost. What verses we have were gleaned from biographical dictionaries, poetical anthologies and works on eloquence. The present edition contains a listing of everything found in such sources, supplemented by additional information taken from modern authors. The collection contains 410 verses, 50 of which were hirtherto unknown.
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[Collection of poems by Monjeek Termazi, who was a court poet for the Choghani kings.]
In Persian.
Romanized title from cover, page 4. :
1 online resource. :
9789004406100
9786002030405
ʿArafāt al-ʿāshiqīn wa-ʿaraṣāt al-ʿārifīn. Volume 4, Shīn-Ẓāʾ /
:
In Persian literature, tadhkira ('note', 'memorandum') works are for the most part collections of biographies of poets, combined with selections from their writings. The earliest such work is Dawlatshāh Samarqandī's Tadhkirat al-shuʿarāʾ (completed in 892/1487), which set a standard for posterity. The tadhkira genre was especially popular in the 10th/16th century and following. The present work by Taqī al-Dīn Awḥadī (alive in 1042/1632-33) is a good example of this. Born in Isfahan in 973/1565, as a young man his poetical talent was commended by, among others, the poet ʿUrfī Shīrāzī (d. 999/1591). After some time in the entourage of Shāh ʿAbbās I and a six-year stay in Iraq, he left Persia to try his luck at one of the courts in India. The present work, completed in 1024/1615, was written for a high official at the court of Jahāngīr. It contains about 3500 entries on Persian poets from the earliest times until his own day.
:
1 online resource. :
9789004405530
9789648700824
Dīwān-i ghazaliyāt-i Asīr-i Shahristānī /
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Persian poetry of the pre-modern era is divided into three successive styles, each belonging to a different period: Khurāsānī, ʿIrāqī and Hindī. The Hindī style's name comes from Safavid times, during which it developed; poets no longer enjoyed the shah's patronage, so that many of them went to India, where Persian poetry had flourished from Ghaznavid times (11th-12th cent.). The Hindī style is often regarded as being of a lesser kind than the Khurāsānī or ʿIrāqī ones, but has the merit of having ended the decline that Persian poetry was suffering from at the time and also, by its accessible language and subject matter, of having brought poetry within reach of the ordinary man. The poems of Asīr Shahristānī (11th/17th cent.), whose ghazal s are published here, are written in the Hindī style. Popular in India, even if he never went there, their appreciation in Iran has varied.
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1 online resource. :
9789004404137
9789646781733
Dīwān-i Fānī : Mawsūm bih Ganj Allāh /
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Born in Khūy (Azerbaidjan), Mīrzā Muḥammad Ḥasan Zunūzī Khūʾī (1172-1225/1758-1810) was a traditional Islamic scholar and man of letters who signed his poems as 'Fānī'. He received his basic education in Zunūz, Tabriz and Khūy, leaving for the holy cites of the Shīʿa in Iraq at the age of 23. There he attended the classes of, among others, Āqā Muḥammad Bāqir Bihbihānī (d. 1205/1790) and Mīrzā Muḥammad Mahdī Shahristānī (d. 1215-16/1800-01). He then returned to Khūy where he spent the rest of his life, save for a two-year 'sabbatical' in Mashhad. In Khūy Fānī was a protégé of the local ruler, Aḥmad Khān Dunbul (d. 1200/1785) and his son Ḥusayn Qulīkhān Dunbul (d. 1213/1799). He is the author of a number of works, among them the encyclopaedic Baḥr al-ʿulūm (Persian) and the spiritual Wasīlat al-najāh (Persian). The Persian poems published here are mostly mystical in tone, often inserting terms or concepts taken from astronomy.
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1 online resource. :
9789004405851
9786002030238
Dīwān-i Hātif-i Iṣfahānī /
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Persian poetry of the pre-modern era is divided into three successive styles, each belonging to a different period: Khurāsānī, ʿIrāqī and Hindī. The Hindī style is called such because in Safavid times, during which it developed, poets no longer enjoyed the shah's patronage so that many of them went to India, where Persian poetry had flourished since Ghaznavid times (11th-12th century CE). The Hindī style is often regarded as a lesser style, but has the merit of having put a halt to the decline that Persian poetry was suffering from at the time and also, by its accessible language and subject matter, of having brought poetry within reach of the ordinary man. The poetry of Hātif Iṣfahānī (d. 1198/1783) published here was written in the latter half of the 12th/18th century, at the beginning of the neo-classical period of return ( bāzgasht ) to the poetical styles of the pre-Safavid era.
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1 online resource. :
9789004407244
9786002031167
Taḥqīq dar majālis-i tafsīri-yi Faḍl b. Muḥibb-i Nīshābūrī wa abyāt-i Fārsi-yi ān : Ganjīnaʾī az surūdhā-yi Zāhidāna-yi Fārsī az sada-yi panjum-i hijrī /
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In Persian literature, so-called ' majālis ' (sg. majlis , 'session') works typically evoke the atmosphere of a religious gathering. In some of these gatherings, a lecturer recounted parts of the history of Islam and the lives and times of its prominent representatives. In others, his focus was on the interpretation of the Qurʾān or some other subject. Sometimes, a speaker answered questions and at others, he sermonized. An early work in this genre is a majālis text on Qurʾān interpretation by Faḍl b. Muḥibb Nīshāpūrī (d. 472/1079). Issuing from a well-educated family of Nishapur, Faḍl was known for his learning and his virtue, earning him the nicknames of ustādh ('master') and wāʿiẓ ('preacher'). The lines of poetry published here were culled from a majālis text by him, the title of which remains unknown. Testimony to his use of rhetorical means to enhance the impact of his talk, these lines of poetry are also among the earliest in their genre in Khurāsān.
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1 online resource. :
9789004406643
9786002031044
Muntakhab-i risālāt-i Ṣafāʾ al-Ḥaqq /
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Ṣafāʾ al-Ḥaqq (1879-1962) is the artist's name of an Iranian Kurd whose family had moved from Kurdistan to Hamadan when he was still a child. His father was a respected businessman and a follower of the ideas of Shaykh Aḥmad Aḥsāʾī (d. 1241/1826). Though well-educated, having studied traditional and herbal medicine and animal husbandry, as an adolescent Ṣafāʾ al-Haqq spent a lot of time in his father's business in the bazaar. Due to his convictions, his father lost his livelyhood and Ṣafāʾ al-Ḥaqq started travelling. He spent several years in India, where he worked in a British hospital in Bombay. He then returned to Hamadan, where he settled as a physician. As a poet Ṣafāʾ al-Ḥaqq wrote in the Hindī style. He was an amateur musicologist as well as an accomplished calligrapher. This volume contains his autobiography, a treatise on animal husbandry, and two further treatises on various aspects of Shaykhism and music.
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1 online resource. :
9789004404892
9789648700466
Rubāʿiyyāt-i Ḥakīm Khayyām /
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The rubāʿī or quatrain is a short Persian poem in a special metre with a rhyme suitable to its form. Its use is not bound to any specific field, there being philosophical, satirical, romantic, lyrical and other types of quatrain. In the past, it was believed that the rubāʿī was a special form of the hazaj metre of Arabic poetry. Meanwhile, it has been established that it is in fact Iranian, its origin being the pre-Islamic tarānah or song for feasting and wine. In the West the quatrain was rendered immortal through the work of ʿUmar al-Khayyām (d. ca. 517/1123). A native of Nishapur, he was a respected mathematician and astronomer, as well as a recognized expert in poetry. Many of the quatrains ascribed to him are, however, spurious. This volume contains a reprint of Yār Aḥmad Rashīdī's selection (dated 867/1460), first published in 1953, followed by two other works in Persian, also by Khayyām.
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Includes facsimile text originally published in Istanbul, 1953. :
1 online resource. :
9789004404885
9789648700374
Mathnawi-yi Haft awrang. Volume 1 : Silsilat al-dhahab, Salmān wa-Absāl, Tuḥfat al-aḥrār wa-suḥbat al-abrār /
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Regarded by many as the last great mystical poet of medieval Persia, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Jāmī (d. 898/1492) spent the greater part of his life in Herat. As a student, he excelled in every subject he engaged in and appeared destined for an academic career. But then, in his early thirties, he went through a spiritual crisis that ended in him joining the Herat branch of the mystical Naqshbandiyya order, led by the charismatic Saʿd al-Dīn Kāshgharī (d. 860/1456). A protégé of three successive Timurid rulers in Herat, Jāmī's wide network of friendships and relations extended from spiritual and literary circles through the political to the academic. With 39.000 lines of verse and over 30 prose works to his name, Jāmī's literary production is quite overwhelming. Highly imaginative in their treatment of the human condition, Jāmī's seven long mathnawī s contained in the present two-volume edition bear witness to his great artistic talents and wide intellectual horizon. 2 vols; volume 1.
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Poems.
Vol. 2 edited by: Aʻlākhān Afṣaḥʹzād and Ḥusayn Aḥmad Tarbiyat. :
1 online resource. :
9789004402423
9789646781030