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The Allegorical Readings of the Shāh-nāma in Comparison with the Allegoreses of Homer’s Epics Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2024-03-14 Narges Nematollahi
There is a consensus that the Greek epic does not present itself as “veiled expressions (ainos),” but in the Greek literary tradition, several episodes of Homer’s works have received allegorical readings by literary critics and philosophers. These readings are categorized according to the motivations of their authors into two groups: defensive or apologetic and appropriative or exegetical. Against
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Fruits of the Gardens: Ethics, Metaphysics, and Textual Pleasures in Late Qajar Iran Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2024-03-14 Ali Gheissari
This article introduces a miscellany notebook in Arabic and Persian, entitled Favāka al-basātin (Fruits of the Gardens), compiled around 1914 in Tehran by Hājj Mirzā Mohammad Tehrāni (d. 1914–21), a learned sugar merchant and bookseller. The notebook covers a broad range of topics on faith, philosophy, and ethics. It frequently draws on the Qurʾan and the Hadith, as well as Stoic proverbs, mostly from
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Ugly Yet Popular: the Remarkably Long Life of the Safavid Coins of Hoveyza Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2024-03-14 Alexander V. Akopyan
The aim of the work is to identify explanations for the lengthy circulation of Safavid coins bearing the central inscription, “ʿAli is the friend of God (ʿAli vali Allāh),” from the seventeenth to nineteenth centuries. Studying the coins from the period and the hoards in which they were found, alongside historical narratives, ethnographic information, and religious texts, sheds light on their meaning
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Fashioning Persian Identity: Asadi’s Staged Dispute between a Zoroastrian and a Muslim Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2023-11-13 Asghar Seyed-Gohrab
This paper focuses on the earliest surviving specimens of Persian debate poetry (monāzara), a genre which deals with controversial topics such as the Persians’ supremacy over the Arabs or the superiority of Islam over Zoroastrianism. Focusing on one panegyric by the poet Asadi Tusi (1010–70), this paper contextualizes such debates in a cultural milieu of eleventh-century Persia. It shows how poets
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The Howz-e Shamsi and the Making of an Islamic Sacred Site in the Urban Space of Delhi Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2023-10-04 Ayako Ninomiya
Sacred sites are loci with a special relationship with a particular religion and are indicators of religious indigenization. The Howz-e Shamsi (“Reservoir of Shams”) is one such structure considered sacred during the Delhi Sultanate period. Built around 1230 by Shams al-Din Eltotmesh b. Elam Khān (r. 1211–36), the reservoir served as an important element of urban infrastructure. The process of its
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Puzzles and Patronage in the Persian Cosmopolis: Moʿin al-Din Esfezāri’s Acrostic Letter to Mahmud Gāvān Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2023-08-08 Meia Walravens
This article studies a literary puzzle, a maktub-e movashshah or acrostic letter, that is among the Persian monshaʾāt (stylized literary letters) of the Herat-based historian and secretary Moʿin al-Din Mohammad Zamji Esfezāri (fl. 1468–94/873–99). Created in praise of the Bahmani vizier Mahmud Gāvān (d. 1481/886), Esfezāri’s composition fits within a corpus of letters that testifies to the existence
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A French Manuscript on Trade and Diplomacy in Iran during the Zand Era Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2023-05-09 Nicolas J. Preud’homme
A highly interesting memoir about Iran, written by Jean-François-Xavier Rousseau (1738–1808), an agent of the French East India Company (Compagnie des Indes orientales) in Basra, apparently unpublished and unknown until now, covers the political situation of the late Zand period of the 1770s in an effort to promote French trade in the Persian Gulf. This text, entitled Situation actuelle du royaume
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The Introduction to Mohammad-Taqi Bahār’s Sabkshenāsi: A Translation Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2023-05-09 Alexander Jabbari
Mohammad-Taqi Bahār’s 1942 textbook Sabkshenāsi (“Stylistics”) was a landmark text in modern Persian literary studies. It coined terms (like sabk-e Hendi or the “Indian style” of Persian poetry) and laid out a tripartite, geographical-temporal model for the history of Persian poetry which largely remain dominant today. Bahār’s articulation of a national canon of Iranian literature (comprising writings
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The Safavids and “Candechar, King of the Indies”: Polish-Lithuanian Intelligence on Safavid-Mughal Relations Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2023-05-09 Stanisław Adam Jaśkowski
The relations between the Islamic empires of the early modern period—the Ottomans, the Safavids, and the Mughals—have long been the subject of research, as have been the links between each of them and Europe. The present paper adopts a different approach, addressing the relations between them and Central and Eastern Europe as part of a single geopolitical continuum. This is done by focusing on the
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“The Earth My Throne, The Heavens My Crown”: Siyāvash as Supranational Hero in Ferdowsi’s Shāh-nāma Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2023-05-09 Alyssa Gabbay
This article explores the Shāh-nāma’s recounting of the tragic myth of Prince Siyāvash and analyzes the implications of Siyāvash’s supranational ethical sense in an epic often closely associated with proto-nationalism and a concrete sense of Iranian identity. It proposes that Ferdowsi’s depiction of Siyāvash’s evolving sense of identity—one that contains elements of what we would associate today with
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The Persian Literary Tradition in Ottoman Bosnia and Its Environs Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2022-12-30 Sabaheta Gačanin
Numerous Bosnian intellectuals during the centuries of Ottoman rule were authors of works in the Persian language. Mostly, they produced poems and divāns (poetic anthologies) under the strong influence of the Persian literary canon. After a brief and introductory overview of the Persian literary canon, its origins, and its presence in the Ottoman realms, this article presents selections of verses (mostly
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Cultural Translation and Linguistic Equivalence: Persian–Marathi Bilingual Inscriptions Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2022-11-13 Pushkar Sohoni
Bilingual inscriptions in Marathi and Persian are known through the period of the Deccan sultanates. This paper investigates whether the inscriptional programs, usually with Persian as the dominant language, can provide greater cultural context and meaning to processes such as translation and multilingualism in the period. Bi- and multi-lingual inscriptions are intended usually for public display and
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Retrieving Lost Texts: Early Persian Newspapers of Bombay Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2022-11-13 Murali Ranganathan
While the study of the history of print culture in India is still at an early stage, languages moribund in India, like Persian, have been all but ignored in this narrative. Persian newspapers of the nineteenth century, especially from its first half, played an important role in the development of the Indian public sphere. To a certain extent, they continued in the vein of the pre-British akhbārs, while
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ʿAli al-Aʿlā and the Early History of Horufism Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2022-10-14 Hüseyin Ongan Arslan
This article examines the life and activities of ʿAli al-Aʿlā (d. 1419/822), the principal successor of the founder of Horufism, Fazlollāh Astarābādi (d. 1394/796), and early Horufi history. Widely known as “Khalifatollāh (Vice-gerent of God)” in Horufi literature, the prolific ʿAli al-Aʿlā compiled five Persian books in the first two decades of the fifteenth century, namely the Korsi-nāma, Towhid-nāma
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Philosophical Poetry and Courtly Appeal: Fakhr al-Din Rāzi’s Didactic Panegyric for the Khvārazmian Prince Nāser al-Din Malekshāh Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2022-10-14 Nora Jacobsen Ben Hammed
While Fakhr al-Din Rāzi’s (d. 1210/606) works of philosophical theology are well known, his poetry has been largely ignored by scholars to date. This article provides a translation and analysis of Rāzi’s previously untranslated Persian panegyric ode (qasidat al-madh) entitled “Fi al-manteq va-ʾl-tabiʿa va-ʾl-elāhi va-madh al-soltān (On Logic, Physics, and Metaphysics, and Praise of the Sultan).” Combining
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The Sasanian Elephant Corps Revisited: Ammianus Marcellinus on the Tactics of Persian Elephantry Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2022-09-06 Vladimir Dmitriev
According to Ammianus Marcellinus, elephants substituted, to some extent, siege towers; he describes wooden towers on the backs of the animals, armed with Persian warriors who attacked the defenders of a fortress. Certainly, elephants may have served as an element of ancient psychological warfare. But, at the same time, it appears that the Sasanians employed elephants in their battle fighting, bearing
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Apocalyptic Imagery and Royal Propaganda in Khosrow II’s Letter to the Byzantine Emperor Maurice Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2022-08-23 Andrea Piras
The Byzantine historian Theophylact Simocatta (fl. 620s) records an exchange of letters with the Sasanian Empire. The correspondence of March 590, from the Iranian shah Khosrow II Parviz (r. 591–628) and addressed to the Byzantine emperor Maurice (r. 582–602), exhibits a particular style, focused on the ideological oppositions of order and disorder and legitimacy and usurpation. This paper suggests
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A Clarification of the Terms Dakhma and Astodān on the Basis of Literary Records and Archeological Research in Fars Province Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2022-08-23 Mojtaba Doroodi, Farrokh Hajiani
The terms dakhma (open-air tomb) and astodān (ossuary) are often used interchangeably despite the fact that they refer to two distinct structures with different meanings in pre-Islamic Iranian burial practices. The present study explores the differences between the two structures, along with burial-related terms used by ancient Persians, by examining ancient and medieval Iranian manuscripts and by
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How to Develop a Fabula: The Case of Dēnkard VII Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2022-08-23 Massimiliano Vassalli
In his important 1963 study, Marijan Molé (1924–63) argued that Dēnkard VII does not provide an objective and complete biography of Zoroaster, but rather reflects a later Zoroastrian conception of him as a prophet at the time of its writing. Following his approach, the present article examines the text as a cultural product and a narrative fabrication of late Antique Zoroastrianism. This study attempts
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Linguistic and Religious Continuity in Outer Iran Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2022-08-23 Paolo Ognibene
Classical sources give evidence for the presence of Scythians, Sarmatians, and Alans at different times in the region north of the Black Sea. While not all scholars agree with Abaev’s idea of “strict continuity” in the languages of these peoples, none deny the existence of at least some form of linguistic continuity between them. The aim of this article is to investigate whether we can suppose another
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Manichæism as a World Religion of Salvation and Its Influence on Islam Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2022-08-23 Saïd Amir Arjomand
Māni created a new religion of salvation out of the Mazdæan religion of ancient Iran and named himself as its final prophet. The decisive impact of Manichæism as a salvific faith on Islam is evident in the Qurʾan’s prophetology and Christology, its conceptions of wisdom and knowledge, and the idea of the salvation of the soul through light. Just like Māni, Mohammad in the Qurʾan is the “Seal of the
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Ohrmazd’s Divine Mercy and the End of the World between Apocatastasis and Apocalypse Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2022-08-23 Antonio Clemente Panaino
This article focuses on the central importance of the concept of apocatastasis (or apokatastasis)—the full regeneration of the world and the annihilation of hell—within the framework of the Zoroastrian doctrine of the end of the world, as well as its origin and development. This study insists strongly on a necessary distinction between this idea and the more frequently-encountered doctrine of apocalypse
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The Purpose and Practice of Divorce in Sasanian and Post-Sasanian Texts Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2022-08-23 Amin Shayeste Doust, Carlo Giovanni Cereti
Many scholarly works aim to identify and explain the continued survival of pre-Islamic social phenomena and institutions deep into the Islamic age. To understand the historical roots of Iranian social issues more profoundly and accurately, it seems necessary to examine the social structure and institutions of the Sasanian era. Such a study enables us to trace their subsequent development and identify
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Ray and Pahlaw in the Context of Sasanian Iran Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2022-08-23 Carlo Giovanni Cereti, Mehdi Mousavi Nia, Mohammad Reza Neʿmati
Ray—located near present-day Tehran—is among the most important historical areas in Iran and the plains to the south of Tehran have always been densely inhabited and intensely cultivated thanks to the waters coming from Mount Tochal and the Alborz Mountains. Historical records and archeological data for the early history of the city in the Median, Achæmenid, Seleucid, and even Parthian periods are
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Some Observations on Ahriman and his Miscreation in the Bundahišn Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2022-08-23 Domenico Agostini
The Bundahišn (Primal Creation) is one of the most important surviving Zoroastrian works in Pahlavi Middle Persian. In this book, the evil spirit Ahriman and his demons play a crucial role in the cosmogonic drama from creation until the end of times, according to the well-known Zoroastrian dualistic system. This article describes the forms and the effects of the onslaught of Ahriman and his evil creatures
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Visitation and Awakening: Cross-Cultural and Functional Parallelisms between the Zoroastrian Srōš and Christian St. Sergius Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2022-08-23 Gianfilippo Terribili
Similarities between the two celestial entities, the Zoroastrian Srōš (or Sraoša) and the Christian St. Sergius, have occasionally been mentioned in studies on late-antique and medieval Iran. Comparing the Zoroastrian and Syriac Christian traditions, the study will deal with evidence describing a phenomenological complex that includes the manifestation of celestial entities through a revelatory dream
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The Agricultural Economics of the Allied Occupation of Iran in the Second World War Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2022-08-23 Michael Vahidirad, Marjan Borhani
The occupation of Iran in 1941 by the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, and the United States and the deposition of Rezā Shāh (r. 1925–41) by the Allied powers involuntarily drew Iran into the Second World War, affecting the country’s politics, economy, and society on multiple levels. In particular, the consequences of Allied involvement affected the agricultural sector. Using contemporary descriptions
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An Analysis of the Rug-Washing Ceremony in Mashhad-e Ardehāl, Kāshān Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2021-07-06 Sayyed Mahmood Sadat Bidgoli
The Iranian religious ceremony of rug-washing (qāli-shuyān), commemorating the martyrdom of Emāmzāda Soltān-ʿAli b. Mohammad Bāqer (d. 734/116), is held every year in the second week of autumn in Mashhad-e Ardehāl, a village of Kāshān, Esfahān Province. This ceremony is unique amongst Twelver Shiʿis for its observance in accordance with the solar calendar rather than the lunar. The objective of the
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An Iranian Shāh-nāma Writer at the Court of Bāyezid II: Malekzāda Āhi Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2021-07-06 Vural Genç
Malekzāda Āhi was an Iranian-born Shāh-nāma writer (shāh-nāmaji, Ott. şehnameci) who served at the court of the Ottoman sultan Bāyezid II (r. 1481–1512) and composed the first Ottoman dynastic history to bear the title of “Shāh-nāma.” Accompanying the sultan since his years as a prince, Malekzāda wrote his Shāh-nāma after the tradition of Ferdowsi (d. 1019–20) and Nezāmi (d. 1209), in addition to many
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Joseph and His Two Wives: Patterns of Cultural Accommodation in the Judæo-Persian Tale of Yusof and Zoleykhā Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2021-07-06 Julia Rubanovich
The Tale of Yusof and Zoleykhā appears as part of a religious epic poem, the Bereshit-nāma (Book of Genesis), by the fourteenth-century Judæo-Persian poet Shāhin. Composed in 1358–59, in classical Persian with an admixture of Hebraisms and written in Hebrew characters, this tale was enormously popular within Persian-speaking Jewish communities and was frequently copied on its own. The paper focuses
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Narratives of Home on the Fringe of Tehran: The Case of Shahriar County Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2021-07-06 Saeed Dalil, Barend Wind, Abolfazl Meshkini, Jafar Javan
This paper focuses on the notion of home as a narrative of one’s lived experience that clashes with planners’ understanding of housing and housing policies, using as a case study Shahriar County, located on the western fringe of the metropolitan area of Tehran. Following Heidegger, the feeling of home is a fundamental aspect of human existence. From this perspective, housing policies and spatial planning
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Recent Scholarship on Early Modern Central Asia Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2020-08-18 Daniel Beben
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The Emergence and Development of Persianate Sufism: Khorasan, Ninth to Twelfth Centuries Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2020-08-18 Saïd Amir Arjomand
This paper examines the emergence of Sufism and its differentiation from other religious trends in early Islamic Khorasan and Transoxania and traces the influence of Buddhism and Manichæism on the development of Sufism. The corresponding professionalization of the Sufi sheikhs in this formative process went hand in hand with the elaboration of Sufi mystical theory. The theoretical elaboration of Sufism
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“Neither Eastern nor Western, Iranian”: How the Quest for Self-Sufficiency Helped Shape Iran’s Modern Nationalism Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2020-08-18 Rudi Matthee
This essay identifies an historically-enduring Iranian insistence on self-sufficiency—which can be summed up, in a superordinate manner, as the idea that the world needs Iran more than Iran needs the world. Economically, this insistence is reflected in a (rhetorical) quest for self-reliance in production; politically, it tends to be articulated in an instinctive anti-(neo)colonial, often defiant stance
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The Saffarid Yaʿqub b. Layth and the Revival of Persian Kingship Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2020-08-18 Mohsen Rahmati
The sparse historical data suggest that Yaʿqub b. Layth was the first Iranian ruler following the Arab-Islamic conquests to make significant efforts to revive Persian kingship. This article seeks to clarify, as far as possible, Yaʿqub’s actions and goals, as well as the context for his efforts. This interpretation of the sources argues that the Saffarid ruler’s government faced a crisis of social legitimacy
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Introduction: Kingship and Political Legitimacy in the Persianate World Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2020-01-02 Kazuo Morimoto
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The Hazaraspid Dynasty’s Legendary Kayanid Ancestry: the Flowering of Persian Literature under the Patronage of Local Rulers in the Late Il-khanid Period Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2020-01-02 Osamu Otsuka
This article discusses the flowering of Persian literature under the patronage of the Hazaraspid Nosrat al-Din, the local ruler of Lorestan in the late Il-khanid period. It is generally accepted that Persian literature evolved dramatically under the patronage of Mongol Il-khanid rulers. However, little research deals with the contribution of local rulers to this evolution. Persian literary works offered
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How to Found a New Dynasty: The Early Qajars’ Quest for Legitimacy Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2020-01-02 Nobuaki Kondo
This paper focuses on how early Qajars established their rule and legitimacy. At first, Āqā Mohammad Khān, the first shah, imitated other rulers since Nāder Shāh, such as Mohammad-Hasan Khān Qājār, Āzād Khān Afghān, and Karim Khān Zand, in his coins and documents. Like his predecessors, he also tried to install a Safavid prince at Tehran as a puppet ruler. However, following his official coronation
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In This Corner of the Entangled Cosmopolises: Political Legitimacies in the Multilingual Society of Sultanate and Early Mughal Kashmir Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2020-01-02 Satoshi Ogura
This essay explores the forms of political legitimacy claimed by Muslim sultans and received by their Muslim and non-Muslim subjects in sultanate and early Mughal Kashmir. The establishment of the Shahmirid sultanate in 1339 marked the beginning of a new multilingual situation where Sanskrit and Persian were both used as official languages. In such a situation, presentation of the Shahmirids’ political
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The Jalayirid Hidden King and the Unbelief of Shāh Mohammad Qara Qoyunlu Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2020-01-02 Evrim Binbaş
This article provides an account of the transfer of power from the Jalayirids to the Qara Qoyunlu in ʿErāq al-ʿArab (Iraq) and the religio-political history of the Qara Qoyunlu dynasty with a particular focus on the reign of Shāh Mohammad b. Qara Yusof, the Qara Qoyunlu ruler in Baghdad between 1411/814 and 1433/836. Contemporary historians accused Shāh Mohammad of unbelief and apostasy. The article
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Introduction: Advice Literature and Persianate Political Ethics Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2019-12-05 Louise Marlow
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Review Essay: Persianate Political Thought and Islam Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2019-12-05 Saïd Amir Arjomand
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Élite Folktales: Munes-nāma, Ketāb-e dāstān, and Their Audiences Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2019-12-05 Nasrin Askari
Drawing on evidence from the texts, illustrations, and contexts of production of two Persian manuscripts, the present paper points to the role of female élites as both audiences and protagonists of the two works, and argues that both works functioned as advisory literature for the female élites of medieval Persian royal courts. It also draws attention to the strong connection of both works to the two
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From Blessed Lips: the Textualization of Abu Saʿid’s Dicta and Deeds Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2019-12-05 Austin O’Malley
This paper examines the formation and development of the Abu Saʿid Abuʾl-Kheyr hagiographic tradition. It shows how reports about the eleventh-century saint circulated within a shrine community of his descendants and disciples, both orally and in ad hoc notes, before being set down in writing. It argues that the Asrār al-towhid, the largest and best-known hagiography devoted to Abu Saʿid, is not a
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“A Marvelous Painting”: the Erotic Dimension of Saʿdi’s Praise Poetry Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2019-12-05 Domenico Ingenito
This article approaches Saʿdi’s little-studied panegyric production. The contribution focuses on an encomiastic modality that is almost completely neglected when it comes to the study of the Persian qasida as a performative text that enacts the political, ethical, and aesthetic values of the court. This modality is primarily amatory, and combines the standard erotic discourse of the Ghaznavids and
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“When a Lion is Chided by an Ant”: Everyday Saints and the Making of Sufi Kings in ʿAttār’s Elāhi-nāma Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2019-12-05 Ghazzal Dabiri
This paper addresses Farid al-Din ʿAttār’s views on social and kingly ethics as espoused in the Elāhi-nāma. It offers a holistic reading of its stories, which are suffused with the tenets of Sufism, to illustrate the myriad ways that the Elāhi-nāma adopts and adapts the characteristics and tropes of practical ethics and Sufi hagiographies to advance its views. Indeed, the Elāhi-nāma promotes the ideal
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Betrayed by Earth and Sky: Poetry of Disaster and Restoration in Eighteenth-Century Iran Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2019-01-28 Matthew C. Smith
In the winter of 1778, an earthquake shattered the city of Kashan. Three poets, Āẕar, Hātef, and Sabāhi, responded to the disaster in verse. Although all three are commonly associated with the Bāzgasht-e adabi (Literary Return) school that championed the style of an earlier era, their poems display an affinity with more contemporary Safavid poetry, particularly that of Mohtasham Kāshāni. In their responses
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The Coronation of the Early Sasanians, Ctesiphon, and the Great Diadem of Paikuli Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2019-01-28 Michael Shenkar
The article discusses the venue and the nature of the coronation ceremony of the Sasanian kings in the third century. It is argued that the coronation of the early Sasanians was a continuation of a Hellenistic ceremony, which was essentially the act of binding a diadem around one’s head. It seems that the common practice was for the king to bind the diadem himself in the presence of a select circle
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Fayz Mohammad Kāteb and Gholām Mohammad Ghobār’s Divergent Allegories of an Afghan Rebellion Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2019-01-28 Elham Bakhtary
Recent scholarship on Afghan historiography has shed light on how Afghan historians, particularly from the early twentieth century onwards, have used events such as the First Anglo-Afghan War for the purpose of national narratives. This article deepens this analysis by paying particular attention to how two prominent Afghan historians, Fayz Mohammad Kāteb and Gholām Mohammad Ghobār, rendered the Afghan
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How to Rule the World: Occult-Scientific Manuals of the Early Modern Persian Cosmopolis Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2019-01-28 Matthew Melvin-Koushki
Imperial grimoires—that is, manuals on various forms of magic and divination written for or commissioned by royal readers—proliferated across the early modern Persianate world, more than paralleling the (decidedly non-imperial) grimoire boom in Renaissance Europe; but only the latter has been studied to date. This programmatic essay diagnoses the colonialist-Orientalist causes for this wild imbalance
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New Nation, New History: Promoting National History in Tajikistan Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2019-01-28 James D. Clark
This essay looks at the national history of the Tajiks of Central Asia that was created in the twentieth century and has continued to develop into the twenty-first century. It traces the notion of Tajik nationalism, which arose in the 1920s under the Soviet Union, largely in response to Uzbek nationalism. Soviet intellectuals and scholars thereafter attempted to construct a new history for the Tajiks
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Some Critical Remarks on the Migration of Iranian Poets to India in the Safavid Era Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2019-01-28 Saeid Shafieioun
Many scholars still firmly believe that the Safavid period was one of hostility towards poets and men of letters. Numerous learned men fled Iran to India, for both religious and ideological reasons, which in turn affected both the quality and quantity of Persian literature from this era. There is evidence that corroborates this line of argument, but there are other socio-political, religious and cultural
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The Black Death in Iran, according to Iranian Historical Accounts from the Fourteenth through Fifteenth Centuries Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2018-10-19 Ahmad Fazlinejad, Farajollah Ahmadi
The Black Death, as a unique historical event, has long attracted the attention of medieval and medical historians both in terms of the length of the pandemic and its geographical scope. Nevertheless, historical studies on the Black Death have often neglected the role it played in Iran. The present paper examines Iranian historical accounts of events pertaining to the pandemic in the late Middle Ages
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Ferdynand Goetel’s Iranian Experience: A Non-Colonial European Account of Mashhad Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2018-10-19 Magdalena Rodziewicz
Ferdynand Goetel was a prisoner-of-war and a Polish refugee from Soviet Russia who, in 1920, spent a few months in Mashhad. The current study is an attempt to present Goetel’s unique view of the city and its inhabitants. Khorasan, at the beginning of the twentieth century, was frequently visited by foreigners who left numerous accounts of both the province and its capital Mashhad. Most of them were
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A Persian Origin of the Arabic Aristotle? The Debate on the Circumstantial Evidence of the Manteq Revisited Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2018-10-19 Erik Hermans
The oldest Arabic translation of any Greek text is an eighth-century paraphrase of the first half of Aristotle’s Organon, known as the Manteq. This text has been ascribed to Ebn al-Moqaffaʿ, the Persian administrator, author, and translator. Although the source text of the Manteq has not survived, the ascription to Ebn al-Moqaffaʿ—who knew neither Greek nor Syriac—implies that it was written in Middle
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Reading ʿAttār’s Elāhināma as Sufi Practical Ethics: Between Genre, Reception, and Muslim and Christian Audiences Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2018-10-19 Ghazzal Dabiri
This paper seeks to contribute to the field of reception and audience studies by analyzing ʿAttār’s Elāhināma. Little studied, the Elāhināma offers an opportunity to understand better ʿAttār’s attitudes towards socio-religious issues, as well as the types of audiences that the text seeks, how it addresses them, and what possible aims it has. The paper argues that the Elāhināma mobilizes the formal
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Armenians, Diplomats, and Commercial Agents of Shah ʿAbbās: The European Journey of Khvāja Safar (c. 1609–14) Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2018-10-19 José Cutillas Ferrer
In the first quarter of the seventeenth century, Safavid–Spanish relations took a substantial leap forward when Shah ʿAbbās I, together with a plan of alliance against the Ottomans, proposed a trade agreement that would reroute the silk market from Ottoman territory. This scheme and other factors highlighted the need to send to Iran, for the first time, a Spanish ambassador who was not linked to a
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The Politics of Poetics in Early Qajar Iran: Writing Royal-Commissioned Tazkeras at Fath-ʿAli Shāh’s Court Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2017-12-01 Naofumi Abe
The middle of the eighteenth century reportedly witnessed the emergence of the new literary movement in Persian poetry, called the “bāzgasht-e adabi,” or literary return, which rejected the seventeenth-century mainstream Indian or tāza-guʾi style. This literary movement recently merits increased attention from many scholars who are interested in wider Persianate cultures. This article explores the
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Constituting Love in Persianate Cinemas Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2017-12-01 Pedram Partovi
Critics have long regarded the popular cinemas of India, Iran, and Turkey as nothing more than cheap Hollywood knock-offs. While scholars have recognized the geographic and economic ties between these film industries, few have noted their engagement with themes and images particularly associated with earlier Persianate courtly entertainments. Persianate cinemas have challenged modernist ideas of love
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The Accidentality of Existence in Avicenna and its Critique by Averroes Journal of Persianate Studies Pub Date : 2017-12-01 † Yegane Shayegan
The accidentality of existence in Avicenna (Ebn Sinā, d. 1037) is related to his distinction between “existence (vojud)” and “quiddity (māhiyya).” Both these theories have been greatly criticized by Averroes (Ebn Roshd, d. 1198). The latter’s misunderstanding of Avicenna has been the cause of confusion for the comprehension of Aristotle (d. 322 bce) in Western Christian scholasticism. This misunderstanding