Firdawsi

Firdawsi, real name Abdul Qasim Mansur (c. 940-c. 1020), Persian poet.

Born near Tūn in Khursan, he belonged to the landed gentry. He was married at the age of 28 and some eight years later began the work for which he is most famous, the great national epic poem Shah nameh (Book of Kings). The work is based on a poem by the Persian poet Daqiqi (died c. 980). Firdawsi spent 35 years writing this epic and completed it in 1010, when he was about 70 years old.

The poem contains 60,000 rhyming couplets, making it more than seven times the length of Homer's Iliad. It deals first with the legendary Persian kings: Gayumart, Hoshang, Tahmuras, and the most famous of the group, Jamshid, who reigned for 500 years during the golden age of the Earth. Following this happy period came the evil rule of the Arab Dahhák, or Zohak, who was tempted by Ahriman, his own ancestor. As a result, Dahhák fell into sin, becoming more and more evil until Kavah, a smith, rebelled and established his leather apron as the banner of revolt. Finally, the tyrant was bound and confined beneath Mount Damāvand on the shores of the Caspian Sea. Soon after this point in the poem is an episode of considerable beauty; it recounts the loves of Zal, of the royal line of Persia, and Rudabah, the daughter of the king of Kabul. Their union resulted in the birth of the most romantic of all the heroes of the Shah nameh, Rustam, who occupies a position in Iranian legend somewhat analogous to that of Hercules in Greek and Latin literature. The epic progresses through Persian legend to historic times, tracing the reigns of the Sasanian kings down to the Muslim conquest and the death of Yazdegerd III in 651. Thus, the work constitutes a valuable source for the early history of Persia, which is necessary to supplement the accounts given in the old Persian cuneiform inscriptions and the Avesta. In addition to his poetic incentive, Firdawsi had a distinctly patriotic motive in writing the Shah nameh. He plainly desired to keep alive in the hearts of his people the faith of their ancestors and the glories of their deeds so that the Persians would not become mere puppets under Arab domination.

The epic contains an introductory eulogy of Sultan Mahmud of Ghaznī, to whom the work is dedicated. Firdawsi went to Mahmud's court to present his work as a tribute and was awarded the sum of 20,000 dihrams, (about $2,400). The amount was considerably less than he had been led to expect. The disappointed poet took his revenge by writing a bitter satire on Mahmud, which he sent to the sultan as a substitute for his former eulogy. Firdawsi then fled to Herāt, and from there to Tabaristan, where the reigning prince protected him. He later settled in Baghdad where he composed an epic of 9,000 couplets, Yüsuf and Zuleikha. The work is an Arabic version of the biblical story of Joseph and Potiphar's wife, a favourite theme of Oriental poets. In his old age Firdawsi retired to his native town near Tūn, where, according to legend, he received Mahmud's forgiveness, and substantial financial recompense for his poor treatment, just before his death. The Shah nameh is perhaps best known to English readers through Sohrab and Rustum, a poem by the English poet Matthew Arnold, which is based on one episode in the Persian epic.