In 1315 such acrimonious disputes broke out between
Rashídu'd-Dín and 'Alí-sháh, as to who was responsible for
Fall and death of
Rashídu'd-Dín
in A.D. 1318
the lack of money to pay the troops, that
Úljáytú assigned to the management of each
one different provinces of Persia and Asia Minor.
Nevertheless 'Alí-sháh continued his campaign of calumny
against his colleague, who succeeded only with the greatest
difficulty in saving himself from disaster. The same rivalry
and intrigue continued after the death of Úljáytú and the
accession of Abú Sa'íd, until finally Rashídu'd-Dín, having
succumbed to the attacks of his traducers, was deprived of
his office in October, 1317, and ultimately, on July 18, 1318,
at the age of over seventy years, was put to death with his
son Ibráhím, a lad of sixteen years of age, on a charge of
having poisoned the late king. His property was confiscated,
his relatives were persecuted and despoiled, his pious founda-
Destruction of
his foundations
and desecration
of his tomb
tions were robbed of their endowments, and the
Rab'-i-Rashídí, the suburb which he had founded,
was given over to rapine. He was buried in the
mausoleum which he had prepared for his last
resting-place, but his body was not suffered to rest there in
peace, for about a century later Míránsháh the son of Tímúr-
For the conception of the Jámi'u't-Tawáríkh the credit, in Quatremère's opinion, * belongs to Gházán Khán, who,
General plan and execution of the Jámi'u 't-Tawáríkh foreseeing that the Mongols in Persia, in spite of their actual supremacy, would in course of time inevitably be absorbed by the Persians, desired to leave to posterity a monument of their achievements, in the shape of a faithful record of their history and conquests, in the Persian language. For the accomplishment of this great task he chose (and no better choice could have been made) Rashídu'd-Dín, at whose disposal were placed all the state archives, and the services of all those who were most learned in the history and antiquities of the Mongols. The minister, though engrossed by the state affairs of a vast empire, yet succeeded in finding time to prosecute his researches and commit them to writing, though, according to Dawlat-sháh, * the only time at his disposal for this purpose was that which intervened between the morning prayer and sunrise.Before Rashídu'd-Dín's history of the Mongols was completed, Gházán died (May 17, 1304), but his successor Analysis of the contents of the Jámi'u't-Tawáríkh Úljáytú ordered it to be finished and dedicated, as originally intended, to Gházán; whence this portion of the work, generally called the first volume, is sometimes entitled Ta'ríkh-i-Gházáni, the “Gházánian History.” Úljáytú also ordered the author to write a companion volume containing a general history of the world and especially of the lands of Islám, and a third volume dealing with geography. This last has either perished, or was never actually written, but only projected, so that the work as we now know it comprises only two volumes, the first on the history of the Mongols, written for Gházán, the second on general history. The whole work was completed in 710/1310-11, though two years later the author was still engaged on his supplementary account of Úljáytu's reign.
The contents of this great history are briefly as follows:
VOL. I, ch. i. History of the different Turkish and Mongol tribes, their divisions, genealogies, pedigrees, legends, etc., in a Preface and four sections.
VOL. I, ch. ii. History of Chingíz Khán, his ancestors and successors, down to Gházán Khán.
VOL. II, Preface. On Adam and the Patriarchs and Hebrew Prophets.
Part 1. History of the ancient kings of Persia before Islám, in four sections.
Part 2. History of the Prophet Muḥammad and of the Caliphate, down to its extinction by the Mongols in 1258; of the post-Muhammadan Persian dynasties of Persia, viz. the Sultans of Ghazna, the Seljúqs, the Khwárazmsháhs, the Salgharid Atábeks of Fárs, and the Isma'ílís of the West and of the East; of Oghuz and his descendants, the Turks; of the Chinese; of the Jews; of the Franks and their Emperors and Popes; and of the Indians, with a long and full account of Sakyamuni (Buddha) and of the religion which he founded.
The above is the arrangement actually adopted in the manuscripts of the India Office and the British Museum, but Intended arrangement of the Jámi'u'tTawáríkh the divisions proposed by the author in his Introduction are slightly different, for he intended to begin the second volume with the history of the reigning king Úljáytú from his birth until 706/1306-7, and to add a supplement at the end of the same volume continuing the history of this monarch year by year. This confusing arrangement is not actually observed in most manuscripts, which, if they contain Úljáytú's reign at all, put it in its natural place, at the end of vol. i, after Gházán. Few if any of the extant manuscripts are, however, complete, though every part of the history is contained in one or other of them. In the J.R.A.S. for January, 1908 (pp. 17-37) I have given a fuller analysis of the contents, together with a scheme for the complete edition which is so much needed. Ignoring the complicated and confusing divisions made by Scheme for a complete edition of the Jámi'u'tTawáríkh in seven volumes the author, I proposed to publish the whole book in seven volumes, of which the first three, containing the history of the Turks and Mongols, would correspond to vol. i of the original, and the last four to vol. ii, as follows: