It may be mentioned that Asadí incurred Sulṭán Maḥmúd's
displeasure by one of his “strife-poems” (that entitled “Arab
and Persian”), in consequence of the praise which he bestowed
on two princes of the rival House of Buwayh, viz., Shamsu'd-
Abu'l Faraj of Sístán, though earlier in time than most of the poets above mentioned, is subordinate in importance Abu'l Faraj-iSagzí. to them, and also to his pupil Minúchihrí, of whom we shall speak immediately. His chief patron was Abú Símjúr, one of the victims of Sulṭán Maḥmúd's inordinate ambition, and he is said to have died in A.D. 1002. Of his life and circumstances we know next to nothing, though in Dawlatsháh, * as usual, personal details are forthcoming, though only one fragment of his verse is given, of which this is a translation:—
“Gladness in this age of ours is like the 'Anqá of the West;
Consecrated unto sorrow seems our mortal life's brief span.
Widely o'er the earth I've wandered, much the World of Form
explored,
Man I found fore-doomed to sorrow, made to suffer: wretched
man!
Each in varying proportion bears his burden of distress;
Unto none they grant exemption from the universal ban.”
Of Abu'l-Faraj's pupil Minúchihrí, who survived till A.D. 1041 or later, mention has been already made, and a Minúchihrí. translation of one of his most celebrated qaṣídas is given at pp. 30-34 supra. Manuscripts of his díwán are not very common, but it has been printed, with a historical Introduction, a full translation, and excellent notes by A. de Biberstein Kazimirski (Paris, 1886), and a lithographed edition was published in Ṭihrán some six years earlier, while Dawlatsháh speaks of it as “well known and famous in Persia.” That he was a native of Dámghán (some fifty miles south of Astarábád, on the Ṭihrán-Mashhad road), not of Balkh or Ghazna, as Dawlatsháh asserts, clearly appears from one of his own verses. 'Awfí * gives his full name as Abu'n-Najm Ahmad b. Qúṣ (or Ya'qúb, according to Ethé, op. cit., p. 225) b. Aḥmad al-Minúchihrí, and vouchsafes little further information, save that he was precociously clever and died young. He is generally said to have borne the sobriquet of shast galla, a term variously interpreted, * but generally as meaning “sixty herds,” in allusion to his wealth. 'Awfí says nothing of this, and a passage in the unique history of the Seljúqs entitled Ráḥatu'ṣ-Ṣudúr, to which I called attention in my account of this important work in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society for 1902, pp. 580-581, inclines me to believe that two different poets have been confounded together by later writers: to wit, Abu'n-Najm Aḥmad Minúchihrí, who flourished in the first half of the eleventh century of our era, and Shamsu'd-Dín Aḥmad Minúchihr, who lived in the latter part of the twelfth century, and to whom the sobriquet of shast galla really belonged. Of this latter poet's verses nothing, so far as I know, has been preserved, and we only know that he wrote a qaṣída called (probably from its rhyme) qaṣída-i-titmáj.
Here is a translation of another celebrated qaṣída by the real The “Candleqaṣída.” Minúchihrí, describing the Candle, and ending with praises of 'Unṣurí. It is given both by 'Awfí and Dawlatsháh, and of course in the editions of the Díwán:—
“Thou whose soul upon thy forehead glitters like an aureole,
By our souls our flesh subsists, while by thy flesh subsists thy
soul.
Why, if not a star, dost waken only when all others sleep?
Why, if not a lover, ever o'er thyself forlorn dost weep?
Yes, thou art indeed a star, but shinest in a waxen sphere!
Yes, thou art a lover, but thy sweetheart is the chandelier!
O'er thy shirt * thou wear'st thy body: strange, indeed; for all
the rest
Wear the vest upon the skin, but thou the skin upon the vest!
Thou revivest if upon thee falls the fire when thou art dead,*
And when thou art sick they cure thee best by cutting off thy
head! *
Even midst thy smiles thou weepest, * and, moreover, strange
to tell,
Thou art of thyself the lover, and the well-beloved as well!
Thou without the Spring dost blossom, and without the
Autumn die, *
Laughing now without a mouth, and weeping now without
an eye! *
Me most nearly thou resemblest; closely I resemble thee;
Kindly friends of all the world, but foes unto ourselves are we.
Both of us consume and spend ourselves to make our com-
rades glad,
And by us our friends are rendered happy while ourselves
are sad.
Both are weeping, both are wasting, both are pale and weary-
eyed,
Both are burned in isolation, both are spurned and sorely tried.
I behold upon thy head what in my heart doth hidden rest;
Thou upon thy head dost carry what I hide within my breast.
Both our visages resemble yellow flowers of shanbalíd,
Mine the bud unopened, thine the bloom which beautifies the
mead.
From thy face when I am parted hateful is the sunshine
bright,
And when thou art taken from me, sad and sorrowful the
night.
All my other friends I've tested, great and little, low and
high;
Found not one with kindly feeling, found not two with loyalty.
Thou, O Candle, art my friend; to thee my secrets I consign;
Thou art my familiar comrade, I am thine and thou art mine.
Like a beacon light thou shinest, while with eager eyes I scan
Every night till dawn the Díwán of Abu'l-Qásim Ḥasan, *
'Unṣurí, the greatest master of the day in this our art,
Soul of faith, of stainless honour, great in wisdom, pure in
heart,*He whose voice is like his wit, alike original and free;
While his wit is like his verse in grace and spontaneity.
Art in verse surpassing his to claim were but an idle boast;
Others have at best one talent; he of talents owns a host.
In the crow will ne'er appear the virtues of the horse, I trow,
Though the neighing of the horse be like the cawing of the
crow.
Whilst his poems you're reciting sugar-plums you seem to eat,
And the fragrance of his verses than the jasmine is more
sweet.”
Minúchihrí, it may be added, took his pen-name from the Ziyárid Prince of Ṭabaristán, Minúchihr b. Qábús b. Washmgír, entitled Falaku'l-Ma'álí (“The Heaven of High Qualities”), who succeeded his murdered father in A.D. 1012-13, and died in A.D. 1028-29.
Ghaḍá'irí of Ray has been already mentioned (pp. 69-70 supra) as the author of an ighráq, or hyperbolic praise, of Sulṭán Ghaḍá'irí. Maḥmúd, which is said to have been rewarded with seven purses of gold, equivalent in value to 14,000 dirhams. The qaṣída in which these two verses occur begins:—
“If in rank be satisfaction, if in wealth be high degree,
Look on me, that so the Beauty of Perfection thou may'st see!
I am one in whom shall glory, even till the end of days,
Every scribe who o'er a couplet writes the customary ‘says.’”
*
Both 'Awfí and Dawlatsháh give brief notices of this poet, of
whose life we know practically nothing, save that he excelled
in “strife-poems” and poetical duels as well as in panegyric.
Bahrámí of Sarakhs has been already mentioned (p. 115 supra) as the author of a prose work on Prosody entitled Khujasta-náma.
Bahrámí. Two other similar works of his, the Gháyatu'l-