UP to the beginning of last century the Sháhnáma existed in MS. only. Since then five more or less complete editions have appeared in print:—
i. In 1808 Dr Lumsden undertook to superintend an edition of the poem, one volume of which was published at Calcutta in 1811, but the publication went no further. This edition will be referred to as L.
ii. In 1829 Turner Macan, who must always hold the place of honour among the editors of the poem, after devoted labour in collation of MSS., published at Calcutta in four volumes the first and only complete edition, the earlier portion of the text being based on that of L. This edition will be referred to as C.
iii. In 1838 Jules Mohl published the first volume of his most sumptuous edition at the expense of the French government. Six volumes have appeared; but the work was never finished owing to the death of the editor. This edition is based on an independent collation of MSS., and includes a French prose translation as well as the Persian text.* This edition will be referred to as P.
iv. In 1850 a complete lithographed edition in one volume folio, edited by Muhammad Mahdí, a native of Ispahán, was published at Tihrán. The text is a reprint of that of C, with occasional variations, some of which are of value. This edition will be referred to as T.
v. In 1877 J. A. Vullers published the first volume of his edition, and two other volumes have since appeared. The publication of the third volume was interrupted by the lamented death of the editor, but has since been completed from the materials left by him by Samuel Lindauer. Even thus the edition contains only about the first half of the entire poem. This edition is based on the collation of the texts of C and P, with occasional readings from L and T, and other sources. This edition will be referred to as V.
The only complete European translations of the Sháhnáma hitherto published are the French one above mentioned and an Italian one in verse by Signor Pizzi. Translations and summaries of portions of the poem have appeared in English and German. The indulgence both of the Persian scholar and of the English reader is asked on behalf of this the first English translation of the poem as a whole in view of the magnitude and difficulty of the undertaking. Our prime object has been to produce a clear and intelligible rendering, and with this end in view we have found it needful to dispense with certain redundances in the original. All these probably may be grouped under the following heads—variant, corrupt, and spurious passages; repetitions, tautologies, and platitudes; and idiomatic and grammatical constructions that proved intractable. Those who are acquainted with the original will readily understand what these omissions amount to; those unacquainted with it may easily find out by comparing our version with that of M. Mohl. Both will, we think, admit that we have left the fable absolutely intact, that we have scrupulously avoided cutting to the quick and have done nothing to forfeit our claim to call this the first complete English translation of the Sháhnáma.
Our version is metrical, partly rhymed and partly unrhymed. The rhymed portion consists of preludes, apologues, sayings of wise men, songs, terminal couplets, passages in which the poet speaks in his own person, and some others that seemed to lend themselves to such treatment. These form a very small part of the whole, and are generally line for line with the original, though couplets or hemistichs may be sometimes inverted for convenience in rendering. We have changed the metre occasionally partly for the sake of variety, partly to suit the character of different passages, and partly for our own refreshment and amusement. The reader should, however, clearly understand that a change of metres implies no corresponding change in the original, of which the metre is the same throughout.
The unrhymed portion, which forms the bulk of the translation, and does not aspire to the dignity of being called blank verse, is more condensed than the rhymed, though the proportion of English to Persian is constantly varying; sometimes a whole couplet in the original is best expressed by a single line in the translation; sometimes a line and a half, two lines or more in the translation go to the couplet in the original. The average may be roughly stated as three English lines to two Persian couplets. The result of these various economies is that our translation is some twenty-five per cent. shorter than otherwise it would have been.
We have followed the text of V as far as if goes, silently incorporating with it all the changes and additions made by the editor himself in his notes and in his Apparatus Criticus at the end of his first volume, subject of course to the heads of omissions stated above and to the occasional adoption of readings from other texts. These, we hope, we have invariably noted.
When the text of V failed us we fell back upon that of C, as to which we reserve any remarks that we may find it necessary to make till the volume of our translation is reached in which the change of text occurs.
The attention of the reader is called to the following points:—
1. It is hoped that the Introduction may prove sufficient for those who wish to read the Sháhnáma in its English dress but have no previous acquaintance with the subject. They will find notes prefixed to the principal divisions of the poem, but it has been thought desirable to avoid footnotes, as far as possible, to the translation itself.
2. The passages that need the most constant elucidation
are those of a descriptive, figurative, or metaphorical
character. An attempt has been made to
explain the principal of these once for all in the
previous chapter. Such passages often might have
been made self-explanatory by a sufficient sacrifice of
the imagery of the original. It has seemed to us,
however, better to say that the Sháh dropped the ball
into the cup*
or bestowed the kettledrums upon
some one, than that the Sháh gave the signal for the
host to move or appointed some one commander-in-
3. The structure of the Persian language is very loose grammatically. One form, for instance, stands for he, she, and it. For the sake of clearness we have often substituted the noun for the pronoun. Of course this involves a certain amount of interpretation, and differences of opinion in some cases legitimately may exist as to who or what the person or thing referred to may be. On the other hand, we often find a noun where in English we should use a pronoun, and we have constantly made the substitution in passages where no doubt can arise in the reader's mind. Again the couplet-form in which the poem is written has a tendency to break it up into a succession of short sentences, and this, added to the above-mentioned use of the noun where we should naturally use the pronoun and to the paucity of connecting particles, frequently makes the transition from sentence to sentence somewhat abrupt and the line of thought difficult to follow. Often we have carried on sentences by the addition of connecting particles which are not in the original.
4. We desire to make some explanations with regard to certain important words in the original.
Báj and Zamzam. By these terms is known a certain practice of Zoroastrians which may be paraphrased in English as “taking prayer inwardly.” Before eating, washing. &c., it is customary to mutter the beginning of some sacred formula, to carry through the operation in complete silence, and then to utter the rest of the formula aloud.* We have employed such expressions as “muttering” or “muttered prayer” to describe the practice. It is sometimes used as a pretext for obtaining a few moments' private conversation.
Barsam. This was formerly a bundle of twigs, but now of metal wires varying in number according to circumstances, held in the hand during the performance of certain religious rites of the Zoroastrians.* The practice is clearly referred to in Ezekiel viii. 16, 17. We translate “Barsam” by “the sacred twigs.”
Dakhma. Firdausí does not use this word in its proper sense—that in which it is still used by the Parsís at the present day—but in that of mausoleum, charnel, or charnel-house, and we have so translated it.*
Dihkán. The general sense of this word is that of countryman as distinguished from townsman. Owing, however, to the fact that the rural class in Írán as elsewhere were the chief repositories of the traditions and folklore of their native land, which were handed down orally and recited at local gatherings by those best qualified for the task, the word came to have the secondary meaning of bard or minstrel, and we have rendered it according to its first or secondary meaning as the sense of the passage required.
Dínár and Diram. Of these the dínár was a gold and the diram a silver coin. The Attic drachma was made the basis of his monetary system by Alexander the Great, and Persia possessed no native gold coinage till more than five centuries later. It then obtained one by accident. By the terms of peace between Ardawán (Artabanus), the last Parthian monarch, and the Emperor Macrinus, after the great battle of Nisibis in A.D. 217, the latter agreed to pay to the former an indemnity of more than a million and a half of our money. The sum seems to have been chiefly paid in aurei. Consequently when Ardshír Pápakán (Artaxerxes) became the first Sháh of the new native Persian (Sásánian) dynasty in A.D. 226 he found the country flooded with two distinct coinages with no recognised relation between them except the rough and ready one of commerce. He seems to have left matters to settle themselves, and in his own coinage followed the type of the aureus for his gold coins and that of the drachma for his silver.* The expression “dínárs and dirams” is one frequently met with in the poem, and as it is rather an inconvenient one metrically we have substituted the older form “drachm” for “diram.”
Dív. We retain this word as in the original. When spelt with a capital it is to be regarded as equivalent to Áhriman or Iblís, except in the collocations “Black Dív” and “White Dív.” When spelt with a small letter it may mean either a demon or a member of some savage or outlandish tribe.*
Farr. The “farr” was regarded as the special divine endowment of the Íránian race—the favoured people of Urmuzd—and as an object of envy or ambition to the neighbouring peoples. It was regarded in the Zandavasta as something material, that could be sought, seized, and carried off, and even in the Sháhnáma we find a few occasions when it assumes a visible form. Each of the three primitive castes into which the Íránians were divided had its own special “farr,” while the Sháh united all three in his own person, and the possession of the threefold “farr” constituted his title to the throne. There is an instance in the present volume where after the death of a Sháh his two sons are both passed over in the succession as not being possessed of the “farr.” Firdausí, it should be noted, gives himself great latitude in the use of this and many other expressions, but wherever the word appears to be used in its correct sense we render it by “Grace” or “Glory.”
Farsang. The farsang is a measure of length, and we have always translated it as “league,” although it is about three-quarters of a mile longer than our English league.
Khil'at. The word properly means a robe bestowed by a ruler from his own wardrobe on some one as a sign of special favour. As it was accompanied by other gifts it came to mean gifts generally when bestowed by the ruler on a subject. We usually translate the word as “robe of honour.”
Maidán. This word properly means a level piece of ground attached to palaces or cities and used for purposes of exercise or pastime. Hence it comes to mean any level stretch of country, the space between two hostile hosts on which opposing champions would ride out and contend, a battlefield, park, &c. We have adopted various translations of the word to express these various meanings.
Múbid. The word properly means a chief priest of the Magi, but is often merely equivalent to “sage,” and is sometimes used of priests of other religious denominations. When used in its proper sense we translate it by “archmage” or “archimage,” when used generally by “priest.” The expression “múbid-i múbi-dán,” i.e. chief of the múbids, we always translate by “high priest.”
Pahlaví and Pahlaván. The first of these two words has been already explained.* We render it by such phrases as “olden tongue,” &c. The second is applied by Firdausí to all his chief Íránian characters other than the Sháhs, for the Pahlaván was essentially a subject. The chief Pahlaván was the protagonist or champion of the race for the time being but not necessarily commander-in-chief. Sometimes he was kept in reserve as a last resort when matters were going very badly. The office was hereditary in the heroic family of Garshásp, and Rustam, with whom its mythic glory becomes extinct, was its chief exponent. We translate by “paladin.”
Parí. It is hard to realise that this word, which in Arab lips would become “Fari,” is not connected with “fairy,” but it appears that for the etymology of the latter we must go to the Latin “Fata.” In meaning, however, our “fairy” and “fay” are the nearest English equivalents, and we have so rendered the word.
Saráparda.—We translate this word by “camp enclosure.” The saráparda was a screen of canvas or other material encircling an encampment.
5. Some of the chief characters in the poem are
known in the original by several titles. Zál, the
father of Rustam, is also called Zál-i-Zar, Dastán-i-
Again, the poet uses the word Sháh in a very wide
connection, but we employ it only when one of the forty-
6. With regard to the spelling of proper names we have followed the original with a few exceptions. We have kept Cæsar instead of Kaisar, Rúman instead of Rúmí, Indian instead of Hindí, and there may be a few more instances.*
For Khákán we invariably substitute the shorter form Khán, as the expression “the Khákán of Chín” is inconvenient metrically.
In the Persian the letter k in the word Kábul for instance is a different letter from that beginning the name of the hero Káran, which in accord to present usage should be spelt Qáran. Similarly the z in the word Zábul is a different letter from that in Ázargashasp, but we thought that on the whole it was better not to make such distinctions.
7. In cases in which it seemed to us that ambiguity might arise we have spelt words used metaphorically with a capital letter.
8. Those who desire to compare our translation with the original will find on the pages of the former references to the corresponding pages of the latter. For instance, V. 233 against a line indicates the beginning of that page in Vullers' edition of the text.
9. A note on pronunciation will be found immediately preceding the translation in each volume.
10. The headings of the reigns, parts, and sections are reprinted at the end of the volume to serve as a Table of Contents.
11. A list of some previous translations, the old Persian calendar, some genealogical tables, and a note on abbreviations are appended.
12. Finally we have to ask our readers not to judge, and in all probability condemn, this work on the strength of its first few pages. The Prelude and the initial reigns are most difficult to make anything of in a translation. This is not wholly our own fault. The poet himself, as readers of the original will bear witness, labours heavily, embarrassed perhaps by the character of his subject-matter. “The poem,” says Professor Nöldeke, “does not obtain real life till the reign of Jamshíd.”* In spite of the heroic tale of Káwa the smith, and the pathetic misadventure of Íraj, and much else that is both curious and interesting, we should be inclined to put the beginning of the “real life” later still. At all events the reader will find the poem growing in interest reign by reign till poet and poem appear at their best in the charming tale which fills for us the reign of Minúchihr.