It is impossible to fix a definite date at which Modern Persian literature may be said to have begun. Probably Beginning of Modern Persian Literature. Persian converts to Islám began to write their language in the Arabic character very soon after the Arab Conquest—that is to say, some time in the eighth century of our era. The first attempts of this sort were probably mere memoranda and notes, Prose. followed, perhaps, by small manuals of instruction in the doctrines of Islám. Fragmentary utterances in Persian, and even brief narratives, are recorded here and there in the pages of early Arabic writers, and these at least serve to show us that the Persian of late Sásánian and early Muhammadan times was essentially the same as that with which we meet in the earliest monuments of Modern Persian literature. Of actual books of any extent, the Persian translation of Ṭabarí's history made for Manṣúr I, the Sámánid prince, in A.D. 963 by his minister Bal'amí; the Materia Medica of Abú Manṣúr Muwaffaq b. 'Alí of Herát (preserved to us in the unique MS. of Vienna dated A.D. 1055, of which a beautiful reprint was published by Seligmann in 1859) composed for the same royal patron; and the second volume of an old commentary on the Qur'án (Cambridge University Library, Mm. 4. 15)* belonging, apparently, to about the same period, are, so far as is known, the oldest surviving specimens.
It is very generally assumed, however, that in Persian, as in
Arabic, verse preceded prose. One story, cited by several of
Poetry.
the native biographers (e.g., Dawlatsháh in his
Lives of the Poets), ascribes the first Persian
couplet to the joint invention of Bahrám Gúr the Sásánian
(A.D. 420-438), and his mistress Dil-árám.*
Another
quotes (on the authority of Abú Ṭáhir al-Khátúní, a
writer of the twelfth century of our era) a Persian couplet
engraved on the walls of the Qaṣr-i-Shírín (“Palace of
Shírín,” the beloved of Khusraw Parwíz, A.D. 590-628), said
to have been still legible in the time of 'Aḍudu'd-Dawla the
Buwayhid (tenth century of our era).*
Another tells how one
day in Níshápúr the Amír 'Abdu'lláh b. Ṭáhir (died A.D. 844)
was presented with an old book containing the Romance of
Wámiq and 'Adhra, “a pleasing tale, which wise men compiled,
and dedicated to King Núshírwán” (A.D. 531-579);
and how he ordered its destruction, saying that the Qur'án
and Traditions of the Prophet ought to suffice for good
Muslims, and adding, “this book was written by Magians and
is accursed in our eyes.”*
Yet another story given by
Dawlatsháh attributes the first line of metrical Persian to the
gleeful utterance of a little child at play, the child being the
son of Ya'qúb b. Layth “the Coppersmith,” founder of
the Ṣaffárí (“Brazier”) dynasty (A.D. 868-878).*
Muḥammad
'Awfí, the author of the oldest extant Biography of Persian
Poets,*
who flourished early in the thirteenth century of our
era (A.D. 1210-1235), asserts that the first Persian poem was
composed by one 'Abbás of Merv in honour of the Caliph
al-Ma'mún, the son of Hárúnu'r-Rashíd, on the occasion of
his entry into that city in A.D. 809, and even cites some verses
of the poem in question; but, though this assertion has been
accepted as a historical fact by some scholars of repute,*
the
scepticism of others*
appears to the writer well justified. All
that can be safely asserted is that modern Persian literature,
especially poetry, had begun to flourish considerably in
Khurásán during the first half of the tenth century, especially
during the reign of the Sámánid prince Naṣr II (A.D. 913-
Most of the legends as to the origin of Persian poetry are, as we have seen, unworthy of very serious attention, and certainly merit little more credence than the assertion of serious and careful Arab writers, like Ṭabarí (†A.D. 923), and Mas'údí (†A.D. 957), that the first poem ever written was an elegy composed in Syriac by Adam on the death of Abel, of which poem they even give an Arabic metrical rendering* to this effect:—
“The lands are changed and those who dwell upon them;
The face of earth is marred and girt with gloom;
All that was fair and fragrant now hath faded,
Gone from that comely face the joyous bloom.
Alas for my dear son, alas for Abel,
A victim murdered, thrust within the tomb!
How can we rest? That Fiend accursed, unfailing,
Undying, ever at our side doth loom!”
To which the Devil is alleged to have retorted thus:—
“Renounce these lands and those who dwell upon them!
By me was cramped in Paradise thy room,
Wherein thy wife and thou were set and stablished,
Thy heart unheeding of the world's dark doom!
Yet did'st thou not escape my snares and scheming,
Till that great gift on which thou did'st presume
Was lost to thee, and blasts of wind from Eden,
But for God's grace, had swept thee like a broom!”
Nevertheless there is one legend indicating the existence of Persian poetry even in Sásánian times which, partly from the Bárbad the Sásánian minstrel (A.D. 590- 627.) persistency with which it reappears in various old writers of credit,* partly from a difference in the form of the minstrel's name which can hardly be explained save on the assumption that both forms were transcribed from a Pahlawí original, appears to me worthy of more serious attention. According to this legend, one of the chief ornaments of the court of Khusraw Parwíz, the Sásánian king (A.D. 590-627), was a minstrel named by Persian writers Bárbad, but by Arabic authors Bahlabad, Balahbad or Fahlabad, forms of which the first and third point to a Persian original Pahlapat. Bahlabad and Bárbad when written in the Arabic character are not easily confounded; but if written in the Pahlawí character, which has but one sign for A and H on the one hand, and for R and L on the other, they are identical, which fact affords strong evidence that the legends concerning this singer go back ultimately to books written in Pahlawí, in other words to records almost contemporary. Now this Bárbad (for simplicity the modern Persian form of the name is adopted here, save in citations from Arabic texts) presents, as I have elsewhere pointed out,* a striking resemblance to the Sámánid poet Rúdagí, who flourished in the early part of the tenth century of our era; and indeed the two are already associated by an early poet, Sharíf-i-Mujallidí of Gurgán, who sings:—
“From all the treasures hoarded by the Houses
Of Sásán and of Sámán, in our days
Nothing survives except the song of Bárbad,
Nothing is left save Rúdagí's sweet lays.”
For in all the accounts of Rúdagí which we possess his most remarkable achievement is the song which he composed and sung in the presence of the Sámánid Amír Naṣr b. Aḥmad to induce that Prince to abandon the charms of Herát and its environs, and to return to his native Bukhárá, which he had neglected for four years. The extreme simplicity of this song and its entire lack of rhetorical adornment, have been noticed by most of those who have described this incident, by some (e.g. Nidhámí-i-'Arúḍí of Samarqand) with approval, by others, such as Dawlatsháh, with disapprobation, mixed with surprise that words so simple could produce so powerful an effect. And indeed it is rather a ballad than a formal poem of the artificial and rather stilted type most admired in those decadent days to which Dawlatsháh belongs, and in which, as he says, “If any one were to produce such a poem in the presence of kings or nobles, it would meet with the reprobation of all.” To the musical skill of the minstrel, and his cunning on the harp wherewith he accompanied his singing, the simple ballad, of which a paraphrase is here offered, no doubt owed much:—
“The Jú-yi-Múliyán we call to mind,
We long for those dear friends long left behind.
The sands of Oxus, toilsome though they be,
Beneath my feet were soft as silk to me.
Glad at the friends' return, the Oxus deep
Up to our girths in laughing waves shall leap.
Long live Bukhárá! Be thou of good cheer!
Joyous towards thee hasteth our Amír!
The Moon's the Prince, Bukhárá is the sky;
O Sky, the Moon shall light thee by and by!
Bukhárá is the Mead, the Cypress he;
Receive at last, O Mead, thy Cypress-tree!”