Ferdowsi Tousi (فردوسی طوسی in Persian) (more commonly transliterated Firdausi) (935–1020) is considered to be one of the greatest Persian poets to have ever lived. Among the national heroes and the literately greats of all time, Ferdowsi has a very special place. His life-long endeavour, dedication and personal sacrifices to preserve the national identity, language and heritage of his homeland put him in great hardship in his lifetime but won him fame and honour for one of the great literally masterpieces of all time.
Ferdowsi was born in the Iranian province of Khorasan in a village near Tus, in 935. His great epic the Shahnama ("The Epic of Kings"), to which he devoted most of his adult life, was originally composed for eventual presentation to the Samanid princes of Khorasan, who were the chief instigators of the revival of Iranian cultural traditions after the Arab conquest of the seventh century. During Ferdowsi's lifetime this dynasty was conquered by the Ghaznavid Empire, and there are various stories in medieval texts describing the lack of interest shown by the new ruler of Khorasan, Sultan Mahmud of Ghaznavid, in Ferdowsi and his lifework. Ferdowsi is said to have died around 1020 in poverty and embittered by royal neglect, though fully confident of his work's ultimate success and fame.
His masterwork, the Shahnama is the most popular and influential manifestation of true Iraniannational epics. The Shahnama or the "Book of Kings," consists of the translation of an even older Pahlavi (Middle Persian) work. It has been a work of exceptional popularity among the Persians for over 1.000 years now.
Ferdowsi is one of the undisputed giants of Persian literature. After Ferdowsi's Shahnama a number of other works similar in nature surfaced over the centuries within the cultural sphere of the Persian language. Without exception, all such works were based in style and method on Ferdowsi's Shahnama, but none of them could quite achieve the same degree of fame and popularity as Ferdowsi's masterpiece.
The Hakim Abu al-Qasim Mansur Firdowsi was born about AD 935 to a prosperous and educated farming family near the town of Tus in Khurasan province of Iran.
Firdowsi, on the other hand, begins his Shahname with the creation of the sacred land of Iran in the east and with developments that lead to the breakup of the ancient Iranian world, culminating in the emergence of the independent states of Iran and Turan and their subsequent reunification.
Firdowsi felt that in their evaluation of his work his peers allowed religious bias, racial and nationalistic concerns, and conflict of interest to interfere with a fair assessment.
Firdowsi in the poem "Shah-name" glorified idealized mythological characters, in particular, the first ten kings of Iran in order to remind about greatness of pre-Islamic history of the country and consolidate peoples in their struggle for state independence.
Firdowsi could catch and transmit difference in understanding of the rank and potential of the both mythological personages - Kayumars had no obstacles in his striving to help to the people and establish social prosperity, as for Djamshid, he faced such obstacle in a name of Iblis and delusion provoked by him.
In the miniature it was reflected in a location of Kamayurs on the highest point of the scene, at a distance from the people looking at their king with blank awe, and Djamshid, as closer to earth interests and accessible for the bait, occupies the place among the other characters.
Feeds |
Contact