Iranian Influence on Moslem Literature Part 5

[Footnote 1: Compare the essay of Rosen mentioned above _On the question of the Arabic translations of the Khuday Nameh_, 173-176, and 182-186.]

The next author mentioned at this place in the Fihrist as a translator stands by himself,--Umar ibn al Farrukhan. He is altogether unknown as a translator of historical works. Hence he was not included in the group of persons mentioned before. On the other hand, had he been set down in this pa.s.sage of the Fihrist as a translator of scientific works he would have been a.s.signed a place not at the close of the list but in the middle of the translators of this cla.s.s of books, that is, after Ibn Muqaffa and in the midst of the descendants of Naubakht and other persons mentioned above. Therefore we think that Umar ibn Farrukhan was a translator of another species of work or, may be, works. In support of our a.s.sumption we must call attention to that place in the Fihrist where are enumerated the books of this author and to which an-Nadhin himself refers in the a.n.a.lysis of the number of translators from Persian into Arabic.

Besides this place in the Fihrist, Umar ibn Farrukhan of Tabaristan has been mentioned in two other places. Once briefly,[1] (268, 25-26) as the annotator of the astronomical book of Dorotheya Sidonia and in another place (277, 14-18) in a few lines[2] specially devoted to him. Here he is mentioned as the annotator of Ptolemy as translated by Batrik Yahuya ibn al Batrik and as the author of two books, one of astronomical contents and the other ent.i.tled _Kitab al Mahasin_, that is the book of good qualities and manners.[3] This latter book demands a few lines from us.

[Footnote 1: Ibn al Qifti 184, 9--10.]

[Footnote 2: Ibn al Kifti 241, 20-242, 12. (This has been pointed out in the Fihrist Vol. II, 110-111, and in ZDMG XXV, 1871, 413--415.) Further mention of him in the same book 98, 9 and 184, 10.]

[Footnote 3: An account of the literary activity of this author was given in the work of H. Suter, _Die Mathematiker und Astronomen der Araber und ihre Werke_, Abhandiungen Zur Geschichte der mathematischer Wissenschaften Supplement zum, 45 Jahrgang der Zeitschrift fur Mathematik und Physik, Leipzig, 1900, 7-8. Haji Khalfa cites only the astrological books of Omar Ibn Farrukhan I, 198 and V, 35, 386. See also Justi _Namenbuch_ 95, Nos. 15 and 19.]

Umar ibn Farrukhan is mentioned in the section of books on astronomy, mathematics, physics, mechanics, and music. In this group are mentioned a number of writers who composed works on these sciences, beginning with Euclid and ending with the contemporary authors of an-Nadhin. In the midst of them, an-Nadhin has also mentioned the grandsons of Naubakht.

Not one of them wrote any _Kitab al Mahasin_ which appears, therefore, to be the independent work of Umar ibn Farrukhan. This book, further, could not have been of a scientific astronomical, or mathematical nature as is obvious from its subject-matter which related to good manners and conduct. This book has been mentioned in this group only because here are enumerated the works of Umar ibn Farrukhan. And good manners and conduct const.i.tuted, as we saw above, a favourite theme of Parsi literature: wherefor the book heads the list. Similar to it are the contents not only of _Andarzes_ and _Pand Namehs_ but of a series of tracts on religious subjects. Hence we think that it was mainly owing to this book that Umar ibn Farrukhan was included among the number of princ.i.p.al translators from Persian into Arabic and came to be enumerated among the translators to whom is ascribed a certain amount of speciality. For he was the solitary representative of his category of translators of ethicodidactic books intimately connected with the problems of the Paris religion. Possibly Umar ibn Farrukhan was the first to introduce this species of literature into Arabic, and we must add, employed for his material as well as ideas Parsi tracts. Originally from Tabaristan, he, in the words of Ibn al Qifti, was introduced to Abu Maashar al Balkhi, stood well with Jaffer the Barmecide, and subsequently with Fazl ibn Sahl, the Wazir who recommended him to his sovereign al-Mamum. And for this Khalif Mamun he prepared a number of translations. The sympathy of these persons for the Persian literary tradition could not have been confined to the translation of scientific works, but must have extended to the preservation of Persian ethico-didactic tradition in literature.

Books with the t.i.tle of _Kitab al Mahasin_ are to be met with in the Fihrist, if not often, several times. A book with this t.i.tle (77, 21) has been ascribed to the celebrated Ibn Qutaiba. It was composed doubtless after the book of Umar ibn Farrukhan, for Qutaiba flourished at the close of the reign of Mamun and his literary activities could be referred to the ninth century. Qutaiba undoubtedly interested himself in Persian literary materials. Hence it can be concluded that his _Kitab al Mahasin_ was not foreign to the materials and in form could be the first imitation of Farrukhan. Further it is interesting to note that books with this t.i.tle were attributed especially to Shia authors such as Abu Nadar Muhamed ibn Masud al Ayashi who wrote _Kitab al Mahasin al Akhlak_ or a book of good morals (195, 10) and Abu Abdullah Muhammad ibn Khallid al Barki who wrote _Kitab al Mahasin_ (2213-4, also 7-9). And the interest of Shia authors in Persian tradition was unquestionable. A book with the same t.i.tle of _Kitab al Mahasin_ is ascribed to a certain Ibn al Harun, (148, 17) an author who has been a.s.signed in the Fihrist a place among the writers on Adab and as responsible for a book called _Kitab al Adab_. Now the discussion of Adab as we said above is intimately connected with Persian tradition. And this tradition probably survived in the books which had for their theme "the good qualities of Adab."[1] We believe that all these books were devoted to Persian literary tradition, in close relation to which stands the book on "good qualities and manners" mentioned in the Fihrist as translated from the Persian language into Arabic by the man from Tabaristan, Umar ibn al Farrukhan.

[Footnote 1: For instance, _Mahasin al Adab of Ispahani_, see Brockelmann, _Geschichte der Arabischen Litterature_ I. 351.]

Co-related with these books on "good qualities" stand, in our opinion, the books on "good morals and their opposite," or "goodness and wickedness," _Kutub al Mahasin wal Azdad_, or _Kutub al Mahasin wal Masawi_. Although in the Fihrist we do not come across books with this t.i.tle, we have a book so named from the beginning of the tenth century whose author was Ibrahim ibn Muhammad al Baihaki.[1] Under the t.i.tle of _Kitab al Mahasin wal Azdad_ we likewise possess a work ascribed to Jahiz.[2] Both these books evidently go to a common origin.[3] It is quite possible that ant.i.thesis was originally not excluded from these _Kutub al-Mahasin_, from which were developed a special species of educative treatises,--those on "good qualities and their opposites."

Continuing our comparison with the Parsi literature, we notice that a similar kind of ant.i.thesis is most commonly employed there.

[Footnote 1: Ibrahim ibn Muhammad al Baihaki, _Kitab al-Mahasin val masavi_, herausgegeben von Dr. F. Schwally, Geissen 1902.]

[Footnote 2: _Le livre des beautes et des ant.i.thesis attribue a Abu Othman Amr ibn Bahr al-Djakiz_, texte arabe publie par G. Van Vloten Leyde; 1898.]

[Footnote 3: See the review by Barbier de Meynard of the edition of _Mahasin wal Azdad_ in the Revue Citique, 1900, 276.]

In the Parsi ecclesiastical literature of an ethical nature we find definitely settled what is "proper" and, on the other hand, what is "improper."[1] It is well known that books under this t.i.tle,--"the proper and the improper" or "the licit and the illicit"--are to be found among the Pahlavi tracts the time of whose composition can be fixed somewhere between the seventh and the ninth centuries A.D.[2] Comparing the Pahlavi tracts with reference to these questions with Arabic books on good and bad qualities and manners, we have to bear in mind the general features, general outline, as well as the conditions of civilisation of the period when these books were written, in other words, the circ.u.mstances of their intimate relation generally of a cultural nature, particularly of a literary form obtaining between the Arab and Persian nations, and between Islam and Parsism. Not only in detail, but also in their nature these books must be differentiated in proportion as were different the clergy who wrote these ethical tracts from didactic works of a strong legendary element belonging to the pen of secular people. These literary monuments must be differentiated quite as much as their authors and with reference to them we may inst.i.tute the same parallel which we suggested above between the Parsi clergy and the Iranophile party of the Shuubiya.

[Footnote 1: Shayed-na-shayed.]

[Footnote 2: _Shayast la-shayast_ West Pahlavi Texts, Part I, 1880.

Sacred Books of the East, Vol. V. 237-407.]

Furthermore, a.s.sociated with these literary features was also that cla.s.s of Arabic books, so well known and the period of which interests us, the books on _Questions and Answers._[1]

[Footnote 1: Kitab al Masael wa Jawabat.]

And this is precisely the form in which some of the better known of the Parsi books have been cast, for instance, the _Minog-i-Khrad_[1] and the _Dadistan_[2] The second of these books decidedly belongs to the ninth century. Its contents no doubt, were strongly divergent from others owing to its dependence on altered conditions.

[Footnote 1: Sacred Books of the East, Vol. XXIV, 1-15.]

[Footnote 2: Sacred Books of the East XVIII, 1-277.]

We have already indicated the importance of the citations in early Arabic anthologies incorporated from Persian historical works.[1] This nature of quotations are to be found also in books on "good and bad morals and conduct." Further we find embedded in Arabic works a considerable amount of matter of great importance, a circ.u.mstance of vital moment for the investigation of the survival of Persian literary tradition. A number of pa.s.sages similar to those found in these books are undoubtedly embodied in various Arabic anthologies. We give below from the two works _al Mahasin wal Masavi_ and _al Mahasin wal Azdad_ extracts bearing on Persian subjects.[2]

[Footnote 1: See Noeldeke "National Epos" 13.]

[Footnote 2: See Part II.]

The list of Persian subjects comprised in these Arabic books afford us a sufficient idea of the wealth and variety of the material on these points to be recovered from Arabic discourses on manners and morals.

CHAPTER VII

The Book of Ali Ibn Ubaida ar Raihani

_PAHLAVI RUSHNAI NAMEH_.

We spoke above about the Arabic writer Ali ibn Ubayd ar Rayhani who was p.r.o.ne to Persian cultural tradition in general and to the literary tradition in particular. Besides the ethico-didactic book, _Mehr Adar Jushnas_, he is the reputed author of a book on Adab which has a Persian t.i.tle (Fihrist 1, 119, 22 and II, 52),[1] and also another book the t.i.tle of which could not be deciphered by Flugel when he edited the text of the Fihrist, (Fih. 119, 21). The t.i.tle consists of two words which can be read conjecturally as _Rushna nibik_.[2] Such a name of a book we know to exist in Middle Persian literature.[3]

[Footnote 1: _Kitab Adab Jawanshir_].

[Footnote 2: As regards the mutilation of Persian proper names in the Fihrist, such comparatively wellknown books as _Khuday_ Nameh appear in some of the ma.n.u.scripts of the Fihrist as Baktiyar Nameh instead of _bakhuday Nameh_; see Rosen's essay on the Translations of the Khuday Nameh, 177.]

[Footnote 3: West; Sacred Books of the East Vol. V. page 241, note 1, and Sacred Books of the East Vol. III, 169. [The first authority is not quite clear to me. The second authority is evident: "writing which the glorified Roshna, son of Atur-frobag, prepared--for which he appointed the name of the _Roshan Nipik_." Tr.] _Re_ the name of Rushen see Justi _Namenbuch_ 262 under the word Rozanis.]

Books of this t.i.tle in Pahlavi literature related to a variety of religious problems and treated of ethicodidactic themes. The same t.i.tle, further, we find in the Middle Persian literature. This is the t.i.tle of the wellknown book of Nasir-i-Khusrao, namely, _Rushnai Nameh_, a considerable portion of which manifests Shia and Sufistic influences and which by its nature must have been connected with ethico-didactic literature.[1] It is quite possible that Ar Rayhani interested himself in Persian of ethics and morality literature and in Persian _Adab_ and gave his book the name of the 'Book Light' which treated of questions of this nature. This book formed, as no doubt its author did, the uniting link between the didactic Parsi clerical writings and the ethical literature of Islam.

[Footnote 1: GIPh Vol. II, 280.]

Now reading as Rushana Nibik the t.i.tle of the book of Ar Rayhani occurring in the Fihrist, we establish a historical fact in literature.

Not only redactions of Persian historical books like _Khuday Nameh_ and the _Ain Nameh_, not only diverse monuments of Persian ethico-didactic literature but also books with Pahlavi t.i.tles appear in the index of the books of the flourishing period of Arabic literature in Fihrist. This is a phenomenon of outstanding importance for the appreciation of the significance of Persian literary tradition in the first centuries of Islam.

APPENDIX I

_INDEPENDENT ZOROASTRIAN PRINCES OF TABARISTAN._

In the mountains to the south of the Caspian Sea the Persians defended themselves longer than in the rest of the Empire against the Arab invasion. Here the Arsacide princes had permitted the local tribes to rule, for these tribes were probably from the first almost independent and only acknowledged their paramountcy and paid tribute. They had the t.i.tle of Spadhapati or in modern language _Ispehbed_ which was turned into the Arabic _Isfehbed_. One of them, Gushnasp Shah, is named as a contemporary of Ardashir I. It was only so late as in the time of Kawadh that this king succeeded in establishing a Sasanian prince, his son Keyus, as Shah of Tabaristan in 530. At the death of his father he contested the throne with Khusrow I, and was therefore slain by the latter in 537. His son Shapur remained in Persia, and a prince of the Arsacide house of Qaren, named Zarmihr, son of Sokhra was appointed governor. The administration of Rae, Derbend and a portion of Armenia was before now entrusted to Jamasp, a son of Peroz, who was succeeded by his son Narsi, while another son, Behvat, father of Surkhab became the ancestor of the kings of Shirvan who were known as Shirvan Shahs.

Narsi's son was Peroz, the father of Farrukhan Gilanshah, whose capital accordingly was Gilan and who in 643 concluded a peace with the Arabs.

Gil Gaubareh, the son of this prince, united, with the consent of Yezgird the III, who could not prevent him, Gilan with Tabaristan, where the dynasty of Zarmihr had come to an end. It cannot be doubted that Sasanian princes became the governors of these territories. The sons of Gaubareh were Daboe (660-676) and Patospan, in Pahlavi Patkospan or governor, in modern Persian Baduspan. Daboe was succeeded by his brother Khurshed (676-709). We possess coins struck by him in the years 706-709.

Then came Daboe's son Ferkhan more correctly Farrukhan, the Great (709-722); he defeated several attempts on the part of the Moslems to penetrate the country. Our authorities are Tabari (vol. 2 p. 1321); Kitaboloyun (22-8); Zahireddin (45, 10.273, 14); Mordtmann (ZDMG 19, 494). His son Dad-Burzmihr died according to Zahireddin in 748, still his son Khurshed II already struck in 734 his first coin. He was defeated by the Arabs and took poison which he used to carry in his signet ring in 759.

The Masmoghan or the "priest-prince," the successor of Zarathustrotema of Ragha or modern Rai, who had his seat in the city of Demawend or the Castle of Ustunavend, and who was the son-in-law of the Ispehbed, was defeated and the daughters of both the princes were married to members of the house of Abbas.

The descendants of the Badusepan, whom Zahireddin carefully traces in all the branches of the family, ruled over Ruyan, Rustamdar, Nur and Kujur, down to the year 1453, when they divided themselves into two branches which continued to reign till 1567, and 1576.

Another dynasty was the mountain rulers of Qaren, which is named after its founder. The first Qaren was the son of Sokhra, the brother of Zarmihr. These princes were also styled _Ispehbeds_. A descendant of Qaren was Vindad-Hormizd, who in conjunction with Shervin I of the house of Bavend, and with the Badusepan, Shahriyar I, conquered the Arabs in 783, but subsequently surrendered himself to Hadi and went to Baghdad till the latter became Khalif in 785. There is some confusion in the chronology of this dynasty also. A few rulers appear to be wanting because between the beginning of the dynasty in 565 to its close in 839 the average reign of the six princes would come to 45 or 46 years.

Maziyar, son of Qaren, and grandson of Vindad-Hurmizd was at first defeated by Shahryar the son of Shervin of the Bavend dynasty and took refuge with the Khalif Mamun in 816-17, and returned after the victory over Musa Ibn Hafs in 825 but was himself worsened by the Arabs in 839 and executed. Thereupon Tabaristan came into the power of the Tahirides, the nominal governors of the Khalif in Khorasan. Our authorities are Beladhori 134, 14; Masudi 7, 137; Kitab ol Oyun 399, 6; Yaqut 3, 284, 4.