[IO Islamic 132] ديوان ناصر خسرو

• Dîwân-i-Nâṣir-i-Khusrau.
• This manuscript is now IO Islamic 903 in the India Office collections.
• [metadata: Hermann Ethé, Catalogue of Persian Manuscripts in the Library of the India Office, 2 vols. (Oxford: India Office, 1903): volume 1, number 132 here with notations and hyperlinks].

903

Dîwân-i-Nâṣir-i-Khusrau ( ديوان ناصر خسرو).

The dîwân or rather one of the dîwâns of Abû Mu’în Nâṣir bin Khusrau, with the takhalluṣ Ḥujjat, who was born in Ḳubâdiyân near Balkh, A.H. 394, Dhû-alḳa’dah (A.D. 1004, August-September), and died in Yumgân A.H. 481 (A.D. 1088); see on the life and works of this truly wonderful man, whose real character has so long been shrouded in mystery, and whose very identity with the author of the Safarnâma has been hotly disputed until a very recent date, especially Fagnan, Note sur Nâçir ibn Khosrou (Journal Asiatique, vii série, tome 13, 1879, pp. 164-168); Rieu i. pp. 379-381, and iii. p. 1086^b; Schefer, Sefer Nameh, Paris, 1881, Introduction; and Ethé, Nâṣir bin Khusraus Leben, Denken und Dichten (compare Haft Iḳlîm, No. 863, col. 441 in this Cat.), and Die mystische, didaktische und lyrische Poesie, etc. der Perser, Hamburg, 1888, pp. 13-19. Copies of this dîwân are described in A. Sprenger, Catal., p. 428; G. Flügel i. p. 496, and W. Pertsch, Berlin Cat., p. 741; there are also two copies lately added to the British Museum Collection (Or. 2845 and 3323); large extracts are found in the Butkhâna (Bodleian Cat., No. 366, ff. 36^b-66^b), and a peculiar tasmîṭ in the Daḳâ’iḳ-alash’âr (ib., No. 1333, col. 802); a lithographed edition appeared in Tabrîz, A.H. 1280.

Selections from Nâṣir’s dîwân, with German metrical translation, have been edited by Ethé in the Göttinger Nachrichten, 1882, pp. 124-152, and in the Zeitschrift der D. M. G., vol. 36, pp. 478-508; one poem of his has also been published by W. Shukowskij in Sapisski, iv. pp. 386-393, 1890. Other works of the poet are: (1) the Rûshanâ’înâma, see below, No. 904; (2) the Sa’âdatnâma (edited by Fagnan in the Zeitschrift, vol. 34, pp. 643-674; compare also Dr. Teufel’s critical remarks on it, ib., vol. 36, pp. 106-114); (3) the Safarnâma (edited with French translation and valuable notes by Schefer, Paris, 1881; see also A.R. Fuller in the Journal of the Roy. Asiat. Society, 1872, pp. 142-164; and Guy Le Strange, Nâṣir-i-Khusrau, Diary of a Journey through Syria and Palestine, London, Palest. Pilgrims’ Text Sec., 1888); (4) the Zâd-almusâfirîn (here styled in the very short biographical introduction زاد المسافر), which is in the private collection of M. Schefer (comp. his Chrestomathie Persane, vol. i, Paris, 1883, p. 182); (5 and 6) the كتاب وجه الدين and the كتاب دليل المتحيّرين (ib., p. ١٦١), neither of which seems to be extant now.

Beginning of the present copy, on fol. 97^b:

خداوندى كه در وحدت قديمست از همه اشيا

نه اندر وحدتش كثرت نه محدث را ازو تنها

This dîwân, which forms the sixth and last part of a very old and precious collection of Persian dîwâns, formerly belonging to Shâh Isma’îl Ṣafawî and bearing his seal in many places (see W. Morley, p. 7, note 1), was copied A.H. 714 in Dhû-alḳâ’dah=A.D. 1315, February, by ‘Abd-almu’min al’alawî-alkâshî (the other five dîwâns are those of Amîr Mu’izzî, Athîr-aldîn Akhsîkatî, Adîb Ṣâbir, Niżâm-aldîn Maḥmûd Ḳamar Iṣfahânî, and Shams-aldîn Maḥmûd al-Ṭabasî). It is unfortunately greatly damaged in many places ad particularly towards the end.

No. 132, ff. 97-112, 6 coll., each ll. 40; written in a very peculiar and striking style of Naskhî; small illuminated frontispiece on fol. 97^b, and a vignette on fol. 97^a; miniature paintings of a rather funny character throughout; size, 15¾ in. by 11 in.