He was so affected by this proof of universal sympathy with his misfortunes that he went home, fell sick and died. He was buried in a garden, but Abu’l Kasim Jurjani, chief sheikh of Tūs, refused to read the usual prayers over his tomb, alleging that he was an infidel, and had devoted his life to the glorification of fire-worshippers and misbelievers. The next night, however, having dreamt that he beheld Firdousī in paradise dressed in the sacred colour, green, and wearing an emerald crown, he reconsidered his determination; and the poet was henceforth held to be perfectly orthodox. He died in the year 411 of the Hegira (1020 A.D.), aged about eighty, eleven years after the completion of his great work. The legend goes that Mahmud had in the meanwhile despatched the promised hundred thousand pieces of gold to Firdousī, with a robe of honour and ample apologies for the past. But as the camels bearing the treasure reached one of the gates of the city, Firdousī’s funeral was leaving it by another. His daughter, to whom they brought the sultan’s present, refused to receive it; but his aged sister remembering his anxiety for the construction of the stone embankment for the river of Tūs, this work was completed in honour of the poet’s memory, and a large caravanserai built with the surplus.
Much of the traditional life, as given above, which is based upon that prefixed to the revised edition of the poem, undertaken by order of Baisingar Khan, grandson of Timur-i-Leng (Timur), is rejected by modern scholars (see T. Nöldeke, “Das iranische Nationalepos,” in W. Geiger’s Grundriss der iranischen Philologie, ii. pp. 150-158).
The Shāhnāma is based, as we have seen, upon the ancient legends current among the populace of Persia, and collected by the Dihkans, a class of men who had the greatest facilities for this purpose. There is every reason therefore to believe that Firdousī adhered faithfully to these records of antiquity, and that the poem is a perfect storehouse of the genuine traditions of the country.
The entire poem (which only existed in MS. up to the beginning of the 19th century) was published (1831-1868) with a French translation in a magnificent folio edition, at the expense of the French government, by the learned and indefatigable Julius von Mohl. The size and number of the volumes, however, and their great expense, made them difficult of access, and Frau von Mohl published the French translation (1876-1878) with her illustrious husband’s critical notes and introduction in a more convenient and cheaper form. Other editions are by Turner Macan (Calcutta, 1829), J.A. Vullers and S. Landauer (unfinished; Leiden, 1877-1883). There is an English abridgment by J. Atkinson (London, 1832; reprinted 1886, 1892); there is a verse-translation, partly rhymed and partly unrhymed, by A.G. and E. Warner (1905 foll.), with an introduction containing an account of Firdousī and the Shāhnāma; the version by A. Rogers (1907) contains the greater part of the work. The episode of Sohrab and Rustam is well known to English readers from Matthew Arnold’s poem. The only complete translation is Il Libro dei Rei, by I. Pizzi (8 vols., Turin, 1886-1888), also the author of a history of Persian poetry.
See also E.G. Browne’s Literary History of Persia, i., ii. (1902-1906); T. Nöldeke (as above) for a full account of the Shāhnāma, editions, &c.; and H. Ethé, “Neupersische Litteratur,” in the same work.
(E. H. P.; X.)
[1] A sort of cuirass.
FIRE (in O. Eng. fýr; the word is common to West German languages, cf. Dutch vuur, Ger. Feuer; the pre-Teutonic form is seen in Sanskrit pū, pāvaka, and Gr. πῦρ; the ultimate origin is usually taken to be a root meaning to purify, cf. Lat. purus), the term commonly used for the visible effect of combustion (see [Flame]), operating as a heating or lighting agency.