Sykes' History of Persia Vol 2 (pdf) - Heritage Institute

1 40 HISTORY OF PERSIA
lips to rubies, and of witching eyes
to Harut,
the fallen
angel, who teaches magic to such as seek him in the pit
where he is
imprisoned at Babylon." This is admirably
put, and it may incidentally explain why the European
does not as a rule care for, or admire, Eastern poetry.
Nizam- al-Arudi. Frequent references have been
made to the Chahar Maka/a, or " Four Discourses," of
Nizami, which is a mine of useful information and throws
a clear
light
on the life of the time at the courts of
Central Asia. The " Prosodist," as his title may be
translated, to avoid confusion with Nizami of Ganja,
was at Samarcand, at Nishapur, where he frequented the
society of Omar Khayyam, and at Tus, where he visited
the tomb of Firdausi. But his post was that of Courtpoet
to the Ghorid Kings, and in the " Four Discourses "
he mentions the " World Burner " as still living
a fact
that helps to fix the date of his famous work, which, on
Browne's authority,
is about A.D. 1155.
Anwari and Khakani. We now come to a class of
panegyrists, the greatest of whom is Anwari, the Poetlaureate
and Astrologer of Sultan Sanjar.
As Browne
writes
"
: These were poets by profession,
artificers in
words and sounds, literary craftsmen of consummate skill
and ingenuity, and for this very reason they will not bear
translation, because their beauty is a beauty of words
*
rather than of thought."
The taunting verse shot into Hazar Asp by order of
Sanjar has already been quoted, and also two stanzas of
on the devastation wrought
the fine
poem by the savage
Ghuzz, which prove that the poet could write something
better than mere formal panegyrics. Khakani was a
native of Ganja, the modern Elizabetpol in the Caucasus,
and was of low extraction.
Having been taken up and
taught by an old poet, he became a brilliant star in the
literary firmament, notorious for the difficulty of his
verse, which is also extremely
artificial. His poems were
mainly panegyrics, but one inspired by the ruins of the
Tak-i-Kism, which I have quoted in Chapter XLL, strikes
a loftier note.
1
Lecture delivered before the Persia Society in 1912.