A literary history of Persia

466 THE LITERATURE OF PERSIAAbu Bakr al-Kdtib (the secretary), whose father was secretaryto the Samanid Prince Isma'il b. Ahmad (A.D. 892-907) andwazlr to his son and successor Ahmad b. Isma'il (A.D.907-913) :" Wondei not at a man of 'Iraq in whom fhou seest an ocean oflearning and a treasure of culture ;Wonder ratf,er at one whose home is in the lands of ignorance ifhe be able to distinguish head from tail I "These lines were, of course,written before that brilliantepoch described in another passage of the Tathna (vol. iv,pp. 33-4 see : pp. 365-6 supra], but it shows that the flow ofMuhammadan culture was, as we should expect, centrifugal,from Baghdad towards the periphery of the Lands of Isldm.*The next poet mentioned by Awff, Abu Bakr Muhammaab. *Ali al-Khusrawl as-Sarakhsl twas attached neither to theSamdnid nor to the Buwayhid Court, but to that eminentprince of the Ziydrid dynasty of Tabaristan, Amfr Shamsu'l-Ma'ali Qdbus b. Washmgfr (A.D. 976-1012), of whose ownliterary achievements we shall shortly have to speak. He toowas a bilingual poet, and apparently wandered from court tocourt, praising now his proper patron Qabus, now the Sdhib,and again the grandson of Simjur, Abu'l Hasan Muhammad.Another poet who sang the praises of Qabus was Abu'l-^aslmZiyad b.Muhammad al-Qumri of Gurgan, whose few survivingverses shew taste and ingenuity, and something also of thatartificialitywhich we have already remarked in Mantiqf.Abu Tahir al-Khusrawani was another Samanid poet, whohas some bitter verses against" four sorts of men from whomnot one atom of good accrued " to him, viz., physicians,devotees, astrologers, and charm-mongers. Somewhat betterknown is Abu Shukur of Balkh, who,in A.H. 336 (= A.D. 947-8)completed a work (now lost) called the Afarln-nama^ and whois also the author of the following lines :