Khāqānī and Andronicus Comnenus

V. Minorsky

doi:10.1017/S0041977X0007227X

Khāqānī and Andronicus Comnenus

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 December 2009

V. Minorsky

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One of the greatest Persian poets, Afḍal al-Dīn Ibrāhīm Khāqānī, is still insufficiently known to the public. Only in 1937 was his Dīvān printed in Tehran, and before that date the readers had to content themselves with an inconvenient Indian lithograph published some seventy years ago. The long Mathnavī (Tuḥfat al 'Irāqayn) in which the poet describes his pilgrimage accomplished in 551–2/1156–7 is available only in Indian lithographs.

Type: Articles
Information: Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies , Volume 11 , Issue 3 , October 1945 , pp. 550 - 578

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0041977X0007227X [Opens in a new window]
Copyright: Copyright © School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London 1945

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^{page 550 note 1} Dīvān-i Khāqānī-yi Shirvānī, ed. al-Rasūli, 'Ali 'Abd, Tehran, 1316, 944 pp.Google Scholar, containing a short introduction and a detailed index of names (pp. 945–979). The previous edition (Kulliyāt, but without the Tuḥfat al-'Irāqayn) was lithographed in Lucknow, 1293/1878, 2 vols., 1582 pp., with a commentary in the margin (see below).

^{page 550 note 2} Ed. by Abu' 1-Hasan, Agra, A.D. 1855, 222 pp. (with commentary); Lucknow, 1294/1877; several selections: Cawnpore, 1867; Lahore, 1867.

^{page 550 note 3} Tadhkirat al-shu'arā, ed. Browne, E. G., p. 79.Google Scholar

^{page 551 note 1} I do not know whether the commentary by Ḥasan Dihlavī (?), quoted in Tarbiyat, Dānishmandān-i Ādharbāyjān, 130, is identical with any of the above.

^{page 551 note 2} See a complete bibliography in Salemann, Chetverostishiya, pp. 13–14.

^{page 551 note 3} Khanykoff, , Dorn, Lettre à M., Tabriz, , 8th–20th 06, 1857, in Bull. hist, et phil. de l'Ac. de St. Pétersbourg, xiv, No. 23, col. 353–376Google Scholar (various historical references in Khaqani, chiefly to the Russians); Mémoire sur Khâcâni. 1. Étude sur la vie et le caractère de Khâcâni, J.As., aout-sept., 1863, pp. 137–200. 2. Texte et traduction de quatre odes de Khâcâni, J. As., marsavril, 1865, pp. 296–367.

^{page 551 note 4} K. Saлemahь, ЧetbepoctИШiя XakahИ, t. Petersbourg, 1875, 87 + pp.

^{page 552 note 1} Grundriss d. iran. Phil., ii, 263–5Google Scholar.

^{page 552 note 2} A Lit. Hist. of Persia, i, 391–5Google Scholar.

^{page 553 note 1} In the light of Badī' al-Zamān's discovery R. A. Nicholson has changed his translation in his commentary, G.M.S., iv/7, p. 368Google Scholar.

^{page 553 note 2} Tarbiyat, Muḥammad 'All, Dānishmandān-i Ādharbāyjān, 1314/1935, pp. 129–132Google Scholar, also contains some new facts of Khāqānī's biography.

^{page 553 note 3} I have recommended this verse to be engraved on the tombstone of Lady Ross, buried in Stambul by the side of Sir Denison Ross.

^{page 554 note 1} Among them, Jesus Christ alone is mentioned 207 times.

^{page 554 note 2} Khanīkov wrongly took him for Isaac Comnenus, but Kunik (in Dorn's Caspia, 1875, p. 240) corrected this mistake.

^{page 555 note 1} Willermus Tyrensis Archiepiscopus, liber XX, cap. 2 (Recueil des hist. des croisades, i/2, 1844, p. 943Google Scholar)—a trustworthy witness of the events (d. after 1183). “Persia” in this case means only the area directly or indirectly dependent on the great Seljuks.

^{page 555 note 2} Michael the Syrian, Jacobite patriarch of Antioch, died circa 1199, vide Recueil, Sources Arméniennes, p. 361.

^{page 555 note 3} Diehl, , Figures Byzantines, ed. 1927, ii, 86–134Google Scholar, whose source I have failed to trace.

^{page 555 note 4} It is doubtful whether on his way to Coloneia he visited Persia. Nicetas Choniata does not mention such a détour, and Cinnamus applies the term “Persian” to the Muslim neighbours of the Byzantine Empire. The contemporary Seljuk ruler of Persia was Arslan II (556–573/1161–1177). One might also consider as “Persia” the dominions of the powerful Ildeguzids, atabeks of Azarbayjan, namely of Muḥammad Pahlavān-i Jahān (568–582/1172–1186). His possessions lay on the road from Georgia to Armenia (Erzerum, Coloneia), but Saltukh's dominions bordered directly on Georgian territory in the basin of the Chorokh.

^{page 555 note 5} Nicetas, ed. Bonn, pp. 185, 294.

^{page 555 note 6} Their history is very little known, apart from some reference sin I. Athīr, x, 147a (496); xi, 126: in 548/1153 Saltuq was defeated by the Georgians; xi, 185: in 556/1161 Saltuq was captured by the Georgians but redeemed by his daughter, wife of the ruler of Khilāt (Shah Arman); xi, 209: in 560/1165 the Dānishmandid Yaghī-Arslan kidnapped the fiancée of the Saljuq Qīlīj Arslan, who was the daughter of Saltuq b. 'Ali b. Abu'l-Qāsim; xii, iii: in 597/1201 the Seljuk Rukn al-Dīn seized Erzerum, which belonged to the son of al-Malik (li-walad al-malik), son of Muḥammad, son of Saltuq, and this was the end of the dynasty.

^{page 556 note 1} See Houtsma, Mengudjek in E.I. Important facts on the dynasty are quoted by van Berchem, and Edhem, Halil in Corpus inscr. arab., iii, pp. 90–103Google Scholar.

^{page 556 note 2} Cinnamus, vi, p. 251, and various Western European chronicles. How wild were the rumours circulating in the West may be instanced by the fantastic confusion in the report on the affairs in Constantinople which reached Ibn Jubayr during his sojourn in Sicily in January, 1185, Riḥla, ed. Gibb Memorial, pp. 330–340 (tr. Schiapparelli, pp. 336–9 and 367).

^{page 556 note 3} , Lebeau, Hist, du Bos-Empire, 1834, xvi, ch. 89–91Google Scholar; Gibbon, ch. xlviii; Bréhier, sub verbo, in Baudrillart, Diet, d'histoire ⃛ ecclésiastique, ii, 1914, col. 1776–1182; Vasiliev, A., History of the Byzantine Empire, Madison, 1929, ii, 13–17, 88–95Google Scholar.

^{page 557 note 1} Toumanoff, Prince Cyril, “On the relationship between the founder of the Empire of Trebizond and the Georgian queen Thamar,” Speculum, 1940, xv, 299–312CrossRef Google Scholar.

^{page 557 note 2} , Brosset, Hist. de la Géorgie, i, 396Google Scholar.

^{page 557 note 3} Muskir = Mushkur; Shaburan = Shābarān and Sharabam = Sharvān (?). Several of Khāqānīs verses suggest that in his time Shirvan was called Sharvān. For example, T. 71 (already noticed by H. Hasan): “Do not blame Sharvān, for Khāqāni is from the town whose name begins with shar [sharr ‘evil’]. Why should you blame a town for the two letters with which shar [‘religious law’] begins and bashar [‘humanity’] ends,” etc. Cf. also T. 405: “Shar-vān has become Shīr-van [‘place of lions’], nay, Sharaf-vān [‘place of honour’], for metaphorically it has assumed the aspect of Baghdad and Egypt, thanks to the (canal of) Khayr-vān,” cf. T. 263 and 275.

^{page 557 note 4} 0 Derbendskom kniazhestve XII-XIII v, Baku, 1930.

^{page 558 note 1} Mentioned in al-Gharnāṭī, Abu-Hamīd, Jour. As., 1925, No. 1, p. 85Google Scholar.

^{page 558 note 2} Studied by , Khanikov in Mél. As., iii, 1853Google Scholar.

^{page 558 note 3} They particularly interested the older generation of Russian scholars; see , Dorn, Caspia. Über die Einfälle der Russen, 1875Google Scholar.

^{page 558 note 4} On the geographical background see the Hudūd al-'ālam, pp. 398–411. Cf. Minorsky, Rus in E.I.

^{page 558 note 5} Such is also the view of Toumanoff, loc. cit., 310.

^{page 558 note 6} Khaqani, Nizami, Rustaveli, fasc. i, ed. by the Academy of Sciences of the U.S.S.R., 1935.

^{page 559 note 1} Another ode, dated six years before the expected conjunction of planets (i.e. in 576/1180–1), is dedicated to the atabek of Azarbayjan Qizil-Arslan. In Chaykin's opinion, after his return from the second pilgrimage Khāqānī settled down in Tabriz and never revisited his birthplace Shirvan, but this view is contradicted by the facts quoted in Badī' al-Zamān, ii, 335.

^{page 559 note 2} I see that Chaykin proposed to study the dating of the qaṣīda dedicated to Andronicus in fasc. ii of Khaqani, Nizami and Rusthavdi, but I do not know whether he has carried out this intention.

^{page 559 note 3} The Georgian princes Andronikashvili claim descent from Andronicus. I do not know whether they consider themselves as issued of the first marriage of Andronicus (vide supra, p. 557) or of some other connection.

^{page 560 note 1} See a detailed analysis of the very shaky chronology of the Shirvān-shāhs in Hasan, Hādī, Falakī-i Shirwāni, 1929, pp. 12 and 32/ot. The author has carefully studied the Russian literature on the subject.Google Scholar

^{page 560 note 2} After the death of her husband, Minūchihr, she retired to a convent in Georgia.

^{page 560 note 3} Justi, , Iranisches Namenbuch, p. 12Google Scholar.

^{page 560 note 4} Miller, V., Grundriss d. Iran. Philol., [Die Sprache d. Osseten,] p. 6Google Scholar; Miller-Freiman, V., Osetinskiy slovar, i, 242Google Scholar; Dzagurov, G. A., Pamiatnilci narod. tvorch. Osetin, fasc. ii, Vladikavkaz, 1927, p. 3Google Scholar (I was able to consult the latter through the kindness of H. W. Bailey).

^{page 560 note 5} Minorsky, , “L'épopée persane et la littérature populaire russe”, in Hazāra-yi Firdausī, Tehran, 1944, 48–57Google Scholar.

^{page 560 note 6} If Khāqānī was born circa A.D. 1120, his “service” might have begun only about 1140. This would indicate that towards 555/1160 Minūchihr was still ruling.

^{page 561 note 1} South of the present-day shusha: see Minorsky, Mūḳān in E.I. (Supplement).

^{page 561 note 2} Khanīkov, Mél. As., iii, 117; Pakhomov, Kratkiy kurs istorii Azerbayjana, Baku, 1923, 16. Cf.Google Scholar Hādī Ḥasan's criticism, Falakī, p. 35. In any case the rise of Baku results from Khāqānī's ode dedicated to Akhsatān (T.34): “owing to his blessings Baku resembles nowadays the Bistām of Khāvarām (Khorasan ?); owing to his existence Baku collects tribute from Khazrān., Rayy, and Zirih-garān.” The latter is the famous Kubachi in Daghestan; Khazrān = “the Khazars”, or perhaps the canton now called Khazrī (north of Baku). “Rayy” is a puzzle, unless Khāqānī means that Akhsatān established rights on some dependency of the Seljuksof Rayy (?). At the period in question, Shirvan leant upon Georgia, whereas Darband south help from the Seljuks.

^{page 561 note 3} The poems beginning: falak kazh-rautar-ast az khaṭṭ-i tarsā (T.19); rāḥat az rāh-i dil chanān bar-khāst (T.17); har ṣubḥ pāy-i ṣabr ba-dāman dar-āvaram (T. 244); rūzam furū shud az gham ham gham-khurī nadāram (T. 272); ṣubḥ-dam chī kalla bandad āh-i dūd-āsā-yi man (T. 327).

^{page 562 note 1} Nicetas, in Manuel, i, § 2, (72), ed. Migne, p. 383. Cf. Du Cange, Historia Byzantina, i, 189.

^{page 562 note 2} Nicetas, in Manuel, i, 1 (68), ed. Migne, 379.

^{page 562 note 3} T. 127: in the ode dedicated to Sayf al-Din, commander of Shamākhī, his lord Akhsatān receives his share of eulogy.

^{page 562 note 4} The commentator in L., 273 (bottom), took the “Baqraṭiyān” for descendants of Hippocrates!

^{page 563 note 1} The ode could hardly have been addressed to Giorgi alone, in view of the numerous references to Byzantium (Rūm), Cæsar (qaysar), etc.

^{page 563 note 2} In fact, Mengüjek may have been called Dāvūdī if he was a slave of Chaghrī-bek Dāvūd, whose son Alp Arslan gave to him the fief of Erzinjan.

^{page 563 note 3} This title cannot be equivalent to the Pahlavān-i jahān, which Khāqānī correctly gives to Muḥammad b. Ildiguz, atabak of Azarbayjan (T. 575).

^{page 563 note 4} {It would be too far-fetched to imagine on the part of the poet a further reference to the patron's name. Tahamtan as a personal name is of coúrse known in Ghazna, Ormuz, Fars, and Luristan. Curiously enough, enough, a couple of centuries after Bahrām-shāh, the ruler of Erzinjan was called Ṭahar-tan: see Žafar-nāma, ii, 237 (under 802/1399). Thomas of Metzoph, ir. Nève, Exposé des querres de Tamerlan, Brussels 1860, 59,Google Scholar calls him T' a k'rat'an. In the Razam-u-bazam, ed. KÖpuülü. 243 (circa 783/1381the prince appears under the arabicized name of MuṬahhar-tan, but I feel strongly that Ṭahar-tan is likely to be a vulgar form of Tahamtan. Nothing is known about the connection of this amīr with the Mengūjekids; but even the appearance of such otherwise is less satisfactory than the hypothesis about King Giorgi.}

^{page 564 note 1} Except for one irrepressibly Khāqānīn verse: “I shall your contentment, even though I seek no fortune. I possess a Messiah, although I have not the ass' hoof”, with reference to a relic (the hoof of Jesus's ass) exploited by an unscrupulous monk. Vide infra our commentary on v. 58.

^{page 564 note 2} Isfahān in the text is dubious, but it is suitable as indicating the residence of the Seljuk Sultan.

^{page 565 note 1} The attribution of this MS. to Ghanā'ī in E. G. Browne's Catalogue is not certain, unless it is only a short extract from the original.

^{page 566 note 1} Cf. the still obscure statements in the Tuḥfat, p. 199: “of Nestorian and Mōbadian origin, of Islamic and godly nature. She was born in the country of Dhūghṭāb (?), the great *Philippos was her ancestor. … She sat on the road of the temple (miyasfu), silently (listening) to sorcery (hērūtī). … She was brought from the Byzantine darkness; the slavetrader of righteousness (?) educated her”. [The term Mobadī apparently refers too family of Christian priests. The name Dhūghṭāb (var. Ūghtab) sounds Armenian, many Armenian placenames ending in tap' (“flat”). The name might be restored as Ṭūgh(a)ṭāb and compared with Tolatap' (now Teghtap), a small valley to the east of Khinis. Faylaqūs-i kablr may be some Christian worthy. InWright's, W.A Short History of Syriac Literature, 1894Google Scholar (Russian ed., completed by P. Kokovtsov, 1902), I have failed to find anything relevant.] Dr. W. Henning suggests that the doubtful miyāsṭū should be read *manāsṭir “or monastery”.

^{page 574 note 1} See, however, above p. 566 where the poet says that his mother was descended from Faylāqūs al-kabīr.

^{page 574 note 2} See Matthew, xxi, 1–7 etc.

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