Shahnameh

“ The Shammar tribe is the most powerful of Northern Nejd, and the towns of Haïl, Kefar, Bekaa, and the rest, put themselves under the protection of Abdallah ibn Rashid, who had succeeded in gaining the Shammar Sheykhat for himself. He seems to have been a man of great ability, and to him is due the policy of rule which his descendants have ever since pursued. He took up his residence in Haïl, and built the castle there, and caused himself to be recognized as Emir, first in vassalage to the Ibn Saouds, who had reappeared in Aared, but later on his own account. ”

“ I was in Qum at the time when he gave recognition to this government of infidels - and Jewish infidels at that - thereby affronting Islam, the Qur'an, the Muslim governments and the entire Muslim people. The name of Israel was not openly mentioned at first, but later it was.
Indeed, this person was a slave from the very beginning as he himself later made clear. This man (the Shah) who openly raises the question of human rights is in fact quite right to ask what it is all about. What does human rights mean? It means the logic of bandits! It is nothing to do with human rights. ”

“ Shams Shah gave orders for their immediate execution; but he first sent for Mukarnas into his presence, and said to him, “Accursed fiend, hast thou forgotten me? Hast thou not been well informed that I was alive? Thou hast treated with violence and oppression both my own subjects and a man who is under my protection; dost thou not tremble at the thoughts of my revenge? Tell me this instant, what hast thou done with the prince of Yemen and his guides?”—“I, along with my friends, feasted on their carcases,” replied he, “the moment they were brought before me.”—“False demon,” rejoined the king ”

“ After the doctor came an astrologer, who said: ‘Most noble Shah! In observing the courses of the stars I have discovered a woful piece of news; an awful fate awaits you. O King, you will soon have horns like a goat, and claws like a panther, you will lose the power of speech, and flee from us into the woods, where you will dwell exactly seven years and three months.’ To him likewise the shah replied: ‘That is possible,’ and he too disappeared, amid the jeers of the mob. ”

“ The Shah, in his wisdom, trusting to the misery which is now known to assail the English nation, enjoins the Hajji, as he would gain the royal favour, and gain a great name in Iran, ever to keep a watchful eye upon penknives, broad-cloth, chandeliers, and looking-glasses. He will make as large a collection as possible for the use of the Shah,—for nothing if he can: for little if he cannot for nothing. He will also accumulate every other desirable thing fitted for the use of the king, which may come within his grasp. ”

“ The king embraced Marzavan, to express his thanks, without inquiring the means by which so surprising a change was instantaneously effected; and immediately went out of the room with the grand vizier, to proclaim this agreeable intelligence. He ordered public rejoicings for several days; he distributed presents to his officers and the populace, gave alms to the poor, and had all prisoners set at liberty. In short, nothing but joy and mirth reigned in the capital, and which very soon spread its influence throughout the dominions of king Schahzaman. ”

“ The powers of the Shah (Shahanshah, [16] or “king of kings”) over his subjects and their property were absolute, but only in so far as they were not opposed to the shar’, or “divine law,” which consists of the doctrines of the Mahommedan religion, as laid down in the Koran, the oral commentaries and sayings of the Prophet, and the interpretations by his successors and the high priesthood. ”

“ The habits of the Shah are simple. He is, unlike most Persians of high class, abstemious as regards both food and drink. Two meals a day, served at midday and 9 p.m., and those of the plainest diet, washed down by a glass or two of claret or other light wine, are all he allows himself. When on a hunting-excursion, his favourite occupation, the Shah is even more abstemious, going sometimes a whole day without food of any kind. He is a crack shot, and is out nearly daily, when the weather permits, shooting over his splendid preserves around Teherán. There is no lack of sport. ”

“ In its own land it has no peer, while in construction and subject-matter it is unique. Other Epics centre round some heroic character or incident to which all else is subservient. In the Sháhnamá there is no lack either of heroes or of incidents, but its real hero is the ancient Persian people, and its theme their whole surviving legendary history from the days of the First Man to the death of the last Sháh in the middle of the seventeenth century of our Era. ”

“ Men's houses were ruined, and the ordinances of the Prophet disregarded. The Shah, who is a pious prince, and respects the Ullemah, and who holds the ceremony of marriage sacred, complained to the head of the law, the mollah bashi, of this subversion of all morality in his capital, and, with a reprimand for his remissness, ordered him to provide a remedy for the evil. The mollah bashi (between you and me, be it said) is in every degree an ass,—one who knows as much of religion and its duties, as of Frangistân and its kings. ”

“ The Shah is a particular monarch, and if everything is not in apple-pie order on his arrival there is certain to be big trouble for someone. In fact, if the smallest thing goes wrong Mirza Ali Khan is likely to lose his head when he returns to Persia. My guest of to-morrow has a very important commission to execute before the Shah's arrival. Amongst some valuable gems and stones which he is bringing to have cut and set for his monarch is, in especial, the bloodstone. ”

“ The spirit of loyalty to persons and to families is very strong in the East, and we can imagine that, as the long procession marched from Shahdara and crossed the shrunk and sandy Jamna, Shah Alam, from the back of his chosen elephant, looked down upon a scene of hope and gaiety enough to make him for the moment forget both the cares of the past and the anxieties of the future, and feel himself at last every inch a king. ”

“ But they are more commonplace people. The Shah makes his appeal, not on account of his importance but on account of his romantic associations. He fills the mind with thoughts of uncut rubies, diamond-studded swords, Arab chargers, veiled houris, and the very best Persian sherbet. One does not stand outside Victoria in the hope of seeing any of these things in the carriage with him, but one feels that is the sort of man he is, and that if only he could talk English like you or me, he could tell us a story worth the telling. ”

“ The only evil you have to fear is an order from the Shah, that no one on pain of death shall give you food: if so, you will be starved into a surrender, and then the Prophet be your protector! But your case is not one of sufficient consequence to make you fear this. The Shah cannot care so much for one slave, when he has a hundred others to fill her place. After all, men do not die so easily as we Persians imagine. ”

“ Even the idols of the vanquished shared the fate of their people: the king tore them from the sanctuaries which had hitherto sheltered them, and took them as prisoners in his train to form a court of captive gods about his patron divinity. Shamash, the great judge of heaven, inspired him with justice, and the prosperity which his good administration obtained for the people was less the work of the sovereign than that of the immortals. ”

“ He was unremitting in his attention to the discharge of the business of the state, and if in reading the history of his reign we find some acts of barbarity recorded, we must make due allowance for him on account of the character and customs of his subjects; the unsettled nature of the times on which he was cast, and the necessity of making himself feared by those who would have wished to ascend his throne. The Shah's body was conveyed from Ispahan to the tomb which he had caused to be prepared at Koom. ”

“ The young Shah must have been utterly at a loss whom to trust. On his way to Tehran he received intelligence of the defection of two of the generals in whom he had till then reposed the utmost confidence. One of these was Mahomed Veli Khan, who had put down the rebellion of Mahomed Khan, Zend, and who now espoused the cause of the Shah's rebel brother. The other was the chief, Suleiman Khan, whom the king had left in charge of the government of Azerbaeejan. ”

“ The Shah had now put down the rebellions of Sadek Khan; that of his own brother; that of his cousin; that of one of his generals; those of a chief of the Zend, and that of a pretended descendant of the Sefaveeans. It remained for him now to crush yet another pretender to sovereign power. This was Nadir Meerza, the son of Shahrukh, and the great-grandson of Nadir Shah. That prince, on the occasion of the visit of Aga Mahomed to Khorassan, had taken refuge with the Affghans, and on the death of the first Kajar Shah he had returned to Khorassan, and assembled troops about his person. ”

“ These kings call themselves the sun of the world. The phrase, [264] indeed, has so distinctly an Egyptian flavor, that, in connection with other considerations, it seems quite plausible to assume that the influence of Egyptian reverence for Ra had much to do with the popularity of the sun-cult about this time. Shalmaneser bestows numerous epithets upon Shamash. He is the guide of everything, the messenger of the gods, the hero, the judge of the world who guides mankind aright, and, what is most significant, the lord of law. ”

“ You might just as well tie the wings of a goose to your back and call yourself an angel.'
'Wonderful, wonderful,' exclaimed the head of the nobles; 'the Shah-in-Shah speaks like an angel. Show us a king in Europe that would speak like him.'
'Yes, yes,' was chorused by all the bystanders.
'May he live a thousand years,' said one.
'May his shadow never be less,' said another.
'But it is of their women,' continued the king, 'of whom we hear the most extraordinary accounts. In the first place, they have no anderûn [4] in their houses; men and women all live together ”

“ The Vizier, looking out from the terrace, saw in the water below him the shipwrecked Marzavan, [Pg 59] tossed this way and that and unable to land; so his heart was moved with pity and he came running to the King and crying, 'Permit me, O my lord, to open the gates of the court and put forth my hand to save yonder man who is now drowning. For since a just action is never without reward, it may be he shall bring us good.'
Shahzaman replied, 'Thou art the cause of all our trouble, and I doubt not that coming by thy hand this drowning man will bring us more. ”

“ During the reign of Shah Abbas this chief was generally in prison, except when his services were required against the enemies of his country. This had gained for him the name of the Lion of Persia, as men said that he was always chained except when wanted to fight.
The Shah can raise whomsoever he chooses from the lowest to the highest position or post, except in the most powerful of the nomad tribes, where the nomination to chieftainship is confined to the elders of the leading families, who generally represent two lines from one head, one being in the opposition when the other is in power. ”

“ It is beneath the dignity of the Shah to kill less than his thousands and tens of thousands. Would you have him less than Rustam, and weaker than Afrasiab? No, our kings must be drinkers of blood, and slayers of men, to be held in estimation by their subjects, and surrounding nations. Well, have you written?' said the grand vizier. ”

“ Feth Ali Shah, the present king of Persia, was the son of the same Hussain, on whom Kerim conferred the government of Asterabad, after the downfall of Mohammed Khan, and who perished in consequence of his rebellion, if that term may be applied to the attempts of a number of ambitious men to seat themselves on a throne to which there was no rightful owner. Feth Ali, who, prior to his elevation, was called Baba Khan, held a command in the army of his uncle Aga Mohammed, who also invested him with the dignity of governor of Shiraz, which he held at the time of Mohammed's death. ”

“ Since the death of Ibrahîm Pasha, the Shammar and the ’Anazeh share, without amity, the lordship of Mesopotamia, as they did before the Kurd rose into power. The road from Tekrît to Môṣul is in Shammar territory, so far as it can be said to be in the territory of any one. Not a caravan passes up and down but it pays tribute to Mejwal ibn Farḥân, a beshlik (three piastres) on every mule, and half a beshlik for a donkey, unless the travellers happen to be escorted by a zaptieh as I was. ”

“ His majesty having accepted this, with many encomiums on the khanum's industry and skill, the women were marshalled in two lines on each side of him; 'and I,' said Zeenab, 'in order that every mortification possible might be heaped upon me, was placed the last in the row, even below Nûr Jehan, the black slave. You ought to have seen the pains which all of us, even old Leilah, took to attract the Shah's attention: some were bashful, others stole wicked looks and glanced sideways; others, again, were bold, and kept their eyes fixed on the king's face. ”