study.

[Sidenote: Direct Sources of Ferdausi.]

[Sidenote: The Persian prose Shahname was not derived from Arabic but
Pahlavi.]

A superficial reading of Firdausi would engender the view that he
obtained his material partly from Pahlavi books direct and partly from
the oral communication of competent renconteurs. That this is only a
deceptive illusion we conclude at once from his strong resemblance not
only in the main features but also in the details and the order, with
Arab writers some of whom were much anterior to him. Firdausi positively
knew no Pahlavi and as for Arabic he knew next to nothing. He did employ
written sources preponderatingly if not exclusively and these were in
modern Persian. His principal authority was, according to the
introduction mentioned above, a translation of the old Book of Kings
which was prepared by Abu Mansur bin Abdar Razzak bin Abdullah bin
Ferrukh. So far our information is surely trustworthy. For, Biruni
testifies to a Shahname by Abu Mansur bin Abdar Razzak of Tus. According
to the introduction, this man was a minister of Yakub bin Laith Saffar,
who was commissioned with the work which he accomplished through a
certain Sund bin Mansur Mamari with the help of four competent people
from Khorasan and Sagistan in 360 A.H. The chronological impossibility
involved in the figure is removed by Mohl who emends it to 260. Yakub
ibn Laith got a foothold in Khorasan in 253 A.H. and reigned till 265.
Still this report involves much that is incorrect. That the uncouth
warrior Yakub who was perpetually camping in the battle fields should
have possessed a sense for such a literary undertaking is extremely
improbable, though not altogether inconceivable. May be, he was actuated
by a political design, but Abu Mansur bin Abdar Razzak did not live
under Yakub but flourished two or three generations later. For he is
either a brother of Muhammad bin Abdar Razzak of Tus or Muhammad
himself. The first surmise has the weight of greater likelihood in that
the Strasburg manuscript calls him once Abu Mansur Ahmed and Muhammad
had in fact a brother named Ahmed who participated in his political
manouvres. Muhammad was the lord of Tus. We hear much about him--how he
in the years A.D. 945-960 stood up now for the Samanides, his proper
overlords, now for their powerful antagonist Ruknaddin, the Buide, whose
capital lay in dangerous proximity to his territory. In those days when
an enthusiasm for Modern Persia