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Ferdowsi

Type Figure Region West Asia Time c. 940–1020 Also known as Ferdowsi Tusi

Persian epic poet active in Khorasan c. 940–1020, who spent over thirty years writing the Shahnameh, systematically compiling Iranian royal legends a…

Timeline

  1. c. 960–977Tus · KhorasanBorn into a prominent family in Tus, Khorasan, he received training in traditional Persian literature and historiography; inspired by the Samanid cultural revival, he resolved to compose a great epic in New Persian covering the entire lineage of Iranian kings.
  2. c. 977–1010Khorasan (Tus and the Ghaznavid court) · KhorasanOver more than thirty years he completed some sixty thousand couplets of the Shahnameh, drawing on Middle Persian sources such as the Book of Kings and incorporating oral tradition; with narratives of heroes like Rostam and the succession of dynasties as its main thread, the work established a model for New Persian literature.
  3. c. 1010–1020Tus · KhorasanLegend holds that after completing the work he resented the meagre rewards, and he returned to Tus for the rest of his life; after his death he was buried in the Ferdowsi Mausoleum in Tus, and his work was widely transcribed in Iran and Central Asia, shaping later poetic style, views of history, and national identity.

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