Shiraz in the Age of Hafez: The Glory of a Medieval Persian City

182 Pages·2004·4.2 MB·English

by  John Limbert

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Yasser Tabbaa Shiraz in the Age of Hafez: The Glory of a Medieval Persian City
John Limbert
SHIRAZ IN THE AGE OF HAFEZ
THE GLORY OF A MEDIEVAL PERSIAN CITY

JOHN LIMBERT

UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON PRESS
Seattle and London
This publication was supported
in part by the Donald R. Ellegood
International Publications Endowment.

Copyright © 2004 by the University of Washington Press Printed in the United States of America

All rights reserved. No portion of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any
means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage or retrieval
system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Limbert, John W.
Shiraz in the age of Hafez : the glory of a medieval Persian city / John Limbert.
p. cm.—(Publications on the Near East) Includes bibliographical references (p.) and index.
ISBN 0-295-98391-4 (alk. paper) e-ISBN: 978-0-295-80288-6
1. Shåråz (Iran)—History. 2. Shåråz (Iran)—Intellectual life. 3. Shåråz (Iran)—Social life and customs.
4. Shåråz (Iran)—Description and travel.
I. Title.
DS325.S52L56 2004
955'72—dc22 2003064510

The paper used in this publication is acid-free and recycled from 10 percent post-consumer and at least 50
percent pre-consumer waste. It meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for
Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984.
Dedicated to the memory of Terence O'Donnell, 1924-2001. Terry first
welcomed us to his Garden of the Brave in War in Shiraz and helped me open
my eyes to what lay hidden in that city.
CONTENTS
Preface and Acknowledgments

PART ONE: HISTORY OF SHIRAZ FROM ITS FOUNDING TO THE
CONQUEST OF TIMUR
1. History of Shiraz to the Mongol Conquest
2. Things Fall Apart: Shiraz under the Mongols and Their Successors
3. Shiraz as City-State: Abu Eshaq Inju and the Mozaffarids

PART TWO: CITY OF ROSES AND NIGHTINGALES
4. Peoples and Places
5. The City Administration
6. Shirazi Society: Patricians, Poets, and Scholars
7. A Very Special Place

Appendix: The First Families of Shiraz
Notes
Bibliography
Index
PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Throughout history, foreign visitors to Shiraz have praised the city's gardens, its
site, its clear air, its wines, and the charm of its people. Today a wine lover will
find the city's name memorialized in a delicious red produced (alas) in Australia.
Iranians themselves, however, have long treasured Shiraz as a city of Islam. Its
traditional Iranian names—Dar al-Elm (Abode of Knowledge) and Borj al-
Owlia (Tower of Saints)—speak to us more of piety and learning than of roses,
wine, nightingales, and poetry.
In the fourteenth century C.E. violence and murderous anarchy prevailed in
the streets of Shiraz. Through sieges, changes of rule, mob violence, and
dynastic strife, the city also provided the setting for a remarkable flourishing of
the arts and scholarship. In those years one of its sons, Shams al-Din
Mohammad Hafez Shirazi, composed a collection of lyric poetry never equaled
before or since. According to the traditional biographies, Hafez spent most of his
life in his beloved Shiraz. His verses, even with their infrequent references to
famous places and persons, still wove themselves into the spirit and society of
his city. His poems remained part of the rich urban life of fourteenth-century
Shiraz—both in its body of walls, gates, palaces, shrines, mosques, seminaries,
and bazaars, and in its soul of violence, learning, arts, prayers, fasts, and
hedonism.
This work looks at the backdrop to Hafez's verses and at the amazing, varied
life of fourteenth-century Shiraz where poets composed, scholars studied,
mystics sought hidden truths, ascetics prayed and fasted, drunkards brawled, and
princes and their courtiers played deadly games of power. This work recounts
the history of Shiraz from its founding in the first century of Islam (seventh
century C.E.) to its conquest by Amir Timur (Tamerlane) at the end of the
fourteenth century. It reconstructs the city's geography and social organization in
the age of Hafez. The data for this reconstruction I collected during a four-year
residence in Shiraz, where I searched the alleys of the old city for medieval
tombstones in forgotten cemeteries and shrines, and spoke to Shirazis who
remembered the city in the days before the rebuilding of the Pahlavi era (1925-
79) drove new streets through the old quarters.
In recreating the society of the period I used three kinds of prose works:
histories of the period; biographies of holy men and women who lived in Shiraz;
and accounts of travelers and geographers. Another source is poetry, including
both verses from Hafez and those of less well-known Shirazi poets. Although
classical Persian poetry rarely describes historical events or social conditions, it
remains an inseparable part of the Iranian spirit. Persian poetry is not history, but
it does reflect Iranians’ intellectual and emotional response to events—a
response that Americans might express today in Internet chat rooms, letters to
the editor, cartoons, and folk songs.
AN OBLIGATORY NOTE ON NAMES AND DATES
In this history I have kept the cast of characters as clear as possible, although the
history of the times sometimes resembles a crowded Russian novel. Here is a
brief guide to Muslim names, using as an example the names and titles of the
famous Sheikh Ruzbehan of Shiraz (d. 1209):
The Name
The basis and literal center of everyone's name was the given name, or esm. In
this period, most Iranian Muslims had Arabic names, such as Ali, Osman, and
Mohammad, and some had Persian names, such as Bahram, Ruzbeh, or Salbeh.
Turkish names such as Abesh and Bozghash also appear, especially among
military commanders and the women of the ruling families. This holy man's
given name was the Persian Ruzbehan, literally “one whose days are fortunate.”
The Nickname
Immediately preceding the esm was the koniyeh or nickname, such as Abu
Mohammad or Abu al-Abbas. The nickname was typically Abu (father of) plus
the name of one's eldest son. Sheikh Ruzbehan's nickname was Abu
Mohammad. The koniyeh was the name most commonly used among friends.
The Title
Before the name and nickname were titles (laqab), some purely honorific and
others denoting the holder's position in society. Purely honorific titles such as
Sadr al-Din, Mo'in al-Din, and Zein al-Din began to appear among high-ranking
Shirazis in the late tenth and early eleventh century C.E. Before them came such
titles as Qazi (judge), Mowlana (teacher), Sheikh (sufi master), Kalu (bazaar or
neighborhood chief), and Khwajeh (nobleman). For example, the sources almost
always refer to the chief judge of Fars in Hafez's time as Qazi Majd al-Din—i.e.
by his titles. To these titles might be added others like Seyyed (descendent of the
prophet) or Amir (originally a military commander, but often simply denoting
respect). Ruzbehan's title was simply Sheikh, and in today's Shiraz the
neighborhood of his tomb is still called Dar-e-Sheikh.
The Patronymic
Following the name were the patronymics or nasab showing the names of
ancestors. Although the most common usage was to use the Arabic ibn (son of)
with the father's name (e.g. Ali b. Hasan for Ali, son of Hasan), the ibn might be
omitted (e.g. Ali Hasan for Ali b. Hasan). Sometimes a famous but distant
ancestor would replace the father's name. For example, Omar b. Yusef b. Salbeh
was Omar, son of Yusef, descendent of Salbeh. Ruzbehan's patronymic was Ali
Nasr.
The Family Name
Following the given name and patronymic came the nesbat, roughly equivalent
to the family name. These names (one person often used several of them)
indicated a relationship between the individual and a town, a region, an
occupation, a tribe, or a famous person (nesbat means “relationship”). Among
the most common family names in Shiraz during the fourteenth century were
Fali, Dashtaki, Hoseini, Alavi, Kuhgiluye'i, and Baghnovi. Ruzbehan had two
family names, including Baqli (grocer), and Fasa'i-Shirazi (from Fasa, a small
town near Shiraz).
Title of Rank
Further titles, denoting high social position and occupation, were often attached
to the family name. These last included such titles as Vazir (minister) and Naqib
(leader of the seyyeds).
In any work concerned with Islam and Islamic history, a problem with dates
arises from the fact that the lunar Islamic year is eleven days shorter than the
solar Gregorian or Zoroastrian years. An Islamic century is therefore about three
years shorter than a Christian one. In this work I have used the Christian year
which most closely coincides with the Islamic one in the sources.
The transcription system in this work follows modern Persian pronunciation,
and there is no attempt to differentiate between the various representations of the
sounds z, s, and t. Specialists will know the original spellings. I have used
common English usage where it deviates from this system. For example, Islam,
not Eslam; Iraq, not Eraq, except in compounds such as Sheikh al-Eslam,
Darvazeh-ye-Esfahan, and Eraq-e-Ajam. Occasionally, there will be diacritical
marks added if necessary to avoid confusion.
With acknowledgments I hardly know where to begin. First, I am forever
grateful to the people of the old districts of Shiraz, who provided invaluable aid
in finding the monuments there. Then to the late Dr. Arthur Upham Pope, by
whose kindness I was first able to go to Shiraz and begin research under the
auspices of the Asia Institute of Pahlavi University; to Mr. Naser Kojuri of the
Fars Office of Arts and Culture; to Mr. Ja'far Vajad, who helped me decipher the
fifteenth-century tax inscription discussed in Chapter 4; to Mr. Karamat Ra'na-
Hoseini, who introduced the precious source Shadd al-Izar to me; to Mr. Paul
Enseki of the Asia Institute and Mr. Griff Nelson of the English Department of
Pahlavi University, both of whom patiently took many photographs for me; to
Dr. Hasan Khub-Nazar, director of the Asia Institute, who generously allowed
the use of the Institute's facilities for study and research; to Mrs. Zhaleh Mahluji
of the Institute's library; to Mr. N. H. Pirnia of the Office of Preservation of
National Monuments in Teheran, who helped me read the inscriptions in Chapter
1; and to many of my students at Pahlavi University, who shared their
knowledge of Shirazi tradition.
Special appreciation also goes to Dr. Richard N. Frye of Harvard University,
who provided constant guidance, advice, and encouragement for the writing of
the dissertation on which this book is based. To Dr. Richard Bulliet, of Columbia
University, who suggested much of the methodology, and who offered patient
and careful criticism, especially of the details of the second part; to Dr. Beatrice
Forbes Manz of Tufts University; and to Mr. Mas'ud Farzad of Pahlavi
University in Shiraz, whose vast knowledge of Hafez was especially helpful.
Finally, I must acknowledge the assistance of my wife, who provided me with
the inspiration and encouragement to complete the work.