Omar Khayyam

o'mer khi-yam,' a Persian poet and historian. His name signifies Omar the tentmaker. According to tradition he lived during the latter part of the eleventh century. He appears in some way to have been able to obtain an education. He made a reputation as an astronomer. The Arabic ruler of Persia offered him a public position, but he requested instead the means of living and studying in private. He revised the ancient Persian calendar in 1074. He left a work on algebra; also a commentary on Euclid's geometry, both of which are extant. He is best known as a poet. He wrote in rhymed quatrains, reminding the student of Ecclesiastes. His quatrains, or rubaiyat, the native term, are supposed to have been about five hundred in number. The Moslem clergy considered him far from orthodox and took no pains to preserve his poetry, although they are credited with having put many of his lines and ideas to their own use. As a matter of fact, Omar bore about the same relation to the clergy of Persia that was sustained by Voltaire to the clergy of France. Many of his rubaiyat are, in fact, epigrams directed against the narrowness, the bigotry, and hypocrisy of the day. The rubaiyat have been collected by many scholars, particularly Edward Fitzgerald, an English orientalist. Like the proverbs of Solomon and Ecclesiastes to which reference has been made, they have little connection. The theme changes from quatrain to quatrain; from worship of Allah to defiance; from hope to fatalism; from rebellion to humility. See Fitzgerald; Edward