Shah Nameh

shah na-me', in Persian literature, a celebrated epic poem by Abul Kasim Mansur, the greatest of Persian poets. Shah Nemeh means Book of Kings, and the epic is a history of the kings of Persia down to 636 A. D. The poem was written during the reign of Shah Mahmud (940-1020). It consists of 60,000 couplets. The poet, called Ferdusi or Paradise by his countrymen, on account of the beauty of his verse, spent thirty years on the poem, having been promised a piece of gold for every couplet; but when the work was done, the monarch received it coldly, and sent the author 60,000 small pieces of money, instead of the gold. Ferdusi immediately wrote a stinging satire, which he sent to the king, betaking himself, meanwhile, to Bagdad, where his other poems soon won him fame. He added to his great poem a thousand couplets,--these in praise of the Caliph of Bagdad, and received from him the 60,000 gold pieces. The language of the Shah Nemeh is the purest example extant of the ancient Parsee. See Literature; Persian; Parsees