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History as Literature Author(s): Julie Scott Meisami Source: Iranian Studies, Vol. 33, No. 1/2 (Winter - Spring, 2000), pp. 15-30 Published by: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. on behalf of International Society for Iranian Studies Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4311332 Accessed: 20/04/2010 10:47
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IranianStudies,Volume 33, number1-2, Winter/Spring 2000

Julie Scott Meisami

History as Literature
CONFRONTED WITH THE TASK OF WRITING A CHAPTER ON "HISTORY AS Litera-

ture" for the volume on Persian historiographyin the new History of Persian Literature, I found myself asking, "Whatdoes this title mean? And what might it imply?"' In medieval Islamicate societies, "history"(Arabic ta3rikh,Persian tiirtkh)referred both to a specific discipline and to works dealing with the objects of that discipline.2If, as written works, histories may be broadly classed as "literature" (for which neither Arabic or Persian had a correspondingterm until the modem period), this might suggest that historians placed style over substance,or/andthat history is "imaginativewriting"and may, as such, contain an element of "fiction."Indeed, as I shall note below, recent researchon Arabic historiography (which poses somewhat different problems, in the main, than does Persian) has argued that many of the "historical"accounts which appear thereinare, in fact, "fiction"passed off as history. If Persian writers had no word for "literature,"they had a consummate interestin mattersof eloquence and style; and since history was, for them, less a dry recordof events than an elucidation of the meaning of those events, historians employed such "literary"devices-narrative structure, direct discourse, rhetorical embellishment, and so on-as would effectively convey that meaning.3 Studies on pre-modernWestern historiographyhave shown that attention to its literary and rhetorical aspects provides valuable insights into the histo-

Julie Scott Meisami is Lecturerin Persianat OxfordUniversity. 1. The paperon which this article is based was originally presentedin a panel on premodem Persian historiographyat the 2nd International Conference on Medieval Chronicles, Utrecht/Driebergen, Holland, in July 1999. The panel's four speakers(CharlesMelville, Sholeh Quinn,ErnestTucker,and myself) are among the contributors to the volume on Persianhistoriography in the new History of Persian Literature(generaleditor: Ehsan Yarshater), which is being edited by CharlesMelville. 2. Ta'rrkh originally referredto the study of chronology (see F. Rosenthal,A History of MuslimHistoriography,2nd rev. ed. [Leiden:E. J. Brill, 1968], 11-15) but soon came to be applied to any type of historical writing. Otherterms for "history"include akhbar(sg. khabar),"accounts,"and sira (pl. siyar), "life/lives," applied in the first instance to the life and deeds of the ProphetMuhammadbut also, in particular,to the history of the preIslamic Persiankings (siyar muliuk al-Furs). See R. S. Humphreys,"Ta'rikh.II. Historical Writing,"EI2 10: 271-76; Rosenthal,Muslim Historiography, 67-98. 3. See J. S. Meisami, Persian Historiographyto the End of the TwelfthCentury(Edinburgh:Edinburgh UniversityPress, 1999), especially 289-98.

16 Meisami nan's method and ultimate intent;4but only recently have "literary-critical" often by scholmethods been applied to the study of Islamicatehistoriography, ars whose primary concern is to separate "fact" from "fiction." Most such studies have focused on the problematicfield of early Islamic history, as written from earby historianswho lived much later, who utilized accounts transmitted lier authoritiesbut had their own political and/orpolemic agendas. The seminal work in this respect is Albrecht Noth's QuellenkritischeStudien zu Themen, (first published fruhislamischerGeschichtsuberlieferung Formen und Tendenzen in 1973), a revised version of which, in collaboration with Lawrence Conrad, appearedin English translationin 1994.5 The authors come to the conclusion that (for example) the presence of identifiable "topics" and "schemes" in an 6 account is an indicatorof its historical unreliability. A slightly more "literary" approachhas been taken by Stefan Leder, who has argued, in one study, that while the use of isnad (chain of transmission)would seem to exclude "narrative creativity . . . inasmuch as the factual value of the informationis maintained," when we find that "essential parts of [the] plot" of an account originate from "narrativeinvention"we are faced with "falsification"on the part of the historian/compiler utilizing that account.7 Such arguments hark back to the old view-voiced notablyby Gibb and von Grunebaum-that the virtualtakeoverof the writing of history in the 4th/lOth century by court secretariesand officials, of style which resulted,led to a decline in that and the increasing"literarization" "oncenoble"discipline.8 In a recent seminar talk I discussed the possible implications of such focusing on Stefan Leder's research for the study of Persian historiography,9 lead article in a volume of conference proceedings,'0titled "Conventionsof Fic4. The relevant literature,which encompasses historical writing from the classical to relevantessays the early modernperiod, is far too abundantto cite here. For particularly in the EuropeanMiddle Ages and the Renaissancesee Emest Breisach on historiography ed., Classical Rhetoricand Medieval History (Kalamazoo:WesternMichigan University Press, 1985). 5. AlbrechtNoth, The Early Arabic Historical Traditions:A Source-CriticalStudy, in collaborationwith Lawrence I. Conrad,trans. Michael Bonner (Princeton:Darwin Press, 1994). 283-84. 6. Noth, Studien,109-10; see also Meisami,Persian Historiography, The Downfall of Xalid al7. S. Leder, "Features of the Novel in Early Historiography: Qasri,"Oriens 32 (1990): 74. 8. See Meisami, Persian Historiography, 1-2, and the references cited. Gibb also influence of the Persianhistorical traditionon Arabiccommented on the "unfavorable" Islamic historiography; see H.A.R. Gibb, "Tarikh,"in Studies on the Civilization of Islam, ed. StanfordJ. Shaw and William R. Polk (Princeton:PrincetonUniversity Press, 1982), 116-17 (originallypublishedin the Supplementto the first edition of the Encyclopaedia of Islam in 1938). c.400-c.1300, St. Hilda's College, Oxford, 9. Seminaron the Medieval Mediterranean, 25 November 1999. 10. Stefan Leder ed., Story-Tellingin the Frameworkof Non-Fictional Arabic Literature (Wiesbaden:Harrassowitz,1998).

Historyas Literature17 tional Narration in Learned Literature."This title is somewhat surprising, as Leder begins by citing various scholarlyopinions to the effect that "Arabicliterary theory does not provide for fiction" and that "there was a reluctance to accept fiction in medieval learned literature." Nevertheless, he insists, "the existence of fictive contents in many narratives,"including historical accounts, "cannotbe seriously contested;""and he sets out to prove this in his article, in which, after noting that "fictional narration"is always "imbedded in a mainstreamof factual, or allegedly factual, narration," producingan ambiguitywhich "often obstructsany attemptto decide which text, or which partof a text, should be regardedas fiction," he attemptsto "clarify the criteriawhich allow to idenArabicliterature."'12 tify fiction in pre-modern After many convoluted arguments-which involve, in particular,identifying those elements which "betrayliterarycomposition, authorialintentions and fictitious contents")13 (note how the three are equated;and note that telling word, "betray")-and after asserting that the use of various types of embellishment (direct discourse, insertion of appropriateverses, and so on), which serves to present the charactersin a certain moral light, "is intentionaland thus indicates [the historian's]perceptionof decreasingfactuality,"'14at the end of this lengthy article (which I have, perhaps unjustly, only barely summarized here) Leder seems to waffle, when he states that Our conclusion that a narrativeis created according to the invention and narrativeskills of a story-telling mind does not offer ample proof
for [its] fictional status . . . i.e., that it is conventionally reckoned as fiction. The status of our examples . . . cannot be established on the

ground of an analytical reading of the plot, as long as the intended receptionof the text is not considered... which, to all intents and purposes, it is not.'5 Without going into details, I think that Leder has, basically, missed the boat: he has failed, first, to perceive the
11. Leder, "Conventionsof Fictional Narrationin LearnedLiterature," in Storytelling, 34. 12. Ibid., 34-35. 13. Ibid.,46. 14. Ibid., 55. 15. Ibid., 59. Leder's concluding statement gives the game away, as he states that "Narrativetexts often oscillate between factual and fictive . .. because fiction has not won general acceptanceas a mode of literaryexpression in its own right .... Story-telling is an essential component of learned literature.At instances, fictional narrationis deliberately chosen as a mode of expression. As a rule, however, narrationretains the guise of factuality and thus establishes its ambigious [sic] charactertypical of this literature. This convention seems to generate a constant play engaging narrator and recipient: The exposure of the fictional characterof narrationis avoided, and this mode of expression is thus integratedinto the confines of refined literature.Thefact thatfiction did not unfold in this literaturein a way comparableto the Europeantraditionmust not blur the perception of the existing range of expression" (Leder, "Conventions," 60; emphasis mine). What we have here, it appears, is an apologia for why Arabic literature never

18 Meisami difference between "fiction" and "invention" and, second, to recognize that productsof the "story-tellingmind"do not necessarily equate with the "deliberate use of fiction." What has this to do with Persian historiography?Nearly twenty years ago the late Marilyn Waldman, in her pioneering study of Abu'l-Fazl Bayhaqi, argued that the adoption of a literary-criticalapproachto historical texts could reveal an "unconsciouspatterning. .. which has meaning beyond the deliberate intention of the author.",16 She posited that "historicalnarrativeis . . . problematic . . . because it is neither ordinarydiscourse nor is it literaryor poetic discourse in today's usage," but is presumed to be "a special kind of language whose determiningcharacteristicis its aim to be truthful"and "to be free from fictivity to the extent that it is good history."'17Adapting "speech-act"theory, especially as developed by Mary Louise Pratt,and Pratt's distinction "between the assertible, i.e, true and informative, and the tellable, i.e., the not obviously true," she argued that in terms of this theory Bayhaqi's history constitutes a 18In ratherthan on "factuality." "displaytext" whose emphasis is on "tellability" other words, if it's a good story, tell it, even though the "facts"may go by the board. It surprisesme that, while writerson Islamicatehistoriography often invoke a ratherheterogeneousselection of Western "literarytheory,"they seldom have recourse to studies on pre-modernWestern historiographythat might provide useful comparative insights. In particular,the concept of "ethical-rhetorical" historiography,which is widely accepted in Western scholarship, has not yet penetratedour field, and I seem to be the only person to have made use of it.19 Yet this concept is crucial to the presentdiscussion. For from the beginning the writers of histories in Persian were, almost without exception, court secretaries or officials, who were both schooled in the strategies and subtleties of rhetoric (both Arabic and Persian)and supremelyconscious of the ethical lessons history had to offer, and who utilized their rhetorical skills to convey those lessons. And, as I shall argue here, if the style of the early historians was relatively unembellished (in the conventional understandingof "rhetoric"),it was, nonetheless, rhetorical. One of the earliest surviving Persian histories is the "translation"of "HisMuhammadibn JarirTabari's (d. 314/926) Ta-rrkhal-rusul wa-al-muluik, tory of Prophetsand Kings," commissioned in 352/963 by the Samanidrulerof Transoxaniaand Khurasan,Mansur ibn Nuh, and carried out, on his order, by his vizier, Abu cAli Balcami. As Balcami took abundantliberties with his origideveloped "fiction" as "we" (that is, we Westerners) know it and, more importantly, define it. 16. M. R. Waldman,Towarda Theoryof Historical Narrative:A Case Studyin PersoIslamicateHistoriography(Columbus:Ohio State UniversityPress), 7. 17. Ibid., 17. 18. Ibid., 18-19. 19. See for example the essays in Breisach, Classical Rhetoric; also J. S. Meisami, "The Past in Service of the Present,"Poetics Today 14 (1993): 247-75, and Meisami, Persian Historiography.

Historyas Literature19 While Balcamis nal, the result was less a "translation"than an adaptation.20 prose of the style is often considered representativeof the "simple, unadorned" early period of Persian prose, it is also highly rhetorical,althoughthe deliberate use of rhetorical techniques is reserved for certain crucial episodes, "high points" in the narrative.One such "high point" concerns the fall of the Barmakids, that powerful Persian family of viziers and officials, in 187/803, in the reign of Harunal-Rashid.This catastropheprovideda "set piece" for many Arabic and Persian historians, who saw in it an opportunityfor comment on the dangerof acquiringtoo much power, influence, and wealth, on the fickleness of rulers, and (especially in Balcami's case) on the moral decline of the Abbasid caliphate.2'While the historiansdisagree about the reasons for this catastrophe, most concur that its immediate cause was the caliph's discovery of the affair between his sister, cAbbasa,and the BarmakidJacfar, which resulted in Jacfar's of the entireBarmakidfamily. execution and the destruction Balcami's account of the Barmakids'fall constitutesan independentchapter in which the events leading up to Jacfar'sdeath form the climax.22 The chapter may be briefly summarizedas follows. The Barmakidvizier, Yahya, had four sons (Fadl, Jacfar, Musa, and Muhammad);they were powerful officials, possessed great wealth, and were close to the caliph. (Balcami's comment on the caliph's habit of drinkingin the company of his womenfolk, female slaves, and musicians is a detail which will prove relevant later.) Various reasons are given for the Barmakids' downfall. When Yahya sought to retire, the vizierate alternated between Fadl (whom Yahya preferred)and Jacfar(whom the caliph preferred), until Yahya finally resumed his duties. Inevitably, his lengthy service (some 17 years) made him many enemies, one of whom accused the Barmakids of heresy (that is, of secretly practicingZoroastrianism).In the past, Jacfarhad freed a rebel who had been in his custody; the caliph pardoned him, but remaineddispleased. Last (but not least), in orderto enjoy the company of both Jacfarand cAbbasain the same gatheringswithout Jacfarfeeling uncomfortable, the caliph arrangeda marriagebetween the two. This was to be a marriagein name only; but naturetook its course, and cAbbasabore a child, who was sent away to Mecca to be hidden. Eventually, Harunlearned about the child's existence from a disgruntledslave. In 187/803 Harunwent on the pilgrimage;on the return journey he had Jacfarexecuted, and destroyedthe entire Barmakidfamily. A translation of the relevantpartof the accountfollows.

20. See Meisami, Persian Historiography,28-37, and the referencescited. 21. There is an extensive literatureon the Barmakidcatastropheand its historical and literarytreatments.See, for example, J. S. Meisami, "Masctidi on Love and the Fall of the JRAS 1989: 252-77; and, more recently, A. Hamori,"Going Down in Style: Barmakids," the Pseudo-IbnQutayba's Story of the Fall of the Barmakis,"Princeton Papers in Near Eastern Studies 3 (1994): 89-125; J. Sadan, "Death of a Princess: Episodes of the BarmakidLegend in Its Late Evolution,"in Stefan Leder,ed., Story-Telling,130- 57. 22. Abu cAli Balcami, Tdrikhndmah-i Tabart, bakhsh-i chap-nashudah, ed. Muhammad Rawshan(Tehran:Nashr-iAlburz, 1994), 1: 1193-1200.

20 Meisami That year [the caliph] determined to go on the pilgrimage. He took Yahya and the [other] Barmakidswith him, and completedthe pilgrimage. Then he summoned cAbbasa's son, and found that he was extremely beautiful, and resembled both cAbbasa and Jacfar. He wanted to kill him; then he thought, "What sin has he committed?" When he returned[from the pilgrimage] and reached Anbar [a station on the pilgrimageroute], he stayed there threedays. On the thirdday he summonedJacfar, Fadl and Musa, Yahya's sons, and bestowed robes of honor upon them, along with other honors, as he did upon Yahya too, so that all were happy and felt secure. At the time of the noonday prayerhe said: "Tonight I will drink wine with my slave-girls; otherwise I would not let you go." Then he said to Jacfar:"Tonightyou, too, make merryand drinkwith your slave-girls."Jacfarwent out. Rashid entered the slave-girls' tent and sat down to drink. Some time passed. He sent someone to Jacfarto see if he was drinking;he was not. Rashid sent someone (else) to him, to say: "By my life and soul! Organize a drinking party, and drink and make merry tonight, because wine is not pleasing to me unless I know that you too are drinking!" Jacfar was distressed and frightened; against his will he organizeda party, and withdrew.He had a blind singer called Bu Zakkar. When they had drunksome wine, Jacfarsaid to Bu Zakkar:"I am fearful tonight, and feel very unwell." Bu Zakkarreplied:"O vizier, the caliph has never honored you and your family as much as he has done on this day and night; you should be happy."Jacfarsaid: "Bu Zakkar, my heart is ever fearful, and I am very anxious." "Such thoughts are suggestions (of the devil); put them out of your mind, and make merry tonight." At the time of the evening prayera messengercame to Jacfar from Rashid bearingsweetmeats and fragrantincense which (the caliph) had collected from his own partyand sent to him; and the same happenedat the time of the late-night prayer.Three times that night Rashid sent a messenger to Jacfarwith sweetmeats and incense. When the night was half-gone, Rashid went from the women's tent to his own, summoned Masrur al-Khadim [the royal executioner] and said: "Go now, take Yahya's son Jacfarto your tent, cut off his head and bring it to me." When Masrurentered (Jacfar'stent) Bu Zakkarwas singing this verse of poetry: Do not go far away! For to every noble youth will come death,whetherhe travelby night or by morning. Masrurwent in and stood over Jacfar.When Jacfarsaw him he was afraid.Masrursaid: "The caliph summonsyou." (Jacfar)asked: "Where is the caliph?"- "He was (drinking)with the women, but now he has gone to his own (tent)." Jacfarasked: "Give me enough time to go to my women's tent and make my testament."Masrurreplied: "You cannot go there; whatever testamentyou wish to make, make it here." So

Historyas Literature21
Jacfar made his testamentin that same place; (then) Masrurtook him to

his own tent and drew his sword. Jacfar asked: "What has he [the caliph] commanded?" (Masrurreplied):"He has commandedthat I take him your head."-"Beware; he said this while drunk,and will repentof it. You must go once more [and ask him]." He swore an oath (to Masrur),and remindedhim of the obligationsand friendshipsof the past. Masrurwent to Rashid, who was in the place of prayer,waiting for Masrur.He said: "So, where is Jacfar'shead?"(Masrur)answered:"O caliph, I have broughtJacfar.'' "I did not ask for Jacfar;I asked for his head!" Masrurwent back, cut off (Jacfar's)head and brought it to Rashid. He said, "Keep his head and his body until I ask you for them; now, at once, take Yahya and his three sons, Fadl and Muhammadand Musa, and his brother Muhammad. . . to your tent and put them in chains, and seize whateverbelongings you find with them."Masrurdid so. When it was day, Rashid sent Jacfar'shead to Baghdadto be exhibited on a cross.23 Following this account, Balcami moves to the consequences of the Barmakid affair. People blamed the caliph for having made a private matterpublic; Rashid's affairs began to decline, and he was unable to put down the rebellions which broke out against him. He repented his actions publicly, and was criticized for havingdone so and for revealinghis dependenceon the Barmakids.24 Balcami's narrative,which is, in the main, clear and concise, moves forward rapidly.The climax of the story of Jacfar'sfate is adornedby the singer's verses (in Arabic) and by direct discourse, both of which enhance the dramaticeffect. Balcami conveys both criticism (which he attributesto others) and moral and political comment: the caliph's actions ultimately broughtabout his own political collapse. One strikingfeatureof this account is its depiction of the combination of duplicity and arbitrariness which characterizedthe caliph's actions. This is worthbearingin mind. At the end of the 4th/10th century the Samanids collapsed. They were replaced by the Ghaznavids, whose greatest ruler, Mahmud (338-421/998-1030), acquireda large empire. The decline of Ghaznavidpower during the reign of Mahmud's son Mascud I (421-32/1030-41) culminated in the latter's defeat by the Saljuq steppe Turks in 431/1040. Around 450/1058, Abu'l-Fazl Bayhaqi was completing his lengthy history of the dynasty, of which only those partsdealing with Mascud's reign survive. Part of his project was to reaffirm Ghaznavid legitimacy; part was to show how, and why, Mascud had managedto lose half theirempire. The late Allin Luther argued that Bayhaqi's style exemplified the plain, unembellishedprose employed by the Ghaznavidchancery.25 Waldmanthought
23. Balcami,Tarikhndmah, 1: 1197-99. 24. Balcami,Telrrkhnelmah, 1: 1199-2000. 25. K. A. Luther, "Bayhaqi and the Later Saljuq Historians: Some Comparative Abu al-Fazl Bayhaqi (Meshed: Danishgah-i Mashhad, 1971), Remarks;"in Yadnamah-i 14-33. Luther's argumentis, however, circular,since he relies on Bayhaqi's own copies

22 Meisami that his characteristicuse of digressions functioned to dissimulate views which might have been unpopularor offensive26(althoughBayhaqi seems to have had little difficulty in calling a spade a spade); E. A. Poliakova consideredthat his Such conflicting views reflect the primary intention was "to depict reality."27 complexity of Bayhaqi's work, a complexity which may be seen in the chapter devoted to the events surroundingthe execution of Mahmud's former vizier Hasanakin 422/1031, the firstyear of Mascud'sreign.28 Relying on his audience to recall events mentioned earlier-how Hasanak had incurredthe enmity both of Mascudand of his crony Bu Sahl Zawzani, and how, when Mascud had wrested the throne from his half-brotherMuhammad (Mahmud's designated heir, whom Hasanak had supported),Bu Sahl had had Hasanakarrested-Bayhaqi begins this separatechapteron Hasanak'send with a declarationof his intent and an abjurationthat he should not be accused of prejudice (specifically, against Bu Sahl). He then comments both on Bu Sahl's vindictive nature and on Hasanak's arrogance (he is compared to the equally arrogantBarmakid,Jacfar):servants should mind their tongues when speaking to their superiors,he states.29 Bayhaqi recalls how Hasanak,when criticized for his supportof Muhammad,had sent a message to Mascudvia the latter's confidant, saying: "Tell your master:Whatever I do is in accordancewith my master's [i.e. Mahmud's]orders;if you [Mascud]should gain the throne,(then) you must execute me."30We also learn that during his vizierate, Hasanak's chamberlain (pardah-dar) had insulted Bu Sahl, who was, thenceforth, Hasanak's deadly enemy.3' Bu Sahl prevailed upon Mascud to revive an old charge of heresy against Hasanak,incurredin Mahmud'sreign when, as leader of the pilgrimage,he had brought the pilgrims back from Arabia through Fatimid Egypt and Syria, had bypassed Baghdadand the caliphal court, and had accepteda robe of honor from the Fatimid caliph. The Abbasid caliph, al-Qadir,had orderedMahmudto exedeclined to obey.32 cute Hasanakfor heresy; Mahmud(with some forthrightness) Bayhaqi relates the opinions of various officials about this affair-largely favorable towards Hasanak, and shocked at Bu Sahl's vindictive campaign against

of Ghaznavid of chancerydocuments,insertedinto his history,to establishthe parameters chancerystyle. For an illuminatinginsight into how official lettersought (or ought not) to Bayhaqt, ed. cAli AkbarFayyaz (Mashhad: be written, see Abu'l-Fazl Bayhaqi, Tiirrkh-i Danishgah-iMashhad,1971), 844 46. 26. Waldman,Theory,72-73. 27. E. A. Poliakova, "The Development of a Literary Canon on Medieval Persian IranianStudies 17 (1984), 241. Chronicles:the Triumphof Etiquette," 28. Bayhaqi, Thrikh,221-46. On this portion of Bayhaqi's history see also J. S. Meisami, "ExemplaryLives, Exemplary Deaths: The Execution of Hasanak,"in Actas XVI AECI, 1995), 357-64. Congreso UEAI(Salamanca: 221-23. 29. Bayhaqi,Tarlrkh, 30. Ibid., 223. 31. Ibid., 225. 32. Ibid.,227.

Historyas Literature23 him-and tells of Mascud's initial vacillation and his final decision to proceed. After a lengthy account of how Hasanakwas tried, condemned,and his property confiscated,33Bayhaqi moves to the scene of his public execution in Balkh, which standsat the exact midpointof this chapter. All that day and night they made preparationsfor Hasanak's execution. They had got up two men in messengers' dress, as if (they had come) from Baghdad with the caliph's letter, commanding that Hasanak the Carmathianbe crucified and stoned, so that never again would anyone, in despite of the caliph, don an Egyptianrobe of honor, or lead the pilgrims throughthat land. When all had been prepared,the next day . .. Amir Mascudmountedup and went off to hunt and make merry for three days, along with his boon companions, familiars, and minstrels.He commandedhis deputy in the city to erect a scaffold next to the Balkh musalla, at the bottom of the city, and everyone set out for that place. Bu Sahl [Zawzani] mounted up, came near the scaffold and halted on a high place. Cavalry and foot soldiers had gone to bring Hasanak;when they broughthim out of the Bazar-i cAshiqan [one of the marketsof Balkh], and he reached the city, Mika'il [an old enemy of Hasanak],who had halted his horse there, came to meet him, called him a traitor,and cursed him foully. Hasanakpaid no attentionto him, and did not reply. The common people cursed him, and what the elite said aboutthis Mika'il cannotbe told .... They broughtHasanakto the foot of the scaffold-may God preserve us from an evil Fate!-where they had placed the two messengers, [got up] as if they had come from Baghdad.They summonedthe and orderedHasanakto remove his clothing. He put his Koran-readers, hand beneath his garments,tightened the belt of his undertrousers and closed their ankle-strings;then he took off his cloak and shirt and cast them aside, along with his turban.He stood there naked, in his trousers, his hands folded; his body was like white silver, his face like a hundred thousand beautiful idols. The people all wept in anguish. They had brought an iron-bandedhelmet-deliberately, one that was too small, so that it did not cover his head and face-and cried out, "Cover his face, that it may not be ruined by the stones, for we are going to send his head to the Caliph in Baghdad."They kept Hasanak there in that state-his lips moving, reciting something under his breath-until a largerhelmet was brought.In the meanwhile Ahmad, the Keeper of the Robes, came up on horseback, looked at Hasanak and gave him this message: "Ourlord the sultan says: This is what you wished for when you said, 'When you become sultan, then execute me.' We wished to be merciful to you; but the Caliph has written that you have become a heretic; it is by his orderthat we execute you." Hasanakmade no reply at all.

33. Ibid., 228-32.

24 Meisami Then, when they had brought a larger helmet, they covered his head and face with it. Then they shouted to him, "Run!"He did not move, and paid no attention; some people cried out, "Aren't you ashamedto make a man you're going to kill run to the scaffold?"A riot nearly broke out; the horsemen rode at the people and put down the disturbance. They brought Hasanak to the scaffold and placed him there; they set him on a mount he had never ridden. The executioner bound him fast, and brought down the noose. They shouted, "Stone him!" But no one touched a stone, and all wept bitterly .... Then they gave money to a bunch of ruffians to stone him; but he himself was dead, since the executioner had put a cord aroundhis neck and strangled him. Such was Hasanakand his fate .... And if he had wrongly seized the land and water of Muslims, neitherland nor waterremained; all those slaves, properties, possessions, gold and silver and luxuries were of no profit to him. He departed,and those who plotted (against him) have departed,may God have mercy on them! And this story is a great admonition:for they left behind them all those causes of conflict and strife for the sake of worldly rubbish.How stupid is the man who fixes his heart on this world! For it gives blessings, but takes [them] back in an evil way. By thy life! this world is no place of sojourning, when its coveringfalls from the eyes of those with vision. How shouldpeople survivein it, when its survivalis gainedthroughthe means of destruction? Rudakisays: abode. The guest cannotfix his heartforeveron this transient You must sleep deep in its earth, even though now you sleep in silken brocades. What use is it to keep company with others, when you will enter the grave alone? Your companions beneath the earth will be ants and flies, instead of the one who dressedyour curlinglocks. And the one who dressed your curling locks-though his fee be gold and silver coins: When he sees you have grown yellow and wan, his heartwill grow cold-he is not blind! And when they were finished with all this, Bu Sahl and his people left the foot of the scaffold, and Hasanakremainedalone, just as he had emergedalone from his mother'swomb.?4

34. Ibid., 232-34.

Historyas Literature25 After this meditationon the transienceof worldly power, Bayhaqi tells how, after the execution, Bu Sahl, drinking and feasting with his friends, had Hasanak'shead broughtin to them on a covered platter,to the disgust and horror of the gathering.Hasanak'sbody was left to rot on the cross for nearlyseven years, until Mascud commanded that it be taken down and buried. When she learnedof her son's death, Hasanak'smotherdid not grieve "as women do," but wept bitterly,and then said: "Whata great man was this son of mine, to whom a king like Mahmudgave this world, and a king like Mascudthe next."35 "Such a thing has happened(before) in the world," says Bayhaqi, launching into one of his characteristicdigressions, which takes up nearly half the chapter and includes four stories (two fairly lengthy, two so short as to be merely allurebels against sive) about two sets of individuals:first, two first/seventh-century Umayyad authority,who were killed and their bodies hung on crosses; and second, two viziers-Jacfar the Barmakidand the Buyid vizier Ibn Baqiyya-who met similar fates because of their arroganceand inability to hold their tongues.36 The story about Jacfar is worth noting, for purposes of comparison with Balcami. After Jacfar's execution Harun al-Rashid ordered his body quartered and exhibited on four crosses, and forbadeexpressions of pity for the Barmakids under threat of punishment. Later he regretted his actions; and when a man caught reciting sympathetic verses beneath one of the crosses was brought before the caliph, and explained to him that he had been discharginghis obligations of loyalty towardsthe Barmakidsand was ready to accept punishment,the caliph wept and pardonedhim. Bayhaqi tells these stories, he says, to show that "Hasanakhad companions in this world greater than he; if what happened to him happenedto them, it shouldnot be marvelledat."37 Hasanak'sexecution stands at the midpointof this chapter,which is clearly meant to be taken as a whole; but commentatorsusually ignore the digression and concentrateon the historical account. R. S. Humphreys(for example) sees here evidence of Bayhaqi's "political realism," his acknowledgementthat the rulerhad "the right to do whateverhe wished with his servants."The "complex charade"of Hasanak'strial, in which Mascudexhibits a "punctiliousconcern for form and due process," demonstrates that "in order for the state to maintain But Bayhaqi's itself, there must appearto be law even when there is no law."38 "literary"treatment of Hasanak's trial and execution-his appearanceon the scaffold, the reactionof the onlookers-presents him as a martyrto royal injustice, and exposes Mascud's (and Bu Sahl's) manipulationof the "law"for their own vindictive purposes; while the digression, which juxtaposes Hasanakwith two viziers who suffered for their arroganceand two martyrsto Umayyad tyranny, raises a number of questions. Bayhaqi's style is thus not as "straightfor35. Ibid., 236. 36. Ibn Baqiyya's execution was the subject of a famous poem which Bayhaqi quotes at length. (See "Ibnal-Anbari",in J. S. Meisami and Paul Starkey,eds., Encyclopediaof Arabic Literature[London:Routledge, 19981, 1: 311). 37. Bayhaqi,Tdrtkh: 242-43. 38. R. S. Humphreys,Islamic History: A Framework for Enquiry,revised ed. (Princeton: PrincetonUniversityPress, 1991), 144.

26 Meisami ward"as has been imagined;nor does it lack for "embellishment" (we may note that the verses in Arabic and Persian which follow the account of Hasanak's execution form a transition to the remainder of the chapter). Moreover, the structureof the entire chapteris extremely precise: the preliminarymaterial(the supposed charge against Hasanak,backgroundmaterial,the trial etc.) precedes the centralsection (the execution), which is followed by the digression (suitably introducedby an appropriate topical reference,to Hasanak'smother).The organization of the chapterfollows the rhetoricalprinciples of fasl u vasl, and demonstrates that the "rules" of rhetoric are not-pace Luther9-so much "constraints" upon the writeras internalized principlesof composition. From the mid-5th/l Ith century we jump to the late 6thIl2th, when (as Luther argued) the figured, rhetorical style became the norm for Saljuq chanceries.40Lutherwas perhapsnot aware that the credit for this was assigned, not to a Saljuq secretary,but to Rashid al-Din Vatvat, secretaryand importantofficial at the court of the Khwarazmshah Atsiz.41 Luther,contrastingthe plain style of the Ghaznavidchancery(as exemplifed by Bayhaqi) with the figured style of late Saljuqchanceries,arguedthat the differencereflecteda change in the ruler's involvement in the preparation of official correspondence(in which Ghaznavid rulers participateddirectly, but which the often illiterate Saljuq sultans left to their officials), and that writers of other prose genres were constrainedto "follow the rules"laid down in the manualsof style.42But if it is true that this style was popularized by Rashid-i Vatvat, this would seem to invalidate Luther's argument.It is also noteworthythat the authorsof "manualsof style" (most of which were written in the East) routinely caution against the use of an excessively ornamentalstyle, as it both impedes communicationof the matterat hand and leads to unnecessary prolixity. And while the development of the figured of Persian prose, style may be seen as a manifestation of the "literarization" individual styles continued to vary according to both the writer's taste and that of his intendedaudience. It is in such a spirit that we should approachMuhammadcAli Ravandi's Raihatal-sudu4r, completed around601/1204-5, which deals with the history of the Saljuqs from their semi-legendaryorigins to the collapse of the dynasty in

39. K. Allin Luther,"ChanceryWritingas a Source of Constraintson History Writing in the Sixth and Seventh Centuriesof the Hijra,"unpublishedseminarpaper, University of Michigan, 1977. 40. See Luther, "ChanceryWriting"and K. Allin Luther, "Islamic Rhetoric and the Persian Historians, 1000-1300 A.D.," in Studies in Near Eastern Cultureand History in Memory of Ernest T. Abdel-Massih, ed. James A. Bellamy (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan,Centerfor Near EasternandNorthAfricanStudies, 1990), 90-98. 41. Baha' al-Din Baghdadi credits Rashid-i Vatvat with having introducedrhymed prose and the ornate, figured style into Persian tarassul, "partlyto reflect glory on his royal patron and partly to demonstrate [his] own erudition and refined style." F.-A. II. Islamic Persia,"EIr 6: 292; Baha' al-Din Baghdadi,alMojtabd'i, "Correspondence. Tawassul ila al-tarassul, ed. Ahmad Bahmanyar(Tehran, 1936), 9. Baghdadi notes that this innovationwas "notapprovedby the mastersof style." 42. Luther,"Chancery Writing."

Historyas Literature27 590/1194. While Ravandi's accountsof the early Saljuqsare based on the earlier Saljuqnaimahof Zahir al-Din Nishapuri, he has taken many liberties with his model, not least in his additionof rhetoricalembellishment.For this he has been judged harshly,accused of plagiarismand of ignoranceof both the art of history and that of literature,and criticized for his use of such devices as rhymingprose and interpolations,which are consideredtedious, inapt, and unrelatedto the narrative. While Lutherdisagreed with this judgement, he did not (in my view) go to evaluatethe functionof Ravandi' far enough in attempting s ornatestyle.43 A concise example of this style is seen in Ravandi's account of the murder of the formervizier Abu Nasr Kunduriin 456/1064, which appearsat the beginning of his chapter on the reign of the second Saljuq sultan Alp Arslan (455-65/1063-73). The highly schematic nature of this chapter establishes a patternthat Ravandirepeats (and expands upon) in those on later rulers. It may be divided into seven majorsections: (1) Alp Arslan's accession, the durationof his reign, his age at death and his date of birth;the names of his vizier and his chamberlains;his seal; his moral qualities and physical appearance;his skill with the bow ("his arrow never missed its mark");a capsule description of his reign as "tranquil;'44 (2) the murderof Kunduriat the instigationof Alp Arslan's vizier Nizam al-Mulk (see below); (3) Alp Arslan's campaigns, battles, and peaceful achievements, culminating in the battle of Malazgird/Manzikert (463/1071) and the captureof the Byzantine emperorRomanusIV Diogenes; (4) amplification of (3): the story of the Greek slave who capturedRomanus; the fixing of tribute; (5) Alp Arslan's murder, avenged by the officer Jamic (we might note, 'apropos of the earlier reference to Alp Arslan's skill as an archer, that his assassin succeeded because the arrow the sultan loosed at him did miss its mark;this motif links the beginning and end of his reign); (6) amplification of (5): how Jamic gained requital for his son's murderfrom Alp Arslan's son and successor, Malikshah,by remindinghim of his previous action; (7) praise of the book's dedicatee (the Saljuq sultan of Konya, Ghiyas al-Din Kaykhusraw), followed by a panegyricpoem. The style of the first part of the preliminarysection is terse and summary. The second part begins with a long sentence in rhyming prose, and concludes with an Arabicproverband a Persianverse paraphrase. Sultan Alp Arslan was a ruler who possessed dignity and severity, who was merciful, fortunate, and vigilant, who vanquished foes and cast adversarieslow, one without match who the whole world grasped, the throne's adorner,a universal conqueror.He was mighty in stature, with mustachesso long that when he shot his bow he would tie them in a knot. His arrow never missed its mark. He wore a high turban,and seated on the throne on audience days, he was extremely formidable and majestic. They say that from the tips of his mustachesto the top of
43. Luther,"IslamicRhetoric,"95. See also J. S. Meisami, "Ravandi'sRahat al-sudar: Historyor Hybrid?", Edebiyat,n.s., 5 (1995): 187-88. 44. MuhammadAli Ravandi, The Rahat-us-sudurwa-ayat-as-suruir, ed. Muhammad Iqbal(Leiden:E. J. Brill; London:Luzac, 1921), 117.

28 Meisami his crown was two cubits' length. Every envoy who came into his presence was terrified. He had a tranquilreign. [Proverb]For the man of good endeavor,his pastureswill be pleasantever. The man whose life and deeds in good abound: his fields will furnisha good huntingground. These verses constitute the transition to the next section, the account of Kunduri'smurder. Following the death of his uncle Tughril Beg, [Alp Arslan] seized cAmid al-Mulk [Kunduri],who had been his uncle's vizier, and gave the vizierate to Nizam al-Mulk, who had served Alp Arslan before he became sultan. He took Bu Nasr Kunduriwith him wherever he went for a year. [Proverb]The greatest of afflictions is the violation of protection .... In 456 [1064], in the city of Nasa, he orderedthat cAmid al-Mulk be killed; and Nizam al-Mulk was complicit in this. [Proverb] When you seek counsel from the unwise, he will choose for you only lies .... I heard that when the assassin came into his presence, [Kunduri] asked for a brief respite. He performedhis ablutions, completed two prostrationsof prayer,and then made [the assassin] swear, "Whenyou have carried out the king's command, take a message from me to the Sultan, and anotherto the vizier. Tell the Sultan: What an auspicious service was my service to you [the Saljuqs]: your uncle gave me this world, so that I governedit, and you have given me the next world, and provided me with martyrdom. Thus throughserving you I have gained both this world and the next. And tell the vizier: You have introduced an evil innovation and a foul principle into this world by killing a vizier; I hope you will see this custom once again with respect to yourself and your descendants."[Proverb]He who loves himself will avoid sins; and he who loves his son will be mercifulto orphans. Thus has it been, long as the spherehas rolled: sometimesit's filled with hate, sometimeswith love. If you are wise, then count it not your friend; for when it can, your flesh 'twill surelyrend. Althoughthe lofty sphereextends afar, the veil of mysteriesstill standsbefore. Thus, while you can, in joy pass throughthis world; thinkon the fateful turningof the sphere. It elevates one to the lofty heavens, and makes him safe from sickness and from pain; Thence to the earthhe's carriedby the sphere, where all is sickness and regretandfear. That same one thatit raisedwith love it casts, bewildered,down againinto a pit. It bringsone from the pit onto the throne,

Historyas Literature29 and places on his head a jewelled crown; But in the end both lie in earth;the vine gives way unto the clasping of the thorn.45 In this account, the interpolated proverbs serve to provide comment (by heeding the bad advice of an unwise counselor the sultan has violated his moral obligation to protect a loyal servant);the dramaticaccount of the murderconcludes with Kunduri's message to the sultan (in which is clearly echoed the words of Hasanak's mother), and his prophetic words to the vizier (who, as Ravandi's audience well knew, had met his death at the hands of an assassin).46 The section concludes with a proverb and a lengthy quotation from Firdawsi's on the transienceof worldlypower. Shahnamah These three passages show that the rhetoricalbases of the so-called "ornate style" of the 6th/12th century-concern for overall structureand for establishing stylistic and thematiclinks and transitions;the positioningof a crucial episode at a critical point in the account or chapter;the use of direct discourse for dramatic effect-were already in place in the 4th/lOth;all that has been added is a more liberal use of ornament.Moreover,the "ornatestyle" made its way not only into historiography,but also into other types of writing, and notably into story-collections employing mixed prose and verse.47The result, as far as the writing of history was concerned, was an explictly ethical-rhetorical historiography,which is perhapsbest exemplified by Ravandi's Riahatal-sudur; but the pervasiveness of this style was by no means universal, and it continued to co-exist with "simpler"and less embellished prose (exemplified, for example, by Nishapuri's as well as by numerousotherworks). Saljuqniamah, Are the accounts we have discussed, or the works in which they occur, to be classified as "literature"? Insofar as they possess decidedly aesthetic characteristics, the answer must be yes. But should the fact that they featurerecognizable narrativestrategies,conscious emplotment,direct discourse, recurrenttopoi and so on lead us to view them as "fiction"?Our own, modernstandards-which are colored by the fact that the novel has for some two centuries been the dominant genre in Western literature-might tempt us to do so. But none of our authors set out to write "fiction" (as Leder might have it); nor would their audiences have received their accounts as such. For one thing, the events depicted were a matterof historicalrecord;their outcome was alreadyknown to their audiences, but their meaning was geared both to contemporaryand to general concerns. The fact of telling them is part and parcel of the historian'stask.48 It is the pur45. Ravandi,Raihat-us-sudar, 117-18. 46. Unlike Nishapuri,Ravandishows no interestin Nizam al-Mulk's personalmotives; the event is, for him, paradigmatic,as it foreshadows the moral decline of the Saljuqs which culminatedin theircollapse in 590/1194. 47. For an overview see J. S. Meisami, "Mixed Prose and Verse in Medieval Persian Literature,"in Joseph Harris and Karl Reichl, eds., Prosimetrum: Cross-Cultural Perspectiveson Narrativein Prose and Verse(Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1997), 295-319. 48. Perhapsthis should be modified:historiansobviously do not include "all the facts", that is, everythingthat might be said; but events as momentousas (for example) the kill-

30 Meisami pose, and hence the manner,of their telling that is importantfor our historians and for their audiences.Were these accountsnot "true," the purposebehindtheir telling would, arguably, be lost; but were they not told in the most effective manner,their meaning-and their message-might not be clearly grasped.This is the function of rhetoric:to convey, and to persuadeaudiences of, the event's political and ethical significance. Perhaps,in the end, it would be better to call my chapter"Historyas Rhetoric"? But that,too, might be misleading...

ing of a vizier cannot be passed over in silence. It is the historianwho decides what, and how much, to make of them, to suit his own purpose.Thus, for example, Bayhaqi's contemporary,CAbdal-Hayy Gardizi, reportsHasanak'sexecution briefly and without comment, in the more general context of Mascud's vindictive campaign against both his father's former officials and those who had supported Muhammad(Gardizi, Zayn alakhbair,ed. CAbd al-Hayy Habibi [Tehran: Bunyad-i Farhang-i Iran, 1347/1968], 196-97).