Ashura is next week – on 14 November 2013. In Iran, Ashura is commonly commemorated with black for ash and red for blood, as shown in these photos from 2012. Of course, Ashura is all about Hossein. But I think one of the biggest heroes at the battle of Karbala was Abul Fazl – and …
According to Zoroastrian mythology, Lake Hamun was the keeper of Zoroaster’s seed. When the world’s end is at hand, three maidens will enter the lake, and afterwards will give birth to the Saoshyants who will then be the “final saviors” of mankind. Right now, the lake is best known for surrounding the legendary Mount Khwaju: …
The British Library is busy digitising their Persian manuscripts (with help from IHF), and are starting to show off the results. Maybe I should confess that my favourite Mantiq al-Tayr manuscript is the one in the Metropolitan Museum. This was finished in 1487; with more illlustrations added by Shah Abbas in the early seventeenth century, …
The British Library continues to digitise its manuscripts – the latest is an illustrated 14th century Khamsah (Add.18113), containing three of the five poems from the Khamsah of Khvaju Kirmani (1290-1349?). Khvaju drew extensively on traditional Iranian folklore and this manuscript contains the story of Humay and Humayun, the Kamālnāmah (‘Book of Perfection’) and the …
Every year, October 11 is a special day for celebrating Hafez – the great master of Persian poetry. Of course, really every day is Hafez day – his 500 ghazals and 40 rubaiyats have been described as acting like a torch to guide us to our hearts. Very little credible information is known about his …
Every day at dawn and dusk (and whenever a sick pilgrim gets healed), kettle-drums are beaten and long metal trumpets are blown in Mashhad. The 1910 photo here shows the naqqāra-ḵāna: the name used for the ensemble of musicians as well as the place where the performance takes place. Click here (and then on ‘live …
The always-great British Libary Asia and Africa blog shared images from a Gift to Kings / Gift to Viziers, recently purchased at auction. This tract on principles of ethics and government includes forty brief sections (bāb), each with four brief maxims, all “selected by sages from the books of the ancients”. The copy of the …
Kuh-e Khwaja is a complex 30 kilometers southwest of Zabol in the eastern part of Sistan-Baluchestan Province, very near the Afghan border. The main ruins are on the southeastern promontory of a high hill overlooking the marshes of Lake Hamun (the historical Lake of Zereh) in the delta of the ancient Hirmand River. This small …
Everyone knows about Iranian No Ruz, even though it’s now generally thought of as New Year – rather than ‘New Day’ (click here, here and here for some of my No Ruz postings). But what about Nimrouz – meaning mid-day, or noon? Now the Date Line is arbitrarily set in Greenwich; but ancient Iranian wisdom …
Last week, I found a gorgeous star site. And lots of completely lovely Iranian star pics. They made me think of Fatemeh Keshavarz ‘Jasmine and Stars’: “In Shiraz of the 1960s, where I grew up, summer nights were a journey with a few clear stops. We slept in the courtyard under a sky full of …