THE DRAGON IN RELATION TO ROyAL OR HEROIC FIGURES
a Royal and heroic associations of the dragon
By thus creating a visual image like a frieze or
in literary accounts
bas-relief, the court poet uses his skill to pub-
licly display and celebrate the virtues and accom-
In Iranian legends the dragon combat was one of
plishments of the patron 3 Firdawsī’s flattering
the wonders and heroic feats required as proof of
rhetoric is echoed by that of the foremost pane-
the king’s or hero’s legitimacy, so becoming by
gyric poets at the Ghaznawid court, Abu ’l-Ḥasan
extension an important device of royal or heroic
Farrukhī Sīstānī (d 429/1037–8), who called his
ideology 1 A royal victory over the dragon was
royal patron an “illuminating sun” at banquets
intended to manifest virtuous conduct and to
and a “roaring dragon” in combat 4 The imagery
endow the royal persona with heroic qualities
of the dragon seems to have represented a heroic
The visual enactment of this victory communi-
ideal and was frequently used in panegyrics in
cated mastery over the mighty mythical creature
the Qābūs-nāma (“Book of Qābūs”), written in
as well as implying metaphorically that through
475/1082–3 by the Ziyārid prince ʿUnṣur al-Maʿālī
this deed of prowess the vanquisher was able to
Kay Kāwūs ibn Iskandar ibn Qābūs, for the edifi-
take on the formidable qualities of the dragon,
cation of his son In this well-known “Mirror for
that is to say, assume part of the dragon’s nature,
Princes” the 63-year-old prince remarks upon the
as will be shown below
fashion for court poets to liken the “mighty” to
Just as in the visual arts the dragon’s powerful
a “dragon” or a “lion;” urging his son to weigh
likeness was evoked, so it served also in literature
care fully such eulogies 5
as a simile in the formulation of praise and pan-
Dragon symbolism was not only reserved for
egyric for rulers and their entourage Drawing on
the sulṭān; Manūchihrī Dāmghānī, poet at the
the dragon’s qualities of instilling fear and dread
court of Maḥmūd’s successor, sulṭān Masʿūd of
as well as awe and reverence, the creature was
Ghazna (r 421/1030–432/1040), also performed
evoked metaphorically as a lively expression of
services for the sulṭān’s chief vizier, Aḥmad ibn
the heroic qualities of the mamdūḥ (“the praised
ʿAbd al-Ṣamad, by extravagantly praising his vir-
one”) Repetitive reference to the dragon was thus
tues in an ode (qaṣīda) in which he too calls upon
a rhetorical device used by poets and historians,
the symbolic meaning of the dragon:
among them Firdawsī, the celebrated poet from
With such petty enemies why should the
a village near Ṭūs, near present-day Mashhad in
Khwājah do battle?
Khurasan, who began writing the Shāh-nāma
The dragon is shamed who fights with a
during the last decade of Samanid sovereignty and
chameleon 6
completed it during the rule of the Ghaznawids
The latter were ethnical y Turkish but were deeply
That this metaphorical or allegorical use of the
imbued with the Persian and Islamic courtly tra-
dragon image was in widespread currency is fur-
ditions In the opening verses, Firdawsī eulogises
ther attested by its use in a qaṣīda by Ẓahīr al-Dīn
al-Fāryābī (550/1156–598/1201–2; as indicated
the royal patron, sulṭān Maḥmūd of Ghazna
by his nisba he was perhaps born at Fāryāb near
(r 389/999–421/1030), with the words:
Balkh) In his dīwān the poet glorifies the courage
At his banquets (bazm), he is a heaven of fidelity
of the last Great Saljuq ruler in the west, sulṭān
In combat (razm), he is a dragon with sharp claws 2
Ṭoghrıl III ibn Arslan with the words:
1 Khāleqī-Moṭlaq, “Aždahā II,” EIr
cited in Melikian-Chirvani, 1997a, pp 143–4
2
5
Tr and ed Mohl, 1838–1878, vol 1, p 25, ll 221–2
Tr Levy, 1951, p 133 Cf Klíma, 1968, p 95
3
6
Cf Clinton, 1972, p 130
Dīwān, p 25, cited after Clinton, 1972, p 45
4 Dīwān-i Hakīm-i Farrukhī-i Sīstānī, p 363, l 7354, as
112