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In this literary analysis of the Akvan Div story in the Shahnama, the author proposes to read the story through the lens of more ancient texts to arrive at a better understanding of the trickster “archetype” in Iranian culture. After a brief introduction to and critique of Jungian archetypal theory and some remarks on the proposed method of “etymological reading,” a structural summary of the story is offered. The analysis that follows shows that in this reading, the story appears in its unity and parts that are usually seen as epic digressions become meaningful.
This paper was first read at the joint Cambridge–Leiden conference “The Reception of the Shahnama II,” 8–10 January 2009, Leiden University, The Netherlands.
1 Pelton, Robert D., The Trickster in West Africa (Berkeley, 1980), 15.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
2 Jung, C. G., The Archetypes and the Collective Unconsciousness (Princeton, 1969), 42.Google Scholar
3 I only recall Seth in the Egyptian pantheon, the “cunning” snake of the Eden narrative, Loki in Norse mythology and Prometheus in Greek, the Coyote and the Raven in Native American culture, or Reynaart de Vos (fox) in Dutch folklore. The list could easily be expanded, e.g. to include the two jackals, Kalila and Dimna. For the Shahnama more generally, see Clinton, Jerome W., “The Uses of Guile in the Shāhnāmah,” Iranian Studies, 32, no. 2 (1999): 223–230.CrossRefGoogle Scholar For Middle Eastern literatures, Lyons, Malcolm C., The Arabian Epic. Heroic and Oral Story-telling (Cambridge, 1995), 1: 118–127Google Scholar; 2: 425–431 on “The Man of Wiles,” with a rich comparative survey.
4 Jung, C. G., Four Archetypes: Mother, Rebirth, Spirit, Trickster (London and New York, 2003), 165.Google Scholar
5 Davis, D., “Rustam-i Dastan,” Iranian Studies, 32, no. 2 (1999): 239–240CrossRefGoogle Scholar; cf. Clinton, “Uses of Guile,” 224.
6 Clinton, J., “The Tragedy of Suhrab,” Logos Islamikos: Studia Islamica in honorem Georgii Michaelis Wickens (Toronto, 1984), 68.Google Scholar
7 Davis, “Rustam-i Dastan,” 231.
8 Ibid., 232–233.
9 Ibid., 234. The “whiteness,” however, refers only to opponents such as a white elephant, a white mountain, and the White Div (only whose hair is white). The argument is not entirely convincing.
10 Ibid., 237.
11 Ibid., 236.
12 Ibid., 237.
13 In Radin, Paul, The Trickster (London, 1956), 173–191.Google Scholar
14 Davis, “Rustam-i Dastan,” 238.
15 Ibid., 239.
16 Ibid., 235–236.
17 Abu al-Qasim Firdausi, Shahnama, ed. by Dj. Khaleghi-Motlagh (Costa Mesa, 1992), 3: 289, ll. 19–24.
18 Ibid., 290, ll. 31–32.
19 Ibid., 290, ll. 33–34.
20 Clinton, “The Tragedy of Suhrab,” 74.
21 Firdausi, Shahnama, 3: 290, ll. 35–39.
22 Propp, V., Morphology of the Folk Tale (Austin, 1968), 74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
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24 Nöldeke, T., Das Iranische Nationalepos (Berlin, 1920), 10CrossRefGoogle Scholar, note 7. Nöldeke mentions that Friedrich von Spiegel already noted the similarity between the two names in his Eranische Altertumskunde (Leipzig, 1871), 1: 637Google Scholar, cf. Khaleghi-Motlagh, Dj., “Akvān-e Dīv,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, 1: 740a.Google Scholar
25 Khaleghi-Motlagh, “Akvān-e Dīv,” 740a.
26 Duchesne-Guillemin, J., “Akōman,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, 1: 728b.Google Scholar
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28 Nöldeke, Iranische Nationalepos, 10.
29 Firdausi, Shahnama, 3: 291–292, ll. 49–55.
30 Ibid., 292, ll. 58–60.
31 Khaleghi-Motlagh, “Akvān-e Dīv,” 740a; idem, “Babr-e bayān,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, 3: 325a.Google Scholar The reference is not found in most mss of Tusi's Lughat-i Furs; see further Omidsalar, M., “The Beast Babr-e Bayān: Contributions to Iranian Folklore and Etymology,” Studia Iranica, 13, no. 1 (1984): 130–131.Google Scholar
32 Firdausi, Shahnama, 3: 292, ll. 55, note 1.
33 Davis, “Rustam-i Dastan,” 237.
34 Interestingly, in the following story of “Bizhan and Manizha” the company led by Rustam to save Bizhan reaches “the great stone of the Akvan Div and the pit of sorrow and grief” (Davis, D., trans. Shahnameh: the Persian Book of Kings [New York, 2006], 337Google Scholar).
35 Firdausi, Shahnama, 3: 292–293, ll. 61–70.
36 Ibid., 293, l. 72.
37 Ibid., 293, ll. 78–79.
38 Ibid., 294, ll. 86–92.
39 Ibid., 294, ll. 95–98.
40 Davis, “Rustam-i Dastan,” 232; see also Doostkhah, Jalil, “Gorz,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, 11: 165–166.Google Scholar
41 Firdausi, Shahnama, 3: 296, ll. 125–127.
42 Ibid., 296, ll. 128–133.
43 Ibid., 296, ll. 134–136.
44 Ibid., 297–298, ll. 145, 149–154.
45 Clinton, “The Tragedy of Suhrab,” 77.
46 Firdausi, Shahnama, 300, ll. 183–186.
47 Note that reading the Akvan Div in this Jungian, “archetypal” sense in no way implies an adherence to Jungian archetypal theory, but is an interpretative strategy that at the beginning of this essay started with the metaphysical problems of Jungian theory and now comes full circle in showing that the Jungian archetype is, nevertheless, a proper metaphor for understanding the Akvan Div on a deeper level, viz. as a structure of man's own psyche in the anthropology of the Shahnama.
48 Duchesne-Guillemin, “Akōman,” 728b.
