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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 January 2022
The ShĀhnĀmah Provides an Obvious Starting Point for an Examination of the role of guile in Persian literature. It is the earliest major work in which male and female characters both play significant roles, and in many of its stories guile, by which I mean the whole range of dishonest or deceitful behavior, plays a central role. Rethinking the stories in the Shāhnāmah from this perspective leads to several general conclusions. First, guile is a pervasive presence in the Shāhnāmah. Despite the consistent and ubiquitous condemnation of all forms of dishonesty, and the parallel exhortations to honesty and truth, lies and deceit are familiar weapons in the armory of heroes as well as villains. Second, warriors employ guile, as they do more conventional weapons, when it will yield some advantage over an opponent, and, in particular, when their own strength by itself will not be enough to assure victory. Third, although the ways in which men and women deploy guile varies according to their very different roles in society, men use it as readily as women do. Finally, when a woman does lie or dissimulate, men do not generalize from her behavior to that of all women.
1. This paper was initially presented in a panel, “The Wiles of Women—and of Men,” at the Second Biennial Conference on Iranian Studies, Bethesda, Maryland, May 22, 1998. I would like to thank the other panelists, Afsaneh Najmabadi and Farzaneh Milani, and the chairwoman, Haleh Esfandiari, for their comments and suggestions.
2. c.f. especially the Vāzhenāmak of Abdolhoseyn Nushin (Tehran: Bunyad-i Farhang, 1354/1976)Google Scholar, and the Farhang-i lughat-i adabī of Mohammed Amin Adib-Tusi (Tabriz, 1345/1967).Google Scholar
3. All references to the text of the Shāhnāmah in this note as well as those to follow are to the Soviet edition of Ye. E. Bertel's, et. al. (Moscow 1960-71). Passages cited are to be found in the following volumes: the murder of Iraj, vol. 1, 102—4, 11. 402-15; Rustam's deception of Suhrab, vol. 2, 231-6, 11. 853-61; Garsivaz's decision to plot Seyavash's downfall, vol. 3, 119, 11. 1826-9; Rustam's promise to Isfandiyar, vol. 6, 265-70, 11. 834-5.
4. The name of Rustam's father, Dastan, means “deceit”, and he is the only hero of his line who is famous not for martial prowess but for occult power. There is a suggestive pun in references to his son as Rustam-i Dastan, “Rustam, the son of Dastan,” since the same phrase also means “Rustam, the deceitful.“
5. In refusing to identify himself initially to Suhrab Rustam is employing a deceit he used earlier to intimidate a threatening opponent. In this earlier incident Rustam arrives in Mazandaran as the ambassador of Kay Kavus. He demonstrates his strength by various feats, and ends by humiliating the court's chief pahlavān, Kalahur, who asks him if he is Rustam. Rustam responds that he is only that great hero's servant and much his inferior (Bertel's, vol. 2, 115, 11. 729-31).
6. Ferdowsi, Abol-Qasem The Tragedy of Sohráb and Rostám. Translation, introduction and notes by Clinton, Jerome W.. Persian text based on the earliest complete manuscript, that of the British Museum of 1276-7. (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1987).Google Scholar The incidents mentioned here occur on pages 117, 141, 145, and 149-50 (Bertel's vol. 2, 223-37).
7. Rustam recognizes how much this victory is not truly his (“I was the agent of the tamarisk; that's all./I am what's dark and dismal in this tale.” (Ibid., vol. 6, 308, 1. 1451.)
8. Rustam employed this deceit earlier to gain entrance to Khotan in Afrasiyab's kingdom so that he may rescue Bizhan. (Ibid., vol. 6, 62, 11. 911-28.)
9. Ibid., vol. 6, 254, 11. 607-10.
10. Ibid., vol. 2, 218-19, 11. 627-0.
11. Ibid., vol. 3, 23, 11. 288-9. The translation is from: Firdawsi, The Legend of Seyavash, trans. Davis, Dick (New York: Penguin, 1992), 17Google Scholar (henceforth Davis).
12. Bertel's, vol. 3, 39, 11. 565-7; Davis, 31.
13. There is a suggestive contemporary comment on how one should read the meaning of Sudabah's perfidy in Chapter 42 of Nizam al-Mulk's, Siyar al-Mulūk. He says there that in the “Story of Siyavash” a war of many years that caused much slaughter on both sides came about because Sudabah held domination over Kay Kavus. Nizam al-Mulk uses this incident as an illustration of the problems that arise when rulers listen to their wives. He makes clear, however, that the rulers are at fault here, not the women. Men ought to know better. After all, the intelligence of women is limited (kāmil ˓aql nabāshand). Nizam al-Mulk, Siyar al-Mulūk, also known as the Siyāsatnāmah, ed. Darke, Hubert. (Tehran: Bungah-i tarjumah wa nashr-i kitab, 1347/1968), 242-5Google Scholar, and translated by him as, The Book of Government for Kings. (London, Henley and Boston: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1960, 1978), 180-81.Google Scholar
14. One such comment occurs early in the story of Rustam and Isfandiyar. Katayun, Isfandiyar's mother, says to him that since he is already the effective ruler of the state he should not confront his father on the question of succession, but simply wait for him to die. Isfandiyar rejects this sound counsel, and abuses her with the irrelevant insult that women are not good at keeping secrets (Bertel's, vol. 6, 218, 11. 22-24).
15. In the story of Sam and Zal, for example, Sam's advisors rebuke him for rejecting and abandoning his son, saying that “fish and crocodiles” were kinder to their young. (Ibid., vol.2, 141-42, 11. 99-102.) And later, in the story of Suhrab and Rustam, Firdawsi laments that unlike wild animals and creatures of the sea, only man “cannot distinguish son from foe.” (Ibid., vol.2, 224, 11. 705-8.)
16. In some later mss. a section has been added in which the body of Suhrab is transported back to his mother, so that she can weep over him.
17. Clinton, Sohrab. The encounter between Suhrab and Gurdafarid is told on pages 35-47.
18. kih ham razm justī ham afsūn va rang / nayāmad zi kār-i tū bar dūd nang. (Bertel's vol. 2, 188, 1. 255.) Similarly, in the story of Rustam and Isfandiyar, Shah Gushtasp encourages Isfandiyar to use all his deceit and guile as well as his strength when he goes after Rustam (…bi-kār āvarī band wa rang wa fusūn). (Ibid., vol. 6, 224, 111.)
19. This attitude is hardly unique to the Shāhnāmah. See, for example, Pratt, Louise H. Lying and Poetry from Homer to Pindar (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1993)Google Scholar, especially chapter 2, “Odysseus and Other Tricksters: Lying Kata Kosmon.”
