Shahnameh – Islamic Literature
Death of Iskandar (Alexander), from the Great Mongol Shahnameh (Iran, 1330s AD) In the 900s AD, Central Asia was the most civilized part of the world. The universities and libraries of [...]
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07, 2017
Rudaba and Zal in the Shahnameh
Rudaba lets down her hair A story from the Shahnameh Rudaba's name means "The River Water Girl". She was a character in the Persian epic Shahnameh, written by the poet Ferdowsi [...]
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07, 2017
Medieval Islamic historians
A page from Ferdowsi's Shahnameh, from Herat, Afghanistan, about 1444 AD. Now in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge Islamic historians began by translating Greek historians like Herodotus and Thucydides into Arabic. But soon historians wrote in [...]
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07, 2017
Hero and Leander – a Greek story
Leander swimming to Hero (from Pompeii) Who was Hero? In this Greek version of an old story, Hero was a priestess of Aphrodite, whose father sent her to live alone in [...]
