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The Chronograms of Khaqani
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 January 2022
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As with the majority of great national figures of the Middle Ages, we know relatively little about the facts, and, in particular, about the dates of the life of the major Persian language poet of the twelfth century, ode-writer to the Shirvānshāhs, son of a carpenter of Shirvān, Afẓāl al-dīn Ibrāhīm Khāqānī.
A brief sketch of the biographical information concerning the poet, which was compiled from oriental sources by N. Khanikoff almost a century ago, was then somewhat expanded and supplemented by K. G. Zaleman. With some insignificant variations and additions, this sunmary was then reproduced in all the works on Khāqānī up to our day. The question of the role of Transcaucasian elements In the works of Khāqānī was raised in the study carried out by Ju. N. Marr, in cooperation with K. I. Chajkin, during the last year of his life. Following the excellent tradition of V. A. Žukovskij, both sought first of all to extract bibliographical material from the poet's divan itself.
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- Research Article
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- Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 1969
Footnotes
*
This article originally appeared in Epigrafika Vostoka, 1960, Vol. XIII, pp. 59-68. In preparing this translation I have frequently drawn upon the profound knowledge of the Russian language of my friend Donald L. Stilo.
References
Notes
1. Khanikoff, N. “Mémoire sur Khācāni, poàte Persan du XIIe siecle,” J. As., VI série, t. IV, 1864, p. 137-200Google Scholar; t. V, 1865, p. 296-367.
2. K. G. Zaleraan, 
etverosti
ija Xakani. SPb., 1875.
3. Minorsky, V. “Khāqānī and Andronicus Comnenus,” BSOAS, 1945, XI--3.Google Scholar
4. Xakani. Nezami. Rustaveli. L. , 1935: cf. also a bibliography of the works of Ju. N. Marr.
5. K. I. Chajkin, “K ustanovleniju nekotoryx dat biografii Xakani. Cb. Xakani. Nezami. Rustaveli.
6. The inscription reads: 
As it happens, this was the sole date about whose correctness K. G. Zaleman had his doubts.
7. Khanikoff, N. “Lettre à M. Dorn. Tabriz 8-20 avril 1857,” Bull. hist. et phil. de l'Acad. de S Pb., XIV, No. 23, col. 353-76.Google Scholar
8. Cf. Shams al-qays, 
, p. 317 for typical examples of letters which have been thus interpreted.
9. Khāqānī Shirvāni, Dīvān, ed. Abd al-rasūlī, p. 39.
10. B. Dorn, Kaspij. SPb., 1874. p. 240.
11. K. I. Chajkin, op. cit., p. 27.
12. Ibid., p. 24.
13. Idia., p. 31.
14. Dīvān, p. 284. With regard to this verse, the editor of the dīvān writes in a note; “
is the year 550 by the abjad system: 
500, 
50; but many have written that it signifies the year of the pig, and in the commentary it is recorded as 
, that is, 556.”
15. 
“mortal game,” the last decisive round of play in backgammon, when a player, having lost all and wishing to recoup his losses, pledges his head or hand. In this case, his opponent must get 
in order to win the round, that is, must place six of his counters in sequence on the board ( 
) and by that deprive his opponent of the possibility of movement. Images from the game of backgammon are highly characteristic of Khāqānī's poetry, and are used by our poet not in their literal but in their figurative sense. Consider, for example, this line from the ode in honor of Andronicus Comnenus:
“I am Khāqānī, with my soul made prisoner in the shishdar of your separation.
Where shall I place my counter, for I have no open square?” (dīvān, p. 273)
or this one in the tarjī band on the death of Manūchihr:
“The gambling moon defeated you in the mortal game. But it disfigures its lunar orbit, which remains after you.” (dīvān, p. 542)
This poetical discourse concerns events more serious than an unsuccessful game of backgammon. These events, which took place in the troubled times between the death in 553 of the Shirwānshāh Manūchihr and the accession to the throne of Akhsītan in 557, lead Khāqānī, who took active part in them, to jail. Not by chance, at the conclusion of another and also little known “prison elegy” which was also written after his release from prison, the poet, speaking of the accession to the throne of Akhsītan, does not at the same time hide his joy on the occasion “of the murder of Khāqānī's blood enemy.” (dīvān, p. 73)
16. 
A leather sheet on which executions are performed, and also a chess or backgammon board.
17. Dīvān, p. 805. The first half-verse of the last line has the variant 
in place of 
which also gives, as A. N. Boldyrev has drawn to my attention, a satisfactory context, “Khāqānī sharpened like a hair the sword of his tongue…” If we prefer this reading, then, of course, it would be necessary to reject the decipherment of the chronogram offered below, and to offer a more simple variant of its solution which would give the same result: to “free” ingeniously the second half-verse of the phrase 
However, the first solution, constructed on the multi-meaninged verse, in which the chronogram is included is more characteristic of Khāqānī's work.
18. K. I. Chajkin, op. cit., p. 15, and p. 195.
19. Dīvān, p. 30-33.
20. The first portion of this elegy was translated into Russian by A. N. Boldyrev. See “Dva Shirvanskix poeta, Nizami i Xakani.” Pamjatniki epoxi Rustaveli. L., 1938, p. 134-6.
21. Dīvān, p. 329. Such a reading of the given verse, which was suggested by O. I. Smirnova, is irreproachable with regard to meaning, but is grammatically awkward and unusual for so subtle a master of words as Khāqānī. This is indirect evidence that Khāqānī was bound to the second reading which is necessary for a chronogram.
22. K. I. Chajkin, op. cit., p. 30.
23. Muḥammad ibn Yūsif, Court Polisher to Nāṣr al-dīn Shāh & Murafar al-dīh Shāh, in particular discusses such a device--that is, the addition of the age of the poet or addressee to the number contained in a chronogram--in his composition 
(Tehran 1320), p. 118. See also the above mentioned correspondence between Vaṭvāṭ and Khāqānī in which the age of the addressee plays such a large role.
24. Dīvān, p. 19-25. The sixteenth verse of the given ode, which contains within itself a chronogram, has repeatedly attracted the attention of scholars from N. Khanikoff to Ju. N. Marr.
25. Dīvān, p. 662. The last verse, which contains a chronogram, is here given in a distorted form.
26. I have recently learned that M. S. Sultanov has suggested another solution for the chronogram with the date of the victory against the Russians. He substitutes for 
its synonym 
“throne,” “heavenly throne,” the numerical value of which equals 570. In theory such a solution is quite permissible, but in the given context, insofar as Khāqānī is directly addressing his enthroned monarch, 
may not be used in the sense of “heavenly throne”--characteristically an attribute of a deceased monarch. Such a double entendre might cost a court poet dearly. However, this device makes possible the decipherment of another and more nearly typical chronogram. In the poem “Gift of the two Iraqs,”( 
) in the chapter devoted to eulogizing Muḥammad's ascension to the throne, Khāqānī, addressing himself to the latter, says:
“The noble date which is of the heavens, Rose (there) on the date of your birth.”
In this context, 
really is completely synonymous with 
. Consequently, Khāqānī is here naming 570 as the year of Muḥammad's birth. But by which system of chronology? It is impossible to indicate this year relative to the Hijra, for it was established after Muḥammad's birth. The Iranian and Byzantine calendars contemporary with him were calculated according to the age of the ruling monarch. The chronologies of the pre-Islamic Arabs were of exactly the same character. Of the fact that at this time the seventh raillenium from the “creation of the earth” had passed, the poet speaks in the subsequent line. There thus remains only the chronology based on the birth of Christ. And, in fact, if we subtract from 622--the first year of the Hijra--the 52 years which according to the most widespread tradition (cf. Abu Rīhān al-Bīrūnī, Izbrannye Proizvedenija, Tashkent, 1957, t. 1, p. 139) Muḥammad had lived up to this time, we obtain the date indicated in the chronogram of 570 A.D. as the date of his birth. It can scarcely be doubted that the decipherment of this chronogram, which was subsequently lost because of its singularity, was mechanically shifted by later Muslim commentators to one closer in form which also concurred in the numerical value of the chronogram with the date of the victory over the Russians. Mr. Sultanov has followed this later tradition.