Qatran Tabrizi

Abū-Mansūr Qatrān-i Tabrīzī (Persian: قطران تبريزى‎, 1009–1072) was a Persian[1] poet.

He was born in Sahar near Arrah, Tabriz and was the most famous panegyrist of his time in Iran. His full name according to a manuscript that is attributed (although scholars are not sure if this attribution to Anvari is 100% is correct) to the famous poet Anvari Abivardi (529 Hijra about 60 years after the death of Qatran) is Abu Mansur Qatran al-Jili al-Azerbaijani.[2] The Al-Jili would identify his ancestry from Gilan while he himself was born in Shadiabad.[2] He also identifies himself as part of the Dehqan class.[2]

According to Jan Rypka:[3] “He sings the praise of some thirty patrons. His work has aroused the interest of historians, for in many cases Qatran has perpetuated the names of members of regional dynasties in Azerbaijan and the Caucasus region that would have otherwise fallen in oblivion. His best qasidas were written in his last period, where he expressed gratitude to the prince of Ganja, the Shaddadid Fadlun, for the numerous gifts that were still recollected by the famous Jami (d. 1492). Qatran’s poetry follows in the wake of the poets of Khurasan and makes an unforced use of the rhetorical embellishment. He is even one of the first after Farrukhi to try his hand at the Qasida-i Masnu’i, ‘particular artificial qasida’".

According to Jan Rypka:

When Nasir Khusraw visited Azarbaijan in 1046, Qatran requested to him to explain some of the most difficult passages in the divan of Munjik and Daqiqi that were written in “Persian”, i.e. according Chr. Shaffer, in the Persian of Khurasan, a language that he, as a Western Persian, might not be expected to understand, in contrast to the guest from Khurasan.

[3]

Kasravi is of the opinion that the text of the Safar-nama has here been corrupted because Qatran, though he spoke Old Azeri was fully acquainted with (Khurasani dialect of) Persian, as his Divan shows.[3] De Blois mentions that:

The point of the anecdote is clear that the diwans of these poets contained Eastern Iranian (i.e. Sogdian etc.) words that were incomprehensible to a Western Persian like Qatran, who consequently took advantage of an educated visitor from the East, Nasir, to ascertain their meaning .[4]

Qatran Tabrizi has an interesting couplet mentioning this fact:[2][5]

بلبل به سان مطرب بیدل فراز گل

گه پارسی نوازد، گاهی زند دری

Translation: The nightingale is on top of the flower like a minstrel who has lost her heart

It bemoans sometimes in Parsi (Persian) and sometimes in Dari (Khurasani Persian)

Qatran’s qasidehs on the earthquake of Tabriz in 1042 CE has been much praised and is regarded as a true masterpiece (Jan Rypka, History of Iranian Literature. Reidel Publishing Company. 1968).

In his Persian divan of 3000 to 10000 couplets, Qatran praises some 30 patrons.

He is not to be confused with another Persian author: Qatran of Tirmidh, who wrote the Qaus-nama one hundred years later.

Qatran's Qasideh on the earthquake

On the earthquake at Tabriz and an Ode to Amir Abu Nasr Mamlan[6] (Kurdish Rawadi prince) and his son (fragment).

References
  1. Francois De Blois, Persian Literature - A Biobibliographical Survey: Volume V Poetry of the Pre-Mongol Period Volume 5 of Persian Literature, Routledge, 2004. 2nd edition. pg 187: "The point of the anecdote is clear that the diwans of these poets contained Eastern Iranian (i.e. Sogdian etc.) words that were incomprehensible to a Western Persian like Qatran, who consequently took advantage of an educated visitor from the East, Nasir, to ascertain their meaning
  2. Qaṭrān Tabrīzī. Dīvān Ḥakīm Qaṭaran Tabrīzī, bi-saʻy va ihtimām Muḥammad Nakhjavānī. Tabrīz, Chāpkhānih-i Shafaq, 1333 [1954 or 5]
  3. Jan Rypka, History of Iranian Literature. Reidel Publishing Company. 1968 OCLC 460598. ISBN 90-277-0143-1
  4. "Francois De Blois, Persian Literature - A Biobibliographical Survey: Volume V Poetry of the Pre-Mongol Period Volume 5 of Persian Literature, Routledge, 2004. 2nd edition. pg 187:
  5. Mohammad-Amin Riahi. “Molahezati dar-bareye Zaban-e Kohan Azerbaijan” (Some comments on the ancient language of Azerbaijan), ‘Itilia’at Siyasi Magazine, volume 181-182. ریاحی خویی، محمدامین، «ملاحظاتی درباره‌ی زبان كهن آذربایجان»: اطلاعات سیاسی-اقتصادی، شماره‌ی 18۱-18۲ Also available at:
  6. The Cambridge History of Iran, Band 4 by R. N. Frye

See also
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