A Sensational and Unique Novelty: The Reception of Rashid al-Din's World History. Issue 1 (2nd January 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Kamola, Stefan
• Is Part Of: Iran. Volume 58:Issue 1(2020)
• Page Start: 50
• Page End: 61
• Publication Date: 2020-01-02
• Subjects: Rashid al-Din -- Jamiʿ al-Tawarikh -- Persian historiography -- world history -- Karl Jahn; Iran -- Antiquities -- Periodicals; Iran -- Civilization -- Periodicals; 955.005
• DOI: 10.1080/05786967.2018.1544836
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0578-6967

Abstract

ABSTRACT: Rashid al-Din's world history, contained in the second volume of the Jamiʿ al-Tawarikh, is widely popular among modern scholars as a monument of early Persian book art and a witness to the cultural hybridity of Ilkhanid Iran. However, for most of the seven centuries since the work's creation, it received very little attention and was copied in only a handful of contexts. This article examines the circumstances for the production of the world history to understand why it was so unpopular until the nineteenth century. Composed as part of a programme of Ilkhanid political ideology, the world history mattered less as a narrative of the past than as a demonstration of sovereign authority. This may help explain when and how it was copied and why it was mostly ignored.