The Bakhtyār Nāma: A Persian Romance

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      Internet Archive. See
      https://archive.org/details/cu31924026907646


Transcriber’s note:

      Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).





THE BAKHTYĀR NĀMA:

A Persian Romance.

Translated from a Manuscript Text,

by

SIR WILLIAM OUSELEY.

Edited, with Introduction and Notes,

by

W. A. CLOUSTON,

Editor of “Arabian Poetry for English Readers.”


       Each order given by a reigning King
         Should after long reflection be expressed;
       For it may be that endless woe will spring
         From a command he paused not to digest.

                                               _Anvār-i Suhailī._






Privately Printed.
MDCCCLXXXIII.

Edition:
330 Copies, of which 30 are printed on hand-made paper, and numbered.

William Burns, Printer, Larkhall, Lanarkshire.





                                   TO

                      GENERAL JAMES ABBOTT, C.B.,

   MEMBER OF THE ROYAL ASIATIC SOCIETY OF GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND,

                          A TRIBUTE OF RESPECT

                                  FROM

                              THE EDITOR.

------------------------------------------------------------------------




                                PREFACE.


The Romance which forms the staple of this little volume is generally
considered as belonging to the _Sindibād_ cycle of tales. It has for
ages been popular in the East, though to the average English reader the
very name of Prince Bakhtyār is unknown. Many years ago the learned
Orientalist Sir W. Ouseley presented his countrymen with an English
translation of this romance, but copies of his work have now become
extremely scarce. Dr Johnson’s dictum, that the scarcity of a book is
evidence of its worthlessness, otherwise copies of it would have been
multiplied, is (like not a few of his other tea-table sayings) more
specious than true. Many causes, besides that of uselessness, may render
a book scarce. A book may be a very good book yet lack interest,
excepting for only a few readers; and such was doubtless the case of Sir
W. Ouseley’s translation; for, strange to say, considering our vast
Asiatic possessions, the cultivation of Oriental literature in this
country has hitherto met with little or no encouragement from the
English people generally.

But among the more intelligent class of readers there has lately sprung
up considerable interest in the curious migrations and transformations
of popular tales, the tracing of which from country to country, and from
modern to remote times, is not only a fascinating, but a highly
instructive pursuit; and the idea occurred to me that a reprint of Sir
W. Ouseley’s translation of the Romance of Prince Bakhtyār, together
with explanatory and illustrative notes, and—by way of introduction—such
particulars as could be ascertained regarding its origin and that of
similar Oriental fictions, might now find “readers fit, though few.” My
little project has been supported by members of the Royal Asiatic
Society and the Folk-Lore Society. I have, moreover, been materially
assisted by several eminent scholars: amongst others, by Mr William
Platt, to whom I am indebted for the substance of many of the Notes; and
by Dr R. Rost, who not only very kindly supplied me with scarce and
valuable books and manuscripts from the India Office Library, but also
furnished me with much useful information on Eastern Fiction—a subject
upon which he is one of the highest authorities in this country.

Of the present collection of Tales it is remarked by a learned and acute
writer that they are, for the most part, well wrought-out, probable, and
without anything magical or supernatural. And those readers who do _not_
delight in the extravagant creations of Oriental fancy—enchanted groves
and fairy palaces beneath lakes, where carbuncles of immense size supply
the place of the sun—will find little in this romance to shock their
“common sense.” Nor are there—except one or two expressions in the
opening passages—any of those hyperbolical descriptions of female beauty
and the puissance of monarchs which are so characteristic of most of the
fictions of the East. These Tales are, indeed, singularly free from such
extravagancies, and may be considered as well adapted to check the often
fatal impetuosity of Eastern monarchs, which was doubtless the purpose
of the original author.

The Notes and Illustrations may seem disproportionate in bulk to that of
the text. They are, however, designed, not only to explain and
illustrate allusions to Oriental manners and customs, but also to supply
deficiencies of Sir W. Ouseley’s translation, from a comparison of other
Persian texts, and furnish variants of the several tales as they are
found in other versions of the Romance. And while it is not impossible
that critics whose absurd shibboleth is “originality” may be disposed to
consider my little book as “a thing of mere industry, without wit or
invention—a very toy,” yet I venture to think that these Notes will
prove to most readers not the least interesting part of the work.