The Saljūq-Nāma ( fa, سلجوق‌نامه, "Book of Seljuk mpire) is a history of the

Great Seljuk Empire The Great Seljuk Empire, or the Seljuk Empire was a high medieval, culturally Turko-Persian, Sunni Muslim empire, founded and ruled by the Qïnïq branch of Oghuz Turks. It spanned a total area of from Anatolia and the Levant in the west to th ...

written by the Persian historian Zahir al-Din Nishapuri around 1175. Written in Persian, it has been acknowledged as the primary source for Saljuq material for Persian works dating from 13th century to 15th century, which include; ''

Rahat al-sudur The ''Rahat al-sudur wa-ayat al-surur'' or ''Rahat al-sudur'' ( fa, راحة الصدور), is a history of the Great Seljuq Empire, its breakup into minor beys and the subsequent Khwārazm-Shāh dynasty, Khwarazmian occupation, written by the Pers ...

'', ''

Jami al-tawarikh The ''Jāmiʿ al-tawārīkh'' (Persian/Arabic: , ) is a work of literature and history, produced in the Mongol Ilkhanate. Written by Rashid al-Din Hamadani (1247–1318 AD) at the start of the 14th century, the breadth of coverage of the work ha ...

'', ''

Tarikh-i Guzida The ''Tarikh-i guzida'' (also spelled ''Tarikh-e Gozideh'' ( fa, تاریخ گزیده, "Excerpt history"), is a compendium of Islamic history from the creation of the world until 1329, written by Hamdallah Mustawfi and finished in 1330.''E.J. Bri ...

'', ''Zubdat al-Tawarikh'' and '' Rawdat as-Safa''. Abu l'Qasim Qashani, a historian who wrote about the

Ilkhanids The Ilkhanate, also spelled Il-khanate ( fa, ایل خانان, ''Ilxānān''), known to the Mongols as ''Hülegü Ulus'' (, ''Qulug-un Ulus''), was a khanate established from the southwestern sector of the Mongol Empire. The Ilkhanid realm, ...

, made alterations and additions to the original text, which was later misidentified as the original ''Saljuq-nama''.

Content

The ''Saljuq-nama'' is vague concerning the history of the sultans prior to

Toghrul III Toghrul III ( fa, طغرل سوم) (died 1194) was the last sultan of the Great Seljuk Empire and the last Seljuk Sultan of Iraq. His great uncle Sultan Ghiyath ad-Din Mas'ud (1134–1152) had appointed Shams ad-Din Eldiguz (1135/36–1175) as a ...

, as noted by

Claude Cahen Claude Cahen (26 February 1909 – 18 November 1991) was a 20th-century French Marxist orientalist and historian. He specialized in the studies of the Islamic Middle Ages, Muslim sources about the Crusades, and social history of the medieval Isla ...

, that Nishapuri had "...relatively poor sources at his disposal for the Seljuqs before his own lifetime..." Yet it is a short, restrained history using different sources than those used by Arabic writers of that time. Its textual history is complicated; as a preface in rhyme, it first appears as the historical part of a compendium known as ''

''. A later version appears in the 14th century compendium of histories known as ''Jami al-tawarikh'', which was compiled by Rashid al-Din Fadl Allah, vizier of the

of Iran.

Modern era

In 1953, Ismail Afshar claimed he had found a copy of the ''Saljuq-nama''. A.H. Morton believes this copy to be a work by Abu l'Qasim Qashani. Accordingly, no copy of the ''Saljuq-nama'' is believed to exist today. However, A.H. Morton is producing a text based on ''MS. Persian 22b'' which is an anonymous history of the Seljuqs dedicated to Sultan Toghrul III. Morton contends that this is a copy of Nishapuri's original work.

References

Sources

* * * * * History books about the Middle East Culture of the Seljuk Empire Persian-language books 1170s books {{MEast-hist-book-stub