1 00:00:07,510 --> 00:00:13,750 So, yes, thanks for this kind introduction and good morning, ladies and gentlemen, good evening to others. 2 00:00:13,750 --> 00:00:16,690 Good afternoon, colleagues and friends. 3 00:00:16,690 --> 00:00:28,180 I'm delighted to be here today and grateful for the very kind invitation by the Bodleian to speak this morning at the Persian Art of the Conference. 4 00:00:28,180 --> 00:00:36,970 So I came to the podium as a Baha'i fellow, which started in September 2019 and lasted until February 2020, 5 00:00:36,970 --> 00:00:41,620 just before covered the covered pandemic really in. 6 00:00:41,620 --> 00:00:51,190 I had identified the Berlin manuscript ouseley 2017 entitled Ashboro by my count on the catalogue's for this study, 7 00:00:51,190 --> 00:01:01,960 because I had spent a long time researching the history of battle in Afghanistan, which is where the Obama family came from. 8 00:01:01,960 --> 00:01:07,060 And the Obama kids, of course, were the subject of this of this text there. 9 00:01:07,060 --> 00:01:12,610 A famous family of administrators in the early Islamic caliphate of the 8th century, 10 00:01:12,610 --> 00:01:18,550 Abbasids and their ancestors has had in turn served as administrators of the 11 00:01:18,550 --> 00:01:25,630 immensely rich Buddhist monastery temple and the state of Nevada and Backwood, 12 00:01:25,630 --> 00:01:33,520 which is in today's Afghanistan. I didn't really know what to expect from the mass from the manuscript. 13 00:01:33,520 --> 00:01:37,510 But judging from the previous historiography on the barricades, 14 00:01:37,510 --> 00:01:46,870 which consisted mostly of tourists historical accounts written in Arabic, I imagine perhaps more of the same, only written in Persian. 15 00:01:46,870 --> 00:01:55,600 But I was wrong. The book turned out to be not only far more entertaining and fantastical that they 16 00:01:55,600 --> 00:02:02,320 were the Obama kids really feature as the superheroes and these heroes were rich, 17 00:02:02,320 --> 00:02:10,750 they were chic, and they were ultimately badly betrayed by the California Rashied in the 8th century. 18 00:02:10,750 --> 00:02:19,870 But it also turned out the manuscript filled important gaps in our knowledge on what is probably one of the most important 19 00:02:19,870 --> 00:02:30,010 best-known families in early Islamic history of the caliphate in Iraq and Syria and before that in pre Islamic Afghanistan. 20 00:02:30,010 --> 00:02:37,360 So I'm going to show you now very briefly, in the short 15 minutes, I have, I think, three three important things. 21 00:02:37,360 --> 00:02:47,470 One is it's important to take home how manuscripts evolve and change over time, change a text over time. 22 00:02:47,470 --> 00:02:55,030 It is the scribe who tells the story just as much as it is the original author. 23 00:02:55,030 --> 00:03:04,750 No text is static or frozen in time. Editions are often a snapshot of a text in its during this evolution. 24 00:03:04,750 --> 00:03:11,290 And I think scholars and readers, general readers of these texts, need to appreciate this point. 25 00:03:11,290 --> 00:03:18,790 Secondly, there is immense value that I think what will come out of this of this is that there's immense value 26 00:03:18,790 --> 00:03:24,760 in studying specifically Persian manuscripts as a way for understanding early Islamic history. 27 00:03:24,760 --> 00:03:34,870 It has become almost a truism in the field that Arabic alone is enough for the study of early Islam, while Persian and other languages are secondary. 28 00:03:34,870 --> 00:03:39,610 But the study of manuscripts such as this show how? 29 00:03:39,610 --> 00:03:44,200 Well, almost misguided this is, but certainly it's not quite correct. 30 00:03:44,200 --> 00:03:52,120 Thirdly, there's wonderful entertainment value in these manuscripts for young and old and has 31 00:03:52,120 --> 00:03:57,190 been in the past and I think continues to be and can continue to be in the present. 32 00:03:57,190 --> 00:04:07,810 I think these are valuable material for public history and I think they are still unu an unused resource and in that regard. 33 00:04:07,810 --> 00:04:13,210 So during my Baha'i fellowship, my point of departure obviously was the manuscript. 34 00:04:13,210 --> 00:04:20,500 And my first question was what was it about the Alabama Kyun that interested the Muslims who had purchased it? 35 00:04:20,500 --> 00:04:25,900 And eventually it's how they came to the Bodleian was through the Rosalie's. 36 00:04:25,900 --> 00:04:32,500 So what interested people in 18th century England in this text? 37 00:04:32,500 --> 00:04:38,320 It had no stunning imagery, like some of the other important manuscripts that Wasleys had brought to the Bodleian, 38 00:04:38,320 --> 00:04:44,230 such as this well-known, finally illustrated Shahnameh epic. 39 00:04:44,230 --> 00:04:52,240 It could be that the text simply found itself included as a miscellaneous amongst the more prised and famous manuscripts. 40 00:04:52,240 --> 00:04:59,900 But when not consulted, Lucien Bovis excellent 1912 study library masey historians. 41 00:04:59,900 --> 00:05:07,210 A happy person. I realised there seems to have been an 18th and 19th century obsession. 42 00:05:07,210 --> 00:05:21,100 You could almost call it in Europe with the Obama kids, which is, I now think probably why the Muslims were interested in their contracts written. 43 00:05:21,100 --> 00:05:29,440 But the Obama kids became the subject of romance novels and dramatic plays written in French, Spanish and German and more. 44 00:05:29,440 --> 00:05:33,610 The notoriety of the Obama kids at this time can probably be attributed to 45 00:05:33,610 --> 00:05:38,950 the popularity of the Arabian Nights in which the Obama kids feature as well. 46 00:05:38,950 --> 00:05:46,510 They were powerful, erudite, clever administrators and very, very rich and generous. 47 00:05:46,510 --> 00:05:50,620 They became embroiled in intrigues and illicit love affairs. 48 00:05:50,620 --> 00:05:57,940 What's not to love about them? And all wonderful fodder for 18th century European fascinations with the East. 49 00:05:57,940 --> 00:06:05,800 One only needs to think of Verdi's Opera Toronto or Mozart's unfillable costumes. 50 00:06:05,800 --> 00:06:12,100 Putting European interests aside, the next question is sorry there. 51 00:06:12,100 --> 00:06:21,850 Who did this? Who had this manuscript been made for and how well known or widely circulated was it in its time? 52 00:06:21,850 --> 00:06:28,090 There were no fine illuminations, as I said, but the manuscript had a wonderfully executed frontispiece, 53 00:06:28,090 --> 00:06:36,760 which I'm showing you here, with lapis lazuli and gold coloured painting and golden dividers between the lines on one sheet. 54 00:06:36,760 --> 00:06:43,210 And lastly, the script penned by a transcribe the manuscript like to call upon, 55 00:06:43,210 --> 00:06:49,300 however, and the binding is new, which gives us no clues as to stating. 56 00:06:49,300 --> 00:06:54,970 But inside the flyleaf there were plenty of seals. 57 00:06:54,970 --> 00:07:03,670 It seems that perhaps we think this might this might be the yellow circle isn't circling a text that reads as palms rupee. 58 00:07:03,670 --> 00:07:06,220 It seems five rupees might have been paid for it. 59 00:07:06,220 --> 00:07:13,780 I'm not exactly sure what that equates to, but imagine it wasn't literal given the fine execution of the manuscript. 60 00:07:13,780 --> 00:07:19,450 The SEALs are readable and the Bodleian cataloguer had deciphered them already. 61 00:07:19,450 --> 00:07:30,130 But at least now we have Terminus Post KWEM. The manuscript was written before the earliest SEAL, which is dated to 1712 of the Gregorian calendar. 62 00:07:30,130 --> 00:07:37,870 So it's probably produced sometime in the latter half of the 17th century when the Mongols were still in power. 63 00:07:37,870 --> 00:07:50,230 But after the golden age of ACBAR and you see the owners were Muckle officials, the authorship was the next question. 64 00:07:50,230 --> 00:07:57,400 And he has actually identified on the first line right under the Frontispiece. 65 00:07:57,400 --> 00:08:01,690 And he is Ziauddin. Apparently, he's a well-known figure. 66 00:08:01,690 --> 00:08:04,510 A number of his texts have survived. 67 00:08:04,510 --> 00:08:18,070 And he was serving in the 14th century court of Sultan Theros Shah, who was the sultan of the Delhi sultanate and is identified here. 68 00:08:18,070 --> 00:08:26,230 But then the next question for me was how a representative or how well known was was this manuscript? 69 00:08:26,230 --> 00:08:32,320 And this required me to look at other manuscripts or find other manuscripts of this text. 70 00:08:32,320 --> 00:08:38,590 And my colleague, Pejman Firooz Basche, was immensely helpful in that regard. 71 00:08:38,590 --> 00:08:45,490 So we were able to identify two versions of of this text. 72 00:08:45,490 --> 00:08:49,690 So the Bodleian version falls into what we've called version two. 73 00:08:49,690 --> 00:08:53,980 There's no hierarchy here as to what's Wallner, what's true. 74 00:08:53,980 --> 00:09:01,210 And here we have a few others that were all produced in India that seem to fall within that second version. 75 00:09:01,210 --> 00:09:08,440 And then we also identified a another version, which we call version one. 76 00:09:08,440 --> 00:09:12,490 And there are still at least seven more manuscripts. 77 00:09:12,490 --> 00:09:16,510 We need to study in more detail in Persian, most of them in Iran. 78 00:09:16,510 --> 00:09:23,620 One of them is currently in the British Library, had been previously been at the British Museum in London. 79 00:09:23,620 --> 00:09:30,280 And we have now found there are Arabic manuscripts as well from this period, 80 00:09:30,280 --> 00:09:37,150 one which is held in Istanbul in the FATA library, which we have just started to look at as well. 81 00:09:37,150 --> 00:09:48,340 So there are more and more cropping up. What was the author's aim was was another question for us and Barony, the author of the manuscript, 82 00:09:48,340 --> 00:09:59,140 but actually in not the Bodleian version, but in another manuscript of this second version explains the aim was that. 83 00:09:59,140 --> 00:10:06,880 And here Bertani, the author, refers to the great Mahmoud Abbas of the of the 11th time. 84 00:10:06,880 --> 00:10:13,090 Tree that who apparently had said that he loved the stories of the prophets and the first signs, 85 00:10:13,090 --> 00:10:17,500 but in the next tier of importance to him were the stories of generous people. 86 00:10:17,500 --> 00:10:25,540 And then Barony adds that he's writing this because it needs to serve as advice to rulers, 87 00:10:25,540 --> 00:10:36,910 presumably the Daily Times, for whom he was writing not to kill the generous people such as the Obama kids. 88 00:10:36,910 --> 00:10:41,560 It was Grace, the lady who made the film for the Bodleian. 89 00:10:41,560 --> 00:10:48,640 And there's a number of films and one of them I feature and I talk about my work with this manuscript who asked me for images. 90 00:10:48,640 --> 00:10:53,320 She said, do you have any manuscript illustrations of the Obama kids? 91 00:10:53,320 --> 00:10:57,070 And I was looking and looking and I didn't find any. 92 00:10:57,070 --> 00:11:06,160 And the only one I could find, which appears in the film, was this plaque that I had photographed during a visit in Mazar in Afghanistan, 93 00:11:06,160 --> 00:11:12,790 Mazar being the capital of Kabul from which the kids are set to become. 94 00:11:12,790 --> 00:11:19,840 The other image I could think of was Disney's rendering of this important last Obama kid, Jafa. 95 00:11:19,840 --> 00:11:24,400 But the Disney characters a far cry from what we read about him in the sources. 96 00:11:24,400 --> 00:11:32,230 Of course, I showed you the 18th century Spanish drawing in a previous slide, which only found a few days ago. 97 00:11:32,230 --> 00:11:38,800 But I wondered whether there must be something from from the region itself and illustrated manuscripts. 98 00:11:38,800 --> 00:11:48,280 And just recently I chanced on on an image that was depicted in my colleague ploughers new book 99 00:11:48,280 --> 00:11:57,370 that just came out with Cambridge University Press on called In the Mirror of Persian Kings. 100 00:11:57,370 --> 00:12:01,630 And it said that it was at the art museum in Toronto. 101 00:12:01,630 --> 00:12:11,500 So with Blast's help, who mentioned to me that he only knew that a number of other sheets from from this manuscript 102 00:12:11,500 --> 00:12:19,210 had been sold in the 1960s and later by Sotheby's and also by CalEnergy art dealers. 103 00:12:19,210 --> 00:12:32,440 So we started searching Pejman and I, and we managed to find a number of other illustrated manuscripts which we now realise come from what is 104 00:12:32,440 --> 00:12:41,630 now a dispersed illustrated manuscript from circa fifty nine to five in the time of the Emperor Akbar. 105 00:12:41,630 --> 00:12:48,190 And so here we then found another one, which is now at Harvard University Library. 106 00:12:48,190 --> 00:12:52,450 We found another one, which is at San Diego Museum of Art. 107 00:12:52,450 --> 00:13:02,200 We found two and Sotheby's sites and and one the last one here that I just came across in the Twitter Twitter exchange, 108 00:13:02,200 --> 00:13:09,910 probably held at the San Diego Museum of Art. And it seems very possible that these are all from the same manuscript, 109 00:13:09,910 --> 00:13:16,060 which we can tell from the from the script, from the bordering, from the paint and so on. 110 00:13:16,060 --> 00:13:24,580 And so this is the question for us is what happened with the sheets that only have text on them, 111 00:13:24,580 --> 00:13:33,790 but at least from the lines that have survived and by comparing them, we can recognise that they belong to this first version. 112 00:13:33,790 --> 00:13:39,160 So they are quite a few variations with what's in the bottom in the script. 113 00:13:39,160 --> 00:13:45,740 But all in all, the general, the stories appear in both. 114 00:13:45,740 --> 00:13:48,070 The same stories appear in both. 115 00:13:48,070 --> 00:13:57,370 So I'm now going to conclude that the only flag that the personalisation of the story of the Obama kids was only a static. 116 00:13:57,370 --> 00:14:02,740 The content of the text itself was different and important. 117 00:14:02,740 --> 00:14:07,870 40 or so tales that we find in the Bodleian manuscript. 118 00:14:07,870 --> 00:14:18,640 We find lots of things that you don't that don't appear in the Arabic, in the Arabic mentions, but that seem to be authentic. 119 00:14:18,640 --> 00:14:24,880 Once we start to track down the ravis, the people who have passed on these accounts. 120 00:14:24,880 --> 00:14:34,270 And the research continues as we are preparing our translation into English of this important text. 121 00:14:34,270 --> 00:14:41,830 Much of the western of historiography contends that the Obama kids are remembered in a, quote, Arabic tradition. 122 00:14:41,830 --> 00:14:46,600 But the Persian tradition has preserved their memory to and through accounts, 123 00:14:46,600 --> 00:14:52,780 as I said, that have been often lost in the Arabic and are quite different as such. 124 00:14:52,780 --> 00:15:00,130 Texts such as this one are at critical historical data for historians. 125 00:15:00,130 --> 00:15:06,760 And I will end it here just to say that this is why we are translating the. 126 00:15:06,760 --> 00:15:18,130 Techs were providing a critical addition, it's far more extensive than I had seen when I initially applied for the Baha'i Fellowship, 127 00:15:18,130 --> 00:15:20,730 but I think that's also the idea of the fellowship, 128 00:15:20,730 --> 00:15:26,860 is that hopefully what looks like possibly a small project can actually grow into something bigger. 129 00:15:26,860 --> 00:15:36,850 And it's thanks to the invisible E programme that we're able to now dedicate more time to producing this book that, 130 00:15:36,850 --> 00:15:42,280 well, we've got a number of publishers interested in and we are still deciding who we will go with. 131 00:15:42,280 --> 00:15:47,140 And with that, if you'd like to follow us, go to our Twitter account. 132 00:15:47,140 --> 00:15:55,390 I'll be giving a talk in two days time on more of the content of this manuscript at the School of Abbasid Studies on Thursday. 133 00:15:55,390 --> 00:16:10,004 And you can see the details of it on our account later today. Thank you very much.