Rudaki
The first great poet of New Persian (c. 858–941) at the Samanid court, called the 'father of Persian poetry.'
Read in context →At a glance
- Field
- Court poetry (qasida, ghazal, ruba'i)
- Era
- Samanid era (Iranian Intermezzo)
- Key work
- 'Bu-ye Ju-ye Muliyan' ode and surviving Divan fragments
- Birthplace
- Rudak, near Samarkand
Biography
Abu Abdollah Ja'far ibn Muhammad Rudaki (c. 858–941 CE), from the village of Rudak near Samarkand, is the first great poet of New Persian (Dari) whose work survives substantially, and is therefore called the 'Adam of poets' and the 'father of Persian poetry.' He was the celebrated court poet of the Samanids in Bukhara, holding high standing with the Samanid amir Nasr ibn Ahmad and his learned vizier; he is said to have won lavish rewards and wealth. Rudaki worked across many poetic forms — qasida, ghazal, ruba'i, and qit'a — and laid the foundation of the Samanid (Khorasani) style, with a simple, clear, robust, and fresh language that became the model for later poets. Of the many thousands of verses attributed to him only a small portion survives, including the famous ode 'The Scent of the Muliyan Stream' (Bu-ye Ju-ye Muliyan). A contested point is his blindness: long tradition holds he was blind from birth or blinded late in life, but a 20th-century examination of remains believed to be his suggested signs of late blinding — a finding that is itself uncertain and debated among scholars.
Quotes & narrations
«The scent of the Muliyan stream comes wafting; the memory of the kind beloved comes to mind.»
Related entities
Sources
- Encyclopaedia Iranica, "Rūdakī, Abū ʿAbd-Allāh Jaʿfar"
- Encyclopaedia Britannica, "Rudaki"
- Jan Rypka, History of Iranian Literature (1968)