Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-4rdpn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-02T21:24:21.951Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Curious Addition of Non-Religious Characters to The Martyrdom of Imam Husain

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

E. Lucy Deacon
E. Lucy Deacon*
Affiliation:
University of Edinburgh
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The rule of the Qajar dynasty was a vibrant period for the Iranian taʿziyeh tradition; the genre’s anonymous dramatists not only developed the verse of the central plays of the Karbala cycle but innovated new narrative content. This study investigates one such innovation, the curious appearance of two new characters in the climactic play The Martyrdom of Imam Husain. They are the Dervish of Kabul and Sultan Qais of India, both of whom Husain encounters shortly before his martyrdom and neither of whom were previously mentioned in historical literature or religious traditions pertaining to Karbala. Through analysis of fifteen taʿziyeh renditions of Husain’s martyrdom dating from 1204/1790 to the 1950s, including rare manuscripts, this study provides a date window for the incorporation of these characters and argues that they were added to complete a trilogy of trials faced by Husain at Karbala. It also traces their literary origins and considers their social significance.

Keywords

TaʿziyehShabīh-khānīMuharramTheaterQajarKarbalaʿĀshūrāʾPopular Religious Literature
Type
Change and Continuity: Late Qajar Period
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 54 , Issue 1-2 , March 2021 , pp. 193 - 220
Copyright
Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 2021

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

The author is grateful to the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Professors Jaakko Hämeen Anttila and Andrew Newman and Dr Nacim Pak-Shiraz for support during the research process, Yonatan Negev and Ahmed Y. AlMaazmi for useful conversations and the anonymous referees for their insightful comments on an earlier draft of this article.

References

ʿAnāsirī, Jābir. Sultān-e Karbalā: sharh-e vāqiʿeh-ye ʿĀshūrāʾ va āʾīn-hā-ye sūgvārī-ye Abā ʿAbdallāh al-Husain ʿalaihi al-salām dar Īrān. Tehran: Zarrīn va Sīmīn, 1382/2003–4.Google Scholar
Ansary Pettys, Rebecca. “The Ta’zieh: Ritual of Renewal in Persia.” 2 vols. PhD diss., Indiana University, 1982.Google Scholar
Ansary Pettys, Rebecca. “The Ta’zieh of the Martyrdom of Hussein.” The Drama Review: A Journal of Performance 49, no. 4 (2005): 28–41. doi: 10.1162/105420405774762952CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baack, Lawrence J. Undying Curiosity: Carsten Niebuhr and the Royal Danish Expedition to Arabia (1761–1767). Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 2014.Google Scholar
Baizāʾī, Bahrām. Namāyish dar Īrān. Repr. ed. Tehran: Rawshangarān va Mutāliʿāt-e Zanān, 1394/2015–16 [1383].Google Scholar
Balʿamī. Tārīkhnāmeh-ye Tabarī. Ed. Rawshan, Muhammad. 5 vols. Vol. 4. Tehran: Surūsh, 1380/2001–2.Google Scholar
Bérézine, Ilya Nikolaevitch. Voyage en Perse du nord. Trans. Calmard-Compa, Jacqueline, and Calmard, Jean. Paris: Geuthner, 2011.Google Scholar
Bulūkbāshī, ʿAlī. Taʿziyeh-khānī. Repr. ed. Tehran: Amīr Kabīr, 1390/2011–12 [1383].Google Scholar
Būzarī, ʿAlī. Chihil tūfān: barrisī-ye tasāvīr-e chāp-e sangī-ye Tūfān al-bukāʾ fī maqātil al-shuhadāʾ. Tehran: Kitābkhāneh-ye Mūzeh va Markaz-e Asnād-e Majlis-e Shūrā-ye Islāmī, 1390/2011–12.Google Scholar
Calmard, Jean. “Shiʿi Rituals and Power II: The Consolidation of Safavid Shiʿism: Folklore and Popular Religion.” In Safavid Persia: The History and Politics of an Islamic Society, ed. Melville, C.P., 139–190. London: I.B. Tauris, 1996.Google Scholar
Chardin, Jean. Voyages du chevalier Chardin en Perse, et autres lieux de l’Orient. 10 vols. Vol. 9. Paris: Le Normant, 1811.Google Scholar
Chelkowski, Peter. “Kâshefi’s Rowzat al-shohadâ: The Karbalâ Narrative as Underpinning of Popular Religious Culture and Literature.” In Oral Literature of Iranian Languages. Kurdish, Pashto, Balochi, Ossetic, Persian and Tajik: Companion Volume II to A History of Persian Literature. 18 vols. Vol. 18, ed. Kreyenbroek, Philip. G., Marzolph, Ulrich, and Yarshater, Ehsan, 258–277. London: I.B. Tauris, 2010.Google Scholar
Chelkowski, Peter. “Narrative Painting and Painting Recitation in Qajar Iran.” Muqarnas 6 (1989): 98–111. doi: 10.2307/1602284CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chelkowski, Peter. “Popular Entertainment, Media and Social Change in Twentieth-Century Iran”. In The Cambridge History of Iran from Nadir Shah to the Islamic Republic, ed. Avery, Peter, Hambly, Gavin, and Melville, Charles, 765–814. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991.Google Scholar
Chelkowski, Peter. “Taʿzia.” Encyclopædia Iranica. http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/tazia.Google Scholar
Chelkowski, Peter. “Ta’ziyeh: Indigenous Avant-Garde Theatre of Iran.” Performing Arts Journal 2, no. 1 (1977): 31–40. doi: 10.2307/3244963CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chelkowski, Peter. “Time out of Memory: Ta’ziyeh the Total Drama.” Drama Review 49, no. 4 (2005): 15–27. doi: 10.1162/105420405774763050CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Deacon, E. Lucy. “Remembering through Re-Enacting: Revisiting the Emergence of the Iranian Taʿzia Tradition.” Medieval English Theatre 41 (2019): 58–83.Google Scholar
Farahnakianpoor, Mehrangiz. “A Survey of Dramatic Activity in Iran from 1850 to 1950.” PhD diss., Brigham Young University, 1977.Google Scholar
Fath-ʿAlī Baigī, Dāvūd, and Daryāī, Mehdī. Daftar-e taʿziyeh 11. Tehran: Intishārāt-e Namāyish, 1390/2011–12.Google Scholar
Fath-ʿAlī Baigī, Dāvūd, and Daryāī, Mehdī. Daftar-e taʿziyeh 13. Tehran: Intishārāt-e Namāyish, 1394/2015–16.Google Scholar
Flaskerud, Ingvild. Visualizing Belief and Piety in Iranian Shiism. London: Continuum, 2010.Google Scholar
Floor, Willem. “Guilds and Futuvvat in Iran.” Zeitschrift der Deutschen morgenländischen Gesellschaft 134, no. 1 (1984): 106–114.Google Scholar
Francklin, William. Observations Made on a Tour from Bengal to Persia, in the Years 1786–7. Calcutta: Stuart and Cooper, 1788.Google Scholar
Gobineau, Arthur. Les religions et les philosophies dans l’Asie centrale. Paris: Didier et Cie, 1865.Google Scholar
Godard, Yedda A. “L’imamzadè Zaid d'Isfahan.” In Athar-e Iran. 2 vols. Vol. 2, ed. Godard, André, 341–348. Paris: Librairie Orientaliste Paul Geuthner, 1937.Google Scholar
Green, Nile. “Persian Print and the Stanhope Revolution: Industrialization, Evangelicalism and the Birth of Printing in Early Qajar Iran.” Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East 30, no. 3 (2010): 473–490. doi: 10.1215/1089201X-2010-029CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hansen, Anne Haslund. Niebuhr’s Museum: Artefacts and Souvenirs from the Royal Danish Expedition to Arabia 1761–1767. Copenhagen: Forlaget Vandkunsten, 2016.Google Scholar
Humāyūnī, Sādiq. Taʿziyeh dar Īrān. Repr. ed. Tehran: Navid Shiraz, 1380/2001–2 [1368].Google Scholar
Iqbāl, Zahrā, and Jaʿfar Mahjūb, Muhammad. Jung-e shahādat: majmūʿeh-ye 33 majlis-e taʿziyeh. Tehran: Surūsh, 1355/1976–77.Google Scholar
Ismāʿīlī, Husain. Tishneh dar mīqātgeh. Repr. ed. Tehran: Muʿīn, 1396/2017–18 [1389].Google Scholar
Jawharī, Muhammad Ibrāhīm al-Marwazī. Tūfān al-bukāʾ. Tehran: Kānūn-e Kitāb, c. 1940 [1837].Google Scholar
Kāshifī, Husain Vāʿiz. Rawzat al-shuhadāʾ. Ed. Rawshan, Muhammad. Tehran: Sidā-ye Muʿāsir, 1390/2011–12.Google Scholar
Litten, Wilhelm. Das Drama in Persien. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1929.Google Scholar
Mahjūb, Muhammad Jaʿfar. “Sukhanvarī.” Sukhan 9, no. 7 (1337/1958): 631–637.Google Scholar
Malekpour, Jamshid. The Islamic Drama. London: Frank Cass, 2004.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marzolph, Ulrich. Narrative Illustration in Persian Lithographed Books. Leiden: Brill, 2001.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marzolph, Ulrich. “Persian Popular Literature in the Qajar Period.” Asian Folklore Studies 60, no. 2 (2001): 215–236. doi: 10.2307/1179055CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marzolph, Ulrich. “Professional Storytelling (Naqqālī) in Qājār Iran.” In Orality and Textuality in the Iranian World: Patterns of Interaction across the Centuries, ed. Rubanovich, Julia. Leiden: Brill, 2015: 271–285.Google Scholar
Marzolph, Ulrich. “The Visual Culture of Iranian Twelver Shiʿism in the Qajar Period.” Shii Studies Review, no. 3 (2019): 133–186. doi: 10.1163/24682470-12340041CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moazzen, Maryam. “Rituals of Commemoration, Rituals of Self-Invention: Safavid Religious Colleges and the Collective Memory of the Shi‘a.” Iranian Studies 49, no. 4 (2016): 555–575. doi: 10.1080/00210862.2015.1030985CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mudarrisī Chahārdahī, Nūr al-Dīn. Khāksār va ahl-e al-haqq. Tehran: Chāpkhāneh-ye Khūsheh, 1358/1979–80.Google Scholar
Niebuhr, Carsten. Reisebeschreibung nach Arabien und andern umliegenden Ländern. 2 vols. Vol. 2. Copenhagen: Nicholaus Möller, 1778.Google Scholar
Ouseley, William. Travels in Various Countries of the East: More Particularly Persia. 3 vols. Vol. 3. London: Rodwell and Martin, 1823.Google Scholar
Pelly, Lewis. The Miracle Play of Hasan and Husain. 2 vols. London: W.M.H. Allen, 1879.Google Scholar
Peterson, Samuel. “Shi’ism and Late Iranian Arts.” PhD diss., New York University, 1981.Google Scholar
Peterson, Samuel. “The Taʿziyeh and Related Arts.” In Taʿziyeh: Ritual and Drama in Iran, ed. Chelkowski, Peter J., 64–74. New York: New York University Press, 1979.Google Scholar
Rahimi, Babak. “Takkiyeh Dowlat: The Qajar Theater State.” In Performing the Iranian State: Visual Culture and Representations of Iranian Identity, ed. Scheiwiller, Staci Gem, 55–71. London: Anthem Press, 2013.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rossi, Ettore, Bombaci, Alessio, and Cerulli, Enrico. Elenco di drammi religiosi Persiani (Fondo Mss. Vaticani Cerulli). Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1961.Google Scholar
Rossi, Ettore, Bombaci, Alessio, and Cerulli, Enrico. Fihrist-e dastnivīs-hā-ye namāyishī-ye mazhabī-ye Īrān dar kitabkhāneh-ye Vātīkān. Trans. Ismāʿīlī, Husain. Tehran: Intishārāt-e Namāyish, 1396/2017–18.Google Scholar
Sālihī Rād, Hasan. Majālis-e taʿziyeh. 2 vols. Vol. 1. Tehran: Surūsh, 1389/2010–11 [1380].Google Scholar
Salmons, Thomas, and Van Goch, Matthias. Die heutige Historie und Geographie oder der gegenwärtige Staat vom Königreich Persien. Flensburg: Gebrüder Korte, 1739.Google Scholar
Sheil, Mary Leonora Woulfe. Glimpses of Life and Manners in Persia. London: John Murray, 1856.Google Scholar
Sipantā, ʿAbd al-Husain. Tārīkhcheh-ye awqāf-e Isfahān. Isfahan: Intishārāt-e Idāreh-ye Kull-e Awqāf Mantaqeh-ye Isfahān, 1346/1967–68.Google Scholar