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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
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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

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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.

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