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Vīs and Rāmīn: an anomaly among Iranian courtly romances

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 March 2011

Minoo S. Southgate
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Extract

Composed somewhere between 1040 and 1054, Fakhr al-Dīn As'ad Gurgānī's metrical romance of Vīs and Rāmīn celebrates the adulterous love of Queen Vīs and the King's younger brother, Rāmīn. In his introduction the poet informs us that the tale of Vīs and Rāmīn enjoyed great popularity in his time although it was not widely understood in its Pahlavi version or satisfactorily rendered into New Persian. Based on a lost Pahlavi original, Gurgānī's version takes place in ancient Zoroastrian Iran. Scholars have variously identified its setting as Sasanian (A.D. 226–651) and Arsacid Iran (247 B.C.–A.D. 224). Perhaps our scant knowledge of the Arsacid nobility prevents us from deciding between an Arsacid and a Sasanian setting; moreover, even if the story is of Arsacid origin, its subsequent adaptations and interpretations must have altered its original characteristics.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society , Volume 118 , Issue 1 , January 1986 , pp. 40 - 52
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 1986

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References

NOTES

1 Vīs va Rāmīn, ed. Maḥjūb, Muḥammad Ja'far (Tehran, 1337/1958);Google ScholarEnglish trans. Morrison, George, Vis and Ramin (New York, 1972).Google Scholar All references are to these editions. Arabic numbers in references to the Persian text refer to chapters and lines in that order. I have consulted the most recent edition of Vīs va Rāmīn, ed. Todua, Magali A. and Gwakharia, Alexander A., Intishārāt-i Bunyād-i Farhang-i Īrān, no. 101 (Tehran, 1970),Google Scholar but I have used the Maḥjūb edition in my references because Morrison's translation corresponds with Maḥjūb.

2 Vīs va Rāmīn, 7, 11. 29–55;Google ScholarMorrison, , pp. 17–18.Google Scholar

3 See, for example, Hidāyat, Ṣādiq, “Chand nuktah darbārah-yi Vīs va Rāmīn”, Majmū'ah-yi nivishtahā-yi parākandah-yi Ṣādiq Hidāyat (Tehran, 1344/1965), pp. 499 and 506.Google Scholar

4 See Minorsky, Vladimir, Iranica, Publications of the University of Tehran, vol. 775 (1964), p. 180.Google Scholar Some scholars disagree with Minorsky. ‘Abd al-Ḥusayn Zarrīnkūb contends that the romance is fictitious and has no “connection with the story of the Arsacids as such an occurrence could not have survived the Sasanian era “”, Rypka, Jan, History of Iranian Literature (Dordrecht, 1968), p. 178.CrossRefGoogle Scholar For Zarrīnkūb's article see Sukhan, 9:10 (1337/1958), pp. 1015–18.Google Scholar See also Mīnuvī, Mujtabī, Sukhan, 6:1 (1333/1954), pp. 13–21, and 6:2 (1333/1954), pp. 129–37.Google Scholar On the romance's date see Maḥjūb, , “Introduction”, Vīs va Rāmān, p. 73,Google Scholar and Furūzānfar, Badī' al-Zamān, Sukhan va sukhanvarān (Tehran, 1350/1971), pp. 362–72.Google Scholar

5 Shāhnāmah-yi Firdawsī, ed. Bertels, E., 9 vols. (Moscow, 1960–1971). For the romance of Zāl and Rūdābah and Bīzhan and Manīzhah see vols. 1 and 5 respectively.Google Scholar

6 Rūdābah is a descendant of the Arab Ẓaḥḥāk and her father is an enemy of Zāl's father. Afrāsiyāb of Tūrān, Manīzhah's father, is an enemy of the Kiyānī Prince, Bīzhan.

7 For the episode of Sūdābah and Siyāvush see the Shāhnāmah-yi Firdawsī, vol. 3, esp. 1. 135 ff.Google Scholar

8 See Ṣafā, Dhabīḥullāh, Ḥimāsahsarā'ī dar Iran (Tehran, 1333/1954), pp. 241–46.Google Scholar

9 Yar-Shater, E., “Foreword”, Vis and Ramin, trans. Morrison, , p. vii.Google Scholar A summary of the scholarship is provided below:

R. Stackelberg suggests an Indian original for the tales of Vīs and Rāmīn and Tristan (Drevnosti vostochniya, (Moscow), 2:1 (1896), pp. 10–23,Google Scholar referred to in Iranica, p. 190Google Scholar). R. Zenker contends that the Persian romance was a principal source of Tristan and suggests that the romance was transmitted to Ireland by itinerant monks or minstrels, “Die Tristansage und das persische Epos von Wīs und Rāmīn”, Romanische Forschungen, Bd. 29, Heft. 2 (Erlangen, 1911), pp. 321–69;Google Scholar and “Zur Ursprung der Tristansage”, Zeitschrift für romanische Philologie, 35 (1911), pp. 715–31.Google Scholar Minorsky disagrees with Zenker and quotes Zirmunsky, who “admits of considerable analogy of the subject of Vīs-u Rāmīn and Tristan and Isolde, but states that the repeated discussion of the problem has proved ‘entirely inconclusive’,” Iranica, pp. 194–95.Google Scholar While allowing that a comparison between the two stories is “a tempting literary problem,” Minorsky concludes that “even if one admits that a similar feudal background was responsible for parallelism in the sentiments of the heroes and the attitude of the poets towards them, such comparisons do not go beyond vague generalizations,” Iranica, p. 155.Google Scholar

In the 1960s Schroeder's, R. essay “Die Tristansage und das persische Epos ‘Wis und Ramin’,” Germanische-romanische Monatsschrift, 42 (1961), pp. 1–44,Google Scholar called attention to Zenker's theory once more. The most thorough study of the connection between Vīs and Rāmīn and the various Tristan romances is Pierre Gallais' Genése du roman occidental: Essais sur Tristan el Iseult et son modèle person (Paris, 1974).Google Scholar Providing a detailed analysis of both stories, Gallais also addresses the problem of the Persian romance's transmission.

In the introduction and notes to his translation of Vis and Ramin, George Morrison points out the similarities between the two stories, using A. T. Hatto's English translation of Gottfried von Strassburg's Tristan for his comparison. At times, Morrison exaggerates the similarity between the backgrounds of the two stories, translating, for example, the Persian savārī (riding, horsemanship) as chivalry, a term whose connotations are absent in the Persian. (See Vīs va Rāmīn, 41, 1. 170;Google ScholarMorrison, , p. 92.)Google Scholar

10 Trans. Parry, John J. (New York, 1959), p. 100.Google Scholar

11 Ibid., p. 185.

12 Below is a summary of the romance:

In a spring celebration Mūbad, the King of Kings, asks Princess Shahrū of Media to be his wife, or if she chooses, his lover. Shahrū declines the offer, but promises to give Mūbad a daughter, should she ever bear one. Years later she bears Vīs, but gives her in marriage to her son Vīrū (Vīs's half brother). Before the marriage is consummated, however, Mūbad claims Vīs and takes her to his court in Marv. Loyal to Vīrū, Vīs persuades the nurse to make Mūbad impotent with her through witchcraft. Though in love with Vīs, Mūbad is thus forever barred from her enjoyment. Mūbad's young brother, Rāmīn, falls in love with Vīs and with the help of the nurse seduces her. Mūbad discovers the lovers' illicit relationship but fails to put an end to it. About eight years after the beginning of the affair, Rāmīn tries to break free from Vīs by marrying Gul. But sated with Gul, he resumes his relationship with Vīs. A year later, the lovers conspire against Mūbad, win the throne, and rule together for some eighty years, enjoying a peaceful and prosperous life.

13 Vīs va Rāmīn, 8, 11. 16–20;Google ScholarMorrison, , p. 20.Google Scholar

14 Ibid., 8, 11. 21–22; Morrison, , p. 20.Google Scholar

15 Ibid., 9, 1. 8; Morrison, , p. 22.Google Scholar

16 See Morrison, George, “Flowers and witchcraft in the ‘Vis o Ramin' of Fakhr ud-Din Gurgani,” Acta Iranica, 3 (Leiden, 1974), pp. 249–59.Google Scholar

17 Vīs va Rīmīn, 11, 11. 26–29;Google ScholarMorrison, , p. 26.Google Scholar

18 Ibid., 75, 1. 25; Morrison, , p. 225.Google Scholar

19 Ibid., 41, 11. 61–64; Morrison, , p. 88.Google Scholar

20 Ibid., 15, 1. 53; Morrison, , p. 33.Google Scholar

21 Ibid., 40,11. 244–45; Morrison, , p. 84.Google Scholar Rāmīn's action is puzzling, especially since he is in love with Vīs and because the nurse has also been his wet nurse and is in place of his mother. Sex between a wet nurse and a youth she has at one time suckled, however, occurs also in Jāmī's, “Salāmān va Absāl,” haft awrang (Tehran, 1337/1958),Google Scholar though here the wet nurse initiates the relationship. (See Arberry, A. J., Fitzgerald's Salāmān and Absāl (London, 1956Google Scholar).) The Qur'ān (4:23) forbids a man to marry his wet nurse, treating the milk-relationship as the equivalent of blood relationship.

22 Vīs va Rāmīn, 47, 11. 137–38;Google ScholarMorrison, , p. 117.Google Scholar

23 Ibid., 41, 11. 115–138; Morrison, , pp. 90–91.Google Scholar

24 Ibid., 44, 11. 44–46; Morrison, , p. 106.Google Scholar

25 Ibid., 42, 11. 128–31; Morrison, , p. 98.Google Scholar

26 Ibid., 47, 1. 143; Morrison, , p. 117.Google Scholar

27 Ibid., 77, 1. 181; Morrison, , p. 253.Google Scholar

28 Ibid., 10, 11. 6 – 9; Morrison, , p. 23.Google Scholar

29 Ibid., 10, 1. 25; Morrison, , p. 24.Google Scholar

30 Ibid., 74, 11. 68, 90, and 94; Morrison, , pp. 221 and 222.Google Scholar

31 Ibid., 13, 11. 8–9; Morrison, , p. 28.Google Scholar

32 Ibid., 41, 11. 33–42; Morrison, , p. 87.Google Scholar

33 Ibid., 47, 11. 47–50; Morrison, , p. 114.Google Scholar

34 Ibid., 87, 11. 574–76; Morrison, , p. 306.Google Scholar

35 Ibid., 42, 1. 134; Morrison, , p. 98.Google Scholar

36 Ibid., 13, 11. 44–45; Morrison, , p. 29.Google Scholar

37 Ibid., 9, 11. 20 and 22–23; Morrison, , p. 22.Google Scholar

38 Ibid., 37, 1. 16; Morrison, , p. 69.Google Scholar

39 For the treatment of women of the nobility in the Safavid period see Chardin, , Voyages du Chevalier Chardin en Perse … (Paris, 1811), 6, pp. 6–45.Google Scholar

40 Vīs va Rāmīn, chapters 8 and 9; Morrison, , pp. 19–23.Google Scholar

41 Ibid., 74, 11. 86–90; Morrison, , p. 222.Google Scholar

42 Ibid., 48, 1. 46; Morrison, , p. 119.Google Scholar

43 Ibid., 14, 11. 31–35; Morrison, , p. 31.Google Scholar

44 Ibid., 26, 11. 60–67, and chapters 27 and 28; Morrison, , pp. 53–55.Google Scholar

45 Ibid., chapters 74 and 75; Morrison, , pp. 218–226.Google Scholar

46 Ibid., 83, 11. 1–21; Morrison, , p. 273.Google Scholar

47 Ibid., 16, 11. 8–40, and 15, 11. 87–89; Morrison, , pp. 35–36 and 34.Google Scholar

48 Ibid., chapter 38; Morrison, , pp. 70–73.Google Scholar

49 Ibid., 71, 11. 9–14; Morrison, , p. 209.Google Scholar See also 23, 11. 9–16; Morrison, , pp. 47–48.Google Scholar

50 Ibid., 102, 11. 89–95; Morrison, , pp. 347–48.Google Scholar

51 Iranica, p. 190.Google Scholar

52 See the battle between Gurdāfarīd and Suhrāb in vol. 2, 11. 197–273.Google ScholarFor Gurdīyah see the story of Khusraw, vol. 9, 11. 2749 ff.Google Scholar and 11. 2768–2863. For Sīndukht see the episode of Zāl and Rūdabah, vol. 1, 11. 1080–1210.Google Scholar For women in the Shāhnāmah see Djalal Khaleghi Motlagh, Die Frauen im Schahname (Klaus Schwarz Verlag, 1971).Google Scholar

53 Vās va Rāmīn, 104, 1. 59;Google ScholarMorrison, , p. 352.Google Scholar

54 Despite the poet's positive portrayal of women, the romance includes disparaging remarks about them made by Mūbad and Vīs. (See 41, 11. 112–13; Morrison, , p. 90.Google Scholar) Robert Surieu believes that these statements were not in the Pahlavi version and reflect the negative attitude toward women in Islamic Iran. See Sarve Naz, (Geneva, 1967), p. 60 ff.Google Scholar

55 Vīs va Rāmīn, 25, 11. 9–10;Google ScholarMorrison, , p. 50.Google Scholar

56 Ed. Mīnuvī, Mujtabā (Tehran, n.d.), p. 73Google Scholar.

57 Niẓāmī, , Khusraw va Shīrīn, ed. Dastgirdī, Vaḥīd (Tehran, 1333/1954), pp. 33–35.Google Scholar

58 Ibid., p. 258.

59 Ibid., p. 398.

60 Laylā va Majnūn, ed. Dastgirdī, Vaḥīd (Tehran, 1333/1954), p. 224;Google Scholartrans. Atkinson, James, Laili and Majnún (London, 1836), 11. 2475–84.Google Scholar On a mystical interpretation of Majnun see McDonald, M. V., “The Religious and Social Views of Nizami of Ganjah,” Iran: Journal of the British Institute of Persian Studies, I (1963), p. 100.Google Scholar

61 Laylā va Majnūn, p. 264;Google ScholarAtkinson, 11. 2959–64.Google Scholar

62 “Salāmān va Absāl,” haft awrang, p. 330;Google Scholartrans. Arberry, A. J., Fitzgerald's Salāmān and Absāl, p. 160.Google Scholar

63 “Yūsuf va Zulaykhā,” haft awrang. Abridged trans. Pendlebury, David, Yusuf and Zulaykha: An Allegorical Romance (London, 1980).Google Scholar

64 Vīs va Rāmīn, 32, 1. 12;Google ScholarMorrison, , p. 60.Google Scholar

65 Ibid., 43, 11. 19–20; Morrison, , p. 103.Google Scholar

66 Ibid., 45, 11. 51 and 70; Morrison, , pp. 109 and 110.Google Scholar

67 Ibid., 45, 11. 31–32; Morrison, , p. 108.Google Scholar

68 Ibid., 50, 1. 25; Morrison, , p. 125.Google Scholar

69 Ibid., 59, 11. 192–96; Morrison, , p. 153.Google Scholar

70 Ibid., 79, 1. 213; Morrison, , p. 248.Google Scholar

71 For examples of mystical love see the third chapter of Būstān in Kulliyyāt-i Sa'di, ed. Ạlī Furūghī, Muhammad (Tehran, n.d.)Google Scholar. For a translation of Būstān see Wickens, G. M., Morals Pointed and Tales Adorned (Toronto, 1974).Google Scholar

72 See Vīs va Rāmīn, 73, 11. 54 ff;Google ScholarMorrison, , pp. 193 and 194; 67, 1. 28 ff and 51 ff;Google ScholarMorrison, , pp. 191–92;Google Scholar and chapters 61 and 62.

73 This happy ending distinguishes Vīs and Rāmīn from Tristan and most other European romances.

74 Vīs va Rāmīn, 104, 1. 35;Google Scholar translation mine.