ʿAishī’s ʿIshrat-nāma A Dah-nāma with Unexpected Messengers

In the first part of this article I presented an edition with a short introduction of ʿAishī Shīrāzī’s ʿIshrat-nāma, a poem belonging to the dah-nāma genre. In this second part I discuss the messengers who convey the messages between the two lovers. At the request of his patron, ʿInāyat, an amir of the Aq-Quyūnlū Khalīl b. Uzun Ḥasan, instead of the usual messenger, the wind, ʿAishī chose for ten musical instruments. I argue that the choice of these instruments, and the way they are decribed, are not accidental but subtly convey the evolution of the protagonists’ feelings.


Introduction
ʿAishī's ʿIshrat-nāma (Book of Enjoyment [or Pleasure]) is a littleknown poem, belonging to the genre dah-nāma, which, as it seems, has come down to us in a single manuscript at the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris (Suppl. Persan 1142). 1 In this genre the evolution of the relationship of two lovers up to their union is described through their exchange of ten letters or, as also the case here, ten verbal messages. 2 In the first part of this article, I offered an edition with a short introduction. I argued that it was written some seventy years later than Blochet's estimate, that is, between 874/1470 and 882/1478, namely, at the time of the Aq-Quyūnlū Khalīl b. Uzun Ḥasan during his governorship of Fārs and I gave the scant information we have on the poet. Here I shall give a brief discussion of the dah-nāma genre and the poems from which the ʿIshrat-nāma took its inspiration; then I shall go into the unexpected choice of the messengers who convey the lover's messages, namely ten musical instruments. I shall argue that the choice of these instruments, and the way they are decribed, are not accidental but subtly convey the evolution of the protagonists' feelings.

2
The Origin of the dah-nāma Genre: Wīs u Rāmīn and Khusrau u Shīrīn It is generally agreed that the dah-nāma genre originated in Fakhr al-Dīn Gurgānī's mid-eleventh-century mathnawī Wīs u Rāmīn. Its roots lie in both the ten letters full of complaint and reproach that Wīs writes to an unfaithful Rāmīn and the later "dialogue" between the lovers -actually eight long monologues delivered by each of them, Wīs at her palace window, Rāmīn outside having been refused entry. 3 The more direct inspiration of the genre, however, is Niẓāmī's 4 ʿAyyūqī also included ten in his Warqa u Gulshāh, which must date from after 400/1009-10 when the Shāh-nāma was finished, as it shows its influence, but from before 421/1030 when the Ghaznavid Maḥmud died, see Khaleghi-Motlagh s.v. "ʿAyyūqī", EIr, 3: 167b; they are in the same mutaqārib metre as the rest of the poem, do not have a signature (takhalluṣ), but are in monorhyme. Along with the dah-nāma genre being a narrative, in which is an exchange of letters or messages of an amorous nature, the inclusion of a ghazal is seen by 20) to be essential, such that without it, a poem would not qualify as belonging to this genre. Dankoff ("The Lyric in the Romance", 10), does not discuss the dah-nāma, but refers to Gandjeï's article "Genesis"; he is under the impression that in the genre the ghazal is always in mathnawī form and does not have a signature, which is contradicted by the dah-nāma of Auḥadī and ʿAishī in which the ghazals have monorhyme, and in ʿAishī's poem have a makhlaṣ.
9 There exist also a number of mathnawīs with an amorous theme entitled sī-nāma ("thirty letters"), which in theory would differ from dah-nāmas in the number of letters only. However, this is not always the case. Whereas the sī-nāma, also known as Muḥibb u Maḥbūb, written by Kātibī Turshīzī (d. 839/1435-36) as one of the poems of his Khamsa, is indeed a poem of the same kind as Ṣafā (TA, 4: 238) writes (I have been unable to locate it in print, but it is included in a 9th/15th-10th/16th-century manuscript of Kātibī's Kullīyāt in the Majlis Library in Tehran which can be consulted on this library's website dlib.ical.ir (shelf number 2615, pages 169-255). (The poem is also briefly mentioned by Rypka,HIL,284). On the other hand, the sī-nāma by Amīr Ḥusainī Harawī (presumably 671/1273Harawī (presumably 671/ -74-719/1319, which might be the oldest poem thus called and more or less contemporary with the Manṭiq al-ʿushshāq, should be regarded as belonging to a different, although related genre. (The exact date of its composition is unknown; the editor of this poem, Turābī, argues against the claim 9th/15th-century biographer Daulatshāh had made that the poet wrote it "in his youth" (Mathnawīhā-yi ʿirfānī, 11-12). As Khurāsānī and Dāwudī Muqaddam ("Taḥlīl-i dah-nāmahā", 29) already noted, contrary to Ṣafā (TA, 3/2: 756) and ʿAbbāsīya Kuhan ("Dah-nāma-sarāʾī", 74b), the poem does not contain an exchange of letters between the lovers. Instead, it is a love story ending in a unresolved way and told by way of succession of unsent letters, all of them the lover's.
10 Dīwān-i kāmil, 438, v. 11. Gandjeï argues that because of "the absence of any evidence concerning the existence of a Dah-nāma as an independent poem" before Manṭiq al-ʿushshāq, there was none, and suggests that the term may also have indicated more generally "a short love poem in mathnawī form", "as distinct from full-length romantic epics" ("Genesis", 66), offering as an example a verse in the Firāq-nāma (written in 769/1367 or shortly thereafter) in which its author, Salmān-i Sāwajī, allegedly describes his poem as such. (Gandjeï quotes British Museum, Or. 2815, fol. 290v = Dīwān, 617, v. 7) However, when the poet asks God to grant him sufficient time to compose "dah Manṭiq al-ʿushshāq has nearly the same length as the ʿIshrat-nāma. In it, a lover and a beloved exchange ten messages (written and verbal), which include a ghazal and also a short narrative (ḥikāyat). At first, the beloved does not respond to the lover's feelings and resists contact, but gradually the lover wins over the beloved and they are united at the end.
Finally, there is a third work of which ʿAishī says that it gave "fragrance" (būy) to his own, namely, Mihr u Mushtarī (v. 84b), the romantic mathnawī by ʿAṣṣār Tabrīzī, composed, in the same hazaj metre, a century before, in 778/1377. 11 It is, however, not a dah-nāma, although the lovers exchange some letters. The eponymous lovers are two young men, the sons of a king and his vizir, who have known each other since infancy and are united by what the poet calls a "love free of lust" (mihrī zi har shahwat mubarrā, v. 216). The ʿIshrat-nāma shares this characteristic of featuring a male beloved -for most of the poem, the beloved's gender is unspecified; the epithets, such as māhpaikar ("with a face as the moon") or sahī-raftār ("walking upright") suit both genders, but it becomes clear that the beloved is male with mention of his kākul ("forelock"), a typical male hairdo (v. 140). 12 Of the poets who inspired him, ʿAishī does not mention Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī (d. 672/1273), although he clearly did so. In the evocation at the beginning of the poem of how the participants in the majlis listen to, recite, and discuss different kinds of poems, ghazals, qaṣīdas (v. 64) and also mathnawīs, the phrasing evidently alludes to ): Of one, his soul's ear was listening to a mathnawī of another, his heart was intent on a lesson full of meaning (dars-i maʿnawī) Moreover, Rūmī's influence is also apparent in the ten ghazals. 13 For nearly every ghazal in the ʿIshrat-nāma, there is a likely pendant in nāma", this should be read as "ten [such] books". Up to the most recent publication of Khurāsānī and Dāwūdī Muqaddam ("Taḥlīl-i dah-nāmahā", 23 and 27), one also consistently finds ʿIrāqī's ʿUshshāq-nāma mentioned as a predecessor -although circulating under his name since the eighth/fourteenth century, the author is ʿIzz al-Dīn ʿAṭāʾī who wrote it ca. 719/1319-20, some thirty years after ʿIrāqī's death in 688/1289: Feuillebois-Pierunek, À la croisée des voies célestes, 292-5 (with bibliography on this issue).
13 None can be seen as a response (naẓīra) to a ghazal of ʿAishī's illustrious compatri- Rūmī's Dīwān-i Shams, and in two cases they share a rhyme and refrain (radīf) that are too infrequently used to be accidental. 14 Where there are letters or messages, there are messengers, and here the ʿIshrat-nāma shows originality: ʿAishī does not call on the usual messenger, the wind (bād), but, at the request of his patron, amir ʿInāyat, he chooses musical instruments (vv. 76-7). The first instrument is the reed flute, nay, which is again a reminiscence of Rūmī as it immediately brings to mind the wonderful complaint of the nay opening Rūmī's Mathnawī-yi maʿnawī. In the course of the poem, ten different musical instruments are cast in the role of messenger 15 and I shall argue that the choice of these specific instruments and the way they are described are not accidental but subtly convey the evolution of the protagonists' feelings.
With the exception of Niẓāmī, ʿAishī was inspired by poets we know to have been mystics. 16 The short notice on him in Qazwīnī's addition to Majālis al-nafāʾis 17 which I discussed in the first part of this article, does not mention a Sufi affiliation, although, of course, this does not prove that there was none. Indeed, at first sight the ʿIshratnāma is a mystical poem. 18 ʿAishī presents amir ʿInāyat as a learned person, knowledgeable in mysticism (fann-i ʿirfān, v. 50) and many of the terms with which the musical instruments are described are Sufi in inspiration; in the final section (v. 491) there is even a clear allusion to the Sufi concept of fanā fī llāh, "annihilation in God". Nevertheless, the poem, with its telling title "Book of Enjoyment", comes across as lighthearted and playful, rich in witticisms and puns, and 14 Viz., the seventh and the ninth ghazal, with, respectively, rhyme and refrain ārmagẕār (a naẓīra of Rūmī, Kullīyāt-i Shams, ghazal no. 1041, which also has the same metre) and ār-i ʿāshiq (ghazal no. 1307).
15 Though not messengers, personified musical instruments, speaking in zabān-i ḥāl ("the state of speaking by itself", or prosopopeia), are found in other poems from the ninth/fifteenth century, such as Fattāḥī Nīshāpūrī's Ḥusn u dil (finished in 840/1437-38) which has a tambourine (daf), a nay, and a chang facing off in a boasting contest (munāẓara) with the rose, the palm, and the violet respectively (288-301). Another example, also shaping the whole poem, is the Contest of String Instruments, a munāẓara by the Chagatai poet Aḥmadī, in which "seven instruments, representing seven nations and religions (...) and at the same time, seven ranks and social standings, argue with the troublemaker, the tanbura, about their musical (and social) value and importance" (Neubauer, "Music in the Islamic Environment", 4/2: 599-601; online version, 606-7); see also Bodrogligeti, "A Masterpiece of Central Asian Turkic Satire".
16 Syed Hasan describes Auḥadī's Manṭiq al-ʿushshāq correctly as a "mystical allegory" ("Dahnamehs in Persian", 5). Auḥadī was one of the followers of the renowned mystic Auḥad al-Dīn Kirmānī, who died ca. 634/1237 and from whom he took his takhallus (Khaleghi-Motlagh, s.v. "Awḥadī Marāḡaʾī", EIr, 3: 119). ʿAṣṣār was a disciple of Shaikh Majd al-Dīn Sīsī (d. 760/1359) (Ṣafā,s.v. "ʿAṣṣār Tabrīzī",EIr,2: 803). Anna Livia Beelaert ʿAishī's ʿIshrat-nāma: A Dah-nāma with Unexpected Messengers 203 the cheerful majlis ʿAishī describes, during which ʿInāyat asked him to write this poem, seems to have been a literary gathering of poets and poetry lovers (arbāb-i sukhan, v. 61) rather than Sufis. Without knowing more about the poet and of the specific social context, an in-depth interpretation of the poem is difficult to make, however. 19 4 Structure of the Poem The poem is structured as follows. After the introductory sections with praise of God (vv. 1-17) and of the Prophet (naʿt) (vv. 18-26), and prayers (munājāt) (vv. 27-31), the poem continues with a section entitled dar sabab-i naẓm-i kitāb, which contains the praise of Sulṭān Khalīl (vv. 32-40), his amirs (v. 41), and, in particular, the abovementioned ʿInāyat (vv. 42-60). Then follows a description of the majlis (vv. 61-9) in which ʿInāyat commissions the poem, and the poet accepts the task (vv. 70-91). Then abruptly, without title, the story about an unnamed youth ( jawānī) becoming lovestruck by the "glance of a bloodthirsty one" (ghamza-yi khūn-khwāra'ī) begins at v. 92. It is followed by ten chapters -titled as the first letter, the second letter (nāma-yi awwal, duwwum), etc. -although the exchanged messages are delivered verbally rather than by letter. The poem ends with a description of the garden in which the festivities of the lovers' union is celebrated and of their joy at being united (vv. 501-16) and an address to a khudāwand, which must be ʿInāyat (vv. 517-21).
In each of the chapters, the lover or the beloved looks for a messenger and describes it, sometimes extensively; he then gives it the exact message it must deliver, including the ghazal. The messenger answers, goes to the addressee, and delivers the message, always adding a comment of its own as well; this is not a feature in every dahnāma. Here, the instruments are not only messengers, but also gobetweens. The addressee then addresses the messenger, and sends a messenger of his own, and we have come full circle. In addition to being messengers and go-betweens, the instruments are gifts (they are not sent back, as the messengers in this genre normally are) and invested, as gifts often are, with a meaning the giver hopes the receiver will understand. 20 19 Qazwīnī's description of ʿAishī as "shakhṣī hazzāl wa maskhara wa pur ḥāl" ("a jester, facetious and witty"; see Beelaert, "A little-Known Dah-nāma", 204) could be used to argue in favor of a lighthearted interpretation of his poem. Although I acknowledge its mystical tones, I do not go so far as one of the anonymous readers, who pressed for a fully Sufi interpretation of the poem.
20 In Persian literature, the quintessential example of the motif of an exchange of gifts between lovers that need to be decoded is found in the story of the Russian princess, the fourth story in Niẓāmī's Haft paikar (593/1197), a retelling of which was translated

The Instruments as Messengers
As mentioned, the first messenger is the nay, the reed flute, and in twelve verses (vv. 105-16) it is cast as the ideal alter ego of a lover far from his beloved, as is the nay in Rūmī. The lover addresses the flute as follows: O you who are aware of the secrets of love" (zi sirr-i ʿishq āgāh), Anyone among those who suffer (ahl-i dard), knows you, your yellow face (rūy-i zard) testifies to it.
Not a moment are you without complaint (nāla) or lamentation (afghān), not a moment are you without the grief of being separated (gham-i hijrān).
You have a heart empty of everything except the friend, you are burning (sūz) and in ecstasy (ḥāl, wajd) from head to foot. [...] Therefore, you cannot complain less than you do because you have so many holes in your heart (dar dil hama sūrākh dārī). 21 My pains are too numerous to count and you know how hard the pain of love is.
How could a lover stay silent?
One who is in ecstasy (ḥāl) wails continually! (vv. 105a,  ʿAishī continues, enumerating only positive qualities, such as not knowing any "self-conceit" (khwud-parastī, v. 114a), not being in the "fetters of existence" (band-i hastī, v. 114b), the nay having a "talking breath" (dam-i gūyā) and an "intelligent heart" (dil-i āgāh) (v. 116a). When the beloved receives the nay, he addresses it with the same qualities, which are then given negative connotations: 22 O nay, all your talk is wind; I remember hearing many of these tales! Save your breath, leave these tales; keep such messages at home! by François Pétis de la Croix in Mille et un jours (1710-1712), the basis of Carlo Gozzi's play Turandot (1777), which became, in its turn, the inspiration of the libretto of Puccini's opera of the same title. On the history of the motif, see Meier, "Turandot in Persien"; Rossi, "La leggenda di Turandot".
21 Though not in the proem of Mathnawī-yi maʿnawī, Rūmī too refers to the "emptiness" of the nay and compares its holes to eyes (see Schimmel,Triumphal Sun,211).

22
The alternating of praise and blame is characteristic of the Arabic literary genre al-maḥāsin wa-l-masāwī ("qualities and defects", see Gériès s.v. "al-Maḥāsin wa'l Masāwī", EI 2 ), whose influence can be seen in many Persian and Chagatai poems (as that of Aḥmadī, fn. 15 above). See Beelaert, Cure for the Grieving, 72, fn. 177. It would be better, the beloved continues, if "one sewed its eyes together", and "beat it with a stone and burned it" (v. 147); it is only fit "to be bound together for a reed mat" (būriyā, v. 148). In fact, the beloved does tie it up and puts it in the corner (vv. 149-50).

Anna Livia Beelaert
The beloved's messenger is the kamāncha, a viol or vielle, a string instrument with a long neck, which is played with a bow, not plucked. (v. 152) Indeed, it is an apt messenger for one who does not himself experience pangs of love.
The lover does not address the kamāncha but responds immediately by sending the daf, the frame drum or tambourine, which in six verses is portrayed, in contrast to the lover, as self-sufficient and carefree: You have no need of anyone, in this world, for you, your own voice is enough. I am one who lost his heart (bī-dil) in the grip of sorrow, who in this grief lost sleep and appetite.
24 Because of their nodes (band), reeds are said to be "in fetters" (dar band).
25 A pun, the homograph nay also meaning "no, not", its name being thus "a negation", in a sense, "it has no name". In the previous verses ʿAishī also plays thus with the word nay, writing nay for naʾī ("you are not") and nay kardan for nīst kardan ("annihilate").
26 Farmer: "the hemispheric viol" (s.v. "Rabāb", EI 2 , 5: 348a); Blum: "spike fiddle with a small, often spherical, resonating chamber" (s.v. "Kamānča", EIr, 15: 434a).  (vv. 185, 187) It seems as if the lover hopes that the beloved will see the daf as an invitation to join him in a carefree love. The beloved, however, still reacts negatively, and again sees all the features of this instrument only in a negative light. He begins his address of eleven verses (vv. 218-28): Because it has few aspirations (kam-himmatī), he continues, it is always drunk (mast)"(v. 219). This negative view derives from the daf being struck (v. 221b) and its cries (faryād) making the hypocritical deceivers (sālūsān-i shayyād) dance (ba charkh ārī) (v. 222); from which part of the body people strike it with, and from what kind of people do it -lower-class people (kasān, v. 228), for instance, or prostitutes (qaḥbaqān), who hit it with their face and back (v. 224), or others who even put it in their armpits (baghal) and on their shoulders (dūsh) (v. 220). Other negative comments refer to the metal rings in its frame, as when the beloved says they put a ring in its ear (ḥalqa bar gūsh), that is, they treat it like a slave (v. 221). After they finish, they put it in a sack (kīsa) like a snake (v. 223). With the circle of the heavens it shares only its outward appearance (rang), therefore it has a bad reputation (bad-nangī) (v. 225). 28 The beloved threatens "to pull its skin from its body" (v. 226) and "to cut its ears, even if there are ten of them" (v. 227), again a reference to the metal rings. At the end of this invective, he slaps the daf on its neck, puts it in the corner next to the nay, and responds by sending a qānūn, a zither (or psaltery). 29 His response is an instrument that he apparently considers to be above any of the possible allegations of "lowness" he made against the daf. He addresses it thus (vv. 230-7): 27 A reference to the daf having two sides.
28 That is, the daf is curved in the same way as the dome of heaven, the fickle and unreliable celestial sphere (falak).

Your cries (faryād) are not without wisdom (bīḥikmatī nīst)
as there is no associate (ham-ṣuhbat) like you in the world! They sprinkle gold and silver on you, out of reverence people put you on their lap (kinār)! You have the marks of every perfect person (ṣāḥib-kamāl); you have been tuned by every master! 30 Due to you, many instruments are burning and melting (dar sūz u gudāz) because the mighty (ṣāḥib-daulatān) play you! There is no one as capable (qābil) and rhythmical (mauzūn) 31 as you [...] Wherever you go, as a sign of respect (taʿẓīm) they fill the edge of your skirt (kinār-i dāman) with silver! There is no better messenger than you to bring my message to the lover. 32 Although the message that follows is still not very positive, the choice of messenger indicates that the beloved is beginning to take the lover seriously, although his feelings have not yet changed. When the lover receives the qānūn, he does not further characterize it in his own address, but only unburdens his own heart to it.
32 I omitted translating v. 235b, kasī hargiz bad qānūn nadīdam, which lacks one mora between hargiz and bad; since the poet is obviously punning on qānūn, a possible emendation -with qānūn in the sense of rasm, rawish -might be: kasī hargiz ba-d-īn qānūn nadīdam, "I never saw anyone in this way". The lover then sends the rubāb, a kind of lute, 33 which is associated with love and enjoyment, and also with libertinism (rindī), as was the kamāncha the beloved had sent him; however, in contrast to the latter, which "knew no sorrow" (v. 152), as befits an alter ego of the lover, the rubāb is associated with grief: There is no freer (wā-rasta) mystic (ʿārif ) than you, there is no lover more grieving than me! You are the companion (muʾnis) of grieving libertines (rindān-i ghamnāk); you have no fear of evil and good of the world (bad u nīk-i jahān)! 34 (vv. 275-7, 278b-80) The lover goes on to describe the rubāb as someone who engages in galantry (ʿishqbāzī, v. 281a) and who holds his head high among the people of enjoyment (ahl-i ʿishrat, v. 281b); 35 it has no dwelling except the winehouse (maykhāna, v. 282a) and it may complain all the time 33 It can be vocalised as rabāb and rubāb. As rabāb, it is "the generic name in Arabic for the viol", in a Persian context, however, the reference is mostly to the rubāb, a lute. "The rubāb with the Persians has ever been a plucked and not a bowed instrument", Farmer writes (s.v. "Rabāb", EI 2 , 8: 346b-347a), one with "a vaulted sound-chest and incurvations at the waist. It has been described at length in the "Kanz al-tuḥaf" [which is a Persian musical treatise of the 8th/14th century]. "The lower part of the belly was of skin, and three double strings were mounted on it" (Farmer,s.v. "ʿŪd",EI 2 ,10: 770a). Still, there is evidence that in a Persian context, for instance in Rūmī, the reference could be to a bowed instrument: "Quant au rabâb, il ne s'agit pas du rabâb[sic]-luth (que l'on trouve de nos jours dans l'Iran extérieur) mais d'un instrument à cordes frottées, de la famille des vièles" (During, Musique et extase: L'audition mystique, 181). But to which instrument would a Shirazi poet refer? None of the examples in Ḥāf īẓ's Dīwān, for example, is conclusive (Mallāḥ's unquestioning identification with a bowed instrument, unsupported by any proof, carries no weight, Ḥāfiẓ wa mūsīqī, 122-3). There is a clear reference to a plucked instrument, however, in the Dīwān of Ḥāfiẓ's older contemporary and compatriot Khwājū Kirmāni (d. 753/1352), who writes that "minstrels struck their hand on the rubāb" (chu muṭribān-i sahar chang dar rubāb zanand: 440,ghazal no. 140,v. 1a) so arguably the instrument to which ʿAishī refers a century later was also plucked.

An address of ten verses (275-84).
35 This is the first verse, halfway the poem, in which ʿishrat is used. It occurs six more times: in vv. 434, 436, 439 (these three in the ninth nāma, where the messenger is the chang), 496, 500 (in the tenth nāma, where the messenger is the ʿūd), and 515 (in the finale).

Anna Livia Beelaert ʿAishī's ʿIshrat-nāma: A Dah-nāma with Unexpected Messengers
Annali di Ca' Foscari. Serie orientale e-ISSN 2385-3042 56, 202056, , 197-218 ISSN 1125 Anna Livia Beelaert ʿAishī's ʿIshrat-nāma: A Dah-nāma with Unexpected Messengers 209 (hamī nālī) but has no fear (parwāʾī nadārī, v. 282b); it is not like people thinking about their honour or reputation (nang u nām, v. 283a); it is a complete pauper (darwīsh-i tamām, v. 283b). The lover says he puts his hopes in this messenger's magnanimity (muruwwat) to convey his message to his beloved (v. 284). The implicit message that this instrument conveys to the beloved, whom he addresses as ay bī muruwwat, "O you who have no generosity" (v. 285a), is thus: "Do not be haughty, enjoy life, and show some magnanimity". This is the fifth message, only halfway the poem, and the beloved still says of himself that he was created with "tyranny and cruelty" ( jaur u jafā, v. 313b), that is, he is not yet persuaded. However, he does not put the rubāb in the corner with the two other instruments (although the rubāb had expected that he would, v. 301) and the message he sends back is for the first time more responsive. He may press the lover to stay away (v. 322a), and to be content to see him from a distance (v. 323a), but he also lets him know that if his advice is not followed, he will ask his guardians, otherwise hot-tempered (tund-khū), not to harm him (v. 325). He conveys this message with the mughnī, 36 an instrument Farmer translates as "arch-lute", 37 a kind of zither, or maybe a dulcimer. 38 The beloved's address to this mughnī is brief, but kind: O friend with a melodious voice (yār-i khwash-āwāz), sincere (yak-rūy) associate (ham-ṣuḥbat) and confidant (yak-rāz)! Go near that grieving (ghamgīn) and friendless one (bī-kas), hasten to assist his desperate heart (dil-i bī-chāra-ash)! 39 (vv. 320-1) The mughnī calls the message it delivers a "message of happiness" (paighām-i shādī, v. 343), and the lover faints from joy (v. 350), but at the same time his anguish increases as he realizes that a union with the beloved comes closer (v. 352).
38 The difference would be that the former is plucked, while the latter is struck by hammers.
39 This is the entire address; a lacuna follows, for the mughnī's message begins at v. Because of your knowledge of subtleties (nukta-dānī) with an effective strike (ba żarb-i rāst) you receive silver and gold from kings! Night and day, you were active on all sides to take away the burning (sūz) of a lover like me. (vv. 355-65) The lover asks the ṭanbūr to make fragrant (muʿaṭṭar) by his message the beloved's soul's brain (dimāgh-i jān) (v. 366), to relay to him his complaints, and tell him the story of his pain (v. 367). In other words, the lover's troubles are still ongoing; the beloved may not be as ill-disposed toward his love as before, yet there is still cause to 40 "It is generally to be distinguished from the lute by its smaller sound-chest and longer neck" (Farmer,s.v. "Ṭunbūr",EI 2 ,10: 634b).
42 A pun on charkh, which means both "heaven" and "circle". In Islamic iconography, the planet Venus is traditionally represented as a woman playing the lute; see, e.g., Denny, "Music and Musicians in Islamic Art", 64 and pl. 26. 43 A pun on zahra and zuhra is common in Persian poetry.
The beloved receives the lover's message with approval and does not banish the ṭanbūr to the corner; as his next messenger he calls the rūḥ-afzā (lit. "increasing the spirits", or "vivifying"), a string instrument related to the pandore. 45 The beloved addresses the rūḥafzā only briefly (vv. 399-400), showing some empathy for what the lover is going through: O companion of every poor miserable one (muʾnis-i har dardmandī), you who give a remedy to the heart of every wretched one (dawā-bakhsh-i dil-i har mustmandī) ! (v. 399) He admits to having been cruel and praises the lover for nonetheless having been so faithful (yak-rang, v. 404); with his ghazal he hopes to remove the lover's affliction (dil-girānī, v. 407). The message is called a happy one (payāmī īnchunīn khwash, v. 417), and the lover is indeed gladdened by it.
We have now reached the last exchange of instruments -it is likely not fortuitous that these are the same with which Niẓāmī's Nakīsā and Bārbad accompany their "ghazals" when they convey Shīrīn's and Khusrau's feelings.
The last instrument the lover sends is the chang, the harp, in the hope that he will once be able to kiss his beloved's hands and forearms (dast u sāʿid) as the harp will do when it arrives (v. 425). The lover characterizes the harp as the leader of the instruments (bar hama sāzī muqaddam), always honoured (muʿaẓẓam) in the company of kings (v. 428) and he goes on: I haven't seen any old man (pīr) as experienced (kār-dīda) as you, your bent figure (qadd-i khamīda) is enough proof of that! You have more value 46 (andāza) than any other instrument, you have more fame (āwāza) than any of your friends! When [hearing] your voice the heavens cry out (charkh andar khurūsh ast), from your sounds Venus is all eyes and ears (chashm u gūsh ast)! Everyone who is in the grip of sorrow (ba chang-i gham giriftār) 45 This instrument was described by the celebrated musician Ibn Ghaibī in Jāmiʿ alalḥān: "[it] seems to have had a globular sound-chest -"in the form of an orange" -and was furnished with six strings, four of them of silk and two of them of twisted copper. Its tonal scope was much the same as the ordinary ṭanbūr" (Farmer, "AbdalQādir Ibn Ġaibī on Instruments of Music", 244). The description in Muʿīn's Farhang-i fārsī, s.v We see that the harp is associated both with happiness and wisdom, and this association with wisdom is even more prominent when it arrives at the beloved. "Listen to me", it tells the beloved, because I am a wise elder (pīr) (v. 453). How can a young person who does not heed the advice of sages (pand-i pīrān) ever release prisoners from grief (v. 456)? As the beloved is young, he should listen to the pand-i pīr (v. 457). Thus, the chang, with its bent back (qadd-i khamīda) like a pīr who has lived a long life (sāl-dīda), counsels (naṣīḥat kard) him about what is good and evil (v. 458). The harp's association with wisdom is in contrast to a frequent earlier characterization in Persian poetry when many poets regarded its being "bent" as negative, and when it was compared to an elderly person, it was as a rule not a wise one. 50 The beloved, who, in contrast to the harp, walks upright (sahī raftār, v. 459) answers that he will not disobey the advice of a sage: "if I did so before, I won't do it again", he promises (v. 460). This wise old man (pīr-i khiradmand) spoke so beautifully -whoever turns away 47 Emending ba ʿishrat ham-nishīn-i for ba ʿishrat ham-nishīnī.
50 Examples of a negative portrayal of the chang are numerous and dominant in the imagery connected to it. For instance, it was described as someone who is skinny and complaining because of it (e.g., Khāqānī,Dīwān,427,, or, the other way round, someone who is himself "all skin and bones" with protruding "veins" (the analogue of the strings) was portrayed as a chang (Saʿdī, Būstān, v. 1359), as was a bent-over forlorn lover (Farrukhī,Dīwān,qaṣīda no. 80,v. 5). A chang as an old man, bent by age, is found many times in Khāqānī's Dīwān, but then, e.g., bent "from shame" (zi sharm, 493, v. 1) and certainly not represented as a sage. For more negative portrayals, see Beelaert, Cure for the Grieving, 186-92. A chang as a pīr does offer advice, albeit ironically, twice in Ḥāfiẓ: "The bent harp (chang-i khamīda-qāmat) invites you to pleasure (ʿishrat) / listen, as the advice of sages (pand-i pīrān) won't do you any harm! (Dīwān, ghazal no. 122, v. 6) and "Give wine, since the harp bent its head toward my ear and said / "'spend your time pleasurably, listen to this bent old man" (pīr-i munḥanī)!'" (ghazal no. 470, v. 5). The instrument the beloved summons for his final message, namely, the ʿūd, is also associated with wisdom and is described as follows:

Anna Livia Beelaert
I have a ḥakīm, a perfect learned man (dānā-yi kāmil), eloquent (sukhandān), fortunate (saʿādatmand), and intelligent (ʿāqil). (v. 462) He addresses it as "one who is knows what passion is" (ṣāḥib-i ḥāl, v. 467), adding that it makes his soul content (khwushnūd): its melodies are like those of David (v. 468). For the first time, the beloved elaborates on the suffering of the lover who "far too long has burned as aloeswood (ʿūd)", punning, as many poets did before ʿAishī, on the two meanings of ʿūd (v. 469), and he regrets the unjust treatment to which he so long subjected him (v. 470). 51 There is no longer any distinction between the lover and the beloved, "I am the lover", the beloved says, "and you are the desired beloved" (v. 491). Lover and beloved are finally united and a feast is had in a garden that is lovingly described. A feast that will be enlivened by music as all the messengers also attend (vv. 497, 512).

Conclusion
With the edition of the ʿIshrat-nāma I presented in the first part of this article a poem is added to the corpus of poems belonging to the dah-nāma genre. Even if this addition to the mathnawī corpus will do little to influence the judgment on the literary history of the ninth/fifteenth century, the age of Jāmī, each addition is an enrichment and refines our knowledge of a specific genre. At the end of the ninth/fifteenth century, the messenger motif as a compositional device was still a fertile one, and one in which a poet still made variations. 52 Although ʿAishī credits the amir ʿInāyat with the idea of making a change in this motif by replacing the wind with musical instruments, it is ʿAishī who gives this idea a highly personal interpretation; in his characterizations of the instruments, he adjusted the connotations they had come to carry in the centuries before in a completely original way. 53 The Persian Bildersprache is famously 51 The address is fourteen verses (vv. 467-80), but only the first two verses describe the instrument; the rest is devoted to the beloved's commiseration and repentance. 53 My earlier remark on the choice of musical instruments as messengers in ʿAishī's poem (they "can perfectly be cast in the role of grieving alter egos", Beelaert, Cure for the Grieving, 193) must be refined, for actually, in the course of the poem, these "alter egos" grieve less and less. Despite having a "bent back", the chang, for instance, is not grieving but wise.
Annali di Ca' Foscari. Serie orientale e-ISSN 2385-3042 56, 202056, , 197-218 ISSN 1125 214 an enormously rich one and although a number of studies exist, it is yet far from being fully mapped. 54 This article is, first of all, intended as a contribution to this field. The ʿIshrat-nāma may be only a minor poem -albeit one with undeniable charm -but even a minor poem contributes an essential element for the full picture. As yet, I have not found evidence that it influenced others, but if my hypothesis is correct that ʿAishī's patron ʿInāyat is the brother of Hidāyat-ʿAlī Beg, whose Turkish Dīwān survived, 55 its influence may have traces in both Persian and Turkish poetry. Dating a work of literature correctly is, arguably, an essential element into establishing an accurate history of Persian literature, and in this respect also there is much still work to do. Up till now the accepted date of the ʿIshrat-nāma was some seventy years off, and, unfortunately, in histories of Persian literature such a difference is not an exception. 56 To establish any influence ʿAishī might have had, further study should be made of the cultural milieu of the Aq-Quyūnlu Sulṭān Khalīl in Shiraz, to which we now know he belonged. 57 Finally, ʿAishī's poem contributes to our knowledge of the history of musical instruments -it is, e.g., one of the few texts we know of in which the rūḥ-afzā figures 58 -yet there may be more as yet unedited, or even uncatalogued. I hope this article provides inspiration to fill these lacunae.

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