Table of Contents

  • HISSAR, TEPE

    Cross-Reference

    (Tappa Ḥeṣār), prehistoric site located just south of Dāmḡān in northeastern Persia. See TEPE HISSAR.

  • HISTORIOGRAPHY

    Multiple Authors

    This entry is concerned with the historiography of the Iranian and Persephone world from the pre-Islamic period through the 20th century in Persian and other Iranian languages. The periods and their subdivisions of this historiography are covered in 14 articles.

  • HISTORIOGRAPHY i. INTRODUCTION

    Elton Daniel

    Historiography, literally, is the study not of history but of the writing of history. In modern usage, this term covers a wide range of related but distinct areas of inquiry.

  • HISTORIOGRAPHY ii. PRE-ISLAMIC PERIOD

    A. SH. Shahbazi

    Iranian historiography remained unaffected by the Herodotean school and developed from oral traditions and the Mesopotamian-style “quasi-history,” which embellished historical narratives.

  • HISTORIOGRAPHY iii. EARLY ISLAMIC PERIOD

    Elton L. Daniel

    It might be questioned whether there is, strictly speaking, any “historiography of Persia in the early Islamic period” at all, since it is by no means clear that there was an Islamic “Persia” prior to the rise of the Safavids.

  • HISTORIOGRAPHY iv. MONGOL PERIOD

    Charles Melville

    Persian historiography reached its maturity during the period of 13th-15th centuries, which might broadly be described as the Turko-Mongol era.

  • HISTORIOGRAPHY v. TIMURID PERIOD

    Maria Szuppe

    Timurid historiography is firmly rooted within the Persian literary tradition of official court histories of the post-Mongol period.

  • HISTORIOGRAPHY vi. SAFAVID PERIOD

    Sholeh Quinn

    Safavid historiography, although developing unique features of its own, had its origins in the eastern Timurid tradition that was centered in Herāt.

  • HISTORIOGRAPHY vii. AFSHARID AND ZAND PERIODS

    Ernest Tucker

    Persian historical writing in the 18th century reflected the profound changes that occurred in Iran after the1722 Afghan conquest of Isfahan.

  • HISTORIOGRAPHY viii. QAJAR PERIOD

    Abbas Amanat

    In the century and a half that constituted the Qajar period (1786-1925), writing of history evolved from production of annalistic court chronicles and other traditional genres into the earliest experimentations in modern historiography.