TEHRAN – A team of Indian scholars working at the Asiatic Society, a Kolkata-based institute for Oriental studies, has stumbled upon a 700-year-old manuscript of the Divan of Hafez, the Times of India reported on Monday.

The manuscript, which bears the signature and gold insignia of Shah Jahan, the fifth Mughal emperor who reigned from 1628 to 1658, also contains an unpublished ghazal.

The unpublished poem begins with this verse: “Beham Dellah Ke Bazam Didane Ruyat Moyasser Shod” (Thank God, I have the honor of looking at your face again).

Persian poet Hafez lived and wrote much before the time of Shah Jahan, but the insignia means that the manuscript, which also embellished with beautiful illuminations and calligraphy, had landed in the Mughal emperor’s library, scholars said.

Many literati and scholars recently traveled to the city to catch a glimpse of the manuscript currently on display at Asiatic Society’s museum. However, it will soon be relocated, considering its antique value and fragile condition.

Asiatic Society’s researchers discovered the Divan of Hafez while studying the works of the Persian-Urdu poet Mirza Ghalib.

Historian Ramkrishna Chatterjee of the Asiatic Society said, “When our Persian scholars went through it, they were stunned. This was an original handwritten manuscript by Hafez, who preceded Ghalib by nearly 500 years.”

“We started hunting for reference material to authenticate the manuscript while we consulted Persian scholars who vouched for the authorship of the ghazal collection, we had to know how this manuscript reached us,” he added

Syed Akhtar Hussain, associate professor of Persian at Jawaharlal Nehru University and president of the acclaimed Institute of Indo-Persian Studies, said that the unpublished poem will make scholars of Persian literature rush to take a closer look at the manuscript.

He added that a similar handwritten manuscript is kept at Khuda Baksh Library in Patna.

Ahmad KarimiHakkak, an Iranian professor of Persian literature at the University of Maryland, has also made remarks about the manuscript.

“Since this divan bears the signature of Shah Jahan, it naturally adds to the authenticity of the manuscript,” he said, 

“Hafez wrote about 500 ghazals in his own hand. After his death, some of his students copied his manuscripts for greater dissemination. The earlier copies are also considered to be authentic, but since this one contains an unpublished ghazal, its authenticity is unquestioned,” he added.

The question researchers are asking is why the manuscript bears the signature of Shah Jahan although Hafez lived and wrote long before the Mughal Empire. “Successive Mughal courts, right from the time of Humayun, have collected original manuscripts of Persian poets and Hafez was naturally the most coveted figure. Mughal emperors would even gift manuscripts to other rulers, and libraries were looted during wars. This is how manuscripts traveled,” Hakkak explained.

Photo: Tomb of Hafez, Shiraz

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