To emend or not to emend? Notes on restoring the text of the Shahnamah

Abstract

Every edition is essentially an act of interpretation. One generally begins with recording the testimony of a number of surviving witnesses, which may be extant manuscripts or quotations of the text in ancillary sources. One then weighs these testimonies in order to arrive at an editorial decision.The archaic language of the Shāhnāmah requires editors who desire to tackle it to gain a solid knowledge of Iranian philology, the linguistic usages common to Firdawsi's period, scribal practices common to copyists of classical Persian, and the usus scribendi of the individual scribes who copied their Shāhnāmah witnesses. Naturally, it behooves editors of both classical and modern texts to acquaint themselves with the technological and cultural details of book production. For editors of classical Persian, much of this learning comes gradually from practical experience with manuscripts or manuscript reproductions.