Asiri Umani

Asiri Umani, Asiri al-Din Umani, Asiri al-Din 'Abdullah (after 1258), a poet with the nom de plume of Asiri (‘Ether’), who eulogised the local rulers of western Persia in the first half of the thirteenth century. His birth date is unknown, but since he was clearly a middle-aged and experienced man at the time of his death, it may be assumed that he was born around the turn of the thirteenth century. He was killed in the course of the Mongol conquest of the western regions of Persia. He was from the village of Awman in the district of A'lam in the vicinity of Hamadan. Some have considered him a pupil of Khwaja Nasir al-Din Tusi, though Zabihullah Safa, in his Tarikh-i adabiyat dar Iran (‘History of Literature in Persia’) questions this claim. He was a friend of two masters, Kamal al-Din Isma'il Isfahani and Rafi' al-Din Lunbani. He eulogized Atabak Muzaffar al-Din Uzbak, an Atabak in Azerbaijan, and Sulayman Shah Aywa'i, a ruler in Kurdestan and a companion of the caliph al-Musta'sim bi-llah. His life was spent mostly in Baghdad. His poetical works run to 5000 couplets. One notable piece is a qasida describing the horror of the bloodshed of the Mongol invasion (from 1219 onwards) as it affected Hamadan and Baghdad with the fall of the 'Abbasid caliphate in 1258, involving the execution of Musta'sim and Sulayman Shah Aywa’i, the governor of western Persia, both of whom he had eulogised, as well as the earlier caliph al-Mustansir. He also wrote qasidas in praise of Sulayman Shah's enemy, Khalil ibn Shuja' al-Din, a sultan of Lesser Luristan, thus exciting the wrath of his former patron. Asiri al-Din wrote poetry in Persian and Arabic. Some manuscript copies of his complete works are extant. He tends to follow in Anwari's footsteps though lacking the latter’s power, and eloquence. However, his poetry is of a simpler nature, being more fluent, graceful and appealing. Likewise, he does not go to Anwari’s extremes in employing scientific terminology and obsolete Arabic vocabulary, providing a purer example of Persian use of poetic languge typical of the late twelfth and early thirteenth century.

Buzurgan u sukhan-sarayan-i Hamadan (1, 35-45); Tarikh-i adabiyyat dar Iran (3, 394-408); Da'irat al-ma'arif-i Farsi (1, 57); Da'irat al-ma'arif-i buzurg-i Islami (6, 591-592).