An introduction to Kurdish epic and heroic literature especially on Kurdish Shāhnāme

جستارهای نوین ادبی

Article 4, Volume 44, Issue 1 - Serial Number 172, June 2012, Pages 119-148   

Document Type: Research Article

DOI: 10.22067/jls.v44i1.11687

Author

Behrooz Chamanara^*

Abstract

This research tries to achieve an executive determination about Kurdish epopees. The epic poems which we know it’s as Kurdish Shāhnāme. These epopees are rooted in myth and included the general believes and the viewpoints of Zagros settlers belong the earlier ages of human life from today. The difference of mythical foundations between Western and Eastern Iran appointed the researcher to survey in the ideas and worldviews of Kurdish Shāhnāme. This surveying leads to achieve a conceptual classification and it helps to have a comparative studding to know the proportion of original Kurdish Shāhnāme. The structure of Kurdish literary language and the poems meter is the other point that mentioned there and writer tries to determine and explain the concept of “Gurāni” with some sample words. There is a special part for Oral literature also to explain how the booklets and handwritings were engendered and also has speaks about aspects of narrators’ performance. The main conclusion of this paper is that the Kurdish Shāhnāme is an original and independent text in Gorani and the seclusion from official Iranian literature progress causes to accept some metamorphosis and also to be affected from some sects after Islam and ancestors of ancient Iranian religions in Zagros area.

Key words: Epopee, Kurdish Shāhnāme, Gurāni, Oral Tradition, Ferdowsi’s Shāhnāme.