Stefan T. Kamola. Rashīd al-Dīn and the making of history in Mongol Iran. Dissertation (2013)

Stefan T. Kamola. Rashīd al-Dīn and the making of history in Mongol Iran: a dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Seattle, WA: University of Washington, 2013, X+326 p.

Abstract

The Jāmiʿ al-tawārīkh (Collected histories) of Rashīd al-Dīn Ṭabīb (d. 1318) has long been considered the single richest witness to the history of the early Mongol Empire in general and its Middle Eastern branch, the Ilkhanate, in particular. This has created a persistent dependence on the work as a source of historical data, with a corresponding lack of appreciation for the place it holds within Perso-Islamic intellectual history. This understanding of Rashīd al-Dīn and the Jāmiʿ al-tawārīkh, however, does not match certain historiographical and ideological strategies evident in the work itself and in other works by Rashīd al-Dīn and his contemporaries. This dissertation reads beyond the monolithic and uncritical use of the Jāmiʿ al-tawārīkh that dominates modern scholarship on Mongol and Ilkhanid history. Instead, it fits Rashīd al-Dīn and his work into the difficult process of transforming the Mongol Ilkhans from a dynasty of foreign military occupation into one of legitimate sovereigns for the Perso-Islamic world. This is the first study to examine a full range of Persianate cultural responses to the experience of Mongol conquest and rule through the life and work of the most prominent statesman of the period. Drawing on the example of cultural projects undertaken in the early decades of the Ilkhanate, Rashīd al-Dīn canonized a narrative of Ilkhanid history in which his patrons embodied a model of sacred kingship that adhered both to contemporary intellectual trends in the Middle East and to Mongol dynastic traditions emphasizing descent from Genghis Khan. This new model, which first enters political discourse in the writing of Rashīd al-Dīn in response to the vacuum of authority created by the fall of the Abbasid caliphate, laid the groundwork for later Timurid, Safavid and Mughal court ideologies. By fitting Rashīd al-Dīn and his works within their historical context, this dissertation disentangles seven centuries of literary elaboration that have accrued to his historical memory.

Table of Contents

List of figures … vi
Note on transliteration … vii
Acknowledgments … viii
Introduction … 1

Part One. Apocalypse to Ilkhanate … 27

Chapter One. The Middle East in the Mongol Empire … 33
Chapter Two. Early Ilkhanid cultural production … 54
Chapter Three. The time of trouble, 1284-1298 … 79
Chapter Four. The biography of Rashīd al-Dīn … 102

Part Two: Rashīd al-Dīn and Ilkhanid historiography … 129

Chapter Five. The Mongol dynasty and the Iranian state … 135
Chapter Six. Converting history: Rashīd al-Dīn’s theological works … 171
Chapter Seven. The historiographical setting of Rashīd al-Dīn … 222
Chapter Eight. Ḥamd Allāh Mustaufī and the making of Rashīd al-Dīn … 257

Conclusion … 280

Appendix A. The works of Rashīd al-Dīn … 285
Appendix B. The conversion of Ghazan Khan … 294
Bibliography … 299

List of figures

1. Greater Iran and environs at the time of the Ilkhanate … 23
2. Seasonal camps of the Ilkhans … 24
3. Partial tree of the Mongol royal family … 25
4. The dispensation of Genghis Khan … 36
5. Vaṣṣāf’s description of the Jāmiʿ al-taṣānīf, compared to that of aRashīd al-Dīn … 242
6. Rashīd al-Dīn’s collected works, the Jāmiʿ al-taṣanif al-rashīdī … 286
7. Publication history of the Tārīkh-i mubārak-i ghāzānī … 292

Note on transliteration and translation

For Arabic and Persian words, names, and text I have adopted the transliteration system of the International Journal of Middle Eastern Studies (IJMES). When titles of works are Arabic constructions (such as Jāmiʿ al-tawārīkh), I have used the Arabic transliteration scheme, even when the text of such works is in Persian. For Turkic and Mongolian words and names, I have adopted a simplified transliteration, avoiding diacritics for consonants and indicating hard and soft vowels for Turkish short vowels only (u/ü, o/ö, ı/i). For the Eastern Turkic text treated in Chapter Five, I have followed Mehmet Ölmez’s transliteration, which preserves certain additional aspects of Uyghur orthography, such as the soft ġ. Arabic, Persian, Turkic, and Mongol words and titles not in common usage in English have been kept in italics and are explained the first time that they appear. When titles refer to specific individuals, they are given in Roman type with initial capital. Thus amīr, but Amīr Qutlughshāh; sulṭān, but Öljeitü Sulṭān.

Qurʾān citations are Ṣaḥīḥ International. All other translations are my own unless otherwise noted.