Rashīd al-Dīn.

Agent and Mediator of Cultural Exchanges

in Ilkhanid Iran
Warburg Institute Colloquia
Edited by Charles Burnett and Jill Kraye

24

Rashīd al-Dīn. Agent and Mediator of

Cultural Exchanges in Ilkhanid Iran

Edited by Anna Akasoy, Charles Burnett

and Ronit Yoeli-Tlalim

The Warburg Institute – Nino Aragno Editore

London – Turin 2013
Published by
The Warburg Institute
School of Advanced Study
University of London
Woburn Square
London WC1H 0AB
and
Nino Aragno Editore
Strada Rosalia 9
12038 Savigliano
Italy

8The Warburg Institute and Nino Aragno Editore 2013

ISBN 978-1-908590-47-3
ISSN 1352-9986

Images edited by Ian Jones

Typeset by Anna Akasoy and Will Ryan
Printed by Henry Ling, The Dorset Press, Dorchester, Dorset
Table of Contents

[vii] Contributors

ix Preface

1 Speaking about Oneself: Autobiographical Statements in the Works

of Rashīd al-Dīn
Birgitt Hoffmann

15 Rashīd al-Dīn’s alter ego: the Seven Paintings of Moses in Jāmiʿ al-
tawārīkh
Mika Natif

39 Rashīd al-Dīn’s Primary Sources in Compiling the Jāmiʿ al-tawārīkh;

a Tentative Survey
Kazuhiko Shiraiwa

57 The Canonization of Cultural Memory: Ghāzān Khan, Rashīd al-Dīn,

and the Construction of the Mongol Past
Judith Pfeiffer

71 Rashīd al-Dīn as a Historian of the Mamluks

Reuven Amitai

89 Reappraisal of the ‘Register of Chiliarchies’ in Jāmiʿ al-tawārīkh

Hodong Kim

115 A Tale of Two Doctors: Rashīd al-Dīn and Quṭb al-Dīn al-Shīrāzī
Leigh Chipman

127 A Comparative Study of Rashīd al-Dīn’s Tanksūqnāma and its

Chinese Sources
Vivienne Lo and Yidan Wang

173 The Buddha and the Straight Path. Rashīd al-Dīn’s Life of the
Buddha: Islamic Perspectives
Anna Akasoy
197 Rashīd al-Dīn’s Life of the Buddha: Some Tibetan Perspectives
Ronit Yoeli-Tlalim

213 Rashīd al-Dīn’s Historiographical Legacy in the Muslim World

Ron Sela

223 Mongols, Arabs, Kurds, and Franks: Rashīd al-Dīn’s Comparative

Anthropology of Tribal Society
Christopher Atwood

251 Index
Contributors

Anna Akasoy (Hunter College, City University of New York)

Reuven Amitai (Hebrew University, Jerusalem)

Christopher Atwood (Indiana University)

Charles Burnett (Warburg Institute, University of London)

Leigh Chipman (Ben-Gurion University, Israel)

Birgitt Hoffmann (University of Bamberg, Germany)

Hodong Kim (Seoul National University)

Vivienne Lo (University College, London)

Mika Natif (Harvard Art Museums)

Judith Pfeiffer (University of Oxford)

Ron Sela (Indiana University)

Kazuhiko Shiraiwa (Diet Library, Tokyo)

Yidan Wang (Peking University)

Ronit Yoeli-Tlalim (Goldsmiths, University of London)

Preface
Anna Akasoy, Charles Burnett, and Ronit Yoeli-Tlalim

In his The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, the English historian Edward
Gibbon (1737‒94) famously stated concerning the Battle of Tours that had
the Arabs been successful, ‘Perhaps the interpretation of the Koran would
now be taught in the schools of Oxford, and her pulpits might demonstrate
to a circumcised people the sanctity and truth of the revelation of Mahomet.’1
It is one of the ironies of history that despite the military defeat, Arabic
learning – albeit not the doctrines of the Islamic religion – made its way to
Oxford via the Latin translations accomplished in the Iberian Peninsula
and Italy. Western medievalists have put a lot of effort into studying the
cultural, political and social exchanges between ‘the Islamic world’ and
‘the West’. Both terms suggest a homogenous nature which never existed;
the objects of these exchanges too were often substantially transformed as
well as having a transformative effect themselves. Research has often fo-
cused on medieval Spain as the most important region for these fruitful
interactions. Depending on their inclinations and often influenced by their
views of contemporary intercultural relations, scholars have emphasized
collaboration or confrontation, both of which were just two sides of the same
coin.
Another such hotbed of intellectually productive cultural encounters in
the Middle Ages has received far less attention, even though it was just as
impressive and its legacy just as significant as the Arabic-Latin translation
movement. At the time when the Crusaders fought successfully Muslims in
the western Mediterranean and less successfully in the Levant, another pro-
tagonist of thirteenth-century world history entered the stage and threatened
Muslim rule in some of its heartlands. The Mongols under Chinggis Khan
started their conquests in Central Asia at the beginning of the thirteenth
century. In the mid-thirteenth century, led by Hülegü, the expansion con-
tinued westwards and the Mongol empire in Iran under the Ilkhans was
established. The impact of this Indian summer of the Silk Roads on cultural
contacts between Iran and China has been demonstrated by Thomas Allsen,
whose Culture and Conquest in Mongol Eurasia (Cambridge, 2001) is cited by
several contributors to this volume (most notably, Vivienne Lo and Wang
1
The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, III, Philadelphia, 1830, p. 399.

ix
THE EDITORS

Yidan in their analysis of a Persian treatise on Chinese medicine). Felicitas

Schmieder and Peter Jackson have studied the impression left by the Mon-
gols in the West where hopes were raised for unexpected support against
the Saracens.2 Another parallel with the investigations concerning the
cultural encounters in medieval Spain is that, while some scholars echo the
terrorized reactions of medieval Muslims in the Middle East, others such as
George Lane have depicted the situation in a much more positive and
peaceful light.3 Following Gibbon, one could speculate that if the Mongols
had not been defeated by the Mamluks at Ayn Jālūt in 1260 (an event
discussed by Reuven Amitai in this volume), the Yasa of Chinggis Khan
would now be studied at Cairo’s al-Azhar university. The comparison, how-
ever, does not work very well – unlike Christianity and Islam, the native
religion of the Mongols was not a missionary faith. The attitude of the
Mongols to the religions of their newly-conquered subjects was indifference,
and confessional diversity flourished both in lands under Mongol rule and
at the courts of the Khans and Qa’ans.4
At the very heart of one of the most vibrant and diverse cultural milieus,
the Ilkhanid court, stood a man – an exceptionally distinguished author
and patron – who is known in scholarship as the first world historian, who
shared the multi-faceted curiosity of the Renaissance man and the ambition
for objectivity of the modern ethnologist. Born in 1247 in Hamadan as the
son of a Jewish pharmacist, Rashīd al-Dīn converted to Islam at some point
in his life. A peak in his extraordinary career was his appointment to the
vizierate in 1298 under Ghāzān, who commissioned him four years later to
compose a history of the Mongols. This text became the seed of a larger
and much more ambitious project, the Compendium of Chronicles (Jāmiʿ al-
tawārīkh), which includes histories of the Turks, the Jews and the Franks, of
China, and of India. In some manuscripts, the text is accompanied by
luxurious illustrations which underscore Rashīd al-Dīn’s commitment to a
multi-voiced history (see Mika Natif, Kazuhiko Shiraiwa and Judith Pfeiffer
in this volume). The open atmosphere in the Mongol empire is reflected in
Rashīd al-Dīn’s attitude to other religions in this opus, for example in his

2
F. Schmieder, Europa und die Fremden. Die Mongolen im Urteil des Abendlandes vom 13. bis in das
15. Jahrhundert, Sigmaringen, 1994; P. Jackson, The Mongols and the West, 1221–1410, Harlow,
2005.
3
G. E. Lane, Early Mongol Rule in Thirteenth Century Iran. A Persian Renaissance, New York, 2003.
4
See for this R. C. Foltz, Religions of the Silk Road. Overland Trade and Cultural Exchange from An-
tiquity to the Fifteenth Century, Basingstoke, 1999, and J. Elverskog, Buddhism and Islam on the
Silk Road, Philadelphia, 2010.

x
 PREFACE

Life of the Buddha (analysed by Anna Akasoy and Ronit Yoeli-Tlalim in this
volume). Rashīd al-Dīn, however, remained in a liminal state. His Jewish
background remained an issue in biographical works even after his exe-
cution in 1318 (as Leigh Chipman shows in her contribution). This was a
lasting phenomenon. Until recently and despite his cultural and intellectual
achievements, members of both faiths were reluctant to ‘claim’ him as one
of their own, and a distinguished member of their cultural elite.
The aim of the present volume is to explore Rashīd al-Dīn further, in
particular as an agent of cultural exchanges. The volume begins with two
studies of the way Rashīd al-Dīn presented himself which offer insights into
his disposition as a patron and cultural broker. With a focus on written
sources, Birgitt Hoffmann selects passages from throughout Rashīd al-Dīn’s
work and investigates to what extent the contours of his self-image add up
to an individual personality. She introduces Rashīd al-Dīn as a writer and
cultural translator who argued in favour of the incorporation of non-Islamic
material. Other prominent features of Rashīd al-Dīn’s self-image are his
vulnerability resulting from his liminal position, his dependence on his
patrons and commitment to his cultural and scholarly project. A strong
intellectual commitment of Rashīd al-Dīn is also suggested by Mika Natif
who uses visual sources to explore aspects of his Jewish identity. In the
Moses paintings which illustrate his Compendium of Chronicles, commissioned
by Rashīd al-Dīn himself, the prophet’s political, religious and judicial
nature is highlighted, whereas contemporary Jewish sources portray him
as a heroic miracle worker. Rashīd al-Dīn shares his presentation of Moses
with Maimonides who may have influenced him here.
The following four articles deal with Rashīd al-Dīn’s best known role,
that of the history-writer for his Mongol patrons. Kazuhiko Shiraiwa intro-
duces the section with a survey of the manuscripts of the Compendium of
Chronicles and a survey of its sources which range from archival documents
(i.e., state papers and genealogies preserved at the Ilkhanid court), over
historiographical texts to oral traditions. Rashīd al-Dīn’s tendentious
attitude in favour of Ghāzān determined not only what he said, but also
what he remained silent about. Judith Pfeiffer, while conceding that Rashīd
al-Dīn’s approach was shaped by his political loyalties and his consideration
of Islamic historiography as superior, emphasizes the inclusive nature of his
writings. Not only different cultures, but also different strata of Mongol
society are represented with their own voices.
Reuven Amitai and Hodong Kim focus in their respective contributions
on the ways in which Rashīd al-Dīn’s political context shaped his history
writing. Amitai discusses how the vizier dealt with the only serious oppon-
xi
THE EDITORS

ents of the Mongols, the Mamluks, about whom ‘the first world historian’
had surprisingly little to say compared to contemporary historians who
seem better informed. While he reiterates the claims of his patrons and
their ancestors for Mamluk territories, he glosses over embarrassing events.
This may also reflect the higher priority which the Mamluks gave to the
conflict with the Mongols. Hodong Kim focuses on an aspect internal to
Mongol society, namely the ‘Register of Thousands’ at the grand qurilta of
1206. Not unlike the early Islamic conquests, this initial military authority
was passed on to generations of descendants. Rashīd al-Dīn’s version of the
list, which he composed from written documents as well as oral trans-
missions, was probably part of an attempt to increase Ghāzān’s legitimation
by establishing the existence of a privileged position of the Toluids since
old times.
The following two contributions focus on another side of Rashīd al-Dīn:
as an expert in medicine. Leigh Chipman compares what his biographies
have to say about this aspect of his personality with what they offer con-
cerning his contemporary Quṭb al-Dīn al-Shīrāzī who also served the
Ilkhans as a physician. Reversing Amitai’s approach, she discusses Mamluk
perspectives on the Ilkhans. Furthermore, focusing on his Jewish identity
and his death, Rashīd al-Dīn’s biographies clearly reveal his liminal status.
Vivienne Lo and Wang Yidan explore an extraordinary example of Rashīd
al-Dīn’s cultural openness and interest in medicine. His Tanksūqnāma is a
Persian transliteration and translation of Chinese medical texts, often
attributed to legendary figures. They analyse the text against the backdrop
of the transmission of knowledge and materia medica along the Silk Roads
and discuss in greater detail problems of translating specific concepts from
one culture to another.
Another example of cultural translation is the Life of the Buddha in the
Compendium of Chronicles, which Anna Akasoy and Ronit Yoeli-Tlalim
explore from an Islamic and Buddhist angle respectively. Rashīd al-Dīn
uses Qur ānic notions as well as elements of doctrines of prophecy and
traditions within Sufism in order to present Buddhism in a sympathetic
light. Other elements, however, which are associated with other Indian
religions, are rejected with arguments stemming from both Buddhist and
Islamic criticisms. Ronit Yoeli-Tlalim investigates the specific form of
Buddhism reflected in the Life of the Buddha. This text reflects a unique type
of western Buddhism which incorporated elements from the different
parts of the Buddhist world of the Mongol era. Yoeli-Tlalim explores the
role of Tibetan Buddhism within this complex melange of Ilkhanid
Buddhism.
xii
 PREFACE

The final section deals with Rashīd al-Dīn’s legacy. Ron Sela, who focuses
on the author’s impact on Islamic historiography, points out the contrast
between his ‘absence’ from sixteenth- to nineteenth-century Islamic litera-
ture and his fame among modern Western scholars. While immediately
after his death, his Compendium of Chronicles enjoyed a certain popularity
among Muslim writers who used it directly, in later centuries the text was
used indirectly. Thus, Rashīd al-Dīn became an important figure in the
mythologization of the Turks and Mongols. Christopher Atwood, on the
other hand, critically analyses the role of Rashīd al-Dīn as a testimony for
state formation under the Mongols and the abandonment of genealogical
knowledge as part of a previous, tribal society. Atwood’s discussion ties in
with Hodong Kim’s conclusions since both emphasize the significance of
this knowledge for claims of political authority among the Mongols.

***

The contributions included in this volume were presented at a specially

convened colloquium held under the title ‘Rashīd al-Dīn as an Agent and
Mediator of Cross-pollinations in Religion, Medicine, Science and Art’ at
the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at University
College London and the Warburg Institute on 8 and 9 November 2007,
jointly organized by the editors and Vivienne Lo. Our interest in Rashīd al-
Dīn emerged from the research conducted for the project ‘Islam and Tibet:
Cultural Interactions (8th–17th Centuries)’, sponsored by the Arts and
Humanities Research Council and the Shelley and Donald Rubin
Foundation and hosted by the Warburg Institute. While cultural inter-
actions can be traced back as far as the eighth century, the Mongol period
constituted a particularly dynamic phase.5 In addition to the already
mentioned institutions we would also like to thank the Wellcome Trust for
supporting the conference and the Barakat Trust for supporting the
publication of this volume.

5
For further results of the project see Islam and Tibet: Interactions along the Musk Routes, eds A.
Akasoy, C. Burnett and R. Yoeli-Tlalim, Aldershot, 2010.

xiii
Abbreviations

EI Encyclopaedia of Islam (with edition specified)

EIr Encyclopædia Iranica

A Arabic

P Persian

Tib Tibetan

xiv