Gird yourself, for your purpose cuts ahead, sharp and sure—
let no scattering or change unnerve you. (1)
Should the realm of Sāsān’s sons slip from their grasp,
know that Time ever turns through violent, shifting phases. (2)
More than once they reached a station
whose onslaught made even crouching lions quail. (3)
Among them stood the cry-raising hero Bahrām and his brothers,
Hormuzān, Shāpūr—yes, Shāpūr again. (4)
People are but half-siblings through different mothers;
let them suspect decline, and respect is gone, affection abandoned. (5)
Many a blazing midday, fierce as a horned beast,
their revels silenced the very reed-pipes. (6)
They are children of one mother; when they scent war’s flame,
by the Unseen it is preserved for them and victory assured. (7)
Good and evil are coupled in the same yoke:
follow the good, and beware the evil. (8)
He said:
When ʿAbd al-Masīḥ arrived before Khusrau, he related what Satīḥ had told him. Khusrau remarked, “Before fourteen kings of ours have sat the throne, many events will unfold.” Ten of them reigned within four years, and the remainder ruled until the caliphate of ʿUthmān—may Allah be pleased with him.
Al-Bayhaqī (9) recorded this report as well, through the chain of ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Muḥammad ibn Idrīs from ʿAlī ibn Ḥarb al-Mawṣilī, with a similar wording.
(1) Some manuscripts read: “madi al-hamm wa la yufarrighuka tashreed wa ta‘zeer.” (Manal al-Talib, 1:134)
(2) “Afartahum” derives from the verb afaraṭa al-rajul al-qawm, meaning “to advance ahead of people and leave them behind,” here implying the loss of sovereignty. “Dahr daharir” means “intense,” analogous to the phrase layla layla’ (“a night of nights”). (Manal al-Talib, 1:142)
(3) “Mahasir” is the plural of mahsar; al-hasr denotes bending something toward oneself and shattering it—i.e., they will crush all they capture. (Manal al-Talib, 1:143) A variant reading appears as tuhāb ṣawtuhum (“their sound is feared”). (Mukhtasar Tārīkh Ibn Asakir by Ibn Manzur, 8:302)
(4) “Al-sarh” refers to a palace or any lofty edifice. Bahram, Harmzan, and Shapur are names of their kings. (Manal al-Talib, 1:143)
(5) “Awlad al-allat” denotes brothers sharing a father but born of different mothers. “Aqalla” means “to become impoverished” or “to have little,” and al-mahqur is “the humiliated, cast down.” (Manal al-Talib, 1:143)
(6) In manuscript H the couplet reads:
“Wa rabb qawmin lahum siḥban dhi udhn … badat tulhuhum fīhi al-mazāmīr.”
In manuscript T it appears as tulhīhum, and most printed editions have maṣḥafan. The present text follows the recension in Tārīkh Ibn Asakir, where it appears with two other verses and omits the word lahum. “Yawm dhihyan” means “free” or “unbound,” and “dhihyan,” applied to anything, denotes what is fully exposed to the sun (i.e., at dawn). “Dhū arn” means “energetic.” (Lisan al-lugha, s.v. dhihya, arn)
(7) “Nashb” signifies wealth. The particle “imma” here is superfluous, understood as “and they (the maternal uncles) when they see.” A variant reading has lammā an ra’aw with a fatḥa on an. (Manal al-Talib, 1:134)
(8) “Qarn” is the rope used to tie two camels together. (Manal al-Talib, 1:143)
(9) Also recorded in:
• Dalā’il al-Nubuwwa (1:126–129)
• al-Ṭabarī, Tarikh al-Rusul wa’l-Mulūk (2:166–168)
• Abū Nu‘aym, Dalā’il al-Nubuwwa (pp. 41–42)
• Ibn ʿAsakir, Mukhtaṣar Tārīkh Ibn Asakir (8:300–302)
• al-Suhaylī, al-Rawḍ al-Anf (1:19)
• Ibn al-Athīr, Manal al-Talib (1:132–134)
• al-Azhari, Tahdhīb al-Lughah (4:276)
• Ibn Manẓūr, Lisān al-ʿArab (s.v.)
• Ibn Sayyid al-Nās, ʿUyūn al-Athar (1:28–29)
• Ibn Hishām, al-Sīra (1:15)
• And in Majma‘ …