اعتبار نسخۀ سن‌ژوزف در تصحیح شاهنامۀ فردوسی

نسخۀ سن‌ژوزف یکی از نسخه‌های معتبر شاهنامه است که شاهنامه‌پژوهان پس از چاپ نسخه‌برگردان آن در ایران، برای تصحیح بیت‌های شاهنامه به آن توجه ویژه‌ای نشان دادند. برخی پژوهشگران با بررسی بخش اندکی از این نسخه کوشیدند تا خویشاوندی آن و نسخه‌های دیگر شاهنامه را نشان دهند؛ اما تاکنون آماری از شباهت‌ها و تفاوت‌های این نسخه و نسخه‌های معتبر شاهنامه ارائه نشده است تا بتوان با توجه به نتایج این آمار، نسخۀ سن‌ژوزف را در گروه خاصی از نسخه‌ها طبقه‌بندی کرد و به تبار و خویشاوندی آن با نسخه‌های دیگر پی‌برد؛ ازاین‌رو این پرسش مطرح می‌شود که «نسخۀ سن‌ژوزف با کدام نسخه‌های شاهنامه خویشاوند است و با توجه به این خویشاوندی ارزش و اعتبار ضبط‌های این نسخه چقدر است؟». برای پاسخ به این پرسش‌ها با ارائۀ آماری از شباهت ضبط‌های این نسخه با نسخه‌های معتبر شاهنامه مشخص شد که نسخۀ سن‌ژوزف از مقدمه تا پادشاهی لهراسپ به نسخۀ لندن 675 ق. نزدیک است؛ هرچند میان آن دو خویشاوندی نزدیکی دیده نمی‌شود و از پادشاهی لهراسپ تا پایان شاهنامه، نسخۀ سن‌ژوزف خویشاوندی نزدیکی با نسخه‌های لنینگراد 733 ق. و پاریس 844 ق. دارد؛ به‌گونه‌ای که هر سه در یک گروه طبقه‌بندی می‌شوند و احتمال دارد آنها از روی یک مادرنسخه نوشته شده‌ باشند.

Assessing the Validity of Saint Joseph’s Manuscript in Correcting Ferdowsi’s Shahnameh

AbstractSaint Joseph’s manuscript is one of the most authoritative manuscripts of Shahnameh, to which researchers have paid special attention. Some scholars have evaluated a small part of it and tried to show its link with other manuscripts. However, no statistical analysis has been provided on the similarities and differences between this manuscript and the authentic versions of Shahnameh. The relationship of the mentioned manuscript with other manuscripts could be found by classifying it into a specific group of manuscripts. Accordingly, the following questions arise: which manuscripts of Shahnameh are related to this manuscript and to what extent are its importance and validity shown by them? To answer these questions in this research, some statistics were carried out on the similarities of the mentioned manuscript with the authentic manuscripts of Shahnameh. The results showed that this manuscript was close to the version of London (675 AH) from introduction to the kingdom of Lohrasp, but there was no close bond between the two from the reign of Lohrasp to the end of Shahnameh. Saint Joseph’s manuscript was mostly related to those of Leningrad (733 AH) and Paris (844 AH), all of which could be classified into one group. This illustrated the possibility that they had been copied from the same original manuscript.IntroductionIn 2005, Mousavi found a copy of Ferdowsi’s Shahnameh in the library known as Bibliothèque Orientale (Oriental Library) in Saint Joseph University in Beirut, which was later called Saint Joseph’s manuscript of Shahnameh. In the meantime, Mousavi and Khaleghi Motlagh wrote some articles to introduce and evaluate this manuscript and then prepared a facsimile edition for researchers with Afshar, Omidsalar, and Motalebi Kashani’s efforts. The importance of this manuscript was to the extent that Khaleghi Motlagh abandoned the other manuscripts at some instances in the 2nd edition of Shahnameh and picked only Saint Joseph’s manuscript as the accurate record of the original text. Even today, many scholars refer to this manuscript for making corrections to the verses of Shahnameh, some parts of which present the most accurate corrections of some of its verses.Nonetheless, its date of writing was unknown since some pages of Saint Joseph’s manuscript were not found. According to the evidence like the handwriting style used by the scribe, it could be estimated that it was probably written in the late 7th and early 8th centuries AH.Khaleghi Motlagh first evaluated this manuscript based on the photos of 22 pages of it (638 verses from the end of the reign of Zahhak to the beginning of the reign of Fereydun and 426 verses from the reign of Alexander). Then, according to the photos of 494 pages, he presented a more accurate analysis as he mentioned in the introduction of his facsimile edition of this book. He wrote that he had carefully read 336 pages from the beginning to the end of his third edition of the book and 60 pages related to the end of &The Kingdom of Khosrow I (Anushirvan)& as well as all the parts relevant to &Kingdom of Hormizd IV& throughout Saint Joseph’s manuscript. Finally, in an article, in addition to the previous content, he assessed the ancient combinations, Arabic words, dialect words, and some omissions and additions to this manuscript.However, despite all the efforts that have been made to introduce and evaluate this manuscript, the relationship between this manuscript and the authentic versions of Shahnameh has not been thoroughly researched yet, especially those used by Khaleghi Motlagh to illustrate the similarities and differences between this manuscript and other manuscripts and show its validity of correcting Shahnameh, apart from specifying the lineage of Saint Joseph’s manuscript.Materials MethodsIn the evaluation of Saint Joseph’s manuscript, Khaleghi Motlagh found no close relationship between this manuscript and those of Florence (614 AH) and London (675 AH). Following its reevaluation, he concluded that there was even no tight relationship between this manuscript and the other versions of Shahnameh. This manuscript was closer to those of London (675 AH) and Cairo (741 AH). The same view was stated by Aydenlou in his article entitled &Notes from Saint Joseph’s Shahnameh&. Nevertheless, an argument arose here stating that the scholars had extended the validity of one part to the whole text and assumed the same validity in all the stories without a thorough evaluation of all parts of Saint Joseph’s manuscript. It is while Khaleghi Motlagh in his first article on the evaluation of &Kingdom of Zahhak and Fereydun& and &Kingdom of Alexander&pointed out that no same validity of the manuscripts of Shahnameh had to be assumed throughout the book. Therefore, according to the conclusions of these two stories, Saint Joseph’s manuscripts covering all parts of Shahnameh could not be considered to have the same validity. For instance, comparing Saint Joseph’s manuscript with that of London (675 AH) in his review of the story of Alexander through 426 verses, Khaleghi Motlagh concluded that both were matched in 190 verses (nearly half of the content). Consequently, according to the drastic similarities between Saint Joseph’s manuscript and London (675 AH) manuscript from Alexander’s story until the end of Shahnameh, scholars had not reached the conclusion that they were matched in the second half of Shahnameh. Therefore, the present study was focused on the comparison between Saint Joseph’s manuscript and all the manuscripts used by Khaleghi Motlagh and attempted to find their relationships.Discussion of ResultsIn the first half of Shahnameh (from introduction to the end of the Great War of KayKhosrow), the scribe of Saint Joseph’s manuscript had used a reference manuscript containing only half of Shahnameh such as the version of Florence (614 AH) and that manuscript was close to those of London (675 AH), Cairo (741 AH), and London (891 AH). Moreover, &Manouchehr Kingdom&, &Nozar Kingdom&, &KayQobad Kingdom&, &Siavakhsh Story&, &KayKhosrow Widening&, &Twelve Faces&, and &The Great War of KayKhosrow& with 52, 56, 50, 54, 57, 47, and 42% similarities with Saint Joseph’s manuscript based on the Istanbul version (731 AH) were respectively accounted for in the first half, while the manuscripts of Leningrad (733 AH), Cairo (796 AH), Leiden (840 AH), Paris (844 AH), Oxford (852 AH), and Berlin (894 AH) were regarded as its subsets in the second half. The reason for such similarities was that the manuscript of Istanbul (731 AH) had some identical parts with those of London (675 AH), Cairo (741 AH), Vatican (848 AH), and London (891 AH) in the first half, but was different from those of Leningrad (733 AH), Leningrad (849 AH), Paris (844 AH), and Leiden (840 AH). Thus, in the first half, Saint Joseph’s manuscript was not to be classified in the second group of Khaleghi Motlagh’s classification, including the manuscripts of Istanbul (731 AH), Leningrad (733 AH), Cairo (796 AH), Leiden (840 AH), Paris (844 AH), Oxford (852 AH), and Berlin (894 AH), particularly the group of Shirazi manuscripts of Shahnameh.In the second part of Saint Joseph’s manuscript from the reign of Lohrasp until the end of the reign of Yazdegerd III, the scribe was found to be transcribed from a source, which was probably the original transcript of Shirazi manuscripts, including the main group of manuscripts of Istanbul (731 AH), Leningrad (733 AH), and Ghavam AlDin Hassan Wazir (741) and subgroup manuscripts of Paris (844 AH), Cairo (796 AH), and Leningrad (849 AH).