English-language description from Dīwān-i Qāʾimiyyāt
Ḥasan Maḥmūd Kātib (d. after 640/1243) was an Ismaili poet. Born near Qazvīn, he was alive when Imam Ḥasan of Alamūt (d. 561/1166) proclaimed his doctrine of qiyāmat or spiritual ‘resurrection’ in 559/1164. He was a secretary of the governor of the fortress of Gird Kūh, Shihāb al-Dīn, whom he later followed to Quhistān. Around 630/1232 he was in Alamūt, preparing a copy of the diwan whose surviving fragments are published here, to be offered to the Imam of the IsmailisAdherents of a branch of Shi’i Islam that considers Ismail, the eldest son of the Shi’i Imam Jaʿfar al-Ṣādiq (d. 765), as his successor. at the time, ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad (d. 653/1255). Ḥasan Maḥmūd was well-versed in the intellectual and spiritual universe of Nizārī Ismailism as recorded, inter alia, in Naṣīr al-Dīn Ṭūsī’s (d. 672/1274) Rawḍa-yi taslīm Sayr wa sulūk, and Āghāz wa anjām. The present diwan contains the most complete contemporary catalogue of the terminology used in expressing Nizārī Ismaili doctrine, surpassing even the works of Ṭūsī, Nāṣir Khusraw (d. after 462/1070) and Nizārī Quhistānī (d. 720/1320).
Contents translated into English (original in Tajik)
‘Qa’imiyyat’ and its Place in Persian Poetry and Literature, by Mohammad-Riza Shafiei Kadkani
Glossary, by Mohammad-Riza Shafiei Kadkani
Foreword by the editor
Foreword by the author
List of Diwan-i Qa’imiyyat’s First Volume of Qasidas
List of As-Soni fi-l-qaimiyyat’s Volumes
List of Qasidas and Rhymes arranged in Alphabetical Order of First Verses
The Text Diwan-i Qa’imiyyat
Indices