Firdausi (or Firdusi or Firdawsi or Ferdausi or Ferdowsi) (c. 935-1020)

A page from a 16th-century Persian copy of Firdausi's epic, the Shahnama. When read aloud, the original text, written nearly a millennium ago, is still intelligible to an educated speaker of Farsi (Persian), although it contains only a small element of Arabic vocabulary.

Persian poet. He was the author of the Persian national epic Shahnama/Book of Kings, a long poem of about 60,000 couplets, incorporating some lines completed by the earlier poet Daqiqi.

Firdausi's epic relates the legendary history of Persia from its beginnings to the Arab conquest in the 7th century. It was dedicated in its final form around 1010 to Sultan Mahmud of Ghazna, with whom Firdausi then fell out over the payment. The poet fled from Ghazna to the court of a rival ruler, where he proceeded to satirize Mahmud.