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1ANALYZING MUINIDDIN NATANZI'S "MUNTAKHAB UT-TAVARIKHI MUINIY" USING TIMURID-PERIOD IMPORTANT SOURCES ON CENTRAL ASIA'S HISTORY
Gayratjon Ismatullo ogli Jumayev
Ph.D. student, Tashkent State University of Oriental Studies https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6742-587X https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.11100789
Abstract. In this article, we talked about one of the main sources describing the history of Emir Timur, the work of the historian Muiniddin Natanzi called "Muntakhab al-tawarikh-i Muini". The historian is from the village of Natanz in the Isfahan region of Iran, and according to Davlatshah Samarkandi's book "Tazkirat al-shuara" ("Tazkir of Poets"), Muiniddin Natanzi lived in the palace of Mirza Iskandar in Shiraz at the beginning of the 15th century, along with poets such as Haydar Khorezmi and Hafiz Khorezmi. He lived in Herat from 1414. Muiniddin Natanzi's work written in Persian called "Muntahab al-tawarikh-i Muini" ("History of Muini's election") has reached us. This work is dedicated to the history of Central Asia and several other countries from the earliest times to the death of Emir Timur. Manuscript copies of the work are kept in the libraries of England, France, Russia, and Iran. We also included details on the scientific investigation and the work's translations in the article.
Keywords: Muiniddin Natanzi, Emir Timur, Shahrukh Mirza, Ilkhanids, "Iskander Anonymous", Ghulam Karimi, Ahmet Ozturhan, Fatih Bostanci.
Introduction.
Muiniddin Natanzi's work entitled "Muntakhab al-tawarikh-i Muini" contains important information about Emir Temur's activities, military campaigns, and relations with the inhabitants of the territories occupied by Emir Timur, in particular, with the Turkoman. One of the main aspects that determine the place and importance of this work in the historiography of the Timurid period is that it was created independently from the first source, Nizamuddin Shami's "Zafarnama" written in 1404.
Although Muiniddin Natanzi was not in the service of Emir Timur, he served in the palace of Iskandar Mirza, the governor of the Fars region at that time, the grandson of Emir Timur, the son of Mirza Umar Shaikh.
The work "Muntakhab al-tawarikh-i Muini" was written by Natanzi in 1413 and was first dedicated to Sultan Iskandar ibn Mirza Umar Shaikh (1384-1415), the ruler of the Persian region. The work consists of an introduction and three chapters.
Natanzi wrote this work in the form of a general history. The chronological boundary includes the events from the creation of Adam to the death of Emir Timur.
As much as possible, Natanzi wrote the period in which Emir Timur lived. The historical events and their connections to Emir Timur and his lineage, the monarchs of Shabangara, Hormuz, Yazd, Kerman, and Luristan, the Golden Horde or the Jochi descendants, the Chigatai clan rulers, the Mongol khanate of Persia, including the Huleguid (Ilkhanid), Chobanids, Sultans of Jalayirid, the dynasty of Muzaffarid, Turkmen tribes, Iran, and the Ottoman Empire are all collected in this book.
The first information about the manuscript copies of "Muntahab al-Tawarikh-i Muini" appeared in scientific catalogs in the last quarter of the 19th century. In addition to the copy kept in the British Museum in England, two more manuscripts of the book existed in St. Petersburg.
Originally unknown as to authorship, manuscript copies of "Muntakhab al-Tawarikh-i Muini" were made known to European orientalists under the pseudonym "Anonymous Iskander" by V.V. Barthold. However, V.V. Barthold ascertained the original title and author of the work from the manuscript of the book that was stored in Paris.
The manuscript of "Muntakhab al-tawarikh-i Muini" kept in Paris, unlike other copies, is not dedicated to Mirza Iskandar, but to his uncle Shahrukh Mirza. On October 7, 1414, the writer penned a revised introduction for "Muntakhab al-tawarikh-i Muini" and gave it to Shahrukh Mirza upon his return to Herat from his western expedition. In the work, Natanzi mentions the name of Shahrukh Mirza with the following titles: "Muin al-dunya wa din (The support of the world and religion) Abulfath Shahrukh Bakhadur." In this way, both the name of the author and the title of the ruler to whom the work is dedicated are reflected in the title. Two more manuscript copies of "Muntahab al-tawarikh-i Muini" were found in the second half of the 20th century and are kept in the cities of Mashhad and Tehran in Iran. The manuscripts of the work kept in London, St. Petersburg, Mashhad, and Tehran belong to the first edition, and only the manuscript kept in Paris belongs to the second edition. The last parts of the work were prepared for publication by the French orientalist Jean Aubin based on the Paris and London manuscripts and published in Tehran in 1957 in the original, that is, in Persian.
Numerous researchers have taken an interest in the sections of "Muntakhab al-tavarikh-i Muini" that deal with the history of the Golden Horde, Chigatai ulus, local dynasties in Iran, and the state of Emir Timur. Scientists such as V.V. Barthold, L.A. Zimin, V.G. Tizenhausen, L.W. Stroyeva, B. D. Grekov and A. Yakubovsky, J. Oben, M. Abduraimov, D.V. Kastitadze, Yu.E. Bregel, G.A. Fyodorov-Davidov, A.Z. Dogan, J.E. Woods, B.F. Manz, B.A. Ahmedov, V.P. Yudin, T. Nagel, A.H. Ziya, and other scientists used this source's information in one way or another in their studies.
In the years of independence in Uzbekistan, this work of Muiniddin Natanzi was designated as a special research topic at the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Uzbekistan, and a large part of the chapters describing the events related to the history of Emir Timur were translated by Ghulom Karimi, a senior researcher at the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Uzbekistan, in 2006, it was published in two issues (the third and fourth issues) of the magazine "World Literature".
Ghulam Karimi translated the chapters of "Muntakhab al-Tawarikh-i Muini" concerning Emir Timur and the Timurid era into Uzbek, and the book was released in 2011. Ahmet Ozturhan, Ahmet Korkmaz, and Fatih Bostanci translated and published "Muntakhab al-Tawarikh-i Muini" in Turkish in 2023.
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