The Impact of Iranian Elite Migration on the Emergence of Historiography and Political Legitimacy of the Seljuks of Rum

Document Type : Original Article

Author

دانشگاه تهران

Abstract
The present study examines the role of the migration of Iranian elites and literati in the formation and development of historiography within the domain of the Seljuks of Anatolia. Despite the establishment of the Sultanate of Rum at the beginning of the seventh/fourteenth century AH/13th century CE, historiography in this region developed with some delay, and the earliest historical texts emerged under the direct influence of the Persian historiographical tradition. The central question of this research is to what extent this delay is related to the transfer of Iranian historiographical models by migrating scholars. Based on an analysis of primary sources and recent studies, the research demonstrates that Iranian literati—previously nurtured within the Persian literary and bureaucratic tradition—served in the Seljuk court of Anatolia as official writers, secretaries, and chroniclers, and through the transmission of Iranian legitimacy narratives and courtly historiographical models, they laid the foundations of the region’s historiography. Ultimately, the study concludes that the historiography of the Seljuks of Anatolia forms part of the broader legacy of Iranian written culture, and that examining it without considering the transregional scholarly and cultural networks of the Seljuk era would provide an incomplete picture of the political and identity developments of the period.

Keywords


Aḫbār-i Salāǧiqa-yi Rūm (bā Matn-i Kāmil-i Muḫtaṣar-i Salǧūqnāmah-yi Ibn Bībī va ba-inżimām-i Taʿlīqāt va Iżāfāt) (1350/1971-1972AD), edited by MuḥammadǦavād Maškūr, Tehran: Kitābfurūšī-yi Tehran.[in persian]
Āqsarāyī, Maḥmūd ibn Muḥammad (1943AD), Musāmarat al-Aḫbār va Musāyarat al-Aḫyār, edited and annotated by ʿUṯmān Turān, Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu.[in persian]  
ānat, ʿAlī-Akbar (1369/1990-1991AD), “Ibn Bībī”, Dāʾirat al-Maʿārif-i Buzurg-i Islāmī, under the supervision of Kāẓim Mūsavī Buǧnūrdī, Tehran: Intišārāt-i Dāʾirat al-Maʿārif-i Buzurg-i Islāmī, vol. 3.[in persian]
Ǧorfazqānī, Abū al-Šaraf Nāṣeḥ ibn Ẓafar (1345/1966-1967AD), Tarǧuma-yi Tārīḫ-i Yamīnī (ba-inżimām-i Ḫātima-yi Yamīnī yā Ḥavādis̱-i Ayyām), edited by Ǧaʿfar Šiʿār, Tehran: Bungāh-i Tarǧuma va Našr-i Kitāb.[in persian]
Ibn Aṯīr, Abū al-Ḥasan ʿAlī ibn Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Karīm Šaybānī Ǧazarī (1372/1993-1994AD), Tārīḫ-i Kāmil, translated by Sayyid Ḥasan Rūḥānī, Tehran: Asāṭīr.[in persian]
Ibn Bībī, al-Ḥusayn ibn Muḥammad ibn ʿAlī al-Ǧaʿfarī al-Ruġadī (1957AD), al-Awāmir al-ʿAlāʾīya fī al-Umūr al-ʿAlāʾīya, edited by Najātī Luġāl and ʿAdnān Ṣādiq Arzī, Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu, vol. 1. [in persian]
Iqbāl-i Āštiyānī, ʿAbbās (1389/2010-2011AD), Tārīḫ-i Muġul: az Ḥamla-yi Čangīz tā Taškīl-i Duvlat-i Tīmūrī, Tehran: Amīr Kabīr. [in persian]
Nīšābūrī, Ẓahīr al-Dīn (1332/1953-1954AD), Salǧūqnāmah, edited by Ismāʿīl Afšār, Tehran: Kalāla-yi Ḫāvar. [in persian]
Rāvandī, Muḥammad (1386/2007-2008AD), Rāḥat al-Ṣudūr va Āyat al-Surūr, edited by Muḥammad Iqbāl, Tehran: Asāṭīr. [in persian]
Rāzī, Naǧm al-Dīn (1382/2003-2004AD), Mirṣād al-ʿIbād, edited by Muḥammad Amīn Riyāḥī, Tehran: Intišārāt-i ʿIlmī va Farhangī. [in persian]
Riyāḥī, Muḥammad Amīn (1390/2011-2012AD), Zabān va Adab-i Fārsī dar Qalamrav-i ʿOs̱mānī, Tehran: Iṭṭilāʿāt. [in persian]
Ṣafā, Ẓabīḥullāh (1352/1973-1974AD), Tārīḫ-i Adabiyāt dar Īrān (az Avāyil-i Qarn-i Haftum tā Pāyān-i Qarn-i Haštum-i Hiǧrī), Tehran: Intišārāt-i Dānišgāh-i Tehran, vol. 3. [in persian]
Tārīḫ-i Āl-i Salǧūq dar Ānāṭūlī (1377/1998-1999AD), edited by Nādirah Ǧalālī, Tehran: Mīrās̱-i Maktūb. [in persian]
Zalǧīǧ, Aḥmad and Muḥammad Sūrī, “Šukrullāh-i Rūmī va Kitāb-i Ū Bahǧat al-Tavārīḫ”, Kuhannāma-yi Adab-i Pārsī, year 10, no. 1 (serial no. 28), spring and summer 1398/2019AD, pp. 201–222. [in persian]

  • Receive Date 14 February 2026
  • Revise Date 22 December 2025
  • Accept Date 30 May 2026