Page:From Constantinople to the home of Omar Khayyam.djvu/482

 292 RUINED TUS, THE HOME OF THE POET FIRDAUSI

more strongly on account of the excellence of the sources quoted, and because of the persistent local belief that the grave is within the walls, as well as the fact that there is no sign of a tomb found outside the Rizan Gate.^

After we had ridden out of the Rizan Gate, we found an old man named Mullah Muhammad, who told us that he could point out the spot inside the walls where Firdausi's grave was located. Following his lead, we rode along the northern wall to a point not quite half a mile east of the Ark, and then passed once more within the ramparts to a spot two hundred yards dis- tant from the wall, and about six hundred yards east of the Citadel. There the old man pointed out the place which he said marked Firdausi's grave. A low wall enclosed a rough square, perhaps ten or fifteen yards in each direction; and near the middle of it the old man indicated the spot which he claimed was the grave. The whole ground was cluttered with bricks, and among them were some blue tiles; but there was nothing to denote that Persia's greatest epic poet had been buried there. Our aged guide added, however, that some twenty years pre- viously, a Governor of Khurasan, named Asaf ad-Daulah Shirazi, had started to build on the site a tomb worthy of Firdausi's memory; but as he was afterwards deprived of his office, the building was never finished.

Although wishing to believe that the spot thus indicated represents the real site of Firdausi's final resting-place, I do not hesitate to say that our friend Sykes wrote me a letter a year afterwards, saying he had learned later that the location of the spot was said to have been due to the dream of a Said. Still such dreams, especially when they come at a moment opportune to a governor's wish, are apt to be based upon some sort of tra- dition, or one not likely to be out of harmony with the general local view on the subject.^ It was the desire of Cochran and

1 This latter point is noticed also by burial-place of Firdausi was within Major Sykes, JRAS. 1910, p. 1120. the town walls, the location of the

2 Although fully convinced that the precise spot may be open to question.

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