and are completely in the dark about the special nature of their work.
All that we can postulate as established is that they wrote posterior to
Ibn Mukaffa. The latter is always mentioned in the first place. Muhammad
bin Jahm who is regularly cited next after him and bears the surname of
Bermaki, was a client of the Barmecides, who came to power a long while
after the death of Ibn Mukaffa. Ifc may be supposed that they all laid
under contribution the production of their celebrated predecessor. How
they individually set about their work, whether perhaps some of them
tapped non-Persian tradition; also, how far one or other of them
utilized the novels of which there were probably many in Pahlavi--this
we are no longer in a position to determine. Again this too remains a
mystery whence Tabari came by most of the accounts touching the
Persians, which are conspicuous by their absence in the anonymous Codex.
To clear this whole ground it would appear to be expedient in the first
place to set apart all that for which Ibn Mukaffa directly or indirectly
is responsible. This I have done in the footnotes but an advance is
possible in this direction. On the other hand, we must keep Ferdausi
steadily before our eyes. Whatever in Tabari and other Chroniclers does
not issue from Ibn Mukaffa and is not represented in Ferdausi likewise
merits special study.

[Sidenote: Direct Sources of Ferdausi.]

[Sidenote: The Persian prose Shahname was not derived from Arabic but
Pahlavi.]

A superficial reading of Firdausi would engender the view that he
obtained his material partly from Pahlavi books direct and partly from
the oral communication of competent renconteurs. That this is only a
deceptive illusion we conclude at once from his strong resemblance not