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Sayyid Ja’far ibn Hasan Ja’fari; Tarikh I Yazd,

(The History of Yazd) (about1450)

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Taken from: Memory on the Boundaries of Empire: Narrating Place in the Early Modern Local Historiography of Yazd  by Derek J. Mancini-Lander.

 

This earliest of the three histories of Yazd opens with the statement that the entire world brought tribute to the court of Darab. Then, Jafari simply reports that Phillip of Macedon had died and Iskandar had taken possession of the principalities. He then commences his account of the conflict between Iskandar and Dara. Iskandar refuses to pay tribute to Dara and Dara sends a Russian army against him. When this one is beaten Dara orders an army of Zanzibar against Iskandar…… (Because of these wars Yazd will eventually be founded).


When the army of Rus had turned to Iskandar, Iskandar brought out his own army to meet the King of Rus and a great battle occurred. The army of Rus was routed and much booty fell into the hands of the Rumiyan (1). When news of this reached Darab (2), he commanded that he army of Zangbar (Zanzibar) turn in war upon Iskandar, reduce Rum to ruins, and send Iskandar to him in chains. When the army of Zangbar turned its attention to Rum, Iskandar came out to greet them with his army, made war, and made them flee in defeat. When Darab became aware of this, he turned his attention to making war on Iskandar with four hundred thousand riders, under his own command. Iskandar too came out personally with his army to welcome the army of Darab. The two armies had come together in the vicinity of Hamadan (3)…….

(1) Rumiyan: the once from Rome.

(2) Darab: father of Alexander the Great (in this and many other epic story).

(3) Hamadan: Iran's ancient capital.