User:LouisAragon/sandbox/Ahmad Ghaffari Qazvini

https://referenceworks.brillonline.com/entries/encyclopaedia-of-islam-2/ghaffari-SIM_2441?s.num=8

https://iranicaonline.org/articles/ghaffari-qazvini

Ahmad Ghaffari Qazvini (died 1568) was a Persian historian of 16th-century Safavid Iran. He authored the Tarikh-e Negarestan, a Persian world history compiled as an educational text for Tahmasp I and other Safavid royals on lessons of history.

Backgroundy
Ghaffari was born in Qazvin to a family originally from Saveh. They descended from the Shafi'i jurist Najm al-Din Abd al-Ghaffar Qazvini (died 1266), the writer of the much used al-Ḥāwi al-ṣaḡir fi’l-foruʿ, a book on Shafi'i jurisprudence. He obtained his nesbat through his paternal grandfather Abd-al-Ghaffar, who had been army judge (qāżi-e moʿaskar) under the Aq Qoyunlu. The assertion of the historian John E. Woods who claimed that the family's nesbat was actually Ghefari, suggesting that they claimed descent from Abu Dharr Ghefari, a companion of the Islamic prophet Mohammad, is dismissed.

Biography
Ghaffari started his career under Safavid Shah Tahmasp I. He proved to be very talented as a court scribe, and at some point went working under Tahmasp I's younger brother Prince Sam Mirza. Under his patron Sam Mirza, Ghaffari authored the Tarikh-e Negarestan, which he dedicated to Tahmasp I.

During Tahmasp I's later reign, Ghaffari went on pilgrimage (Hajj) to the Hejaz. After completing pilgrimage, he intended to move to the Mughal Empire. He departed from the Hejaz in 1568, but died in the port of Debal (near modern-day Karachi, Pakistan) in the Mughal province Sindh while on his way to Agra.

Works
The Tarikh-e Negarestan' (also spelled "Nigaristan") is an unversial history which Ghaffari finished writing in September 1552. It consists of over six hundred historical anecdotes meant to underscore the administrative skills and military feats of many kings, military conquerors, prophets and high-ranking bureaucrats. The work concludes with an anecdote narrating the capture and execution of the Timurid prince Abu Sa'id by Aq Qoyunlu leader Uzun Hasan on 5 February 1469. In short; the work is organized into a preface, the over six hundred historical anecdotes and stories, as well as a short epilogue. In the epilogue, Ghaffari laudes Tahmasp I as "precursor of the Hidden Imam", thereby connecting the Safavid Shah to the prophecy of the Qoran wherein is stated that "the earth will be inherited by My righteous servants".

Ghaffari authored the work as an educational text for Tahmasp I and other Safavid royals on lessons of history. In the praface