Majmu'a-yi athar-i Husam al-Din-i Khu?i

In every age and culture, royal courts have always attracted a multitude of scholars, artists and other folk seeking patronage and protection. In the Islamic world, one of these courts was that of the emirs of the Saljuqs of Rum in Kastamonu in northern Anatolia. In the year 680/1282, Qutb al-Din Shirazi (d. 709-1309), a student of Nasir al-Din Tusi (d. 672/1274) who lived in Anatolia for years, dedicated his Ikhtiyarat to the emir of Kastamonu, Muzaffar al-Din Yavlaq Arslan (d. 691/1292). This same Muzaffar also had a secretary in his service by the name of Husam al-Din Khu?i (alive in 709/1309-10), a refugee from Khuy near Tabriz in Iran. Husam al-Din is the author of a number of works, six of which are published here for the very first time: four manuals on the art of the secretary, one Arabic-Persian glossary for use at the chancellery, and finally a collection of his poetry.