Charles Melville is Professor Emeritus of Persian History at the University of Cambridge, UK, President of the British Institute of Persian Studies and Director of the Shahnama Project, at Pembroke College, Cambridge. He is the author and editor of numerous books and articles on the history of Iran, including Every Inch a King, The Mongols’ Middle East and Persian Historiography (I.B.Tauris).

• List of illustrationsAcknowledgementsIntroductionCharles Melville, University of Cambridge, UKArbiters of Iran: Chroniclers and Patrons in an Age of Literary Bounty Shahzad Bashir, Stanford University, USAThe Local and Universal in Turko-Iranian IdeologyBeatrice Forbes Manz, Tufts University, USAAn Idea of Iran on Mongol Foundations: Territory, Dynasties and Tabriz as Royal City (Seventeenth/thirteenth to Ninth/fifteenth CenturyDaniel Zakrzewski, Philips University Marburg, GermanyTwo Later Ninth/fifteenth-Century Iranian TravellersJohn E. Woods, University of Chicago, USAImitational Poetry as Pious Hermeneutics? Jami and Fani’s Rewriting of Hafez’s Opening GhazalMarc Toutant, Centre National de la Research Scientifique, FranceA Man of Letters: Hoseyn Va‘ez Kashefi and his Persian ProjectMaria Subtelny, University of Toronto, CanadaThe Timurid Book: golshan-e naqsh-o tazhib – A Garden of Painting and IlluminationEleanor SimsFrom Maragha to Samarqand and Beyond: Revisiting a Quartet of Scientific Traditions in Greater Persia (ca. 1300s–1500s)Elaheh Kheirandish, Harvard, USAIndex

Charles Melville is Professor Emeritus of Persian History at the University of Cambridge, UK, President of the British Institute of Persian Studies and Director of the Shahnama Project, at Pembroke College, Cambridge. He is the author and editor of numerous books and articles on the history of Iran, including Every Inch a King, The Mongols’ Middle East and Persian Historiography (I.B.Tauris).

• List of illustrationsAcknowledgementsIntroductionCharles Melville, University of Cambridge, UKArbiters of Iran: Chroniclers and Patrons in an Age of Literary Bounty Shahzad Bashir, Stanford University, USAThe Local and Universal in Turko-Iranian IdeologyBeatrice Forbes Manz, Tufts University, USAAn Idea of Iran on Mongol Foundations: Territory, Dynasties and Tabriz as Royal City (Seventeenth/thirteenth to Ninth/fifteenth CenturyDaniel Zakrzewski, Philips University Marburg, GermanyTwo Later Ninth/fifteenth-Century Iranian TravellersJohn E. Woods, University of Chicago, USAImitational Poetry as Pious Hermeneutics? Jami and Fani’s Rewriting of Hafez’s Opening GhazalMarc Toutant, Centre National de la Research Scientifique, FranceA Man of Letters: Hoseyn Va‘ez Kashefi and his Persian ProjectMaria Subtelny, University of Toronto, CanadaThe Timurid Book: golshan-e naqsh-o tazhib – A Garden of Painting and IlluminationEleanor SimsFrom Maragha to Samarqand and Beyond: Revisiting a Quartet of Scientific Traditions in Greater Persia (ca. 1300s–1500s)Elaheh Kheirandish, Harvard, USAIndex