Fakhr Al-Din Asad Gurgani

Dates of birth and death unknown. Persian poet of the 11th century.

Gurgani lived in Gorgan in northeast Iran. He was the author of the poem “Vis and Ramin” (1048 or c. 1054), one of the first examples of the so-called romantic epos. The work was based on a no-longer-extant Parthian tale about the love of the empress Vis and the emperor’s brother, Ramin. It contains elements of satire regarding the mores of the feudal court. The poem has twice (in the 12th and 17th centuries) been translated into Georgian under the title of “Visrami-ani.” It has also been translated into Russian, English, and French.