What question did this study set out to answer?

The aim is to analyze the Seven Sages of Rome narrative through the lens of the Forty Viziers, highlighting its global variances.

January 23, 2026Open Access

The Forty Veziers as Part of the Global Narrative of The Seven Sages of Rome

Key Points

The aim is to analyze the Seven Sages of Rome narrative through the lens of the Forty Viziers, highlighting its global variances.
Examined literature on the Forty Viziers and the Seven Sages of Rome
Compared Eastern and Western versions of the narrative
Critically analyzed the transmission and structure of the narrative
Identified the flexibility of the Seven Sages narrative structure
Highlighted the entanglement of Eastern and Western literary traditions
Proposed a reevaluation of the distinctions between versions as limiting

Abstract

Using the Ottoman Forty Viziers as a starting point, this article discusses the basic structure of the Seven Sages of Rome narrative and its extensive flexibility that has not yet been fully appreciated and explored. Research has been dominated by a distinction between ‘Eastern’ and ‘Western’ versions, and differentiating between such versions has been the basic approach to the Seven Sages material. In this respect, the transmission of the Seven Sages needs to be re-evaluated from the ground up, specifically through its varieties. I consider this is an especially promising approach to the question as to how global literature might best be understood—not universal and identical, but entangled and variable.

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