Idrīs Bidlīsī’s Prefatory Poem to Hašt Bihišt VI: Editio Princeps and Translation

A historian of Kurdish origin, Idrīs Bidlīsī (1457-1520), is undoubtedly one of the most important intellectuals in the Ottoman-Iranian borderland in the late-fifteenth and early-sixteenth centuries. Although his Persian and Arabic works have been the focus of long-standing historical debates, there are as yet few proper, in-depth textual and critical editions. This is particularly true regarding Bidlīsī’s Persian history of the first eight Ottoman sultans called Hašt Bihišt (The Eight Paradises) and especially its unpublished Book VI. This paper provides an editio princeps of Bidlīsī’s Arabic prefatory poem to Book VI and its English translation.