Qissa-i Sanjan

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The Story of Sanjan (also Qissa-i Sanjan or Kisse-i Sanjan) (Persian: قصه سنجان, Gujarati: કિસે સનજાન/કિસ્સા-એ-સંજાણ) is an account of the early years of Zoroastrian settlers on the Indian subcontinent that was originally written in 1599 CE by Parsi priest, Bahman Kaikobad.^[1] In the absence of alternatives, the text is generally accepted to be the only narrative of the events described therein, and many members of the Parsi community perceive the epic poem to be an accurate account of their ancestors.

The account begins in Greater Khorasan, and narrates the travel of the emigrants to Gujarat, on the west coast of present-day India. The first chapter, which is the longest, ends with the establishment of a Fire Temple at Sanjan (Gujarat), and the later dispersion of their descendants. In later chapters, the Qissa narrates the success in repelling foreign Invaders, then the failure in the same, and the subsequent flight of the Zoroastrians. The account closes with a chapter on the conveyance of the "Fire of the Warharan" to Navsari.

In its conclusion, the story is signed by a Parsi priest named Bahman Kaikobad (or 'Bahman Kaikobad Hamjiar Sanjana'^[2]). The date of authorship is recorded as 969 YZ (1599 CE, see Zoroastrian calendar) – several centuries after the described events are thought to have occurred. The account is in verse, in the highly verbose style common to Persian poetry.

The Kisseh-i Sanjan, as Abraham Anquetil-Duperron transliterated the name, became available to European scholarship in 1771, when Duperron published a French translation. However, it was not until the beginning of the 20th century that the poem attracted widespread attention, particularly among the Parsi-Zoroastrian priesthood.^[3]