Who Killed Siyavash? A Doomed Prince, a Modern Lesson
As U.S.-Iran relations deteriorate at an alarming rate, people who care deeply about both sides find ourselves looking in all directions for wisdom and solace. Strangely enough, I’ve found comfort in the tragic story of the doomed prince Siyavash in the Shahnameh, or Persian Book of Kings, by the great tenth-century author Abul-Qasem Ferdowsi. With its descriptions of overly ambitious rulers, long-held hostilities between countries, and pacts that are made only to be broken, the Siyavash tale speaks across the centuries to the events of today – a reminder that our worst faults and follies are nothing new.
Siyavash, as readers of the Shahnameh will remember, is a young man who has been raised outside of the court of his father, the foolish Iranian king Kavus. Handsome, talented, and morally incorruptible, he attracts the attention of all when he finally comes to court, including, unfortunately, that of his stepmother, Sudabeh. After working himself free of a rather uncomfortable and even life-threatening entanglement with her – one promoted, inadvertently, by his own ignorant father -- Siyavash responds gratefully to the news that Turan, Iran’s neighbor, and traditional enemy, has attacked its borders. He volunteers to defend his country, intending to remove himself from the sticky situation at court and at the same time to cover himself with military glory by defeating Afrasyab, Turan’s king.
The rest of the story does not go as one would expect. Instead of acting as a consummate villain and aggressor – a role readers have come to expect him to occupy -- Afrasyab, who has had a bad dream foretelling great destruction and his own death if he continues on the warpath, sues Siyavash for peace. Siyavash agrees upon the condition that Afrasyab surrenders 100 of his relatives as hostages. The king reluctantly accedes. Delighted to have made peace with Iran’s eternal enemy, Siyavash sends word of his feat to his father, but the brainless king reacts with anger. “Now is no time for you to fall for [Afrasyab’s] wiles,” Kavus scolds, suspecting, mistakenly, that his enemy is acting in bad faith. He insists that Siyavash send the hostages to him (where they will be undoubtedly killed) and re-launch an attack on Afrasyab. Siyavash cannot bring himself to obey his father and to break his promise to Afrasyab. Instead, he relinquishes his right to crown, throne, and country, and plans to wander in some distant place as an exile. He would rather be a nobody, a person without a country, than someone who has gone against a pact made before God.
Before he can set out on his journey, though, a seemingly better solution appears. At the urging of his ever-optimistic, peace-seeking adviser, Piran, Afrasyab offers to give Siyavash a home in Turan. Siyavash accepts and takes up life in a world that often seems a copy of the one he left behind. He plays polo, hunts, and establishes cities, just as he would have done as a prince in Iran. He is even semi-adopted by Afrasyab, who lavishes affection and wealth upon him and marries him to his daughter.
In time, however, Siyavash’s bad luck catches up with him. Afrasyab’s brother, Garsivaz, envies the young prince and plots to destroy his reputation with the king. Suspecting him of conniving with his father, Kavus, to take over Turan, Afrasyab has Siyavash brutally killed. Just as Afrasyab’s original dream had predicted, the Iranians then run roughshod over Turan in revenge for the young prince’s death, and blood flows freely.
But who, you find yourself asking at the end, is really at fault for Siyavash’s death and the ensuing bloodbath? Is it Afrasyab? Or Garsivaz? Or Sudabeh? Or is it Kavus, the foolish king who lacked faith in the pact made and thus forced his son into the arms of his enemy? “Who Killed Siyavash” is a game I sometimes play with my students when we read this story together, and the answers are often, “All of the above” – with Kavus bearing the brunt of the blame. Lack of trust, broken pacts, seeing one’s opponents as unworthy of truces – all lead to the murder of innocents, my students suggest. Today, we witness the same qualities in the warmongering exhibited by both the U.S. and Iran, with the same fate no doubt awaiting those who are caught in the middle.
As his country’s chronicler, Ferdowsi is Iran’s champion, but that does not mean he gives its unworthy actions a pass. Both sides are culpable in the war between Iran and Turan and in the death of the young prince. Kavus and Afrasyab both exhibit the overweening ambition, anger, and pride that are the hallmarks of bad leaders and that promote hostilities leading to tragedy. In fact, one of the most prominent themes in the story is the way the two kings reflect each other’s flaws, just as Siyavash and Piran, the Turanian adviser, mirror each other’s laudable desires to build a delicate peace. Ferdowsi, however subtly, does not allow his readers to preen themselves on Iran’s “rightness,” but rather forces them to bear witness to the country’s sins in refusing to see the humanity in Turan. No matter who you are, he implies, if you demonize your enemy, you risk turning into a monster. Words to live by.