Italo Pizzi Quotes

Neither Serse, nor the others who came later, had the mind, the wisdom, the fortune of Darius.* They would like the Sassanids, with noble boldness, to restore the glory of the empire of Cyrus and Darius, but they could not so much. However, they noted the fallen national sentiment and reinvigorated it; they recalled in honor, as it was said, the village religion; they favored studies, founded schools, restrained the nobles, overbearing and greedy, and with them the ministers of worship, intolerant and fanatical, and even sometimes thought of the miserable disedeed plebs.

It belongs to the historian to say worthily of this great prince and to judge him in political and warrior, administrative and civil respect. It is enough for us to note how all antiquity praises it very high, not excluding the Greeks, as can be seen from the pages of Aeschylus and Herodotus.

We, long bred in the ideas of classical culture, because we know that the Greeks defeated the Persians at Marathon, at Thermopylae, at Salamis, we also aged ourselves to consider these people as a bunch of cowards taken to the slaughter by the ambition of a tyrant, while it is also known that they, in those battles, fought as va Herodotus himself makes it, with praise, beautiful and open testimony, nor, bear in mind that, they were all Persians or Iranians the soldiers that Darius and Xerxes were then with them; he was, on the other hand, an infinite bevy, ill-ordered, of distant and very different people. Alexander, it is true, took the kingdom from Dario Codomanno, but and Darius and his people, while yielding, yielded as valiant; and the Arabs who in the seventh century of our Era invaded Iran and destroyed the ancient empire in 650, certainly did not enter without a blow injuring the rich and glorious country, even if the kingdom was torn.

The Ancients [...] almost all made great praises of the Iranians. They praised his tall and beautiful person and his dignified and noble appearance. Herodotus certainly speaks of their decent and great bearing; Aeschylo notices their beautiful and thick skin; Diodorus is pleased to describe the manly beauty of some of them. The Arabs of the Middle Ages used to say that those who wish to have brave and soulful children must take a woman from Persia as a wife. And, after all, in all that strong predilection that the Iranians, according to the Greek and Roman writers, have always had for everything that is chivalrous, noble, elected, as are noble horses, noble dog suits, jurs and exercises in the gym and in hunting, sumptuous palaces and gardens, drapes, gems, perfumes, sumptuous ornaments The same sacred book attributed to Zoroaster, the 'Avesta', commands and orders every pious man to honestly enjoy life and his possessions, as long as he does not exceed anything, as a precious gift of the Creator. The same book proclaims sovereign art among all agriculture, and the Iranians have always been, and still are, of the most diligent and diligent farmers in Asia.

The '[Avestā|Avesta]]' is not an organic book, it is not the work of a single creative and thinking mind, yes well the collection of several works, indeed of fragments of several works that have been lost. It therefore, due to the varied nature of the parts that compose it, can interest the public and scholars in two distinct and different ways. It may interest the philosopher and the theologian as the sacred code of a religion already famous in antiquity; it may interest the historian, the literate, the poet, in that part of it that touches life and customs, the ideas of people lived in remote ages, and expresses, maxims in the poetic part, thoughts, affections, vows, aspirations.

It can be said that every elegy of Mimnermo is marked by the darkest pessimism. For him, what is life worth? It has value as long as the beautiful youth lasts, after which, ceases all enjoyment for the mortal. He undergoes old age, laborious at the will of the Gods, while a thousand and a thousand afflictions afflict man in his short earthly career.

[...] was peculiar Persian doctrine that of Sufism, a doctrine more philosophical than religious, more mystical than devout and believing, pantheistic, although in words he professed monotheism and used the terms of the Koran, atheistic and skeptical in substance, although he professed the most ardent and eviscerated divine And, really strange thing! This gloomy doctrine that longed for the annihilation of the individual being in the universal Being, assumed the most splendid and dazzling poetic form that makes the Persian lyric, even with many nonsense and fainting, an inimitable jewel!

With Yezdeghird the series of Persian monarchs closes, and the conquest of the Arabs marks the entering Iran of a new faith, a new law and new rulers.

Firdusi describes the miserable state of Iran under the scepter of Dahàk. Every guilt, every sad work, was lawful then, while every virtue was persecuted.

His reign began on a day when the sun entered Aries, and lasted thirty years. To him were submissive not only all the men, but also all the beasts of the campaign that paid homage to him.

The Book of Kings can be divided into two parts, one of which is all heroic and legendary, while the other is historical, wandering around the exploits of Iskender or Alexander the Great in the East and telling with many fairy tales the story of the Sassanids until the 651 of the V The first part begins with the first man and first king, Gayumers, and has as its main subject a centuries-old war of the Iranians with the Turani, peoples of North Asia, and with the Devi or demons, creatures of Ahrimane, that is, of the genius of evil. There is no doubt that under this name of Devi there is not a very ancient population that the Iranians found in the long run when they descended into Iran, and that they had to subdue and exterminate in part. But this war against the Devi and against the Turani in the eyes of the Iranians had a truly great meaning. It visibly represented on earth the great struggle between evil and good, between the creator, Ormuzd, and the enemy of all good, Ahrimane, in which all men, for a moral duty, are obliged to take part. As evil one can and must fight with pious and good works, so it can also fight with weapons, and the heroes of Iran, when they take the field against Devi and Turani, they do nothing but satisfy this moral obligation.

It does not have you in the world the richest country of Persia in heroic legends.

Ingenuously made pomp of their native beauty, and it is told of Aisha (she was shei of Muslim time, of the first however) who, reproached by her husband for not wearing a veil, replied: "God has marked me with the seal of beauty, and it 77].</ref>