Khushru Parviz and Shirin

Khushru Parviz and Shirin knew each other from a very young age, and had tender feelings for each other, though Shirin was not from a royal family. Their friendship abruptly ended when Khushru had to leave Iran, to contend with Behram Chobin and then flee to Rome. The two got separated from each other for a long time, but none was able to forget the other. Years after they were separated, once when king Khushru had gone hunting, he passed through the city where Shirin stayed. When Shirin came to know of this, she was overjoyed. She got all dressed up and stood on the balcony of her house. When she saw Khushru, tears of joy started rolling out of her eyes and she cried out to him, reminding him of their past love. When Khushru heard her voice he looked up, saw her and his eyes too welled up with tears of joy.

Khushru stopped his entourage, met Shirin, and then asked his soldier’s to escort Shirin to the Queen’s palace. After returning from the hunt, he went to see her at the Queen’s palace, and the old love was rekindled. They were soon married.

The elders of the court were not happy with this development. They advised the king that marriage of a royalty with ladies from other social or religious strata always resulted in tragedy. They gave the examples of Zohak and Alexander. They requested Khushru not to make Shirin a part of his Queen’s palace. However, Khushru assured his courtiers that Shirin was nobly born, but her family had become poor on account of the vicissitudes of time.

Khushru’s prominence increased. On account of peace in the kingdom, the king spent more time in the Queen’s palace. Since Maryam was the chief queen, Khushru spent more time with her, which made Shirin jealous, as she had to spend long and lonely years all alone. It seems that it must be during this time that she may have developed soft feeling for Farhad (see story below). After some time, Maryam passed away and then Shirin was made the chief of the Queen’s palace, which had twelve thousand young maidens in it.

Shirin and Farhad

A story about queen Shirin, not mentioned in the Shahnameh, but popularized by poet Nizami in local tradition, is about her love with Khushru and then Farhad’s love for Shirin.

In this story, Shirin, an Armenian princess falls in love with prince Khushru and Khushru with princess Shirin, even without seeing each other, on the basis of their descriptions. Both set out to meet the other, Khushru going to Armenia and Shirin visiting Madayan. However fatefully their paths keep crossing several times, and they are were not able to meet. Finally, Shirin went back to Armenia, and Khushru returned to Madayan on account of his father’s death.

Then Khushru, chased out by Behram Chobin, went to Armenia and met Shirin, but Shirin did not agree to marry him till he claimed back the throne from Behram Chobin. Khushru left Shirin in Armenia and went to Rome to seek the Caesar’s help. The Caesar agreed to assist him on the condition that he marry his daughter Maryam, and not marry anybody else as long as Maryam was alive. With the help of Maurice, Khushru regained his throne. Maryam came to know about Shirin and Khushru’s past relationship and tried her best to Khushru away from Shirin. But fate had other choices, King Khushru met Shirin, married her and brought her to the queen’s palace, but Maryam kept the king away from Shirin, who started living a very lonely life in the palace.

Meanwhile, a court sculptor named Farhad, who specialized in carving sculptures for the king’s gardens, befriended Shirin, and in some time fell in love with her. Shirin also started to like Farhad. When the king came to know of this, he decided to break their alliance in a subtle manner. He set Farhad a difficult task in a far off place. He sent him off to the Behistun (Bisutun) stone Mountain with the near impossible tasks of carving a pathway for water from one side of the mountain to another for a garden, and finally preparing a huge bas-relief on the outer face of the Bisutun Mountain.

Farhad left off for Bisutun. In the hope of reuniting with Shirin he began his tasks in great earnest and quickly completed the first two tasks. The king was amazed at his ability.  Farhad then started flattening the lower outer face of the Bisutun mountain, his third task, and was about to start reilefs on it.

When king Khushru, realized that Farhad was nearing completion of the third task and about to return, as he had almost finished the three tasks, he started thinking of ways and means to keep Farhad away from Shirin. A devious thought crossed the king’s mind and he sent a messenger to Farhad with the false news of Shirin’s death. Farhad was distraught on hearing this false news, and his desire to live in a world devoid of Shirin vanished. He threw himself from the mountaintop and gave up his life. A relieved Khushru then informed Shirin of Farhad’s death. Soon after this, Shirin too passed away.

Today this unfinished flattened face of the Bisutun Mountain still exists. It is two hundred metres wide and thirty metres high, and is referred to as “Farhad-Taraash.”