Tarikhnama

Tarikh-i Bal'ami (Persian: تاریخ بلعمی‎, lit. '"History of Balami"') or Tārīkhnāma (تاریخنامه, "Book of History") is a translation of al-Tabari's History of the Prophets and Kings into Persian language by Muhammad Bal'ami, the Samanid vizier. Bal'ami started translating the book on 352 AH (963 CE).

Tarikh-i Bal'ami is one of the oldest extant prose books in the Persian language and it has significant linguistic importance. Arabic loanwords in this book are rare, the writing style of the book is very simple and it doesn't contain unfamiliar and poetic words. Like Middle Persian, the sentences are short, and the author tried to avoid using Arabic loanwords whenever possible.

Various manuscripts of this book are today available in the libraries of Iran, India, Turkey and Europe, but none of them are complete and error-free. The oldest surviving manuscript seems to be from 7th century AH.

The book was translated into Persian language at the order of Mansur ibn Nuh, the Samanid amir. The book provides invaluable information about the Sasanian Persia and mythical history of Iran.[1] Generally considered merely an abridged version of Tabari's work, A. C. S. Peacock demonstrated that Balami reshaped Tabari's work considerably, and that the differences between the two works are such that the Tārīkhnāma is essentially a new work.[2]