This is a manuscript copy of the poems 'Gulistan' and 'Bostan' by the Persian
poet Sa'di and dates from 1201 A.H. / 1786 A.D (Persian MS 29). The manuscript
comprises 120 leaves sized 9 x 6 inches. The verses of the 'Gulistan' (Persian
for 'Garden of Roses') are written in Nasta'liq script in double columns
of thirteen lines to a page within panels marked out by a double border
of gold and black while the text of the 'Bostan' (Persian for 'Fruit Garden')
is written diagonally in the margins around these in the same very clear
hand. The manuscript also contains a number of painted miniatures and is
bound in vellum boards tooled in gold. 
Sa'di was born sometime between 1194 and 1218 A.D. in Shiraz and he became
an orphan at an early age. He studied in Baghdad, where he met Suhrawardi,
an Iranian philosopher and a major Sufi figure. Having had to flee Baghdad
because of the Mongol threat, he travelled extensively throughout central
Asia and India, then through Mecca to Yemen and Ethiopia. He was captured
by the Franks in Syria and forced to carry out hard labour until he was
ransomed. Sa'di then went to North Africa and Anatolia, before returning
to his native Shiraz in 1256. His 'Gulistan', written in rhyming prose,
is his most popular work, and proved deeply influential both in the East
and the West. His 'Bostan', composed in mathnawi (rhyming couplets), is
a didactic text dealing with ethical issues. Sa'di also wrote many qasidas
(a form of poetry, a panegyric, often written in praise of a person or thing)
in Persian and Arabic, satires and ghazal (love poems with a spiritual undercurrent).
Sa'di's tomb in Shiraz remains a shrine.
