The Analysis of Bayaze Khoshbooee Based on the Codicology and Textual Criticism

Today, critical analysis of texts is not anymore considered a technique for publishing and just reviving the old books, but it is actually a broad knowledge for understanding the nature of the texts, the critique of their sources and the textual evolution of their manuscripts, which is referred to as "textual criticism." This knowledge was originally used for ancient and holy books, and then from 18th century for classical literary works. New approaches to textual criticism are based on linguistic-stylistic researches.The linguistic and stylistic knowledge has the capacity of analyzing the text and providing remarkable results for the interpretation and criticism of the texts. It also presents new concepts of literary and non-literary texts. In traditional text studies, the emphasis was on philology, semantic and diversity of recording, but in modern text studies, text criticism shapes new approaches and provides different findings for analysis. In modern text studies, text is analyzed from two points of view: the inner view (linguistic and stylistic context) and the outer view (non-linguistic context, or situation).  Thus, textual criticism in the West, although beginning with scriptures for the analysis of the sources and textual variation of the content of these books, and their correction, in later centuries, deallt with literary, historical, and classical texts.This study investigates the text of Bayaze Khoshbooee through a textual criticism approach. This work has not been corrected and published. In this study, the features of the text was analyzed from phonetic-lexical, syntactic and rhetorical (or static) points of view.

A unique version of Bayaze Khoshbooee is kept at the Indian Diwan in London with the number 828. The work was written in ‘Nastaliq hand writing’ by Mohammad Azam on Sha'ban 6, 1109 AH. It has 183 pages with 11 lines in each page. In spite of the insignificant introduction, the author’s name is not included. Of course, considering the Hindu names, terms, and rhythms ​​used in the book, the author may originate from the Indian subcontinent. He has probably been a physician or druggist. The work belongs to the early period of Shah Jahan Gurkāni era in India. It had been a matter of knowledge for the Gurkāni nobles and courtiers.In the case of the criticism of the sources of the text, it should be noted that the sources of the author were mostly of two types: fixed sources, including the books and writings available to the author, and the non-fixed sources, with terms such as "mentioned by someone", "written by someone", and "narrated by someone".. In other words, the sources used by the author of Bayaze Khoshbooee were two types: specific text sources such as the books and handwritten texts, and unspecific sources which consisted of quotes, actions, and practices of experts. The author has recorded the data of sources indirectly and in his own words. Since Bayaze Khoshbooee is limited to only one manuscript, the method of text correction is a deductive correction method. Deductive correction that is revision and correction of incorrect recordings based on guessing and analogy in the distinguishing the correct recordings. The book’s table of content indicates that Bayāz  consists of seventeen chapters.

In this paper, the textual criticism of the text is explained in two levels: "inside of the text" and "outside of the text". In outside view of the text, three issues are surveyed: reviewing the text, criticizing of the sources of the work and the method of correction. Inside view of the text surveys the analysis of the text content and the linguistic-literary aspects of the text at three levels: lexical, syntactic and rhetoric.Linguistic and literary studies about Bayaze Khoshbooee also show that the text in its time was considered as a scientific-educational textbook that according to the writer's belonging to the ministerial environment of the Shahjahan era, in terms of the style of prose, it can be classified among the ministerial prose in the Gurkāni era. Regarding the lexis of the text, the frequency of mandating and medical lexicons are more than other terms. The use of some specialized terms about the professions and the words from Indian language also are among the lexical features of the work. The syntactic analysis of the text shows that regarding the deployment of sentence components, the text completely belongs to the norms of the formal Persian language of its time. At the rhetorical level, since the mentioned work is an educational text, not a narrative or an artistic, the existence of rhetorical elements in the text is few. Nevertheless, aesthetic implications particularly in the book introduction have been impressive. The book’s introductory part has an artificial and technical prose that has been conventional in the bureaucratic prose books. Through the chapters, the author used superior/excellent Morsal prose of the Indian Gurkāni era with the scientific and mandating literature.

In this essay, the attempt was to use an extracted of the text pattern in two levels of "within the text" and "out of the text" for textual criticism of a lesser-known text. According to this pattern, the text has been an anthology of essential knowledge with a dual approach, both educational and applied, for the nobles and courtiers of Gurkāni. Being single-version of the text is related to the genre of these works, which, because of the empirical and scientific aspects, were not usually written in any transcription identically, but with additions and annotation, they were converted to a new version. In terms of sources criticism, sources were written and verbal. Comparing a text with closely related texts and reasoning with a deductive approach is considered as the best text correction method. In terms of content, the text in its external form is a "scientific Bayāz": a kind of text that was essentially in the form of an empirical textbook, similar to a course pamphlet that turned into a book by developing a pupil into a scholar. But the bureaucratic aspect made it that Bayāz was only a subject sample pattern and orders, and setting out chapters does not have any similarity to a Bayāz, which is a large package of information. The book in its internal form has also been a big encyclopedia with educational content and a bureaucratic form.

In the linguistic-literary study of the text, it was concluded that despite the educational aspect, the author entered some aesthetic implications on the margin of educational implications. According to the predominant conventions, a technical and ornate prose was used in the book Introduction, whereas in the chapters, a superior Morsal (simple) prose have been used. The frequency of lexical terms (specifically, those related to medicine and the study of the human body) are higher than the other subjects.