Assessing the Validity of Saint Joseph's Manuscript in Correcting Ferdowsi's Shahnameh

Saint Joseph's manuscript is one of the most authoritative manuscripts of Shahnameh, to which researchers have paid special attention. Some scholars have evaluated a small part of it and tried to show its link with other manuscripts. However, no statistical analysis has been provided on the similarities and differences between this manuscript and the authentic versions of Shahnameh. The relationship of the mentioned manuscript with other manuscripts could be found by classifying it into a specific group of manuscripts. Accordingly, the following questions arise: which manuscripts of Shahnameh are related to this manuscript and to what extent are its importance and validity shown by them? To answer these questions in this research, some statistics were carried out on the similarities of the mentioned manuscript with the authentic manuscripts of Shahnameh. The results showed that this manuscript was close to the version of London (675 AH) from introduction to the kingdom of Lohrasp, but there was no close bond between the two from the reign of Lohrasp to the end of Shahnameh. Saint Joseph's manuscript was mostly related to those of Leningrad (733 AH) and Paris (844 AH), all of which could be classified into one group. This illustrated the possibility that they had been copied from the same original manuscript.