A Reading on the Woman in ShhNmé

ShhNmé has been a rather important source of cultural studies on women. This is so because on the one hand, women in ShhNmé are given an important and positive role to perform, and on the other hand ShhNmé manifests some pessimistic judgments about women. The aim of this writing is to look into ShhNmé and see what the desired status of woman was prevalent in the society at that time. Such aim also encompasses the researcher’s outlook, an outlook which is involved in today’s human rights regarding the woman. As far as this paper is concerned, (this paper is based on portions of a research on bearing the same subject), women in ShhNmé enjoys a status which can be considered better (higher) than what the spirit of the times had for her. Having said that, it is doubtful that female personifications in ShhNmé, that is, images that are political, reasonable, and power-seeking, can be viewed as pointing to an egalitarian situation to be existing in ancientIran. Such personifications tend to lend themselves more suitable for the aristocratic setting of the ‘events’, and for rendering the epic stories more attractive. Based on the above statements, although female models described in ShhNmé as being independent, bold, and wise, can support feminine ideals, similar to those portrayed by feminist narratives, yet this portrayal cannot be overstated because there are other female models in Ferdowsi’s work which differ more radically from the former.