The Relation between History and Epic in Iranian National Epic

As both epic and history express some stories of the past، their existing similarities and dissimilarities and their relation have attracted the attention of scholars. These two kinds of stories have been so similar that previous experts could not distinguish the historical events from epics. In Shāhnāme، as an excellent sample which Iranians consider as their pre-Islamic history until the last Qajar، the line between historical events and epic cannot be drawn. Finding the roots of many of Iranian national epic stories in Avesta and observing their contradictions to the works of foreign authors، inscriptions and archaeological findings، aroused many serious questions about the existing relation between epic and history in the field of Iranian studies. This essay is generally studying the relationship between epic-history and its ratio to Iranian national epic specifically.