Slaves in Persian Poetry Investigation of Allegorical Tales about Slaves from Sanai to Qasim Anwar

The slaves had an undeniable role among the different social classes regardless of sex, race and color. In this respect the significant presence of Zangi slaves is remarkable. At first, they were only slaves and they had a very hard living and social life. Gradually, they achieved an intellectual and social status with their presence in other communities.They confirmedtheirpresence in the mind and language of the Farsi speakers and entered Persian poetry and poetic allegories. The proof of this claim is the various allegorical tales and proverbs that are based onthe life of slave characters. In this article the importance of the presence of slaves and the structure of lexical-grammaticalaspects of the term slave are discussed and then their race andorigin, sociallife and their entry into the politicalarena are considered. The socio-political presence of the slaves led to their presenceinthefieldofpoetry. The pleasantandunpleasanteffects of the presence of the slaves in Persian poetry have been analyzed and then the numerous evidencesinpoetry have been noted. In the main part of this article, allegorical anecdotes aboutslaveshave been investigated to show various effects of their physical and mentalcharacteristics. Some of theseanecdotes have traditional background,but some others have escaped traditionand, therefore, give a differentimage ofthe slaves.