DESCRIPTION & PORTRAYING IN ALI-NAMEH EPIC POEM

Alinameh is a fifth century Persian epic poem about virtues and battles of Imam Ali(AS) composed by a poet named “rabi’”. Containing 2000 lines of verse, it is regarded the first epic poem of Twelver Shi’is and is very important in view of both antiquity of Shii epic history and also uniqueness in containing old Persian words and combinations unknownup to the present in Persian literary history. Alinameh gains high value in regards to epic expression, particularly in terms of epic description and portraying via related devices. Because these devices make various scenes in epic poetry more tangible and perceptible, they are regarded as a criterion for measuring the epic work qualitatively. In epic poem,descriptions and images are shown using special devices such as simile, metaphor, allegory, metonymy, and hyperbole (usually in epic poem, hyperbole is based on simile and figurative attribution). Study of the role of each one of these devices in epic poem has made critics and analysts of literary works busy from the ancient times.