A Comparative Study of Supernatural Beings in Qazvini's  Ajāyeb al-Maxlūqāt and Fozuni Astarabadi's  Bohaira'

A great part of wondrous books (‘Ajāyeb Nāmeh) describes functions and features of beings such as Divs, Qouls, Jins, devils and monsters. These monsters create a wonderful fantasy for the books and lead the audience to the generic tradition. The authors have known the audience of such books and their needs, so they have tried to make an amazing wonderful world by mythic and folk elements. On the other hand, a lot of narratives in these kinds of books found their way in popular culture again; therefore many beliefs, idioms, proverbs, adages and folk anecdotes were rooted in them.The fantastic imagination is vague and very limited in the first generations of such books, but in later versions the complex imaginary themes about supernatural being’s life and functions have formed; then a kind of “fantastic literature” was created gradually. One of the oldest as well as most famous Persian wondrous books (‘Ajāyeb Nāmeh) is ‘Ajāyeb al-Maxlūqāt o γarāyeb al-Mojoudāt written by Mohammad Zakaria Qazvini in 12th century, and one the latest one of such books written by Mir Mahmoud Fozouni Astarabadi in 17th century named Bohaira.