Arash the Archer in the Old Preamble to the Shahnameh

One of the controversial discussions about the Shahnameh is about the absence of the story of Arash the Archer in it. A number of scholars are of the opinion that this story did exist in Abu Mansur’s prose Shahnameh but Firdawsi intentionally did not turn it into verse. The reason some of them put forward in support of their argument is the spurious presence of an expression in the first edition of the Preamble of the Abu Mansuri’ Shahnameh. In the second edition the phrase “dastbord-e Arash” (the appropriation by Arash) has replaced “dast-e baradarash” (his brother’s hand) used in the first edition. It is this new recording that has become the basis of some scholars’ argument for the presence of the story of Arash in the Shahnameh. However, the Allameh Qazvini is suspicious about the recording of “dastbord-e Arash”. Moreover, this recording, based on the most important rule in critical redaction that the more difficult recording is more reliable, has little validity. Therefore, the more difficult recording, namely “dast-e baradarash” of which “dastbord-e Arash” appears to be the distorted form, is of greater credit and can well be related to the ensuing sentence, as confirmed by the reasons stated in the article.