Ancient Iran through the Lens of Culture; A Reflection on the Why and How of Cultural Review of History in the Historiography of Abu Rayhan Biruni (422 A.H)

Abstract

The view of Abu Rayhan Biruni toward the history of Ancient Iran is of cultural-critical feature due to his reviewing the pure political and authoritative approaches. Such an insight is the consequence of some important element including the development of Iranism discourse in this era and the methodological distinctions in the historical view of Abu Rayhan Biruni. The present research is to analyze and explain these multidimensional features in the account by Abu Rayhan Biruni pertaining to the history of Ancient Iran. The results of research illustrate that the cultural approach of Abu Rayhan toward the ancient history of Iran includes both the mythological and historical aspects away from any bias and it merely Challenges the political and authoritative approaches in the Iranian-Islamic system of historiography. Finally, it is an opening toward reviewing this span of time in Iran and this issue is regarded as one of the elements consciously or unconsciously effective on the Iranian identity

Keywords

• abu rayhan biruni
• ancient iran
• iranian historiography
• islamic historiography
• historical view