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Comment by mdani | Hacker News Reader

wow, this is amazing. Reading Qazwini's Padshahnama.

Even though I am a full time engineer like most others here, I had an interest in history so I learned to read Nastaliq hand written script and basics of Persian grammar online (had no knowledge of Farsi when I started). A lot of collections are now online so the first-hand sources are much more accessible now.

I still have issues deciphering the full meaning or reading an old hand which is beyond my basic skills. Anyone willing to help or know a good book/site that will help me in deciphering these old manuscripts (Persian or Arabic)?

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You should be able to use a site like ganjoor.net, which contains most classical Persian texts, in Persian only, but in modern type (as opposed to simply being a picture of an ancient or modern manuscript page). We've made heavy use of these sites over many years and been very happy. Errors seem to be extremely rare. Keep in mind though, that there will almost certainly be differences, often major, between whatever manuscript you are looking at and whatever modern edition is the one that's been typed into ganjoor.net (or another similar site). For another approach, there are academic texts to help you learn to read old handwritten scripts. As for deciphering the full meaning (bearing in mind that there may be many layers of meaning and lots of puns and other wordplay), that just takes a whole lot of work. We (my partner in reading for 13 years and I) just start at the beginning of a work (say, Nezami's Khosrow and Shirin) and take it line by line, using dictionaries, grammars (though we pretty much have all the grammar down now), and translations. We use the footnotes, too, in the back of the contemporary editions in Persian. We get the Persian books from Persian on-line bookstores, most of which seem to be in LA. Congratulations for getting as far as you have on your own. Amazing!

That is a great site.

Also see: http://www.sufism.ir/MysticalBooks.php

English translations are here: http://www.sufism.ir/MysticalBooks(11)-en.php

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