A Splash of Persian Literature
FAMOUS POET
OMAR KHAYYAM, a Persian poet, mathematician, and astronomer, was born at Nishapur, in Khorasan, about A.D. 1050 and died about 1125. Khayyam means “the Tent-maker,†and it is probable that Omar maintained himself by the craft until the sun of fortune rose for him. He was in youth a pupil of the most famous philosopher of Khorasan; he and two of his fellow-students entered into a compact that if either of them rose to fortune he should share it with the others. Nizam-ul-mulk, one of the three, became in time Vizier of the mighty Alp Arslan, and his successor, Malek, son and grandson of Togrul Beg, the Tartar founder of the Seljouk dynasty. He devoted himself to study, especially of astronomy, and when vizier undertook to reform the confused Mohammedan calendar, Omar was one of those to whom the work was confided. The result of their labors is thus described by Gibbon; “The reign of Malek was illustrated by the Gelalaan era; and all errors, whether past or future, were corrected by a computation of time which surpasses the Julian and approaches the accuracy of the Gregorian style.â€
