So, I used to have a 14th century Ilkhanid Mongol persona (Mongol-dominated Persia). Ever since I found out about yarliks (decrees, usually granting authority) of Golden Horde Russia (the qatuns even issued them, not just the qans), I have badly wanted to do an SCA award scroll in the style of a yarlik. I was fortunate enough to see one in the State Historical Museum in Moscow three years ago, and I have some blurry pictures to remind me. Fortunately, it’s all text. Here’s the best picture I have:
Yarlik of Timur-Kutluga Qan (it’s sideways)
The label said, approximately, “Yarlik of the qans of the Golden Horde, which confirmed the rights
of Russian princes to rule(?)” (I’m not sure about the last word; need to look it up). It dates to 1397 C.E.
And here’s a picture from Wikipedia of an Ilkhanid Quran.
Both documents seem to have the alternate scripts going on. At first I thought they might be different languages, but after reading the Wikipedia entry on Islamic calligraphy, I think it’s actually Kufic for the main text, with cursive Naskh (similar to the modern Arabic script I learned in college).
So then the question becomes what language the yarlik is in (or what language yarliks were commonly written in). There is all but nothing online about yarliks, so I’m going to have to get a stack of books out of the library again and hit the journals. I’m not sure any of the sources I looked at a few years ago said much about either language or style.
There are three possibilities:
-Arabic (unlikely)
-A Mongolian language (most likely)
-Russian (possible, since yarliks were often given to grant authority to Russian nobles, but unlikely)
So, stuff I need to do:
1. Find out what language yarliks were typically in (let’s assume Mongol for now).
2. Find out the style of Golden Horde yarliks.
3. Write an alternate SCA award text in that style.
4. Get it approved.
5. Find someone to translate said text into Mongol.
6. Transliterate said text phonetically into Arabic (ideally, I’d like to find period rules for this, but I’m not holding my breath on the likelihood of that).
7. Learn to write Kufic.
8. Brush up on Naskh.
9. Wait for someone with a Mongol persona who’s into authenticity to be up for an award.
10. Make scroll.
…good thing this is a long-term goal.
But oh, it would be SO FREAKING AWESOME, ‘cos I don’t think anyone’s ever done this in the SCA before. There have been Persian scrolls and Russian scrolls and Chinese-style Mongol scrolls (three that I know of), but I’ve never heard of anyone doing a yarlik in Arabic script before.
(So in other news, I decided to take up bobbin lace, calligraphy, and illumination. Right now I’m playing with Ottonian, because I heart Carolingian miniscule.)
