The purpose of this paper is to examine the rules for writing letters and the extent these rules were carried out at the end of the Timurid era, through considering the contents and composition of the guidebook for writing letters, Makhzan al-Inshā’, composed by Ḥusayn Wāʻiz-i Kāshifī (d. 1504/05) in Herat.
In Makhzan al-Inshā’, there are two types of letters based on the difference in social rank between addresser and addressee : 1） those addressed to people of higher rank, 2） those addressed to people of comparable rank. Moreover, letters initiating a correspondence are divided into twelve elements. Kāshifī comments on every element, then includes phrases and verses suitable for each element in tabular form.
We can recognize from investigating the rules concerning the opening of letters that while Kāshifī refers to new trends in writing, he always gives priority to traditional rules over new ones. When we reconstruct the openings of letters, which rulers should send to other rulers, based on the examples in Makhzan al-Inshā’, it is clear that the optative sentence form is used in 1） letters addressed to those of higher rank, and the salutation form is used in 2） letters addressed to those of comparable rank. On the other hand, the 14th-century letter-writing guidebooks had only one or the other type of letter opening.
Furthermore, both optative and salutatory opening forms can be seen in collections of model letters and in existing letters of the Timurid era. When we look at the relationship between addresser and addressee, and the contents of these letters, we find that when the addresser and the addresee were of comparable rank, the salutation form was generally used. On the other hand, if the addresser wanted to show more respect than usual to an addresse of comparable rank or the letter was to someone of different ranks, the optative form was uesd.
It can be concluded from this study that Makhzan al-Inshā’ is a work which integrates various and contradictory elements of Persian letter-writing tradition, and that the rules defined in this work were observed in letters written at that time.
