NE NEWS SERVICE
AMSTERDAM, JAN 18
A stolen 15th-century book by the famed Persian poet Hafez has been recovered by a Dutch art detective after an international “race against time” that drew the alleged interest of Iran’s secret service.
The gold-leafed volume worth around one million euros ($1.1 million) was found to be missing from the collection of an Iranian antiques dealer after his death in Germany in 2007. It sparked a decade-long search for one of the oldest surviving copies of the “Divan of Hafez” – the collected works of the poet who remains extremely popular in Iran and has inspired artists worldwide. But Arthur Brand, dubbed the “Indiana Jones of the Art World” for tracing a series of lost works, finally tracked down the tome via the murky stolen arts underworld. “This is a hugely important find for me, because this is such an important book,” Brand said.
Along with Rumi, Hafez — full name Shams al-Din Muhammad Hafiz Shirazi — is one of the best known mystical bards. American essayist Ralph Waldo Emerson called him the “Prince of Persian poets”.
Hafez’s Divan can still be found in most Iranian homes where it is traditionally read out during family celebrations for the Persian New Year.
The theft of the manuscript, which dates from 1462 to 1463, was discovered by the family of book dealer Djafar Ghazy after he died in an old people’s home in Munich in 2007. While going through Ghazy’s computer, they realised the reclusive pensioner had in fact collected hundreds of ancient manuscripts — but that they were all gone.
In 2011 German police recovered 174 of them raiding the home of another Iranian pensioner who had befriended Ghazy. “But the most important piece, one of the earliest and most accurate copies of the famous ‘Divan of Hafez’, was still missing,” said Brand. Courtesy: AFP
