3155 



FIRDAUsf 



Fin-whale. 



Stranded specimen of rorqual, Balaenoptera 

 musculus 



rorqual (B. musculus) is often met 

 with in the English and Irish 

 Channels and is frequently cast 

 up on the coasts. Sibbald's rorqual 

 (B. Sibbaldi) is the largest of all 

 whales, often exceeding 80 ft. in 

 length. It is abundant in the 

 North Sea, and occurs occasionally 

 around the Hebrides. Rudolphi's 

 rorqual (B. borealis) is much 

 smaller, and during recent years 

 has been found around the E. and 

 S.E. coasts of England. The lesser 

 rorqual (B. rostrata) is about 30 ft. 

 in length, and is fairly common 

 around all the British coasts. See 

 Whale. 



Fiord (Scand.). Type of inlet 

 found on the coasts of regions which 

 have been greatly glaciated. During 

 the ice age great glaciers scooped 

 out deep trough-like valleys with 

 precipitous sides, and the disap- 

 pearance of the glaciers admitted 

 the sea. A fiord is usually very deep 

 except near the entrance, and in 

 some cases subsidence of the land 

 has added to its size. Fiord coasts 

 are found in British Columbia, 

 Scotland, and Norway. 



Fir. Cone-bearing tree of the 

 natural order Coniferae, and genera 

 Abies, Picea, and Pinus. A native 

 of Britain, N. Europe, N. America. 

 Japan, and the Himalayas, its 

 height varies from 10 ft. to 200 ft. 

 In gardens firs are best grown as 

 specimen trees on lawns, where 



their beauty can 

 be fully appreci- 

 ated. They thrive 

 in any deep, rich 

 loam, may be 

 planted in autumn 

 or spring, and are 

 propagated by 

 seeds sown in a 

 cold frame in 

 spring. Much con- 

 fusion in nomen- 

 clature exists 

 among these coni- 

 fers, but it is now 

 generally accepted 

 that the true fir 

 means Abies, the 

 silver fir. The genus Picea embraces 

 the spruces, and Pinus the pines. 

 Their cultivation in large quanti- 

 ties for timber is a branch of 

 forestry (q.v.). See illus. p. 1287. 

 Firbolg. Legendary name of an 

 early Irish race, usually said to 

 mean bag-men. Some ethnologists 

 employ it to denote the aboriginal 



on Joseph and Potiphar's wife. 

 The first-named work, in 60,000 

 couplets, was commissioned by 

 Mahmud, sultan of Ghazni, who 

 promised 60,000 gold pieces as a 

 reward. Firdausi, however, excited 

 the enmity of Mahmud's vizier, 

 and when, at the end of his task, 

 which occupied him for 30 years, 

 the vizier sent him pieces of silver 

 instead of gold, the indignant poet 

 divided the money between the 

 keeper of a bath, a sherbet seller, 

 and the vizier's messenger, penned 

 a flaming satire on Mahmud, and, 

 after spending the remainder of his 

 life a proscribed man, died at Tus. 

 According to legend, as his body 

 was being borne to the grave, a 

 messenger laden with 60,000 gold 

 dinars from Mahmud arrived, and, 

 as Firdausi's daughter refused the 

 money, it was spent on some much- 

 needed public buildings in Tus. 



The Shah-Nameh, which has 

 been described as the Iliad of Per- 

 sia, is characterised by its Persian 

 vocabulary, the simplicity of its 

 style, its high qualities of inven- 

 tion, its original transcripts from 

 nature, its patriotism, its dramatic 

 dialogues, and its reflection of the 

 author's Zoroastrian faith. Battles, 

 combats, feasts, scenes of riot, and 

 carnage alternate with pictures of 

 innocence and peace. Much is 

 taken up with the wars of Persians 

 and Tartars, and one of the central 

 characters is Rustum, the Persian 

 Hercules, who unwittingly kills his 

 own son, an episode familiar to 

 modern readers in Matthew Ar- 

 nold's poem, Sohrab and Rustum. 



Bibliography. Poems of F., Eng. 

 trans, by J. Champion, 1785 ; Shah- 

 Nameh, trans, and abridged, J. 

 Atkinson, 1832, new ed. 1892 ; Sooh- 



Fir. 



Foliage of silver fir, Abies 

 pectinata * 



people, mainly 

 composedof dark- 

 h aired, long- 

 headed non- 

 Aryan Iberians, 

 whoweresubdued 

 by the Milesians, 

 a wave of Goi- 

 delic Celts that 

 may have crossed 

 from Great Brit- 

 ain. /See Milesian. 

 Firdausi o R 

 FERDUSI (c. 940- 

 1020). Pen-name 



of Abu-'l Kasim Mansur, Persian 

 poet, called the Homer of the East. 

 He was born at Schadab, near Tus, 

 Khorassan, son of a small land- 

 owner. Carefully educated and an 

 apt scholar, he is famous as the 

 author of the Shah-Nameh, or Book 

 of Kings, a metrical history of 

 Persia from early times to A.D. 

 641; and Yusuf u Zulikha, a poem 



Fiord. View in the Naero Fiord, Norway; above, typical 

 cliff-walls of a fiord 



rab, a free trans., J. ACTcinson, 2nd 

 ed. 1828; Episodes from the Shah- 

 Nameh, trans, into English verse, 

 S. Weston, 1815 ; Biographical No- 

 tices of Persian Poets, Gore Ouseley, 

 1846 ; Shah-Nameh, the orig. text, 

 with French trans, in prose, J. Mohl, 

 1876-78 ; The Epic of Kings, H. 

 Zimmern, 1886 ; Literary History 

 of Persia, E. G. Browne, 1902-6; 

 Yusuf and Zalikha, ed. H.Eth<, 1908. 



