Pembroke opens Centre for Persian Studies after £1.2 million donation
The donation means that the College’s “phenomenal tradition” of Oriental and Persian studies can continue. Pembroke alumnus E.G. Browne was famously one of the first Western scholars to publish works on Persia, even having a street named after him in Tehran.
The centre will acquire an extensive library of books and publications on Persian literature and culture.
The Shahnama Centre is a development of The Shahnama Project, founded by Professor Charles Melville in 1999. It has an online database of illustrated manuscripts of the Shahnama, Book of Kings.
Speakers included professors and students involved in Persian Studies at Cambridge, such as Dr Abdullaeva, Dr Olga Davidson, Professor Touraj Daryaee and Dr Sussan Babaie. The speakers held high hopes for the future of Persian studies at Cambridge University.
The event, based in Pembroke’s Old Library, included an exhibition of Medieval and Contemporary art based on the concept of the Shahnama, an epic poem written by 11th-century author Firdausi, and the longest poem ever written.