Abai and Firdowsi

Abstract

Abay Qunanbaev (Qunanbaiuli) was the founder and architect of Kazakh written literature. Since his childhood, he studied religious science and got acquainted with eastern literature, particularly Iranian classic literature and Persian poetry and poets such as Ferdowsi, Hafiz, Sa’adi, Molavi, Nezami and etc.Abay read epic poetry and odes from the great eastern poets on their original texts or Jugatay (old language of central Asia) translations and first raised prosody derived from Persian poetry in Kazakh poetry and this way many Persian vocabulary entered Kazakh language.Using a bibliographic method, the author in current research studies this Kazakh poet’s works from valid and reliable resources. Regarding the special attention paid by this poet to the existing concepts in Persian poetry, particularly those of Ferdowsi, we have attempted to express some of their similarities.