EDEB (Pers. and Ar. Adab), pen name of the Kurdish poet ʿAbd-Allāh Beg b. Aḥmad Beg Bābāmīrī Miṣbāḥ-al-Dīwān (b. Armanī Bolāḡī, a village northeast of Būkān in western Azerbaijan, 1277/1860, d. ca. 1297 Š./1918). He was born into a family of landed nobility that traced its descent from the local Mukrī rulers and educated first at the local mosque and then in Tehran, though he returned home after only a year. Edeb led a life of leisure, traveling and engaging in music, painting, and poetry. He was an associate of the crown prince Moḥammad ʿAlī Mīrzā, who gave him the title Miṣbāḥ-al-Dīwān. In his mid-30s Edeb began to suffer from an illness that led gradually to total paralysis and death (Afḵamī, 426).
Edeb’s poems, mostly lyrics, follow the canons of classical Persian and Kurdish poetry in prosody, symbolism, imagery, and diction. Love, the predominant theme, is often treated in erotic and even sexually explicit language (e.g., the poem Döšew šewî šemme … Last night, Saturday night …”). His choice of the Kurdish language is indicative of national awareness, but his published poetry, unlike that of Ḥājī Qādirī Koyī (1240-1315/1824-97) or Abu’l-Ḥasan Sayf-al-Qożµāt (1293-1364/1876-1944), does not reflect explicit commitment to Kurdish nationalist aspirations of the period.
Edeb’s work has been little studied. The proscription on publication in the Kurdish language in Persia under the Pahlavis was a serious impediment to the collection and publication of Kurdish literature in general. Nevertheless, a few editions of his works have been printed: Dīwānī Edeb (ed. Ḥ. Ḥuznī, Rawāndiz (Ravāndūz), 1936; Dīwanī šāʿirī benāwbāng Miṣbāḥ-al-Dīwān (ed. B. Mušīr, Baghdad, 1939); Dīwānī Edeb, ed. G. Mukrīānī (Arbil, 1966; repr. Mahābād, n.d.).
Bibliography:
E. Afḵamī, Tārīḵ-e farhang o adab-e Mokrīān I, Saqqez, 1364 Š./1985, pp. 415-31.
M. Khaznadar, Ocherk istorii sovremennoĭ Kurdskoĭ literatury (A study in the history of contemporary Kurdish literature), Moscow, 1967, pp. 91-93.
Idem, ʿAbd-Allāh Bagī Miṣbāḥ, Baghdad, 1970.
B.-M. Rūḥānī, Tārīḵ-e mašāhīr-e Kord II, Tehran, 1366 Š./1987, pp. 123-24
. ʿA. Sajjādī, Mēžūy edebī Kurdī, 2nd. ed., Baghdad, pp. 437-56.[1]