Today is Sunday; 7th of the Iranian month of Mehr 1398 solar hijri; corresponding to 29th of the Islamic month of Muharram 1441 lunar hijri; and September 29, 2019, of the Christian Gregorian Calendar.

2541 solar years ago, on this day in 522 BC, a few months after the suspicious death of Emperor Cambyses II (son of Cyrus the Great) his lance-bearer and Achaemenian kinsman, who had seized power and styled himself Emperor Darius I, killed what he has claimed in the Bistoun Inscription: "Gaumata the Magian Priest impersonating Bardiya, the younger son of Emperor Cyrus the Great." Darius, to justify his seizure of the Iranian throne, further claimed that Cambyses on becoming king of Persia and before setting out for Egypt, had killed Bardiya and kept this secret – but he never says how he came to know of this secret. According to historians, on his deathbed Cyrus had appointed Bardiya as satrap (governor) of some far-eastern provinces, and they are thus skeptical of Darius' account, since following the death of Cambyses none of the women in the royal harem had doubts about the identity of Bardiya. The only speculation is that if Darius I – who now married Atossa the daughter of Cyrus to legitimize his rule – is telling the truth, Gaumata may have completely brought Bardiya under his control, thereby threatening to usurp the rule of the Achaemenians.  

1380 lunar years ago, on this day in 61 AH, 19 days after the heartrending tragedy of Karbala and the martyrdom of Imam Husain (AS), the captive children and womenfolk of the Household of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA), along with the heads of martyrs, mounted on spear-points, were brought to Damascus, the capital of the Godless Yazid, the self-styled caliph of the Omayyad regime. The noble captives were made to stand at the city gates without any shade, until the bazaars and streets of Damascus were decorated to mock at the Prophet’s family.

812 solar years ago, on this day in 1207 AD, the famous Persian poet and mystic, Jalal od-Din Mohammad Balkhi Rumi, was born to Iranian parents in the village of Wakhsh, near Balkh in Khorasan. Wakhsh is now in Tajikistan while Balkh is in Afghanistan. It is said that the most important influences upon the young boy, besides his scholarly father, Baha od-Din Walad, who was connected to the spiritual lineage of Gnostic, Najm od-Din Kubra, were the Persian poets Attar Naishapuri and Sana’i Ghaznavi. He was hardly ten years when the family had to flee Khorasan towards Iraq because of the barbaric Mongol invasion. After a sojourn in Baghdad and travel to the holy cities of Mecca and Medina, followed by a brief residence in Damascus, he settled in Qonya in Anatolia which was under the Persianate Seljuq Sultanate of Rum, and hence his title Rumi. He produced his famous work “Mathnawi” here and died in 1273 AD at the age of 67. He was buried in Qonya (Konya) and his tomb is a place of pilgrimage for Sufis. Iranians, Turks, Afghans, Tajiks, and other Central Asians as well as Muslims of the Indo-Pakistan Subcontinent have greatly appreciated his spiritual legacy. His poems have been translated into many languages. In 2007 Rumi was described as the "most popular poet in the US.” His “Mathnawi” remains one of the literary glories of the Persian language. His poetry influenced Persian literature as well as Urdu, Punjabi, Turkish, Pashto, Chagatai language and Sindhi languages. Rumi in his poems has paid homage to the unsurpassed merits of Imam Ali (AS, the cousin, son-in-law and divinely-decreed heir of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA).

538 lunar years ago, on this day in 903 AH, the Iranian historian, Mohammad bin Khwandshah, popularly known as Mirkhwand, passed away in Herat, which was then part of Khorasan and is now in present day Afghanistan. He was from a well-known Seyyed family of Bukhara that traced its descent to Prophet Mohammad (SAWA). Spending most of his life in Herat in the court of the last Timurid sultan, Hussain Bayqarah, Mirkhwand enjoyed the patronage of the renowned minister, Ali Shir Nava’i, a celebrated writer and poet himself. At the request of his patron, he wrote the general history titled "Rowzat os-Safa" (Garden of Purity). The work is composed of seven large volumes and a geographic appendix, sometimes considered an 8th volume. The history begins with the pre-Islamic Persian kings and surveys the major Muslim rulers of Iran up to his times. Mirkhwand’s maternal grandson, the historian Khwandamir, wrote a sequel to it, and in the 19th century the Iranian scholar Reza Qoli Khan Hedayat wrote a supplement to this work. Mirkhwand is often criticized for his highly embellished and bombastic style and for his uncritical approach to the sources, but his history preserves sections from earlier works that have since been lost. Volumes 5 and 6 are particularly reliable, for they utilize the abundant historiographical materials of the Mongol and Timurid periods and furnish independent information on events contemporary or near contemporary to the author’s lifetime.

472 solar years ago, on this day in 1547 AD, Spanish author and novelist,   Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, was born near Madrid. His magnum opus is “Don Quixote”, considered to be the first modern European novel. His influence on the Spanish language has been so great that the language is often called “la lengua de Cervantes” (the language of Cervantes). “Don Quixote” has been regarded chiefly as a novel of purpose. He wrote it to satirize the chivalric romance and to challenge the popularity of a form of literature that had been a favorite of the general public for more than a century. Cervantes enlisted as a soldier in a Spanish Navy infantry regiment and continued and was captured by Algerian-Ottoman naval forces. After 5 years of captivity he was released by his captors. He died in 1616 in his hometown.

261 solar years ago, on this day in 1758 AD, Horatio Nelson, British naval commander who defeated the French and their allies on numerous occasions during Napoleonic Wars, was born in Burnham Thorpe, Norfolk. Noted for his superb grasp of strategy and unconventional tactics, he was wounded several times in combat, losing one arm in the unsuccessful attempt to conquer Santa Cruz de Tenerife and the sight in one eye in Corsica. He was shot and killed during his final victory at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805. A morally-loose person, Nelson openly lived an adulterous life despite the denunciations of his father, who was a priest.

118 solar years ago, on this day in 1901 AD, the Italian physicist, Enrico Fermi, was born in Rome. He discovered the law on movement of gas molecules. He also conducted research on atomic changes of elements and succeeded in making an atomic battery through fission for release of atomic energy. He died in 1954.

117 solar years ago, on this day in 1902 AD, French journalist, author, and playwright, Emile Zola, died in Paris at the age of 62 as a result of inhaling carbon monoxide. He was the most well-known practitioner of the literary school of naturalism and an important contributor to the development of theatrical naturalism. He was a major figure in the political liberalization of France and in the exoneration of the falsely accused and convicted army officer Alfred Dreyfus.

108 solar years ago, on this day in 1911 AD, Italy declared war on the tottering Ottoman Empire. The war lasted till October 18, 1912, and as a result, Italy captured the North African Ottoman provinces of Tripolitania, Fezzan, Cyrenaica, and Tripoli itself. It changed the name of the land to Libya. During the conflict, Italian forces also occupied the Dodecanese islands in the Aegean Sea. Italy imposed the Treaty of Ouchy (known as the First Treaty of Lausanne (1912) signed in Switzerland), forcing the Ottomans to renounce all claims to these islands. The Ottomans had to withdraw all their military forces and administrative agents from Libya according to the treaty. Although minor, the war was a significant precursor of the World War I as it sparked nationalism in the Balkan states. Seeing how easily the Italians had defeated the weakened Ottomans, members of the Balkan League attacked the Ottoman Empire. The Italo-Turkish War saw numerous technological changes, notably the airplane. On October 23, 1911, an Italian pilot, Captain Carlo Piazza, flew over Turkish lines on the world's first aerial reconnaissance mission, and on November 1, the first ever aerial bomb was dropped by Sottotenente Giulio Gavotti, on Turkish troops in Libya, from an Etrich Taube aircraft. The Turks, lacking anti-aircraft weapons, were the first to shoot down an aeroplane by rifle fire.

106 solar years ago, on this day in 1913, German engineer Rudolf Christian Karl Diesel who invented the internal-combustion engine that bears his name, died at the age of 55. After studying the four-stroke internal combustion engines developed by Nikolaus Otto, he conceived of an engine that would approach the thermodynamic limit established by Sadi Carnot in 1824. If the fuel in a cylinder could be expanded at constant pressure, it could get closer to Carnot's limit. Diesel patented the concept in 1892, while working at the firm of the refrigeration engineer Carl von Linde in Berlin. After boarding an English Channel steamer, he was found dead in the sea. It was most likely suicide resulting from depression, after having lost control over his invention and after scathing criticism in the German engineering journals for his theories

101 solar years ago, on this day in 1918 AD, during the last months of World War I, the Battle of St. Quentin Canal resulted in the victory of the Allied Powers, and breach of the solid Hindenburg Line of defence of the German-led Axis Powers.

81 lunar years ago, on this day in 1360 AH, Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Hojjat Kuh-Kamarei, passed away. A product of the seminary of holy Najaf in Iraq, on his return home, he was active in the northwestern parts of Iran. He groomed many scholars, including his son, Seyyed Mohammad Hojjat Kuh-Kamarei, who was a Marja’ or Source of Emulation of his times.

38 solar years ago, on this day in 1981 AD, Hojjat ol-Islam Seyyed Abdul-Karim Hasheminejad was martyred by the MKO terrorists in the holy city of Mashhad at the age of 48. A student of such prominent scholars as Grand Ayatollah Seyyed Hussain Boroujerdi and the Father of Islamic Revolution, Imam Khomeini (RA), because of his opposition to the Shah's despotic regime he was incarcerated and tortured by Pahlavi agents on several occasions. Following the overthrow of the regime, he played an effective role in public affairs. Among the works he authored are: "Hazrat Zahra (SA)", and "The School of Thought of Resistance".

38 solar years ago, on this day in 1981 AD, several high-ranking commanders of the Islamic Republic of Iran's Armed Forces were martyred in a plane crash while returning from the “Samen al-Ai’mma” operations that broke the siege of Abadan and pushed back the invading Ba’thist forces. Among the 80 martyrs were Minister of Defence Musa Namju, Commander of the Ground Forces Valiollah Fallahi, Air Force Commander Colonel Javad Fakouri, IRGC Deputy Commander Yusuf Kolahdouz, and IRGC’s Mohammad Ali Jahan Aara. On hearing of this incident Imam Khomeini (RA) paid tributes to the martyrs and referred to them as “Commanders of Islam”.

27 solar years ago, on this day in 1992 AD, Angola in southern Africa held its first free elections, resulting in victory for Jose Eduardo dos Santos of MEPLA, who retained his post of president, which he had won in 1976, a year after independence from Portuguese colonial rule. Following withdrawal of Portugal in 1975, civil war broke out between MEPLA, supported by the Soviet Union and Cuba, and UNITA, backed up by the US and the apartheid regime of South Africa, often leading to invasions by white racist troops. Due to US meddling, even after the 1992 elections and signing of a peace accord, clashes continued. The 27-year long civil war came to its end in February 2002 with the death of UNITA leader, Jonos Savimbi.

24 solar years ago, on this day in 1995 AD, the jurisprudent, Ayatollah Mohammad Hassan Safi Isfahani, passed away at the 76. After studies in his hometown Isfahan, and later at the seminary in holy Qom, he left for Iraq for higher studies at the famous seminary of holy Najaf, where his teachers included Grand Ayatollah Seyyed Mohsin Hakim and Grand Ayatollah Seyyed Abu’l-Qassim Khoie. He returned to Iran at the age of 50 and became head of the Isfahan seminary. He wrote manyl books, including “Comparative Study of Islamic Economy with Socialist and Capitalist Economies”.

12 solar years ago, on this day in 2007 AD, Iran's parliament voted to designate the CIA and the US Army as terrorist outfits, in response to a US Senate resolution seeking a similar designation for the Islamic Revolution’s Guards Corps (IRGC).

6 solar years ago, on this day in 2013 AD, a kangaroo court set up by the repressive Aal-e Khalifa minority regime of the Persian Gulf island state of Bahrain handed jail terms of up to 15 years to 50 Shi’a Muslim citizens, including a prominent Iraqi religious scholar. 

AS/SS