Fereydun Vahman

Fellow, 2003, 2004, 2013

Fereydun Vahman is Professor Emeritus at Copenhagen University with more than forty years of teaching and research in Iranian religions and languages. He is the author of a number of books in Persian, English and Danish. His Persian books comprises of:  The Zoroastrian Religion; Folklores of Kirman; Diwan of Salmán of Sáweh, based on the Jewish-Persian manuscript at the Royal Library of Denmark; and recently An overview of 160 years of the Persecutions of the Baha’is of Iran.

Among his books in English are The Divina Commedia, a study of Hell and Paradise in Zoroastrian Religion, Curzon Press London; Western Iranian Dialects in four volumes; and The Religious Texts in Iranian Languages published by the Royal Academy of Science of Denmark. In Danish language he has published a two volumes of Persian-Danish and Danish-Persian Dictionaries. He is also the author of many articles in Encyclopedia Iranica, Encyclopedia of Denmark and Journalsof Iranian Studies.

Publishing the series of “Religion and Society in Iran” is his latest initiative. Starting in 2010 so far five volumes have appeared in this series. As general editor of the series his aim is to invite scholars to write books concerning minority religions of Iran.

Currently he is working on a book based on the Iranian documents from 19th century Qajar period preserved at the Yale Library. This will be the first time part of these valuable documents will be published. The book deals with about fifty documents concerned with the very early persecution of the Babis and the Baha’is of Iran. Professor Vahman is visiting Yale in November 2013 to collaborate with Professor Amanat to finalize this 2014 forthcoming publication.

Professor Vahman is a founders and current president of Danish-Iranian Society. This society was established before 1979 to introduce Iran’s culture and art to people of Denmark.

Professor Vahman was a Yale Iranian Studies Fellow in two occasions in September 2003 and June 2004, and will be here again November 2013.