Abolqasem Ferdowsi (Persian: ابوالقاسم فردوسی), the son of a wealthy land owner, was born in 935 in a small village named Paj near Tus in Khorasan which is situated in today's Razavi Khorasan province in Iran. He devoted more than 35 years to his great epic, the Shāhnāmeh. It was originally composed for presentation to the Samanid princes of Khorasan, who were the chief instigators of the revival of Iranian cultural traditions after the Arab conquest of the seventh century. Ferdowsi started his composition of the Shahnameh in the Samanid era in 977 A.D. During Ferdowsi's lifetime the Samanid dynasty was conquered by the Ghaznavid Empire. After 30 years of hard work, he finished the book and two or three years after that, Ferdowsi went to Ghazni, the Ghaznavid capital, to present it to the king, Sultan Mahmud.
Ferdowsi is said to have died around 1020 in poverty at the age of 85, embittered by royal neglect, though fully confident of his work's ultimate success and fame, as he says in the verse: " ... I suffered during these thirty years, but I have revived the Iranians (Ajam) with the Persian language; I shall not die since I am alive again, as I have spread the seeds of this language ..."
این بخش از شاهنامه به پادشاهی یزدگرد دوم تا یزدگرد سوم و از بین رفتن شاهنشاهی ساسانی می پردازد. در این بخش داستان زندگانی قباد، کسری نوشین روان، زندگانی بزرگمهر، ساخت چترنگ، ساخت تخته نرد، زندگانی خسرو پرویز، داستان خسرو و شیرین، نابسامانی دربار ساسانی و تاخت و تاز اعراب را می خوانید.
The Shahname, literally meaning "Book of Kings", is structured according to the mythical and historical reign of 50 Persian Kings. The epic can be roughly divided into three parts: the first part tells of the mythical creation of Persia; the second part tells of the legendary Kings and the heroes Rostam and Sohrab; and the third part blends historical fact with legend, telling of the semi-mythical adventures of actual historical Kings. متاسفانه بسیاری از روایت های شاهنامه که در بازار کتاب یافت می شوند، تایید نشده و نا شناس اند، و پر از ابیات منسوب به فردوسی و گاه با تحریف های بسیار. در میان شاهنامه های موجود، دو روایت متقن که از طرف شاهنامه شناسان تدوین و تایید شده، عبارتند از شاهنامه ی چاپ مسکو در 9 جلد و شاهنامه به روایت دکتر جلال خالقی مطلق در هفت جلد. در این دو شاهنامه که از روی نسخ معتبر در موزه های معروفی چون "آرمیتاژ"، موزه ی لندن، موزه ی توپکاپی در ترکیه و...استخراج و تدوین شده، ابیات، تا حد ممکن تفکیک، و الحاقات، بصورتی جداگانه مشخص شده اند.