Abū Manṣūr Muḥammad b. ʿAbd al-Razzāq (d. Dhū al-Ḥijja 350/January 962), was a famous commander-in-chief in Khurāsān during the Sāmānid era, also the governor of Ṭūs and the moving force behind the Shāhnāmah-yi Abū Manṣūrī, which is one of the most famous prose versions of the Shāhnāmah. According to a genealogical tree cited in ‘Muqaddima-yi Shāhnāmah-yi Abū Manṣūrī’ (see Qazwīnī, 73–79), Abū Manṣūr descended from Sāsānid military commanders (ispahbadān), and ultimately from the legendary Pīshdādī kings. But in a statement on the custom at that time of creating…