Muhammad bin Ali Rawandi , was a Persian historian who wrote the Rahat al-sudur wa ayat al-surur

Rahat al-sudur

The Rahat al-sudur wa-ayat al-surur or Rahat al-sudur , is a history of the Great Seljuq Empire, its breakup into minor beys and the subsequent Khwarazmian occupation, written by the Persian historian Muhammad bin Ali Rawandi and finished around 1204/1205. Rawandi was encouraged and supported in...

during the fall of the Great Seljuk Empire and the subsequent invasion by the Kharwarzmian empire.

Rawandi was from a scholarly family and studied Hanafi

Hanafi

The Hanafi school is one of the four Madhhab in jurisprudence within Sunni Islam. The Hanafi madhhab is named after the Persian scholar Abu Hanifa an-Nu‘man ibn Thābit , a Tabi‘i whose legal views were preserved primarily by his two most important disciples, Abu Yusuf and Muhammad al-Shaybani...

 fikh in Hamadhan

Hamadan

-Culture:Hamadan is home to many poets and cultural celebrities. The city is also said to be among the world's oldest continuously inhabited cities.Handicrafts: Hamadan has always been well known for handicrafts like leather, ceramic, and beautiful carpets....

 from 1174 to 1184. As a calligrapher, Rawandi was brought to court to craft a Quran for Toghrul III

Toghrul III of Seljuq

Toghrul III was the last sultan of the Great Seljuq Empire.The son of sultan Arslan Shah, he succeeded him in 1175 or 1176. In 1190 he tried to free itself from the tutelage of the Atabeg of Azerbaijan, Kizil Arslan, but he was overthrown and imprisoned by the latter, who proclaimed himself sultan...

 and gained the sultan's favor. After Toghrul's incarceration, Rawandi gained the patronage of Shihab al-Din al-Kashani, who urged him to write the Rahat al-sudur. Rawandi had intended to dedicate his book to Süleymanshah II

Süleymanshah II

Suleiman II aka Rukn ad-Din Suleiman Shah , was the Seljuk Sultan of Rûm between 1196–1204.Son of Kilij Arslan II, he overthrew his brother, Sultan Kaykhusraw I who had succeeded their father in 1192 and became sultan in 1196....

, but dedicated it to Kaykhusraw I, following the latter's accession as Sultan of Rum

Sultanate of Rûm

The Sultanate of Rum , also known as the Anatolian Seljuk State , was a Turkic state centered in in Anatolia, with capitals first at İznik and then at Konya. Since the court of the sultanate was highly mobile, cities like Kayseri and Sivas also functioned at times as capitals...

. Later the Rahat al-sudur was translated into Turkish during the reign of Murad II

Murad II

Murad II Kodja was the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire from 1421 to 1451 ....

.

Modern era

In 1921, the Rahat al-sudur was published by Muhammad Iqbal. It was recognized by Iqbal, Edward G. Browne and Mirza Muhammad Qazwini as a source in other texts namely, Jaml al-tawarikh, Rawdat al-safa of Mir Kwand and Tarikh-i guzida of Hamd Allah al-Mustawfi.