RĀWZ̤AH-KHVĀNĪ is the Persian ritual of public lamentation over the suffering of Imam Ḥusayn and other Shīʿī martyrs. Together with the taʿziyah (passion play) and the Muḥarrm mourning procession, known in Iran as dastah, it forms a part of the trilogy of the mourning observances that determines the basic popular ritual orientation in Shīʿī Islam. Similar rituals are known by different names in other countries with Shīʿī populations.

The recitation and chanting of eulogies for the Shīʿī martyrs, which has flourished in the Muslim world during the last thirteen centuries, produced a literary genre known as maqtal (pl., maqātil). It was precisely at the beginning of the Safavid period (1501), when Shīʿī Islam became the state religion of Persia, that the major Persian maqtal masterpiece was composed...