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Sclupture of Khaqani in Tabriz.

Khaqani or Khaghani (1120 – 1190) (Persian: خاقانی) was a Persian poet. He was born in Shirvan and died in Tabriz.

Khaghani (real name, Afzaladdin Ibrahim ibn Ali Nadjar), a great Persian poet and a master of panegyric qasida was born in the family of a carpenter in Melgem, a village near Shamakhy. Khaghani lost his father at an early age and was brought up by his uncle Qafi-eddin, a doctor and astronomer at the Shirvanshah’s court, who for seven years (till his death) acted "both as nurse and tutor" to Khaghani. Khaghani's mother was a Christian of Georgian origin.

In his youth, Khaghani wrote under the pen-name Haqiqi. After he had been invited to the court of the Khaghan Shirvanshah he assumed the pen-name of Khaghani ("regal"). The life of a court poet palled on him, and he "fled from the iron cage where he felt like a bird with a broken wing" and set off a journey about the Middle East. His travels gave him material for his famous poem Tohfat-ul Iraqein (in Persian: تحفه العراقين meaning A Gift from the Two Iraqs), the two Iraqs being 'Persian Iraq' (western Iran) and 'Arabic Iraq' (Mesopotamia). This book supplies us with a good deal of material for his biography and in which he described his impressions of the Middle East. He also wrote his famous qasida The Arch of Madain (in Persian: ايوان مداين) beautifully painting his sorrow and impression of the remains of Sassanid's Palace near the Ctesiphon.

On return home, Khaghani broke off with the court of the Shirvanshah’s, and Shah Akhsitan gave order for his imprisonment. It was in prison that Khaghani wrote one of his most powerful anti-feudal poems called Habsiyye (Prison Poem). Upon release he moved with his family to Tabriz where fate dealt with him one tragic blow after another: first his young son died, then his daughter and then his wife. Khagani was left all alone, and he soon too died in Tabriz. He was buried at the Poet’s Cemetery in Surkhab Neighbourhood of Tabriz.

Khaghani left a remarkable Persian-language heritage which includes some magnificent odes-distiches of as many as three hundred lines with the same rhyme, melodious ghazals, dramatic poems protesting against oppression and glorifying reason and toil, and elegies lamenting the death of his children, his wife and his relatives.

• List of Persian poets and authors

• Work found in A Thousand Years of Persian Rubaiyat: An Anthology of Quatrains from the Tenth to the Twentieth Century Along With the Original Persian (Paperback)

by Reza Saberi (Editor, Translator)

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v • d • e Literature of Azerbaijan
Medieval	(includes authors of both Turkic and Iranic origins) Qatran Tabrizi1, 4  · Bahmanyar5  · Masud ibn Namdar5  · Khagani Shirvani1  · Mahsati Ganjavi1  · Nizami Ganjavi1  · Shams Tabrizi1  · Homam Tabrizi3  · Abu'l Majd Tabrizi3  · Imadaddin Nasimi2, 6  · Mahmud Shabistari1  · Ohadi Maraghei1  · Shah Ismayil Khatai2  · Muhammad Fuzuli2, 6
Modern	Molla Panah Vagif  · Molla Vali Vidadi  · Mirza Shafi Vazeh2  · Khurshidbanu Natavan  · Abbasgulu Bakikhanov2, 6  · Mirza Fatali Akhundov2  · Gasim bey Zakir  · Seyid Azim Shirvani  · Hasan bey Zardabi  · Mirza Alakbar Sabir  · Jalil Mammadguluzadeh  · Abdurrahim bey Hagverdiyev  · Ismayil bey Gutgashynly8, 9  · Sakina Akhundzadeh  · Suleyman Sani Akhundov  · Yusif Vazir Chamanzaminli8  · Mammed Said Ordubadi  · Najaf bey Vazirov  · Ashig Alasgar  · Muhammad Hadi  · Abbas Sahhat  · Iraj Mirza1  · Abdulla Shaig  · Parvin E'tesami1  · Huseyn Javid  · Jafar Jabbarly  · Mikayil Mushfig  · Samad Vurgun  · Aliagha Vahid
Contemporary	Azerbaijan — Suleyman Rustam  · Rasul Rza  · Nigar Rafibeyli  · Mirza Ibrahimov  · Almas Ildyrym  · Mirvarid Dilbazi  · Madina Gulgun  · Ismayil Shykhly  · Manaf Suleymanov  · Baba Punhan  · Anar Rzayev  · Fikrat Goja  · Nusrat Kasamanli  · Elchin Afandiyev  · Khalil Rza Uluturk  · Bakhtiyar Vahabzadeh  · Magsud Ibrahimbeyov7  · Rustam Ibrahimbeyov7  · Chingiz Abdullayev7  · Natig Rasulzadeh7  · Afag Masud  Iran — Samad Behrangi2  · Mohammad-Hossein Shahriar2  · Gholam Hossein Saedi1  · Reza Baraheni1
Notes	Unless otherwise indicated author wrote in Azerbaijani 1 only in Persian  · 2 also in Persian  · 3 Mainly in Persian but scattered verses in Old Azari language  · 4 Professor Jan Rypka in his book History of Iranian Literature has coined the term "Azerbaijani style of Persian literature" to describe the style of Persian poetry in Azerbaijan. Qatran is credited as the founder of this style.  · 5 only in Arabic  · 6 also in Arabic  · 7 only in Russian  · 8 also in Russian  · 9 also in French