Tradition claims that the Shah; hearing he had come home,--and having meantime discovered the trickery of his minister,--immediately sent Firdusi sixty thousand pieces of gold, but that the money arrived only as his corpse was being lowered into the tomb! As the poet's daughter indignantly refused to accept this tardy atonement, another relative took the money and built the dike which Firdusi had longed to see.
We know that Persian monarchs made sundry attempts to collect the annals of their country, but these collections were scattered at the time of the Arabian conquest, so that only a few documents were brought back to Persia later on.

Although the poem of Firdusi claims to be a complete history of Persia, it contains so many marvels that, were it not for its wonderful diction, it would not have survived, although he declares he has written, "What no tide Shall ever wash away, what men Unborn shall read o'er ocean wide."[38] The poem opens with the description of a ruler so prosperous that the Spirit of Evil sent a mighty devil (deev) to conquer him.

Thanks to the effort of this demon, the king's son was slain, and, as the monarch died of grief, it was his grandson who succeeded him.

During a forty-centuries reign this king gave fire to his people, taught them irrigation and agriculture, and bestowed names on all the beasts.
His son and successor taught mortals how to spin and weave, and the demons, in hopes of destroying him, imparted to him the arts of reading and writing.

Next came the famous Persian hero Jemshid, who is said to have reigned seven hundred years, and to have divided the Persian nation into four classes,--priests, warriors, artisans, and husbandmen.