or religious ideology of the creation of the world and the order of things. While he was primarily a courtier, he noted in his book that he was an astronomer and physician as well.<ref>Nizami Aruzi, A Revised Translation of the Chahár maqála ("Four discourses"), xi, 74, 96.</ref> He reports in the work that he spent time not only in his native Samarqand, but also in Herat, Tus (where he visited Ferdowsi's tomb and gathered material on the great poet), Balkh, and Nishapur, where he lived for perhaps five years. He also claimed to have studied under the astronomer-poet Omar Khayyám, a native of Nishapur. In the introduction to the Chahar Maqala, Aruzi elaborates on issues of Natural Science, epistemology and politics. An identifying feature of Nizámí-i'Arúdí’s writing is the preface, "On Cosmography", is the extensive use of double balance sentences that gives the impression of belief in binary oppositions, or juxtaposition of two opposite things in everything. Also Nizámí-i'Arúdí’s scholastic Islamic ideology holds that a langue or a kind of metanarrative keeps things in order and is surrounded by smaller objects. This langue is God, who is ever-existent. He is a champion of the ancient Persian concept of kingship which, for the sake of legitimation, is expressed in Muslim vocabulary. His elaboration on the classes of society is influenced by Persian as well as Greek conceptions, especially those of Plato. The Chahar Maqala'' has been translated into several languages, such as English, French, Swedish, Turkish, Urdu, Russian and Arabic. See also Persian Literature List of Persian poets and authors References Sources . 12th-century Persian-language poets Year of birth missing Year of death missing Ghurid-period poets 12th-century Iranian people Poets from the Seljuk Empire People from Samarkand