In 1705-1706 after the Battle of Chamkaur, Guru Gobind Singh sent a famous letter to the Mughal emperor in Persian verse, titled the 'Zaffarnameh', the epistle of victory.

Guru Gobind Singh reminds Aurangzeb how he and his Mughal soldiers had broken their oaths sworn upon the Qur'an and the Prophet Muhammad, and decided to attack the Sikh-Khalsa army at Chamkaur. Guru Sahib praises the Almighty, and declares...

...his moral victory over the Mughal forces, and repudiates Aurangzeb for his treachery against his Prophet, his faith in Islam, and the Divine for his cowardice. While this letter itself is quite popular & well-known, the actual metres, archaic style, and cultural background...

...of the letter is not. Upon inspection upon the Zaffarnameh however, it is undeniably revealed how the letter bears a startling resemblance to the legendary Persian epic, the Shahnameh, a long epic poem written by the Persian poet Ferdowsi between c. 977 and 1010 CE.

The Shahnameh was widely read, analysed, and discussed in all Persian-speaking courts, from Greater Iran to the subcontinent, including Mughal India. It was an integral facet of the Indo-Persian royal & martial culture and was seen as a model for kings to abide & rule by.

As such, it is no wonder why Guru Gobind Singh retains the style of the Shahnameh within the Zaffarnameh, alongside another text attributed to him in fragmentary form, the Fathnameh (sometimes seen as a fragmented part of the Zaffarnameh itself). Additionally, the...

...origin of the Akali-Nihang(s) Sikh warriors, from the Persian 'Nahang' is also illuminated via a study of the Shahnameh itself, which will be discussed further in this thread.

Having stated this, the Zaffarnameh is composed of 111 Persian couplets, which actually paraphrases a Shahnameh maxim that names Ferdowsi as its author. Moreover, the Zaffarnameh is composed via the classical 'motaqareb' Persian metre, in the same exact manner the Shahnameh is.

The Zaffarnameh of Guru Gobind Singh, as the tradition of Persian classics, starts off with an invocation to the Divine, and professes a monotheistic belief in one universal Creator, something both Muslims and Sikhs would be quite familiar with. Interestingly, Guru Gobind Singh..

...utilises Qur'anic adjectives of the Creator such as 'Raheem' and Kareem', the various attributes of God in the Islamic tradition, as well as employing Persian vocabulary from the Shahnameh within the Zaffarnameh itself.

In fact, the opening couplet of the Zaffarnameh, besides the word, 'bakhsh', are all the utilizations of Arabic loanwords which convey Islamic notions even when used in a different specific context from the Qur'an itself, such as the word, "Qa'im", which in the Qur'an,...

...is in reference to standing, while in the opening portion of the Zaffarnameh, it represents the self-sustenance of the Creator, who is all-powerful and needs no support from any other entity.