Editing Ghazal (section)

==== Early Persian ghazal poetry (12th to early 13th century) ====
The Persian ghazal evolved into its own distinctive form between the 12th and 13th centuries. Many of those innovations created what we now recognize as the archetypical ghazal form. These changes occurred in two periods, separated by the Mongol Invasion of Persia from 1219 to 1221 AD.

The 'Early Persian poetry' period spanned approximately one century, from the [[Ghaznavids|Ghaznavid era]] (which lasted until 1187) till a little after the Mongol Invasion. Apart from the movement towards brevity, this period also saw two significant and lasting changes to the ghazal form.

The first change was the adoption of the ''[[Takhallus]]'', the practice of mentioning the poet's penname in the final couplet (called the {{'}}''maqta{{'}}''{{'}}). The adoption of the ''takhallus'' became a gradually accepted part of the ghazal form, and by the time of [[Saadi Shirazi]] (1210–1291 AD), the most important ghazal poet of this period, it had become ''de rigueur.''<ref name=":1" /> The second marked change from Arabian ghazal form in Persian ghazals was a movement towards far greater autonomy between the couplets.