Table of Contents

• AČAṘEAN, HRAČʾEAY YAKOBI

  J. R. Russell

  Armenian linguist, born 8 March 1876 (O. S.; 20 March N. S.) at Constantinople. 

• ACƎKZĪ

  C. M. Kieffer

  (ACAKZĪ, or AČƎKZĪ, AČAKẒĪ), a tribal grouping of Paṧtūn clans in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

• ACHAEMENES

  M. A. Dandamayev

  (Greek Achaiménēs), Old Persian proper name Haxāmaniš, traditionally derived from haxā- “friend” and manah “thinking power.”

• ACHAEMENID DYNASTY

  R. Schmitt

  Two principles of their election, dynastic and divine right, belong to contrasting areas and periods—respectively, to prehistoric nomad tribes of Indo-European origin and to the highly civilized Mesopotamian peoples. Three constitutive elements thus enter into Achaemenid kingship and royal ideology: (a) Near Eastern heritage, (b) Indo-Iranian heritage, and (c) a Persian combination of these two.

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• ACHAEMENID RELIGION

  M. Boyce

  Greek writings establish with all reasonable clarity that the later Achaemenids were Zoroastrians; but the religion of the early kings has been much debated.

• ACHAEMENID ROYAL COMMUNICATION

  Bruno Jacobs

  the spreading of every kind of information and decision-making needed for governmental control. Under this topic can be subsumed the royal agenda, political objectives, ideological and legitimizing strategies, and orders and messages to subordinates and the general population.

• ACHAEMENID SATRAPIES

  Bruno Jacobs

  the administrative units of the Achaemenid empire.

• ACHAEMENID TAXATION

  M. A. Dandamayev

   a most important component of the Achaemenid state administration.

• ACHMA

  R. E. Emmerick

  (a Turkish word meaning “opening”), a town in the Domoko (Dumaqu) oasis near Khotan, so named with reference to the local springs.

• ĀÇINA

  M. A. Dandamayev

  son of Upadarma, a rebel against Darius I.

• ĀÇIYĀDIYA

  R. Schmitt

  (a-ç-i-y-a-di-i-y-), name of the ninth month (November-December) of the Old Persian calendar.

• ACKERMAN, PHYLLIS

  Cornelia Montgomery

  (b. Oakland, California, 1893; d. Shiraz, 25 January 1977), author, editor, teacher and translator in the fields of Persian textiles, European tapestries, Chinese bronzes, iconography, and symbolism.

• ACTA ARCHELAI

  Cross-Reference

  See ARCHELAUS.

• ACTS OF ĀDUR-HORMIZD AND OF ANĀHĪD

  J. P. Asmussen

  Syriac martyrological texts.  Their events are set in the year 446 A.D., during the reign of Yazdegerd II; and they were apparently recorded not long afterward. They offer more detailed data on Zoroastrianism and Zurvanism, even though in a somewhat corrupted form, than is commonly found in the records of the Christian martyrs of the Sasanian empire. 

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• ACTS OF THE PERSIAN MARTYRS

  A. Vööbus

  a collection of the acts of martyrdom under Šāpūr II (309-79 CE). The author states that the text is not a free composition for glorification of the martyrs, but rather rests on information he gathered from those close to the actual happenings—even eyewitnesses. 

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• ĀDĀ

  J. Duchesne-Guillemin

  “requital” in Avestan.

• ADAB

  Multiple Authors

  Term applied to a genre of literature as well as to refined and well-mannered conduct; in Persian it is often synonymous with farhang.

• ADAB i. Adab in Iran

  Dj. Khaleghi-Motlagh

  Apart from a genre of literature (see section ii), adab in Persian means education, culture, good behavior, politeness, proper demeanor; thus it is closely linked with the concept of ethics.

• ADAB ii. Adab in Arabic Literature

  Ch. Pellat

  In modern Arabic usage the term adab (plur. ādāb) denotes “literature,” but in classical Islam it was applied only to a limited range of literary works.

• ĀDĀB AL-ḤARB WA’L-ŠAJĀʿA

  C. E. Bosworth

  (“The correct usages of war and bravery”), a treatise in a straightforward Persian prose style in the “Mirror for Princes” genre, written by Faḵr-al-dīn Moḥammad b. Manṣūr Mobārakšāh, called Faḵr-e Modabber.

• ADAB AL-KABĪR

  I. Abbas

  an Arabic work by Ebn al-Moqaffaʿ dealing largely with Persian manners and court etiquette.

• ADAB AL-KĀTEB

  C. E. Bosworth

  (“Manual for secretaries”), a work composed by the celebrated Baghdad scholar probably of Khorasanian mawlā origin, Ebn Qotayba (213-76/828-89).

• ĀDĀB AL-MAŠQ

  M. Dabīrsīāqī

  (“Manual of penmanship”), a short essay on writing the nastaʿlīq hand by the noted Safavid calligrapher Mīr ʿEmād (961-1024/1553-54 to 1615-16).

• ADAB AL-ṢAḠĪR

  I. Abbas

  an Arabic book of wisdom and advice, based on Middle Persian works.

• ADAB NEWSPAPER

  L. P. Elwell-Sutton

  title of several Persian periodicals.

• ʿADĀLAT

  L. P. Elwell-Sutton

  (“Justice”), name of several periodicals.

• ADAM, GUILLAUME

  J. Richard

  14th-century traveler.

• ĀDAMĪ

  A. Gorjī

  late 3rd/9th century Shiʿite traditionist.

• ĀDAMĪYAT

  L. P. Elwell-Sutton

  (“Humanity”), name of two Iranian periodicals.

• ĀDAR

  Cross-Reference

  See ĀDUR.

• ĀḎAR

  Cross-Reference

  See ĀDUR.

• ʿADAS

  A. Parsa and N. Ramazani, A. Parsa

  "lentils."

• ADĀT

  Ḵ. Faršīdvard

  “particle,” Arabic word corresponding to the Persian abzār which is used as a technical term in logic (manṭeq), grammar (dastūr), and rhetoric (maʿānī o bayān).

• ADDĀ

  W. Sundermann

  one of the earliest disciples of Mani.

• ʿĀDEL SHAH AFŠĀR

  J. R. Perry

  the royal title of ʿAlī-qolī Khan, r. 1160-61/1747-48, nephew and successor of Nāder Shah.

• ʿĀDELŠĀHĪS

  R. M. Eaton

  A dynasty of Indo-Muslim kings who governed the city-state of Bijapur from 895/1490 to 1097/1686.

• ADERGOUDOUNBADES

  R. N. Frye

  a kanārang (eastern border margrave) appointed by the Sasanian king Kavād (r. 488-531 A.D.).

• ADHAM, MĪRZĀ EBRĀHĪM

  W. Thackston

  11th/17th century poet.

• ADHYARDHAŚATIKĀ PRAJÑĀPĀRAMITĀ

  R. E. Emmerick

  (“The perfection of wisdom in 150 lines”), title of a Praǰñāpāramitā text in Tantric.

• ADIABENE

  D. Sellwood

  a district near the present-day borders of Iraq, Iran, and Turkey.

• ADIB ḴᵛĀNSARI

  Morteżā Ḥoseyni Dehkordi and EIr

  a major vocalist of Persia in the first half of 20th century (1901-1982).

• ADĪB NAṬANZĪ

  ʿA. N. Monzawī

  poet and linguist of the 5th/11th century, from Naṭanz, near Isfahan.

• ADĪB NĪŠĀBURĪ

  J. Matīnī

  Persian litterateur and poet (19th century).

• ADĪB PĪŠĀVARĪ

  Munibur Rahman

  poetic name of SAYYED AḤMAD B. ŠEHĀB-AL-DĪN RAŻAWĪ (1844-1930).

• ADĪB ṢĀBER

  Ḏ. Ṣafā

  famous poet of the first half of the 6th/12th century. 

• ADĪB ṬĀLAQĀNĪ

  M. Momen

  prominent Iranian Bahaʾi author of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. 

• ADĪB-AL-MAMĀLEK FARĀHĀNĪ

  Munibur Rahman

  poet and journalist (1860-1917).

• ĀDĪNEVAND

  P. Oberling

  a small Lur tribe of Lorestān which lives the year round in the baḵš of Ṭarhān.

• ʿADL, Aḥmad-Ḥosayn

  Bāqer ʿĀqeli

  minister of agriculture, Director General of the Plan Organization, and the first director of the College of Agronomy (1898-1963). He did much to advance industrial development in Isfahan, both holding cabinet positions in the government and contributing in the private sector.

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• ʿADL, MOṢṬAFĀ

  Bāqer ʿĀqeli

  In 1945, as the head of the Iranian delegation in San Francisco, ʿAdl gave a persuasive lecture arguing for de-occupation of Iran and ayment of reparations for damage caused by the war. He attended the assembly of the United Nations, and struggled for the recognition of the rights of Iran and her territorial integrity.

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• ʿADL-E MOẒAFFAR

  J. Calmard, L. P. Elwell-Sutton

  “Moẓaffar’s justice,” a phrase connected with the events of the Constitutional Revolution (1905-11) and the name of a newspaper.

• ADLER, ELKAN NATHAN

  Dalia Yasharpour

  avid traveler and collector of Hebrew, Judeo-Persian, and Judeo-Tajik manuscripts from the Jewish Persian and Bukharan communities (1861-1946). In 1921, personal circumstances compelled Adler to sell his manuscript and book collections to the Hebrew Union College of Cincinnati and the Jewish Theological Seminary of New York.

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• ADMINISTRATION in Iran

  Multiple Authors

  This entry covers state administration in Iran in the modern period, from the rise of the Safavids to the fall of the Pahlavis in 1979. 

• ADMINISTRATION in Iran i. Achaemenid Period

  Cross-Reference

  See ACHAEMENID DYNASTY. 

• ADMINISTRATION in Iran ii. Arsacid/Parthian Period

  Cross-Reference

  See ARSACIDS.

• ADMINISTRATION in Iran iii. Sasanian Period

  Cross-Reference

  See SASANIAN DYNASTY.

• ADMINISTRATION in Iran iv. Early Islamic Period

  Cross-Reference

  See under ʿABBASID CALIPHATE and BUYIDS.

• ADMINISTRATION in Iran v. Medieval Period

  Cross-Reference

  See under GHAZNAVIDS and IL-KHANIDS.

• ADMINISTRATION in Iran vi. Safavid, Zand, and Qajar periods

  S. Bakhash

  The rise of the Safavids was marked by developments that significantly influenced the nature of political, military, and revenue administration.

• ADMINISTRATION in Iran vii. Pahlavi period

  R. Sheikholeslami

  The constitution of 1906 and the supplementary laws of 1907 provided the juridical foundation for a legal-rational state within which the legislature was empowered to establish and modify the administration.

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• ʿADNĪ, MAḤMŪD PĀŠĀ

  T. Yazici

  (879/1474), Ottoman vizier and poet, better known in Turkish literature by his pen name ʿAdnī.

• ADRAPANA

  C. J. Brunner

  the third station from the western border of “Upper Media” recorded by Isidore of Charax in the 1st century CE.

• ADRĀVVŪN

  M. F. Kanga

   Gujarati term for the Parsi betrothal ceremony (in Persian nāmzadī). 

• ADUKANAIŠA

  R. Schmitt

  (a-du-u-k-n-i-š-), name of the first month (March-April) of the Old Persian calendar.

• ĀDUR

  M. Boyce

  (and ādar) Middle Persian word for “fire;” the Avestan form is ātar (of unknown derivation), and the late form is arabicized in New Persian as āẕar.

• ĀDUR BURZĒN-MIHR

  M. Boyce

  an Ātaš Bahrām, i.e., a Zoroastrian sacred fire of the highest grade. 

• ĀDUR FARNBĀG

  M. Boyce

  an Ātaš Bahrām, that is, a Zoroastrian sacred fire of the highest grade, held to be one of the three great fires of ancient Iran, existing since creation.

• ĀDUR GUŠNASP

  M. Boyce

  an Ātaš Bahrām, that is, a Zoroastrian sacred fire of the highest grade, held to be one of the three great fires of ancient Iran, existing since creation.

• ĀDUR NARSEH

  A. Tafażżolī

  son of the Sasanian king Hormozd II (302-09 CE) and ruler for several months after his father.

• ĀDUR-ANĀHĪD

  Ph. Gignoux

  3rd century CE  Sasanian “queen of queens.”  

• ĀDUR-BŌZĒD

  A. Tafażżolī

  a Sasanian mobad of mobads (mowbedān mowbed) or high priest.

• ĀDURBĀD ĒMĒDĀN

  A. Tafażżolī

  second author of the 9th century CE Zoroastrian compilation, Dēnkard.  

• ĀDURBĀD Ī MAHRSPANDĀN

  A. Tafażżolī

  (“Ādurbād, son of Mahrspand”), Zoroastrian mobad of mobads (mowbedān mowbed) or high priest in the reign of the Sasanian king Šāpūr II (309-79 CE). 

• ĀDURBĀDAGĀN

  Cross-Reference

  See AZERBAIJAN iii. Pre-Islamic History.

• ĀDURFARNBAG Ī FARROXZĀDĀN

  A. Tafażżolī

  first author of the 9th century CE Zoroastrian compilation, the Dēnkard. 

• ĀDURFRĀZGIRD

  C. J. Brunner

  a brother of the Sasanian king Šāpūr II (309-79 CE) who is mentioned in the Syriac Acts of the Persian Martyrs.

• AELIANUS, CLAUDIUS

  M. L. Chaumont

  a sophist of the first third of the 3rd century CE, from Praenest near Rome. His chief service to Iranian history was the preservation of some data from the works of Ctesias of Cnidus, the Greek physician of Artaxerxes II.

• AĒŠMA

  J. P. Asmussen

  “wrath” in Younger Avestan, both metaphysically, as a distinct demon, and psychologically as the function and quality of that demon realized in man.

• ĀFARĪN LĀHŪRĪ

  Z. Ahmad and W. Kirmani

  Punjabi Persian poet (b. ca. 1070/1660, d. 1154/1741).

• ĀFARĪN-NĀMA

  J. Matīnī

  a poem in the motaqāreb meter by the 4th/10th century poet Abū Šakūr Balḵī.

• AFḠĀNĪ, JAMĀL-AL-DĪN

  N. R. Keddie

  (1838 or 39-97), ideologist and political activist of the late 19th century Muslim world, whose influence has continued strong in many Muslim countries. Iran, Egypt, and Afghanistan are the countries of his greatest influence; his combination of reformed Islam and anti-imperialism continues to have widespread appeal.

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• AFGHAN

  Ch. M. Kieffer

  (afḡān), in current political usage, any citizen of Afghanistan, whatever his ethnic, tribal, or religious affiliation. According to the 1977 constitution of the Republic of Afghanistan (1973-78), all Afghans are equal in rights and obligations before the law.

• AFGHANI

  ʿA. Ḥabībī

  (afḡānī), the unit of currency in modern Afghanistan. 

• AFGHANISTAN

  Multiple Authors

  (Islamic Republic of Afghanistan), landlocked country located in Central Asia and bordered by Iran to the west, Pakistan to the south and east, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan to the north, and China to the far northeast.

• AFGHANISTAN i. Geography

  J. F. Shroder, Jr.

  Afghanistan has an extreme continental, arid climate which is characterized by desert, steppe, and highland temperature and precipitation regimes.

• AFGHANISTAN ii. Flora

  M. Šafīq Yūnos

  Climate studies have shown the importance of precipitation and altitude as conditioning factors for the diversity of Afghanistan’s flora.

• AFGHANISTAN iii. Fauna

  K. Habibi

  Thirty-two species of bats have been identified in Afghanistan. Their preferred habitat is in warmer sections of the country, where they may be found in abandoned ruins and caves of the Sīstān basin and the steppes. To the east, common bats (Myotis and Pipistrellus) have been observed in Lāgmān and the Kabul river valley.

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• AFGHANISTAN iv. Ethnography

  L. Dupree

  In their ethnolinguistic and physical variety the people of Afghanistan are as diverse as their country is in topography. Except in rural areas off the main lines of communications, few peoples maintain racial homogeneity.

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• AFGHANISTAN v. Languages

  Ch. M. Kieffer

  Best represented are the Iranian languages, followed by Turkish languages of recent import, and Indian languages which are either native (Nūrestānī and Dardic) or imported (New Indian). Most Afghans who are not native Persian speakers are more or less bilingual.

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• AFGHANISTAN vi. Paṧto

  G. Morgenstierne

  Paṧtō is an Iranic language spoken in south and southeastern Afghanistan, by recent settlers in northern Afghanistan, in Pakistan (North-West Frontier Province and Baluchistan), and on the eastern border of Iran. 

• AFGHANISTAN vii. Parāčī

  G. Morgenstierne

  Parāčī is an Iranian language now spoken northeast of Kabul in the Šotol valley, north of Golbahār, and in the Ḡočūlān and Pačaḡān branches of the Neǰrao valley,  northeast of Golbahār. 

• AFGHANISTAN viii. Archeology

  N. H. Dupree

  Excavations by countries other than France did not occur until after World War II. In the winter of 1950-51 the second expedition of the American Museum of Natural History was directed by W. Fairservis; Šamšīr Ḡār and Deh Morāsī Ḡonday, 17 miles southwest of Qandahār, were investigated by L. Dupree.

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• AFGHANISTAN ix. Pre-Islamic Art

  F. Tissot

  In the tombs of Ṭelā Tapa, the dead are covered with fine fabric sewn with gold bracteates, while their clothing is woven from gold thread and embroidered with pearls. Their swords and daggers are placed in gold sheaths decorated with fantastic animals; their necklaces and pendants portray Greco-Iranian divinities.

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• AFGHANISTAN x. Political History

  D. Balland

  1747 marks the appearance of an Afghan political entity independent of Safavid and Mughal empires. In 1709 a Ḡilzay uprising, led by the Hōtakī tribal chief Mīr Ways, had freed all of southern Afghanistan from Safavid control, thus establishing the basis of a state which would extend into Persia; but the retaliation led by Afšār destroyed the new state.

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• AFGHANISTAN xi. Administration

  A. Ghani

  The form and function of Afghanistan’s administrative organizations have reflected the changing balance of power between centripetal and centrifugal forces. 

• AFGHANISTAN xii. Literature

  R. Farhādī

  Under Aḥmad Shah Dorrānī, Afghanistan continued to play its long-standing role as a center of Persian literature and a transmitter of literary currents between Transoxiana and Islamic India. 

• AFGHANISTAN xiii. FORESTS AND FORESTRY

  Xavier de Planhol

  The development of forests is limited in Afghanistan not only by the total quantity of rainfall, but also by its seasonal distribution with respect to the vegetative season.

• AFGHANISTAN xiv. AFGHAN REFUGEES IN IRAN

  Zuzanna Olszewska

  Afghan refugees make up a population of up to 3 million people of various ethnicities, who have settled in Iran since the communist coup of 1978 in Afghanistan.

• ĀFĪ, ALLĀHYĀR KHAN

  Z. Ahmad

  Poet, son of Nawwāb Amīr-al-dawla, the founder of the state of Tonk (b. 1233/1817-18, d. 21 Ramażān 1278/22 March 1861).

• ʿAFĪF

  N. H. Zaidi

  (d. ca. 1399), author of Tārīḵ-e Fīrūzšāhī, a Persian life of Fīrūz Shah Toḡloq (r. 1351-88).

• AFIFI, RAḤIM

  Jalal Matini

  (d. 1996), scholar and author of lexical guides and handbooks of mythology. 

• AFLĀKĪ

  T. Yazici

  author of texts on the virtues of Jalāl-al-dīn Rūmī and his disciples (13th-14th centuries).

• AFNĀN

  M. Momen

  (“twigs” or “branches”), term used in the Bahaʾi faith (initially by Bahāʾallāh) to designate certain lines of descent in the maternal family of the Bāb.

• AFRĀ

  A. Parsa

  Persian term for the maple tree (genus Acer), also embracing a few shrubs of the family Aceraceae.

• AFRAHĀṬ

  J. P. Asmussen

  name attested in Syriac (ʾfrhṭ) of a number of Iranian Christian churchmen.

• AFRAHĀṬ, YAʿQŪB

  J. P. Asmussen

  Persian bishop of the mid-4th century CE, author in Syriac.

• AFRĀSĪĀB

  E. Yarshater

  By far the most prominent of Turanian kings, Afrāsīāb is depicted in Iranian tradition as a formidable warrior and skillful general; an agent of Ahriman, he is endowed with magical powers and bent on the destruction of Iranian lands.

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• AFRĀSĪĀB i. The Archeological Site

  G. A. Pugachenkova and Ī. V. Rtveladze

  the ruined site of ancient and medieval Samarqand in the northern part of the modern town.

• AFRĀSIĀB ii. Wall Paintings

  Matteo Compareti

  The Afrāsiāb wall paintings refer to 7th-century Sogdian murals, discovered in 1965 in the residential part of ancient Samarqand (Samarkand).

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• AFRĀSĪĀBIDS

  Cross-Reference

  See ĀL-E AFRĀSĪĀB (1).

• AFRASIYABIDS

  Cross-Reference

  See ĀL-E AFRĀSĪĀB (1).

• AFRĀŠTA, MOḤAMMAD-ʿALĪ

  B. Sholevar and H. Javadi

  poet, writer and satirist (1908-1959).

• ĀFRĪD

  J. P. Asmussen

  5th-century Christian bishop of Sagastān.

• AFRĪDĪ

  C. M. Kieffer

  (singular -ay), designation of a major Paṧtūn tribe in northwest Pakistan, with a few members in Afghanistan.

• AFRIGHID DYNASTY

  Cross-Reference

  See ĀL-E AFRĪḠ.

• AFRIḠIDS

  Cross-Reference

  See ĀL-E AFRIḠ.

• ĀFRĪN

  F. M. Kotwal and J. W. Boyd

  “blessing,” benedictory prayers said at the conclusion of every Zoroastrian ceremony of blessings (āfrinagān).

• ĀFRĪNAGĀN

  M. F. Kanga

  a term for one of the outer Zoroastrian liturgical services.

• AFŠĀN

  P. P. Soucek

  (“sprinkling”), the decoration of paper with flecks of gold and silver, sometimes called zarafšān “gold sprinkling.”

• AFŠĀR

  P. Oberling

  one of the 24 original Ḡuz Turkic tribes.

• AFŠĀR, AḤMAD SOLṬĀN

  Cross-Reference

  See AḤMAD SOLṬĀN.

• AFŠĀR, ḤĀJJĪ BĀBĀ

  Ḥ. Maḥbūbī Ardakānī

  court physician under Moḥammad Shah Qāǰār.

• AFŠĀRĪ

  H. Farhat

  one of the twelve dastgāhs or modal systems of classical Iranian music. In the contemporary tradition, Afšārī is customarily classified as a derivative of the dastgāh Šūr. In fact, however, Afšārī is quite independent and possesses its own modal characteristics as well as its own forūd (cadence) pattern.

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• AFSHARIDS

  J. R. Perry

  actual power was exercised for most of this sixty years not by the nominal ruler but by military leaders or other court factions, and for a brief time by Solaymān II, whose reign was an attempted Safavid restoration. The remaining parts of Nāder’s empire were now the sphere of the Zand dynasty in western Iran.

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• AFŠĪN

  C. E. Bosworth

  princely title of the rulers of Ošrūsana at the time of the Muslim conquest, the most famous of whom was Ḵeyḏār (Ḥaydar) b. Kāvūs, d. Šaʿbān, 226/May-June, 841.

• AFŠĪN B. DĪVDĀD

  ʿA. Kārang and F. R. C. Bagley

  founder of the semi-independent Sajid dynasty in Azerbaijan (r. 276/889-90-317/929).

• AFSŪS

  M. Baqir

  (AFSŌS), the taḵalloṣ of MĪR ŠĪR-ʿALĪ, late 18th century poet and translator of India.

• ĀFTĀB

  L. P. Elwell-Sutton

  (“Sun”), name of several Persian periodicals.

• AFTARĪ

  G. L. Windfuhr

  the dialect of Aftar (population about 1,200), located at lat 35°39′ N, long 53°07′ E in the mountains one kilometer west of the Semnān-Fīrūzkūh road to Māzandarān. Historical phonology shows Aftarī as a Northwest (i.e. non-Perside) dialect of Iranian.

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• AFTĪMŪN

  A. Parsa

  a medicinal herb.

• ĀFURIŠN

  W. Sundermann

  “blessing, praise,” a technical, literary term for a category of Manichean hymns. 

• AFYŪN

  S. Shahnavaz

  "opium," its production and commerce in Iran.

• AFŻAL AL-ḤOSAYNĪ

  P. P. Soucek

  painter active during the reign of Shah ʿAbbās II (1052-77/1642-66).

• AFŻAL AL-TAWĀRIK

  Charles Melville

  title of a chronicle of the Safavid dynasty, composed by Fażli b. Zayn-al-ʿĀbedin b. Ḵᵛāja Ruḥ-Allāh Ḵuzāni Eṣfahāni.

• AFŻAL BEG QĀQŠĀL

  W. Kirmani

  South Indian taḏkera writer.

• AFŻAL KHAN

  W. E. Begley

  title of MOLLĀ ŠOKRALLĀH ŠĪRĀZĪ, Mughal court official (ca. 978-1048/1570-1639). 

• AFŻAL KHAN ḴAṬAK

  J. Enevoldsen

  (b. 1075/1664-65), chief of the Ḵaṭak tribe, Pashto poet, and author ofTārīḵ-emoraṣṣaʿ.

• AFŻAL KHAN, AMIR MOḤAMMAD

  ʿA. Ḥabībī

  (1220-84/1814-67), governor of Balḵ and for a short time ruler of Afghanistan.

• AFŻAL-AL-DĪN KĀŠĀNĪ

  Cross-Reference

  See BĀBĀ AFŻAL.

• AFŻAL-AL-DĪN KERMĀNĪ

  M. E. Bāstānī Pārīzī

  writer, poet, and physician of Kermān in the 6th and early 7th/12th and early 13th centuries.

• AFŻAL-AL-DĪN TORKA

  R. Quiring-Zoche

  name of three figures from Isfahan.

• AFZARĪ

  Cross-Reference

  See ABZARĪ, ḴᵛĀJA ʿAMĪD-AL-DĪN.

• ĀḠĀ BOZORG TEHRĀNĪ

  Cross-Reference

  See ĀQĀ BOZORG TEHRĀNĪ.

• ĀḠĀ MOḤAMMAD KHAN QĀJĀR

  J. R. Perry

  (r. 1789-97), founder of the Qajar dynasty.

• AḠĀČ ERĪ

  P. Oberling

  a tribe of mixed ethnic origin living in eastern Ḵūzestān.

• ĀḠĀJĀRĪ

  J. Qāʾem-Maqāmī

  town in Ḵūzestān and district (bakš) in the county (šahrestān) of Behbahān, situated seventy-eight km to the northwest of the city of Behbahān.

• ĀḠĀJĪ

  ʿA. Zaryāb

  title of a court official in the administrations of the Ghaznavids and Saljuqs.

• ĀḠĀJĪ BOḴĀRĪ

  ʿA. Zaryāb

  Samanid amir and poet.

• AḠĀNĪ, KETĀB AL-

  K. Abu-Deeb

  (“The Book of Songs”), the major work of Abu’l-Faraǰ Eṣfahānī (284-356/897-967).

• ĀḠĀSĪ

  Cross-Reference

  See ĀQĀSĪ.

• AGATHANGELOS

  R. W. Thomson

  (Greek for “messenger of good news”), the supposed author of a History of the Armenians, which describes the conversion of King Trdat of Armenia to Christianity at the beginning of the 4th century CE.

• AGATHIAS

  M.-L. Chaumont

  Byzantine historian, b. 536 or 537,  d. about 580. Among other matters, Agathias’s History treats the war which was fought between Justinian and Xusraw I (Chosroes) in Lazica in 552-56—a war successfully conducted on the Persian side by the generals Mihr-Mihrōē (Mermeroes) and Naxwaragān (Nachoragan). Digressions, on the Persians in general and the Sasanians in particular, contain much information of interest.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• AGIARY

  Cross-Reference

  See ĀTAŠKADA.

• ĀḠKAND

  R. Schnyder

  This ware was made by local workshops in the time of the Eldigüzids. Nothing indicates that the production survived the Mongol invasions of Azerbaijan, though similar pottery continued to be produced in the 7th/13th century in east Anatolia and north Syria.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• ĀḠOŠ VEHĀḎĀN

  A. Tafażżolī

  (Āḡoš son of Vehāḏ), king of Gīlān at the time of Kay Ḵosrow, the Kayanid king, and one of the commanders of his armies.

• AGRA

  G. Hambly

  City and district center in the state of Uttar Pradesh in northern India, situated on the west bank of the river Jumna (Yamonā) approximately 125 miles south of Delhi.

• AḠRĒRAṮ

  Dj. Khaleghi-Motlagh

  (Av. Aγraēraθa), Turanian warrior and brother of Afrāsīāb in the Avestan yašts and in the the Šāh-nāma.

• AGRICULTURE in Iran

  E. Ehlers

  The tendency to possess not certain, regionally fixed parts of the land but shares of the total, is made possible by the custom of splitting each property or any part of it into “ideal” or “imaginary” shares or allotments.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• ĀHAK

  E. Ehlers, T. S. Kawami

  “lime,” a solid, white substance consisting essentially of calcium oxide.

• ĀHAN

  V. C. Pigott

  With the Tartar conquest of Syria, Tamerlane is said to have deported to Iran the skilled craftsmen he captured. It is suggested that from this point onward Iran supplied itself as well as India and the west with the finest damascene arms and armor, though the steel ingots still originated in India.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• AHAR

  ʿA. ʿA. Kārang

  the name of a county (šahrestān) and town in Azerbaijan.

• AHAR RIVER

  ʿA. ʿA. Kārang

  Originating in the mountains of Eškanbar, Sārī Čaman and Qarāǰa-dāḡ, the Ahar river runs from east to west.

• AHARĪ

  İ. Aka

  (8th/14th cent.), author of Tārīḵ-eŠāh Oways, dedicated to the Jalayerid ruler Oways (757-76/1356-74).

• AHASUREUS

  W. S. McCullough

  name of a Persian king in pre-Christian Jewish tradition; it appears in the biblical books of Esther (1.1 et passim), Ezra (4.6), and Daniel (9.1) and in the apocryphal book of Tobit (14.15).

• AḤDĀṮ, WOJŪH-E

  R. M. Savory

  fines collected in Safavid times by the officers of the night watch (aḥdāṯ), who were under the supervision of the dārūḡa.

• ĀHĪ JOḠATĀʾĪ

  ʿA. ʿA. Rajāʾī

  Chaghatay amir, poet, and companion of Ḡarīb Mīrzā, a son of the Timurid sultan, Ḥosayn Bāyqarā.

• ĀHI, MAJID

  Bāqer ʿĀqeli

  (b. Tehran, 1265 Š./1886; d. 22 Šahrivar 1325 Š./12 September 1946), judge, governor of Fārs, minister of justice, and ambassador to the Soviet Union.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• AHL-E BAYT

  I. K. A. Howard

  (Ahl al-Bayt), the “family of the house” or “household,” i.e., of the Prophet. 

• AHL-E ḠARQ

  Nasrin Raḥimieh

  (The drowned, 1990), best-known novel of Moniru Ravanipur.

• AHL-E ḤAQQ

  H. Halm

  “People of (the absolute) Truth,” a sect found in western Persia and some regions of northeastern Iraq; the name has also been adopted by other Islamic sects (Noṣayrīs, Ḥorūfīs) and appears to be rooted in the tradition of the extremist Shiʿites (ḡolāt).

• AHL-E ḤAQQ ii. INITIATION RITUAL

  M. Reza Fariborz Hamzeh’ee

  The initiation ritual is one of the most important institutions in the tradition of Ahl-e Ḥaqq.

• AHLAW

  Ph. Gignoux

  (Ahlav; written ʾhlwb), a middle Persian term which plays a fundamental role in Mazdean soteriology and which is usually translated as “just.”

• AHLĪ ŠĪRĀZĪ

  W. Thackston

  poet (858/1454?-942/1535).

• AHLOMŌG

  C. J. Brunner

  Middle Persian form of Younger Avestan ašəmaoγa- “one who produces confusion of Truth,” a term applied to Iranian priests who deviated from Zoroastrian doctrine.

• AḤMAD ʿALAWĪ

  H. Corbin

  philosopher and author in Persian and Arabic (d. between 1054/1644 and 1060/1650). 

• AḤMAD ʿALĪ HĀŠEMĪ SANDĪLAVĪ

  S. S. Alvi

   Indo-Persian litterateur (b. 1162/1748-49 in Sandila, a town near Lucknow; d. after 1224/1809).

• AḤMAD B. ʿABDALLĀH

  H. Halm

  (3rd/9th century), son of the supposed founder of Ismaʿili doctrine and grandfather of the first Fatimid caliph, Mahdī.

• AḤMAD B. ASAD

  C. E. Bosworth

  (d. 250/864), early member of the Samanid family and governor of Farḡāna under the ʿAbbasids and Taherids.

• AḤMAD B. AYYŪB

  A. A. Kalantarian

  7th-8th/13th-14th Azerbaijani architect, one of the best representatives of the architectural school of Naḵǰavān.

• AḤMAD B. BAHBAL

  Hameed ud-Din

  Mughal historian and author of a Persian work, Maʿdan-e aḵbār-e Aḥmadī, also known as Maʿdan-e aḵbār-e Jahāngīrī. 

• AḤMAD B. FAŻLĀN

  C. E. Bosworth

  author of an extremely important travel narrative written after he had been a member of an embassy in the early 4th/10th century from the ʿAbbasid caliphate to the ruler of the Bulghars on the middle Volga in Russia.

• AḤMAD B. ḤOSAYN

  İ. Aka

  historian of the 9th/15th century born in Yazd, author of the Tārīḵ-e ǰadīd-e Yazd. 

• AḤMAD B. JAʿFAR

  D. M. Dunlop

  poet, man of letters, musician, wit, and bon vivant at the court of several ʿAbbasid caliphs, hence sometimes called al-Nadīm.

• AḤMAD B. MOḤAMMAD

  C. E. Bosworth

  (r. 311-52/923-63), amir in Sīstān of the Saffarid dynasty (that part of it sometimes called “the second Saffarid dynasty”).

• AḤMAD B. MOḤAMMAD B. ṬĀHER

  C. E. Bosworth

  governor in Ḵᵛārazm and son of the last Tahirid governor in Khorasan. 

• AḤMAD B. NEẒĀM-AL-MOLK

  C. E. Bosworth

  (d. 1149-50), son of the well-known Saljuq vizier (d. 485/1092) and himself vizier for the Great Saljuqs and then for the ʿAbbasid caliphs. 

• AḤMAD B. ʿOMAR B. SORAYJ

  T. Nagel

  Shafeʿite author from Shiraz (249/863-306/918-19)/

• AḤMAD B. QODĀM

  C. E. Bosworth

  a military adventurer who temporarily held power in Sīstān during the confused years following the collapse of the first Saffarid amirate and the military empire of ʿAmr b. Layṯ in 287/900.

• AḤMAD B. SAHL B. HĀŠEM

  C. E. Bosworth

  governor in Khorasan during the confused struggles for supremacy there between the Saffarids, Samanids, and various military adventures in the late 3rd/9th and early 4th/10th century, d. 307/920. 

• AḤMAD ČARMPŪŠ

  S. H. Askari

  (ČERAMPŌŠ), Sohravardī poet-saint of 14th century Bihar (d. 26 Ṣafar 755/22 March 1354).

• AḤMAD HERAVĪ

  D. Pingree

  one of the many eminent astronomers employed by the Buyids in the 4th/10th century.

• AḤMAD INALTIGIN

  C. E. Bosworth

  Turkish commander and rebel under the early Ghaznavid sultan Masʿūd I (421-32/1030-41), d. 426/1035.

• AḤMAD KĀSĀNĪ

  J. Fletcher

  (1461-62—1542-43), known as MAḴDŪM-E AʿẒAM, Sufi, author of about thirty religious treatises, political activist, and founding ancestor of two important saintly lineages of Naqšbandī ḵᵛāǰagān.

• AḤMAD KHATTŪ

  K. A. Nizami

  famous medieval Gujarati saint whose name is associated with the foundation of the city of Ahmadabad (b. Delhi, 737/1336; d. Sarkhej, 10 Šawwal 849/9 January 1446).

• AḤMAD ḴOJESTĀNĪ

  C. E. Bosworth

  military commander in 3rd/9th century Khorasan, one of several contenders for authority in the region after the collapse of Taherid rule had left a power vacuum, d. 268/882.

• AḤMAD MAYMANDĪ

  Ḡ. Ḥ. Yūsofī

  (d. 424/1032), Ghaznavid vizier, statesman, and foster brother and schoolfellow of Sultan Maḥmūd of Ḡazna (r. 388-421/998-1030).

• AḤMAD MŪSĀ

  P. P. Soucek

  8th/14th century painter. 

• AḤMAD NEHĀVANDĪ

  D. Pingree

  2nd/8th century ʿAbbasid astronomer.  

• AḤMAD QAVĀM

  Cross-Reference

  See QAVĀM-AL-SALṬANA, forthcoming online.

• AḤMAD RODAWLAVĪ

  B. B. Lawrence

  early Muslim saint of the Ṣāberīya Češtīya (d. 837/1434.

• AḤMAD ṢĀḠĀNĪ

  D. Pingree

  one of the many astronomers who worked for the Buyids in Baghdad in the 4th/10th century.

• AḤMAD SERHENDĪ (1)

  Y. Friedmann

  , Shaikh (1564-1624), outstanding Mughal mystic and prolific writer on Sufi themes. 

• AHMAD SERHENDI (2)

  Demetrio Giordani

  , Shaikh (1564-1624), Indian Sufi known as Mojadded-e alf-e Ṯāni, the Renovator of the second millennium (of Islam).

• AḤMAD SHAH DORRĀNĪ

  Cross-Reference

  See AFGHANISTAN X. POLITICAL HISTORY.

• AḤMAD SHAH QĀJĀR

  M. J. Sheikh-ol-Islami

  (r. 1909-1925), the seventh and last ruler of the Qajar dynasty.

• AḤMAD ŠĪRĀZĪ

  C. E. Bosworth

  Ghaznavid official and vizier, d. ca. 434/1043.

• AḤMAD SOLṬĀN AFŠĀR

  R. M. Savory

  Qizilbāš amir in the Safavid service.  

• AḤMAD TABRĪZĪ

  İ. Aka

  Persian poet (first half of the 8th/14th century).

• AḤMAD TAKŪDĀR

  P. Jackson

  third il-khan of Iran (r. 680-83/1282-84), seventh son of Hülegü.

• AḤMAD TŪNĪ

  J. van Ess

  Karrāmī theologian who lived about 400/1010.  

• AḤMAD YĀDGĀR

  Hameed-ud-Din

  10th/16th century historian of the Afghans in India.

• AḤMAD, NEẒĀM-AL-DIN

  Erika Glassen

  vizier and amir under the Timurids (d. 912/1507).

• AḤMAD-E ʿABD-AL-ṢAMAD

  Cross-Reference

  See AḤMAD ŠĪRĀZĪ.

• AḤMAD-E JĀM

  H. Moayyad

  a Conservative Sufi with unreserved loyalty to the Šarīʿa (1049 -1141).

• AḤMAD-E ḴĀNI

  F. Shakely

  (1061-1119/1650-1707), a distinguished Kurdish poet, mystic, scholar, and intellectual who is regarded by some as the founder of Kurdish nationalism.

• AHMADABAD

  L. A. Desai

  Major city of Gujarat state in western India and a former center of Persian culture.

• AḤMADĀVAND

  P. Oberling

  a small, sedentary Kurdish tribe of western Iran.

• AHMADNAGAR

  Z. A. Desai

  major city and province in the state of Maharashtra in western India, founded about 900/1495 by Malek Aḥmad Neẓām-al-molk, a Bahmanī governor, on the site where he had earlier won a battle against his sovereign’s forces.

• AḤMADNAGARĪ, ʿABD-AL-NABĪ

  Cross-Reference

  See ʿABD-AL-NABĪ.

• AḤMADPURĪ, GOL MOḤAMMAD

  K. A. Nizami

  (d. 1243/1827), a Panjabi saint and Češtī hagiographer.

• AḤMADZĪ

  C. M. Kieffer

  “descendants of Aḥmad” (sing. Aḥmadzay), a Paṧtō clan and tribal name.

• AḤRĀR

  C. E. Bosworth

  (or BANU’L-AḤRĀR), in Arabic literally “the free ones,” a name applied by the Arabs at the time of the Islamic conquests to their Persian foes in Iraq and Iran.

• AḤRĀR, ḴᵛĀJA ʿOBAYDALLĀH

  J. M. Rogers

  (806-96/1404-90), influential Naqšbandī of Transoxania.

• AHRIMAN

  J. Duchesne-Guillemin

  "demon," God’s adversary in the Zoroastrian religion.

• AHRIŠWANG

  B. Schlerath

  a learned transcription of the Avestan nominative Ašiš vaŋuhī, the goddess “Good Recompense.”

• AḤSĀʾĪ, SHAIKH AḤMAD

  D. M. MacEoin

  (1753-1826), Shiʿite ʿālem and philosopher and unintending originator of the Šayḵī school of Shiʿism in Iran and Iraq.

• AḤSAN AL-TAQĀSĪM

  C. E. Bosworth

  a celebrated geographical work in Arabic written towards the end of the 4th/10th century.

• AḤSAN AL-TAWĀRĪḴ

  ʿA. Navāʾī

  a chronological history of Iran and the neighboring countries written by Ḥasan Beg Rūmlū (b. 937/1530-31), a qūṛčī in the service of the Safavid Shah Ṭahmāsb.

• AHU

  B. Schlerath

  two homonymous Avestan terms: (1) “Existence, life” in a range of religious phrases, (2) “Lord, overlord,” linked with ratu- “lord, judge.”

• ĀHŪ

  B. P. O’Regan, H. Javadi

  Two species of gazelle occur in Iran, Gazella sub-gutturosa and G. dorcas.

• AHUNWAR

  C. J. Brunner

  Middle Persian form of Avestan Ahuna Vairya, name of the most sacred of the Gathic prayers.

• AHURA

  F. B. J. Kuiper

  designation of a type of deity inherited by Zoroastrianism from the prehistoric Indo-Iranian religion.

• AHURA MAZDĀ

  M. Boyce

  the Avestan name with title of a great divinity of the Old Iranian religion, who was subsequently proclaimed by Zoroaster as God.

• AHURA.ṰKAĒŠA

  M. Boyce

  an infrequent Avestan adjective meaning “following the Ahuric doctrine.”

• AHURĀNĪ

  B. Schlerath

  feminine deity of the waters.

• AHVĀZ

  Multiple Authors

  city of southwestern Iran, located in the province of Ḵūzestān on the Kārun river.

• AHVĀZ i. History

  C. E. Bosworth

  Ahvāz was apparently a flourishing town in pre-Islamic times. When the Arabs invaded Ḵūzestān in the later 630s, after the overrunning of Iraq, the general ʿOtba b. Ḡazwān destroyed the administrative half of the town of Ahvāz but preserved the commercial one.

• AHVĀZ ii. The Modern City

  X. De Planhol

  The city has a grid plan adapted to the bends of the Kārūn river. Its heart is on the left bank of the Kārūn; a new quarter has been added on the right bank, where the railway station has been located. Besides the railway bridge an imposing road bridge links the two river banks.

• AHVĀZ iii. Monuments

  J. Lerner

  Little of architectural interest appears to have survived from the medieval period, but a few structures in old Ahvāz and the new city are remnants of various historical and structural happenings.

• AHVAZ iv. Population, 1956-2011

  Mohammad Hossein Nejatian

  This article deals with the following population characteristics of Ahvaz: population growth from 1956 to 2011, age structure, average household size, literacy rate, and economic activity status.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• AHVĀZĪ

  D. Pingree

  a 4th/10th century mathematician.

• AHVĀZĪ, ABU’L-ḤASAN

  Cross-Reference

  See ABU’L-ḤASAN AHWĀZĪ.

• ĀĪN GOŠASP

  A. Tafażżolī

  a general of Hormazd IV (A.D. 579-590), sent by him to campaign against the rebellious general Bahrām Čūbīn.

• ĀĪN-E AKBARĪ

  Cross-Reference

  See AKBAR-NĀMA.

• ĀĪN-NĀMA

  A. Tafażżolī

  Arabic and New Persian form of Middle Persian ēwēn nāmag (“book of manners”), a general term for texts dealing with the exposition of manners, customs, skills, and arts and sciences.

• ĀĪNA-KĀRĪ

  Eleanor G. Sims

  the practice of covering an architectural surface with a mosaic of mirror-glass.

• ĀĪNA-YE ḠAYBNOMĀ

  L. P. Elwell-Sutton

  “The Revealing Mirror,” a fortnightly illustrated magazine which began publication in Tehran on 22 Jomādā I 1325/3 July 1907, edited by Sayyed ʿAbd-al-Raḥīm Kāšānī.

• AIRYAMAN

  M. Boyce

  an ancient Iranian divinity and a yazata of the Zoroastrian pantheon, known in Manichean Middle Persian as Aryaman, in Pahlavi as Ērmān.

• AIRYAMAN IŠYA

  C. J. Brunner

  Gathic Avestan prayer.

• AIWYǠŊHANA

  M. F. Kanga

  Avestan term “wrapping round, girdle”: (1)  a strip from a date-palm leaf used to tie bundle of wires which constitute the barsom, (2) the kusti or sacred girdle.

• ʿAJABŠĪR

  ʿA. Kārang

  a town and baḵš in East Azerbaijan. 

• ʿAJĀʾEB AL-DONYĀ

  L. P. Smirnova

  (“Wonders of the world” or “Wonderful things”), title of a Persian geography.

• ʿAJĀʾEB AL-MAḴLŪQĀT

  C. E. Bosworth, I. Afshar

  (“The marvels of created things”), the name of a genre of classical Islamic literature and, in particular, of a work by Zakarīyāʾ b. Moḥammad Qazvīnī.

• ʿAJĀʾEB AL-MAQDŪR

  U. Nashashibi

  (“The wondrous turns of fate in the vicissitudes of Tīmūr”), a history of the life and conquests of Tīmūr (1336-1405).

• ʿAJAM

  C. E. Bosworth

  the name given in medieval Arabic literature to the non-Arabs of the Islamic empire, but applied especially to the Persians.

• ʿAJAMĪ

  A. A. Kalantarian

  6th/12th century architect under the Eldigüzid atabegs, founder of the Nakhchevan architectural school.

• ʿAJEZ, NARAYAN KAUL

  A. Mattoo

  Kashmiri Brahman of the 17th-18th centuries, a poet and compiler of Moḵtaṣar-e tārīḵ-e Kašmīr (1710-11).

• ĀJĪ ČĀY

  E. Ehlers

  (Talḵa-rūd, “Bitter river”), a river some 200 km in length which flows into Lake Urumia. Due to the mountain origins of many of its source rivers and tributaries, the flow of the river shows marked seasonal variations.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• ʿAJIB MĀZANDARĀNI

  M. Dabirsiāqi

  19th-century poet of the Qajar court.

• ĀJĪL

  M. Kasheff

  an assortment of nuts, roasted chickpeas and seeds such as watermelon, pumpkin, and pear, and raisins and other dried fruits.

• AJINA TEPE

  B. A. Litvinskiĭ

  the present-day name of the mound covering the ruins of an early medieval Buddhist monastery.

• AJMER

  F. Lehmann

  (Aǰmēr, from Skt. Ajayameru), a city in Rajasthan, western India, of great strategic, commercial, and cultural importance from the 6th/12th to the 12th/18th centuries.

• ĀJOR

  Cross-Reference

  See BRICK.

• ĀJŪDĀN-BĀŠĪ

  Ḥ. Maḥbūbī Ardakānī

  a Persian term translating the French military title adjudant-en-chef; aide and deputy to the army commander during the Qajar period.

• ĀKAUFAČIYĀ

  R. Schmitt

  name of a tribe resident in the southeastern part of the Achaemenid empire.

• AḴAWAYNĪ BOḴĀRĪ

  H. H. Biesterfeldt

  4th/10th century physician who worked in Bukhara.

• AḴBĀR AL-AḴYĀR

  B. Lawrence

  The most reliable taḏkera of early Indian Sufis, by Shaikh ʿAbd-al-Ḥaqq Moḥaddeṯ Dehlavī (d. 1052/1642).

• AḴBĀR AL-DAWLAT AL-SALJŪQĪYA

  C. E. Bosworth

  An Arabic chronicle on the history of the Great Saljuq dynasty in Iran and Iraq.

• AḴBĀR AL-ṬEWĀL, KETĀB AL-

  C. E. Bosworth

  (“The book of the long historical narratives”), title of a historical work by the Persian writer of ʿAbbasid times Abū Ḥanīfa Aḥmad b. Dāwūd b. Wanand Dīnavarī.

• AKBAR FATḤALLĀH

  Ḥ. Maḥbūbī Ardakānī

  prime minister of Iran from Ābān, 1299 Š./October, 1920 to Esfand, 1299 Š./February, 1921.  

• AKBAR I

  F. Lehmann

  (949-1014/1542-1605), third and greatest of the Mughal emperors of India. 

• AKBAR KHAN ZAND

  J. R. Perry

  (d. 1196/1782), youngest son of Zakī Khan Zand.  

• AḴBĀR-E MOḠOLĀN

  George Lane

  an original and independent source prepared by Qoṭb-al-Dīn Širāzi on the reign of the Il-Khan Hulāgu Khan and his immediate successors, Abaqa and Aḥmad Tegüdār.

• AKBAR-NĀMA

  R. M. Eaton

  Official history of the reign of the Mughal Emperor Akbar (964-1015/1556-1605), including a statistical gazetteer of sixteenth century North India, compiled by Abu’l-Fażl ʿAllāmī.

• AḴBĀRĪ, MĪRZĀ MOḤAMMAD

  H. Algar

  A leading exponent of the Aḵbārī school of Islamic jurisprudence (feqh) and a violent polemicist against its opponents (1178-1233/1765-1818).

• AḴBĀRĪYA

  E. Kohlberg

  A school in Imamite Shiʿism which maintains that the traditions (aḵbār) of the Imams are the main source of religious knowledge, in contrast to the Oṣūlī school.

• AKES

  M. A. Dandamayev

  (Greek Akēs), a river in Central Asia, the modern Tejen or Harī-rūd (q.v.).

• AḴESTĀN

  Ż. Sajjādī

  a late 12th-century ruler of the Šervānšāh dynasty, patron of the poet Ḵāqānī Šervānī.

• AKHAVAN-E SALESS, MEHDI

  Saeid Rezvani

  prominent poet who holds a place of distinction between the followers of classical Persian prosody and the modernists  (1928-1990).

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• ʿAKKĀS-BĀŠĪ

  F. Gaffary

  photographer and pioneer motion-picture cameraman (1874-1915).

• AḴLĀQ

  F. Rahman

  “ethics” (plural form of ḵoloq “inborn character, moral character, moral virtue”).

• AḴLĀQ AL-AŠRĀF

  P. Sprachman

  (“The ethics of the aristocracy”), a satire composed in 740/1340-41, the most important work of ʿObayd Zākānī. 

• AḴLĀQ-E JALĀLĪ

  G. M. Wickens

  an “ethical” treatise in Persian by Moḥammad b. Asʿad Jalāl-al-dīn Davāni (15th century).

• AḴLĀQ-E MOḤSENĪ

  G. M. Wickens

  an ostensibly serious treatise on ethics by the prolific prose-stylist Kamāl-al-dīn Ḥosayn Wāʿeẓ Kāšefī, completed in 900/1494-95.

• AḴLĀQ-E NĀṢERĪ

  G. M. Wickens

  by Ḵᵛāǰa Naṣīr-al-dīn Ṭūsī, the principal treatise in Persian on ethics, economics, and politics, first published according to the author in 633/1235.

• AḴLĀṬ

  C. E. Bosworth, H. Crane

  a town and medieval Islamic fortress in eastern Anatolia.

• AḴNŪḴ

  J. P. Asmussen

  Enoch, in Manichean texts. According to the Cologne Mani Codex, the outstanding Greek Mani-vita, the prophet grew up in a Judeo-Christian environment, in the sect founded by Elkhasai in Eastern Syria about 100 CE.

• AKŌMAN

  J. Duchesne-Guillemin

  “Evil Mind,” a term personified as a demon in Zoroastrianism.

• AḴORSĀLĀR

  Cross-Reference

  See ĀXWARR.

• AḴSĪKAṮ

  C. E. Bosworth

  in early medieval times the capital of the then still Iranian province of Farḡāna.

• AḴSĪKATĪ

  Cross-Reference

  See AṮĪR AḴSĪKATĪ.

• AḴŠONVĀR

  C. J. Brunner

  The imperfect recording in Arabic of an eastern Middle Iranian term for “king;” it is used as a proper name.

• AKSU

  Alain Cariou

  Nowadays, Aksu is a town and major oasis of the Northwest Tarim Basin in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China. Located between the southern foot of the Tien Shan Mountains (“Heavenly Mountains”) and the edge of the Taklamakan Desert, the administrative area of the city (18,184 sq km) had a population of 572,700, in 2000.

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• AḴTĀJĪ

  D. O. Morgan

  a term, Mongolian in origin, derived from aḵtā “gelding” and meaning “groom” or, more specifically in the context of the court, “master of the horse.”

• AḴTAR newspaper

  L. P. Elwell-Sutton

  a Persian newspaper published in Istanbul, 1876 to 1895-96.

• AḴTAR “star"

  Cross-Reference

  See AXTAR.

• AḴTAR, AḤMAD BEG GORJĪ

  Dj. Khaleghi-Motlagh

  a poet of the era of Fatḥ-ʿAlī Shah Qāǰār (1212-50/1797-1834).

• AḴTAR-E KĀVĪĀN

  Cross-Reference

  See DERAFŠ-E KĀVĪĀN.

• ĀḴŪND

  H. Algar

  (or ĀḴᵛOND), a word of uncertain etymology with the general meaning of religious scholar. Various Persian origins have been proposed for the word.

• AḴŪND ḴORĀSĀNĪ

  A. Hairi, S. Murata

  (1255-1329/1839-1911), Shiʿite religious leader.

• ĀḴŪND, ḤĀJJ

  Cross-Reference

  See ʿALĪ AKBAR ŠAHMĪRZĀDĪ.

• ĀḴŪNDZĀDA

  H. Algar

  (in Soviet usage, AKHUNDOV), Azerbaijani playwright and propagator of alphabet reform (1812-78).

• AKVĀN-E DĪV

  DJ. Khaleghi-Motlagh

  the demon Akvān, who was killed by Rostam in the Šāh-nāma.

• ĀḴᵛOND

  Cross-Reference

  See ĀḴŪND.

• AḴYĀR

  H. Algar

  “the chosen” (Persian, bargozīdagān), a category sometimes encountered in accounts given by Sufi writers of the unseen hierarchy known as reǰāl al-ḡayb (“men of the unseen”).

• ĀL

  A. Šāmlū and J. R. Russell

  a folkloric being that personifies puerperal fever; the name apparently derives from Iranian āl “red.”

• ĀL TAMḠĀ

  G. Doerfer

  “red seal,” Turkish term for the supreme seal of the Mongol Il-Khans of Iran.

• ĀL-E ʿABĀ

  H. Algar

  “The Family of the Cloak,” i.e., the Prophet Moḥammad, his daughter Fāṭema, his cousin and son-in-law ʿAlī, and his grandsons Ḥasan and Ḥosayn.

• ĀL-E AFRĀSĪĀB (1)

  C. E. Bosworth

  a minor Iranian Shiʿite dynasty of Māzandarān in the Caspian coastlands that flourished in the late medieval, pre-Safavid period.

• ĀL-E AFRĪḠ

  C. E. Bosworth

  (Afrighid dynasty), the name given by the Khwarazmian scholar Abū Rayḥān Bīrūnī to the dynasty of rulers in his country, with the ancient title of Ḵᵛārazmšāh.

• ĀL-E AḤMAD, JALĀL

  J. W. Clinton

  (1923-69), well-known writer and social critic.

• ĀL-E ʿALĪ

  Cross-Reference

  See ʿALIDS.

• ĀL-E BĀBĀN

  Cross-Reference

  See BĀBĀN.

• ĀL-E BĀVAND

  W. Madelung

  (BAVANDIDS), a dynasty ruling Ṭabarestān (Māzandarān) from at least the 2nd/8th century until 750/1349. 

• ĀL-E BORHĀN

  C. E. Bosworth

  the name of a family of spiritual and civic leaders in Bokhara during the 6th/12th and early 7th/13th centuries.

• ĀL-E BŪ KORD

  P. Oberling

  a tribe of Ḵūzestān, of uncertain origin.

• ĀL-E BŪYA

  Cross-Reference

  See BUYIDS.

• ĀL-E DĀBŪYA

  Cross-Reference

  See DABUYIDS.

• ĀL-E ELYĀS

  C. E. Bosworth

  a short-lived Iranian dynasty which ruled in the eastern Persian province of Kermān during the 4th/10th century. 

• ĀL-E FARĪḠŪN

  C. E. Bosworth

  The Iranian name of the family, Farīḡūn, may well be connected with that of the legendary Iranian figure Farīdūn/Afrīdūn; moreover the author of the Ḥodūd al-ʿālam, who seems to have lived and worked in Gūzgān, specifically says in his entry on the geography of Gūzgān that the malek of that region was a descendant of Afrīdūn.

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• ĀL-E FAŻLŪYA

  Cross-Reference

  See ATĀBAKĀN-E LORESTĀN.

• ĀL-E HĀŠEM

  C. Cahen

  3rd-5th/9th-11th century local dynasty of the region of Darband.

• ĀL-E JALĀYER

  Cross-Reference

  See JALAYERIDS.

• ĀL-E ḴAMĪS

  Cross-Reference

  See ʿARAB.

• ĀL-E KART

  B. Spuler

  or perhaps ĀL-E KORT, an east Iranian dynasty (643-791/1245-1389).

• ĀL-E KAṮĪR

  J. Qāʾem-Maqāmī

  an Arab tribe of Ḵūzestān composed of two subtribes, Bayt Saʿd and Bayt Karīm and inhabiting two sectors of Šūš and Dezfūl.

• ĀL-E MĀKŪLĀ

  D. M. Dunlop

  a Persian noble family prominent at Baghdad in the 5th/11th century.

• ĀL-E MAʾMŪN

  C. E. Bosworth

  Their rise is connected with the growth of the commercial center of Gorgānǰ in northwest Ḵᵛārazm and its rivalry with the capital of the Afrighids, Kāt or Kāṯ, on the right bank of the Oxus. Gorgānǰ flourished especially because of its position as the terminus for caravan trade across the Ust Urt desert to the Emba.

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• ĀL-E MĪKĀL

  R. W. Bulliet

  the leading aristocratic family of western Khorasan from the 3rd/9th to the 5th/11th century.

• ĀL-E MOḤTĀJ

  C. E. Bosworth

  a local dynasty, most probably of Iranian origin but conceivably of Iranized Arab stock, who ruled in the principality of Čaḡānīān on the right bank of the upper Oxus in the basin of the Sorḵān river.

• ĀL-E MOẒAFFAR

  Cross-Reference

  See MOZAFFARIDS.

• ĀL-E ŠANSAB

  Cross-Reference

  See GHURIDS.

• ĀL-E VARDĀNZŪR

  Cross-Reference

  See ATĀBAKĀN-E YAZD.

• ĀL-E ZĪĀR

  Cross-Reference

  See ZIYARIDS.

• ʿALĀʾ

  H. Busse

  vizier of Fārs under the Buyid rulers Šaraf-al-dawla and Ṣamṣām-al-dawla.

• ĀLĀ DĀḠ

  E. Ehlers

  name of a number of mountains in Iran; of Turkish origin, the words mean “colored mountain.”

• ALA, HOSAYN

  Mansureh Ettehadieh and EIr.

  (1882-1964), statesman, diplomat, minister, and prime minister during the late Qajar and Pahlavi periods. He served as a high-ranking official from the Constitutional Revolution of 1906-07 to the time of the White Revolution of 1963-64.

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• ʿALĀʾ-AL-DAWLA

  Cross-Reference

  See ABŪ KĀLĪJĀR GARŠĀSP.

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-DAWLA

  Ḥ. Maḥbūbī Ardakānī

  (d. 1299/1882), notable of the Qajar tribe and holder of high offices under Nāṣer-al-dīn Shah.

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-DAWLA ʿALĪ

  C. E. Bosworth

  (511-34/1117-40), ruler of the Espahbadīya line of the local dynasty of the Bavandids in the Caspian region of Māzandarān.

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-DAWLA ḎUʾL-QADAR

  R. M. Savory

  early 9th/15th century ruler of Maṛʿaš and Albestān in the kingdom of Little Armenia, east of the Taurus mountains. 

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-DAWLA ḤASAN B. ROSTAM

  W. Madelung

  B. ʿALĪ B. ŠAHRĪĀR, ŠARAF-AL-MOLŪK, Bavandid ruler of Māzandarān. According to the account of Ebn Esfandīār, he reigned from 558/1163 to 566/1171. 

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-DAWLA MOḤAMMAD

  C. E. Bosworth

  (d. 433/1041), Daylamī military leader and founder of the shortlived but significant Kakuyid dynasty.

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-DAWLA SEMNĀNĪ

  J. van Ess

  (1261-1336), famous mystic of the Il-khanid period, opponent of the growing influence of Ebn ʿArabī in Iran.

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-DAWLA, MĪRZĀ AḤMAD KHAN

  Ḥ. Maḥbūbī Ardakānī

  (d. 1329/1911), the son of Moḥammad Raḥīm Khan ʿAlāʾ-al-dawla.

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-DAWLA, ROKN-AL-DĪN MĪRZĀ

  J. Woods

  Timurid prince (820-65/1417-60).

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-DĪN ʿALĪ

  C. E. Bosworth

  Ghurid malek and later sultan, reigned in Ḡūr from Fīrūzkūh as the last of his family there before the extinction of the dynasty by the Ḵᵛārazmšāhs, 599-602/1203-96 and 611-12/1214-15. 

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-DĪN ʿALĪ MOTTAQĪ

  Cross-Reference

  See ʿALĪ MOTTAQĪ.

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-DĪN BĪRJANDĪ

  E. Baer

  a metalworker who lived between the late 15th and the early 16th century.

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-DĪN ḤOSAYN JAHĀNSŪZ

  C. E. Bosworth

  called JAHĀNSŪZ, Ghurid sultan and the first ruler of the Šansabānī family to make the Ghurids a major power in the eastern Islamic world (544-56/1149-61).

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-DĪN ḴALJĪ

  N. H. Zaidi

  sultan of Delhi (r. 695-715/1296-1316). 

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-DĪN MOḤAMMAD

  R. Quiring-Zoche

  naqīb of Isfahan in the Timurid period and ancestor of prominent religious-legal dignitaries of the Safavid period. 

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-DĪN MOḤAMMAD

  B. Lewis

  chief of the Ismaʿilis of Alamūt (d. 1255).

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-DĪN MOḤAMMAD

  C. E. Bosworth

  Ḵᵛārazmšāh who reigned in Transoxania and central and eastern Iran as well as in Ḵᵛārazm, (596-617/1200-20).

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-DĪN MOḤAMMAD BOḴĀRĪ

  Cross-Reference

  See BOḴĀRĪ.

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-DĪN MONAJJEM

  Cross-Reference

  See ʿALĪŠĀH BOḴĀRĪ.

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-DĪN SAMARQANDĪ

  W. Madelung

  Ḥanafī jurist and Mātorīdī theologian.

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-MOLK, ḤĀJJĪ

  Ḥ. Maḥbūbī Ardakānī

  (d. 23 Jomādā II 1308/4 February 1891), holder of various offices under Nāṣer-al-dīn Shah.

• ʿALĀʾ-AL-MOLK

  Ḥ. Maḥbūbī Aardakānī

  son of Mīrzā ʿAlī Aṣḡar Mostawfī, governor and minister in the later Qajar period (1258-1344/1842-1925).

• ʿALĀʾ-Al-SALṬANA

  BĀQER ʿĀQELI

  prime minister and diplomat of the late Qajar period (d. 1918).  Upon the proclamation of the Constitution in 1907, he was appointed minister of foreign affairs. During the post-constitutional period he was a member of most cabinets, until in 1913 he was appointed prime minister.

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• ʿALĀʾ-AL-SALṬANA

  Ḥ. Maḥbūbī Ardakānī

  Displeased with Malkom Khan, the Iranian minister in London, the Shah replaced him with Moḥammad-ʿAlī Khan; at this point he received the title ʿAlāʾ-al-salṭana. During the constitutional period he was back in Iran as a member of various cabinets. In January, 1913 he became prime minister, a position he enjoyed for seven months.

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• ALA-FIRENG

  Cross-Reference

  See ALĀFRANK.

• ALĀFRANK

  D. O. Morgan

  or ALA-FIRENG, the eldest son of the Il-khan Geiḵatu (r. 690-94/1291-95).

• ʿALĀʾI, ŠOʿĀʿ-ALLĀH

  Firuz Kazemzadeh

  (1899-1984), prominent government official and a leading Bahai.

• ALAK-DOLAK

  H. Javadi

  the game of tipcat, played for centuries in Iran, Afghanistan, and surrounding countries.

• ʿĀLAM II, SHAH

  S. S. Alvi

  Mughal emperor (1173-1253/1759-1806).

• ʿALAM KHAN

  J. R. Perry

  viceroy of the Afsharid state of Khorasan, 1161-68/1748-54.  

• ʿALAM VA ʿALĀMAT

  J. Calmard, J. W. Allan

  In both Arabic and Persian, the word ʿalam conveys various senses connected with the general meaning of a distinctive sign or mark. In Persian the word had early carried the meaning of ensign and of standard or flag. The same meanings may also be rendered by the word ʿalāma, which derives from the same root.

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• AʿLAM, HUŠANG

  Mehran Afshari and EIr

  (1928-2007), scholar of the history of science. 

• ʿALAM, Moḥammad Ebrāhim

  Hormoz Davarpanah

  (1881-1944), one of the most eminent local magnates and landowners of the late Qajar and early Pahlavi period.

• AʿLAM, MOẒAFFAR

  Baqer Aqeli

  Sardār Enteṣār (1882-1973), provincial governor, minister of foreign affairs, military minister plenipotentiary. 

• AʿLAM-AL-DAWLA

  cross reference

  See ṮAQAFĪ, ḴALĪL KHAN.

• ʿALAM-AL-HODĀ

  W. Madelung

  leading Imamite scholar, man of letters, and naqīb (syndic) of the Talibids in Baghdad.

• ʿĀLAM-E NESVĀN

  L. P. Elwell-Sutton

  a magazine founded in Mīzān 1299 Š./September 1920, one of the earliest periodicals published by and for women.

• ʿĀLAMĀRĀ-YE ʿABBĀSĪ

  R. M. Savory

  a Safavid chronicle written by Eskandar Beg Monšī (1560-1632). 

• ʿĀLAMĀRĀ-YE ŠĀH ESMĀʿĪL

  R. McChesney

  an anonymous narrative of the life of Shah Esmāʿīl (r. 907-30/1501-24), the founder of the Safavid dynasty in Iran.

• ʿALĀMĀT-E ŻOHŪR

  Cross-Reference

  See APOCALYPTIC.

• ALAMŪT

  B. Hourcade

  a high, isolated valley in the Alborz 35 km northeast of Qazvīn, the center of an autonomous Ismaʿili state.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• ALAMŪT DIALECTS

  Cross-Reference

  See QAZVĪN DIALECTS.

• ALANS

  V. I. Abaev, H. W. Bailey

  an ancient Iranian tribe of the northern (Scythian, Saka, Sarmatian, Massagete) group, known to classical writers from the first centuries CE.

• ĀLĀT

  F. M. Kotwal and J. W. Boyd

  “utensils,” for Parsis the “sacred apparatus” employed in Zoroastrian rituals. 

• ALAVI, BOZORG

  Ḥasan Mirʿābedini

  (1904-1997), leftist writer and one of the most noted Persian novelists of the 20th century, whose works were banned in Iran from 1953 to 1979.

• ʿALAWAYH

  D. M. Dunlop

  AL-AʿSAR (“the Left-handed”), a noted singer at the ʿAbbasid court under Hārūn al-Rašīd and his successors, ca. 184-230/800-54.

• ʿALAWĪ

  W. Kadi

  the nesba used to denote descendants, political states, or sects connected with one or another ʿAli; more particularly, it is employed to refer to a Shiʿite sect centered today in Syria.

• ʿALAWĪ, ABD-AL-KARĪM

  Cross-Reference

  See ʿABD-AL-KARĪM ʿALAVĪ.

• ʿALAWĪ, AḤMAD

  Cross-Reference

  See AḤMAD ʿALAWĪ.

• ʿALAWĪS

  Cross-Reference

  OF ṬABARESTĀN, DAYLAMĀN, AND GĪLĀN. See ʿALIDS.

• ʿALAWĪYAT AL-AʿSAR

  Cross-Reference

  See ʿALAWAYH.

• ĀLBĀLŪ

  A. Parsa

  (or ĀLŪBĀLŪ), sour cherry (Cerasus vulgaris), a tree of western Asia and eastern Europe.

• ALBANIA

  M. L. Chaumont

  an ancient country in the Caucasus (for Albania in Islamic times, see Arrān). 

• ALBORZ

  W. Eilers, M. Boyce, M. Bazin, E. Ehlers, B. Hourcade

  The older name of the range is unknown; perhaps, however, the Assyrian name Bikni designated Mt. Damāvand, the volcanic cone northeast of Tehran. In the Sasanian period part of the region may have been known by the Middle Persian Padišxwār-gar. Ferdowsī in the Šāh-nāma refers to the Alborz mountains as though they lay in India.

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• ALBORZ COLLEGE

  Y. Armajani

  an American Presbyterian missionary institution in Tehran; starting as a grade school in 1873, it grew to a junior college in 1924 and an accredited liberal arts college by 1928. In 1940 it was closed and its property bought by the government of Iran.

• ALBUQUERQUE, ALFONSO DE

  J. Aubin

  (ca. 1460-1515), admiral in the Indian Ocean (1504, 1506-08), second governor of Portuguese India (1509-15), a great conqueror, and the real founder of the Portuguese empire in the Orient.

• ALCHASAI

  J. P. Asmussen

  a sectarian in the early Christian Church, 1st-2nd centuries CE, in the time of Trajan. 

• ĀLČĪ

  D. O. Morgan

  (“sealer”), a Turkish term (from āl “red seal”) designating an il-khanid chancery official.

• ALDANMIŠ KÄVAKEB

  S. Soucek

  Azeri Turkish title of a narrative by Āḵūndzāda (1812-78).

• ʿĀLEMPUR, Moḥyi-al-Din

  Habib Borjian

  (Muhiddin Olimpur/Olimov), Tajik journalist, photographer, and intellectual figure who was instrumental in strengthening cultural ties among Persianate societies (1945-1995).

• ALESSANDRI

  A. M. Piemontese

  (d. after 1595), Venetian secretary and diplomat, author of an important report on Safavid Persia.

• ALEXANDER OF LYCOPOLIS

  G. Widengren

  apparently a Neoplatonic philosopher living in Egypt about 300 CE.

• ALEXANDER THE GREAT

  P. Briant

  (356-323 B.C.). Ascending the throne of Macedonia on the assassination of his father Philip II in 336, Alexander quickly took up Philip’s grand scheme to land an army in Asia and “liberate the Greek cities from the Achaemenid yoke.” 

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• ALEXANDER THE GREAT ii. In Zoroastrian Tradition

  F. M. Kotwal and P. G. Kreyenbroek

  heritage of the Sasanian period includes two widely divergent storylines about Alexander, both of which were presumably transmitted by Zoroastrians and can therefore be labelled “Zoroastrian.”

• ALEXANDER, PRINCE

  G. Bournoutian

  (known in Persian as ESKANDAR MĪRZĀ), pro-Persian member of the royal family of Georgia (b. 1770, d. after 1830).

• ALEXANDRIA

  P. Leriche

  general designation of cities whose foundation is credited to Alexander the Great (356-23 B.C.).

• ALEXANDROPOLIS

  P. Leriche

  name of a number of cities. According to certain historians, these cities were founded after Alexander’s death; others call some of these same cities Alexandria.

   

   

  Search terms:

  الکساندروپولیس

  alexanderopolis

• ALF LAYLA WA LAYLA

  Ch. Pellat

  “One thousand nights and one night,” Arabic title of the world-famous collection of tales known in English as The Arabian Nights. 

• ALFARIC, PROSPER

  H. C. Puech

  (1876-1955), French historian of religions.  

• ALFĪYA VA ŠALFĪYA

  Cross-Reference

  name given to illustrated books, in particular one by Azraqī, describing various kinds of sexual relationships between men and women. See AZRAQI.

• ʿALĪ ʿAJAMĪ

  Cross-Reference

  See ʿALĪ, ḴᵛĀJA.

• ʿALĪ AKBAR

  J. Calmard

  Imam Ḥosayn’s eldest son, killed at the age of 18, 19, or 25 at the battle of Karbalā on the day of ʿĀšūrā (10 Moḥarram 61/10 October 680).

• ʿALĪ AKBAR ḤOSAYNĪ ARDESTĀNĪ

  K. A. Nizami

  Indo-Muslim taḏkera writer, remembered solely for his unpublished Maǰmaʿ al-awlīāʾ, an encyclopedia of Sufi saints compiled in 1043/1633-34 and dedicated to the Mughal emperor Shah Jahān (1037-68/1628-58).

• ʿALĪ AKBAR ḴEṬĀʾĪ

  T. Yazici

  (15th-16th centuries), author of the Persian Ḵeṭāy-nāma or “Book of Cathay,” i.e., of China.

• ʿALĪ AKBAR ŠAHMĪRZĀDĪ

  M. Momen

  known as Ḥāǰǰ Āḵund, a prominent Iranian Bahāʾī (b. 1842).

• ʿALĪ AL-AʿLĀ

  H. Algar

  (d. 822/1419), also known as Amīr Sayyed ʿAlī, principal successor of Fażlallāh Astarābādī, founder of the Ḥorūfī sect.

• ʿALĪ AL-HĀDĪ

  W. Madelung

  the 10th imam of the Emāmī Shiʿites (d. 254/868).

• ʿALĪ AL-NAQĪ

  Cross-Reference

  IMAM. See ʿALĪ AL-HĀDĪ.

• ʿALĪ AL-REŻĀ

  W. Madelung

  the eighth Imam of the Emāmī Shiʿites.

• ʿALĪ ĀQĀ TABRĪZĪ, MIRZA

  Cross-Reference

  See ṮEQAT-AL-ESLĀM.

• ʿALĪ AṢḠAR

  J. Calmard

  Imam Ḥosayn’s youngest son, killed at Karbalā (10 Moḥarram 61/10 October 680).

• ʿALĪ AṢḠAR BORŪJERDĪ

  L. P. Elwell-Sutton

  author of several works including the ʿAqāʾed al-šīʿa, written in 1263/1874 and dedicated to Moḥammad Shah Qāǰār.

• ʿALĪ AṢḠAR ČEŠTĪ

  K. A. Nizami

  Mughal hagiographer, chiefly known for his Jawāher-e Farīdī, compiled in 1033/1623 during the reign of Jahāngīr (1014-37/1605-27). 

• ʿALĪ B. ʿABBĀS MAJŪSĪ

  L. Richter-Bernburg

  physician from Fārs and author of an Arabic work on medicine (d. /994 [?]); probably the most important medical writer between Rāzī and Ebn Sīnā.

• ʿALĪ B. ʿABDALLĀH

  Cross-Reference

  See ʿALAWAYH AʿSAR.

• ʿALĪ B. ABĪ ṬĀLEB

  I. K. Poonawala, E. Kohlberg

  (b. ca. 600, d. 40/661), cousin and son-in-law of the prophet Moḥammad, first Shiʿite Imam, father of the Imams Ḥasan and Ḥosayn by Fāṭema, and fourth caliph (35-40/656-61).

• ʿALĪ B. AḤMAD BALḴĪ

  D. Pingree

  post-3rd/9th century astronomer.

• ʿALĪ B. ASAD

  ʿA. Ḥabībī

  (second half of the 11th cent.), the amir of Badaḵšān to whom Nāṣer(-e) Ḵosrow dedicated his Jāmeʿ al-ḥekmatayn

• ʿALĪ B. BŪYA

  Cross-Reference

  the eldest of three brothers who came to power in western Persia as military adventurers and founded the Buyid dynasty. See ʿEMĀD-AL-DAWLA.

• ʿALĪ B. FARĀMARZ

  C. E. Bosworth

  member of the Deylamī dynasty of the Kakuyids (d. 1095).

• ʿALĪ B. ḤĀMED

  cross-reference

  KŪFĪ. See ČĀČ-NĀMA.

• ʿALĪ B. ḤARB

  C. E. Bosworth

  (or ʿAlī b. ʿOṯmān b. Ḥarb), ephemeral Saffarid amir of the so-called “third Saffarid dynasty”.

• ʿALĪ B. ḤASAN

  cross-reference

  See ʿALĪTIGIN.

• ʿALĪ B. ḤOSĀM-AL-DAWLA

  cross-reference

  ŠAHRĪĀR. See ʿALĀʾ-AL-DAWLA ʿALĪ.

• ʿALĪ B. ḤOSAYN AL-ŠARĪF

  cross-reference

  AL-MORTAŻĀ. See ʿALAM-AL-HODĀ.

• ʿALĪ B. ḤOSAYN ANṢĀRĪ

  cross-reference

  See ZAYN-AL-DĪN ʿAṬṬĀR.

• ʿALĪ B. ḤOSAYN B. ʿALĪ B. ABĪ ṬĀLEB

  W. Madelung

  , ZAYN-AL-ʿĀBEDĪN (d. ca. 712-13), the fourth Imam of the Emāmī Shiʿites.

• ʿALĪ B. IL-ARSLAN QARĪB

  C. E. Bosworth

  or ḴᵛĪŠĀVAND, ZAʿĪM-AL-ḤOJJĀB, Turkish military commander of the early Ghaznavids Maḥmūd, Moḥammad and Masʿūd I.

• ʿALĪ B. ʿĪSĀ B. DĀʾŪD

  D. Sourdel

   B. AL-JARRĀḤ (245-334/859-946), vizier during the reign of the caliph Moqtader (r. 908-32). His family was of Persian origin resident in Iraq.

• ʿALĪ B. ʿĪSĀ B. MĀHĀN

  Ch. Pellat

  (d. 812), officer in the service of the ʿAbbasids.

• ʿALĪ B. MAʾMŪN

  C. E. Bosworth

  , ABU’L-ḤASAN, second Ḵᵛārazmšāh of the short-lived Maʾmunid dynasty in Ḵᵛārazm (r. 997-ca. 1008-09).

• ʿALĪ B. MASʿŪD

  C. E. Bosworth

  [I], BAHĀʾ-AL-DAWLA ABU’L-ḤASAN, Ghaznavid sultan, reigned briefly ca. 1048-49.

• ʿALĪ B. MOḤAMMAD

  cross-reference

  See ABU’L-QĀSEM ʿALĪ B. MOḤAMMAD.

• ʿALĪ B. MOḤAMMAD B. ABĪ ṬĀHER

  cross-reference

  See ABŪ ṬĀHER.

• ʿALĪ B. MOḤAMMAD B. ʿALĪ

  cross-reference

  ASTARĀBĀDĪ. See ŠARĪF JORJĀNĪ.

• ʿALĪ B. ʿOBAYDALLĀH

  M. J. McDermott

  B. ḤASAN ḤASKĀ B. ḤOSAYN B. ḤASAN B. ḤOSAYN, Shiʿite traditionist and biographer (b. 1110-11, d. after 1189). 

• ʿALĪ B. ʿOBAYDALLĀH ṢĀDEQ

  C. E. Bosworth

  , ABU’L ḤASAN (d. ca. 1040), Ghaznavid military commander under Sultan Masʿūd I.

• ʿALĪ B. ʿOMAR

  cross-reference

  KĀTEBĪ QAZVĪNĪ. See NAJM-AL-DĪN ʿALĪ.

• ʿALĪ B. ʿOṮMĀN

  cross-reference

  B. ḤARB. See ʿALĪ B. ḤARB.

   

• ʿALĪ B. OWAYS

  J. M. Smith, Jr.

  Jalayerid prince usually known as Šāhzāda Shaikh ʿAlī, one of the five sons of Oways I (r. 1356-74).

• ʿALĪ B. ŠAMS-AL-DĪN

  W. Madelung

  author of the Tārīḵ-e Ḵānī. 

• ʿALĪ B. ŠOJĀʿ-AL-DĪN

  cross-reference

  See ʿALĀʾ-AL-DĪN ʿALĪ.

• ʿALĪ B. SOLṬĀN-MOḤAMMAD

  A. Welch

  , MĪRZĀ, a master painter of the early Safavid period.

• ʿALĪ B. ṬAYFŪR

  M. A. Nayeem

  BESṬĀMĪ, historian and litterateur at the courts of Sultan ʿAbdallāh Qoṭbšāh (1626-72) and his successor Sultan Abu’l-Ḥasan (1672-86).

   

• ʿALĪ B. ZAYD

  cross-reference

  BAYHAQĪ. See BAYHAQĪ, ẒAHĪR-AL-DĪN.

• ʿALĪ BESṬĀMĪ

  D. M. MacEoin

  early Bābī ʿālem and member of the ḥorūf al-ḥayy or sābeqūn, the first followers of the Bāb.

• ʿALĪ DĀYA

  Cross-Reference

  See ʿALĪ B. ʿOBAYDALLĀH.

• ALĪ DYNASTY

  Cross-Reference

  See ĀL-E ʿALĪ.

• ʿALĪ EBRĀHĪM KHAN

  F. Lehmann

  Indian statesman and literary figure (d. 1208/1793-94).

• ʿALĪ HAMADĀNĪ

  Gerhard Böwering

  full name: ʿALĪ B. ŠEHĀB-AL-DĪN B. MOḤAMMAD HAMADĀNĪ, MĪR SAYYED, surnamed ʿAlī-e Ṯānī, Šāh-e Hamadān, and Amīr-e Kabīr, major 8th/14th century Sufi saint.

• ʿALĪ HERAVĪ

  P. P. Soucek

  also known as MĪR ʿALĪ KĀTEB ḤOSAYNĪ, a calligrapher active in Herat, Mašhad, and Bukhara from the late 9/15th century to 951/1544-45.

• ʿALĪ KANĪ

  H. Algar

  MOLLĀ (1220-1306/1805-88), an influential and wealthy moǰtahed of Tehran who played a decisive role in obtaining the cancellation of the Reuter Concession in 1873. 

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• ALĪ KĀY

  B. Hourcade

  a semi-nomadic Gīlakī-speaking tribe that winters in the foothills of the central Alborz.

• ʿALĪ KHAN AMĪN AL-DAWLA, MĪRZĀ

  Cross-Reference

  , MĪRZĀ. See AMĪN-AL-DAWLA.

• ʿALĪ KHAN ḤĀJEB-AL-DAWLA

  H. Busse

  Qajar official (1222-84/1807-08 to 1867).

• ALI KOSH

  Cross-Reference

  See ʿALĪKOŠ.

• ʿALI MARDĀN KHAN

  Mehrnoush Soroush

  (d. Lahore, 1657), military leader and administrator under Safavid kings Shah ʿAbbās I and Shah Ṣafi, and Mughal ruler Shah Jahān.

• ʿALĪ MĪRZĀ

  R. M. Savory

  (d. 899/1494), eldest son of Shaikh Ḥaydar, head of the Safavid ṭarīqa, and ʿAlamšāh Begom, daughter of the Āq Qoyunlū ruler Uzun Ḥasan.

• ʿALĪ MOTTAQĪ

  M. Baqir

  Saint and Hadith scholar of India (885-975/1481-1567).

• ʿALĪ QĀʾENĪ

  P. P. Soucek

  usually known as SOLṬĀN-ʿALĪ, calligrapher active in Herat and Tabrīz during the late 9th/15th and early 10th/16th centuries.

• ʿALĪ QĀʾENĪ

  D. Pingree

  mathematician.

• ʿĀLĪ QĀPŪ

  P. P. Soucek

  a five-storied building overlooking the Maydān-e Šāh of Isfahan..

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• ʿALĪ QŪŠJĪ

  F. Rahman, D. Pingree

  (QŪŠJŪ), theologian and scientist (d. 879/1474). 

• ʿALĪ TABRĪZĪ (calligrapher)

  P. P. Soucek

  (or MĪR ʿALĪ TABRĪZĪ), 8th/14th century calligrapher who is often credited with the invention of the nastaʿlīq script.

• ʿALĪ TABRĪZĪ (woodcarver)

  H. Crane

  15th-century woodcarver.

• ʿALĪ, AMĪR SAYYED

  Cross-Reference

  See ʿALĪ AL-AʿLĀ.

• ʿALĪ, ḴᵛĀJA

  H. Horst

  also known as SAYYED ʿALĪ ʿAJAMĪ (b. ca. 770/1368-69, d. 830/1427 or 832/1429), an ancestor of the Safavid royal family, the son of Shaikh Ṣadr-al-dīn and grandson of Shaikh Ṣafī-al-dīn Ardabīlī. 

• ʿĀLĪ, NEʿMAT KHAN

  M. U. Memon

  Satirist, historian, and Persian poet of Mughal India (d. 1121/1709-10).

• ʿALĪʾ-AL-DĪN ATSÏZ

  C. E. Bosworth

  a late and short-reigned sultan of the Ghurid dynasty in Afghanistan (607-11/1210-14).

• ʿALĪ-AṢḠAR KHAN AMĪN-AL-SOLṬĀN

  Cross-Reference

  See ATĀBAK-E AʿẒAM.

• ʿALĪ-MOḤAMMAD KHAN BAHĀDOR

  Hameed ud-Din

  Historian of the Mughals and author of Merʾāt-e Aḥmadī (ca. 1111/1700-1177/1763).

• ʿALĪ-MOḤAMMAD ḴORĀSĀNĪ

  Cross-Reference

  MĪRZĀ. See EBN AṢDAQ.

• ʿALĪ-MOḤAMMAD ŠĪRĀZĪ

  Cross-Reference

  See BĀBISM.

• ʿALĪ-MOḤAMMAD WARQĀ

  Cross-Reference

  MĪRZĀ. See WARQĀ.

• ʿALĪ-MORĀD KHAN ZAND

  J. R. Perry

  (r. 1195-99/1781-85), fourth of the Zand rulers.

• ʿALĪ-NAQĪ

  R. Skelton

  a Safavid miniature painter, whose works follow the manner of his father, Shaikh ʿAbbāsī; he is known from the inscriptions on seven paintings dated between 1684-85 and 1700-01.

• ʿALĪ-QOLĪ JOBBA-DĀR

  P. P. Soucek

  painter active in Qazvīn and Isfahan during the late 11th/17th and early 12th/18th centuries.

• ʿALĪ-QOLĪ KHAN (MOṢṬAFĀ PASHA)

  D. M. Lang

  later known as MOṢṬAFĀ PASHA (ca. 1680-1727), Safavid (later Ottoman) wālī or viceroy of Kʿarṭʿli (Georgia), residing at Tiflis.

• ʿALĪ-QOLĪ KHAN

  A. Amanat

  (d. 1240/1824-25), the youngest of nine sons of Moḥammad Ḥasan Khan Qāǰār and half brother of Āḡā (more correctly Āqā) Moḥammad Khan.

• ʿALĪ-QOLĪ KHAN AFŠĀR

  Cross-Reference

  See ʿĀDEL SHAH.

• ʿALĪ-QOLĪ KHAN ANṢĀRĪ

  Cross-Reference

  See ANṢĀRĪ.

• ʿALĪ-QOLĪ KHAN MOḴBER-AL-DAWLA

  Cross-Reference

  See MOḴBER-AL-DAWLA.

• ʿALĪ-QOLĪ KHAN ŠĀMLŪ

  R. N. Savory

  (d. 977/1589), Safavid governor of Herat and guardian of the future Shah ʿAbbās I. 

• ʿALĪ-QOLĪ KHAN WĀLEH

  W. Kirmani

  Persian poet at the Mughal court (1124-69/1712-56).

• ʿALĪ-REŻĀ ABBĀSĪ

  P. P. Soucek

  10th-11th/16th-17th century calligrapher born and trained in Tabrīz but active principally in Qazvīn and Isfahan.

• ʿALĪ-REŻĀ KHAN QĀJĀR

  Cross-Reference

  See AŻOD-AL-MOLK.

• ʿALĪ-ŠĪR NAVĀʾĪ, AMĪR

  Cross-Reference

  See NAVĀʾĪ.

• ʿALIDS

  W. Madelung

  OF ṬABARESTĀN, DAYLAMĀN, AND GĪLĀN. From its beginnings in 250/864 until the early Safavid age, ʿAlid rule in the coastal regions south of the Caspian Sea was based chiefly on Zaydī Shiʿite support.

• ʿALĪKOŠ

  F. Hole

  an archeological site dating to the 8th millennium B.C. in southwestern Iran, near the modern town of Deh Lorān.

• ʿALĪŠĀH BOḴĀRĪ

  D. Pingree

  7th/13th century astronomer.

• ʿALĪŠĀH, TĀJ-AL-DĪN

  B. Spuler

  vizier of the two Il-khans Ölǰeytü (r. 703-17/1304-16) and Abū Saʿīd (r. 717-36/1317-35).

• ʿALĪTIGIN

  C. E. Bosworth

  the usual name in the sources for ʿALĪ B. ḤASAN or HĀRŪN BOḠRA KHAN, member of the Hasanid or eastern branch of the Qarakhanid family, ruler in Transoxania during the early 5th/11th century (d. 425/1034).

• ALIZADEH, Ghazaleh

  Ḥasan Mirʿābedini

  (1947-1996), noted novelist and short story writer.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• ʿALLĀF

  Cross-Reference

  See ABU’L-HOḎAYL.

• ALLĀH-QOLĪ KHAN ĪLḴĀNĪ

  A. Amanat

  Qajar notable (ca. 1236-1309/1820-1892).

• ALLAHABAD

  Z. A. Desai

  Major city and headquarters of a district of the same name in Uttar Pradesh, India at the confluence of the Ganges and Yamuna rivers.

• ALLĀHDĪĀ ČEŠTĪ

  G. Sarwar

  Mughal author of Sīar al-aqṭāb, a biography of the masters of the Ṣāberī Češtī Sufi order (17th century).

• ALLĀHO AKBAR, KŪH-E

  E. Ehlers

  a mountain range that forms part of the northern rim of the Khorasan trench in northeastern Iran, to the north of the city of Qūčān.  

• ALLĀHVERDĪ KHAN (1)

  R. M. Savory

  (d.1022/1613), a Georgian ḡolām who rose to high office in the Safavid state. 

• ALLĀHVERDĪ KHAN (2)

  C. Fleischer

  (d. 1072/1662), son of Ḵosrow Khan (d. 1063/1653), a Safavid ḡolām of Armenian origin.

• ALLĀHYĀR KHAN

  Cross-Reference

  See ĀFĪ, ALLĀHYĀR KHAN.

• ALLĀHYĀR KHAN ABDĀLĪ

  J. R. Perry

  a chieftain of the important Afghan tribe of the Abdālī (later known as the Dorrānī).

• ALLĀHYĀR KHAN ĀṢAF-AL-DAWLA

  Cross-Reference

  See ĀṢAF-AL-DAWLA.

• ALLĀHYĀR KHAN QELĪČĪ

  A. Amanat

  (b. ca. 1150/1735-36), khan of the Qelīča, a minor Turkish tribe in northern Khorasan, and ruler of Sabzevār at the turn of the 19th century.

• ʿALLĀMĪ, ABU’L-FAŻL

  Cross-Reference

  Historian, officer, chief secretary, and confidant of the Mughal emperor Akbar I; see ABU’L-FAŻL ʿALLĀMĪ.

• ALLIANCE FRANÇAISE

  Cross-Reference

  See FRANCE xv. FRENCH SCHOOLS IN PERSIA.

• ALLIANCE ISRAĒLITE UNIVERSELLE

  A. Netzer

  the first worldwide Jewish organization, through which a number of Jewish schools were founded in Iran.

• ALMOND

  Cross-Reference

  See BĀDĀM.

• ALP ARSLĀN

  K. A. Luther

  Saljuq sultan from 455/1063 to 465/1072.

• ALPTIGIN

  C. E. Bosworth

  Turkish military slave commander of the Samanids and founder of Turkish power in eastern Afghanistan (d. 352/963).

• ALQĀB VA ʿANĀWĪN

  A. Ašraf

  titles and forms of address, employed in Iran from pre-Islamic times.

• ALQĀS MĪRZA

  C. Fleischer

  second of Shah Esmāʿīl’s four surviving sons (1516-1550) and leader of a revolt.

• ALTAIC

  K. H. Menges

  The Altaic peoples and languages are distributed around 45° north latitude, from eastern Europe to the Pacific Ocean. 

• ALTHEN, JEAN-BAPTISTE JOANNIS

  S. Schuster-Walser

  (1709-74),  who introduced the cultivation of madder into southern France. When his attempts to grow cotton in southern France proved fruitless, he began to cultivate Oriental madder; this proved so successful that madder soon became a main crop of the region.

• ALTIN TEPE

  V. M. Masson

  a settlement of the Neolithic period and Bronze Age in the south of Turkmenistan near the village of Miana.

• ALTŪN TAMḠĀ

  G. Doerfer

  “gold mark of ownership” (Tk.), a seal that was used throughout their empire by the Mongol rulers of Iran (including the Chupanids and Jalayerids), especially for financial or property decisions and in documents relating to financial transactions by the state.

• ALTUNTAŠ

  C. E. Bosworth

  Turkish slave commander of the Ghaznavid sultans and governor in Ḵᵛārazm (408-23/1017-32). 

• ĀLŪČA

  A. Parsa

  garden plum (Prunus domestica), a fruit with a wide range in size, flavor, color, and texture. 

• ALVAND KŪH

  E. Ehlers

  mountain range near Hamadān, an isolated massif at a point of junction between the Zagros folds and the central Iranian plateau. 

• ALVĪRĪ

  E. Yarshater

  a dialect spoken in the village of Alvīr and belonging to the Central group of Iranian dialects.

• ALWĀḤ

  Cross-Reference

  “Tablets,” pl. of LAWḤ, a term used by Bahāʾīs for epistles issued by the three central figures of the faith.

• Ac~ CAPTIONS OF ILLUSTRATIONS

  Cross-Reference

  list of all the figure and plate images in the Ac–Al entries