Table of Contents

• ARBĀB, MOḤAMMAD-MAHDĪ

  S. Okazaki

  a prominent merchant and scholar of Isfahan (fl. ca. 1818-1896/97).

• ARBACES

  M. A. Dandamayev

  Greek form of an Old Iranian proper name.

• ARBAʿĪN

  M. Ayoub

  40th day after ʿĀšūrāʾ. A day of mourning, preferably at the shrine of Imam Ḥosayn, Arbaʿīn forms part of a cycle of days commemorating the burial of the imam and his companions.

• ARBĀYISTĀN

  G. Widengren

  name of a Mesopotamian province in the Sasanian empire.

• ARBELA

  J. F. Hansman

  capital of an ancient northern Mesopotamian province located between the two Zab rivers.  

• ARBERRY, ARTHUR JOHN

  E. P. Elwell-Sutton

  British orientalist (1905-1969).

• ARCHELAUS

  M. Tardieu

  the assumed author of a Christian polemic against the Manicheans composed before 348 CE.

• ARCHEOLOGY

  Multiple Authors

  The history of archeological research in Iran may be divided into two periods, before and after the Second World War. The early period can in turn be subdivided into a first phase of mainly French activity (ca. 1884-1931), and a second phase in which archeology in Iran became a multinational affair (1931-40). The modern period can be subdivided into what might best be called the “quiet phase” (1940-57) and the “explosive phase” (1958-78).

• ARCHEOLOGY i. Pre-Median

  T. C. Young

  As early as the 17th century, a number of European travelers reported with surprise on the remarkable ancient monuments to be seen throughout the countryside. The first scientific and scholarly attempt to deal with one such monument, however, was Rawlinson’s recording of the Bīsotūn (Behistun) inscription (1836-41). 

• ARCHEOLOGY ii. Median and Achaemenid

  D. Stronach

  While the Medes were likely to have been present in Iran well before the Assyrians first encountered them in 835 B.C., it remains unclear how the earliest Medes, let alone the early Iranians as a whole, should be distinguished in the archeological record.

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• ARCHEOLOGY iii. SELEUCID AND PARTHIAN

  K. Schippmann

  Very few monuments from the Seleucid period have been discovered in Iran, and probably none from the time of Alexander the Great.

• ARCHEOLOGY iv. Sasanian

  D. Huff

  Archeological field work has played a comparatively smaller part in forming the image of Sasanian history and culture than the large number of preserved monuments, buildings, and rock reliefs, collections of coins and objects of art.

• ARCHEOLOGY v. Pre-Islamic Central Asia

  V. M. Masson

  The study of Central Asian archeological remains began on a large scale in the 1920s and 30s with the organization of large archeological expeditions.

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• ARCHEOLOGY vi. Islamic Iran

  R. Hillenbrand

  From the outset Islamic archeology in Iran was overshadowed by the numerous and splendid sites of earlier periods, and archeological investigation of Islamic sites began appreciably later in the Iranian world than in western Islam and in the Indian subcontinent.

• ARCHEOLOGY vii. Islamic Central Asia

  G. A. Pugachenkova and E. V. Rtveladze

  The study of the archeology of the Islamic period was initiated in Central Asia in the late 19th century by Turkestan amateurs and St. Petersburg scholars, and has been carried on with growing intensity since Soviet times. 

• ARCHEOLOGY viii. REPUBLIC OF AZERBAIJAN

  M. N. Pogrebova

  Archeological sites of northern Azerbaijan (the modern Republic of Azerbaijan) first came to public attention in the mid-19th century, when European travelers became aware that it abounded in ancient ruins.

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• ARCHITECTURE

  Multiple Authors

  This series of articles covers architecture in Iran from ancient times to the Pahlavi period. 

• ARCHITECTURE i. Seleucid Period

  T. S. Kawami

  The Seleucid architecture of Iran encompasses the buildings constructed during the period of Greek power from 330 B.C. through the 2nd century B.C. 

• ARCHITECTURE ii. Parthian Period

  E. J. Keall

  It seems impossible to use the Iranian homeland of the Parthians as the basis for the definition of Parthian architecture. 

• ARCHITECTURE iii. Sasanian Period

  D. Huff

  Sasanian architecture is characterized by the widespread use of mortar masonry and the associated vaulting techniques.

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• ARCHITECTURE iv. Central Asian

  G. A. Pugachenkova

  Architecture in Central Asia dates back to the late Neolithic period (6th-5th millennia B.C.).

• ARCHITECTURE v. Islamic, pre-Safavid

  O. Grabar

  The beginnings of an Islamic architecture in Iran are still almost impossible to identify properly. Remaining monuments are few, most of them are very uncertainly dated, and literary information is scanty or difficult to interpret.

• ARCHITECTURE vi. Safavid to Qajar Periods

  R. Hillenbrand

  Iranian architecture from the 16th to the 19th centuries is, not surprisingly, dominated by the Safavids. Though no accurate checklist has been drawn up, it is clear that within the present political borders of Iran several hundred buildings datable between 907/1502 and 1138/1725 survive.

• ARCHITECTURE vii. Pahlavi, before World War II

  D. N. Wilber

  Two features of Reżā Shah’s efforts for the modernization of Iran were related to the architectural construction of the period. One was his reference to the country’s ancient history, which should inspire the present generation to achieve new glories. The other was his desire to adopt aspects of Western civilization in such a fashion that Iran would become equal to the West.

• ARCHITECTURE viii. Pahlavi, after World War II

  N. Ardalān

  Between the close of World War II and the overthrow of the Pahlavi regime in 1979, an ancient and very traditional Iranian culture came fully into contact with contemporary developments, in particular, with the highly scientific and empirical world of the West.

• ARCHIVES i. Turkish archives concerning Iran

  Osman G. Özgüdenli

  Ottoman archive materials are important not only for the history of the Ottoman Empire, but they are also of tremendous significance for the history of all those countries that had relations with the Ottoman Empire.

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• ARD

  Cross-Reference

  (Pahlavi; Manichean Middle Persian ʾyrd). See AHRIŠWANG, AŠI. 

• ARD YAŠT

  P. O. Skjærvø

  Middle Persian name of the Avestan hymn dedicated to Aši.

• ARDĀ WĪRĀZ

  Ph. Gignoux

  “Wīrāz the just,”  principal character of the Zoroastrian Middle Persian text Ardā Wīrāz-nāmag.

• ARDABĪL

  C. E. Bosworth, X. de Planhol, M. E. Weaver, M. Medley

  town and district in northeastern Azerbaijan.

• ARDABĪL CARPET

  M. Beattie

  Persian carpet acquired by the Victoria and Albert Museum in 1893.

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• ARDABĪLĪ

  W. Madelung

  known as MOQADDAS and MOḤAQQEQ ARDABĪLĪ, Imamite theologian and jurist of the early Safavid age. 

• ARDAHANG

  Cross-Reference

  See ARŽANG.

• ARDAKĀN-E FĀRS

  C. E. Bosworth

  a small upland town of the ostān of Fārs.

• ARDAKĀN-E YAZD

  C. E. Bosworth

  a town of central Persia on the present Yazd-Ardestān-Kāšān road along the southern edge of the Dašt-e Kavīr, forty miles northwest of Yazd.

• ARDAKĀNĪ, ABU’L-ḤASAN

  D. MacEoin

  known as Ḥāǰǰī Amīn and Amīn-e Elāhī, one of the four Ayādī-e Amr Allāh appointed by Bahāʾallāh as leaders of the Bahaʾi movement in Iran.

• ARDALĀN, ABU’L-ḤASAN KHAN

  Cross-Reference

  See ABU’L-ḤASAN KHAN ARDALĀN.

• ARDAMITRA

  Cross-Reference

  See ARDAŠĪR SAKĀNŠĀH.

• ARDAŠĪR

  Dj. Khaleghi-Motlagh

  name of several figures in the Šāh-nāma.

• ARDAŠĪR B. DAYLAMSOPĀR

  cross-reference

  See ABU’L-ḤAYJĀ NAJMĪ.

• ARDAŠĪR BĀBAKĀN

  H. Gaube

  Sasanian and early Islamic district (ostān) formed in the early 7th century south of Baghdad and west of the Tigris. Its capital was Weh-Ardašīr (Ar. Bahrasīr).

• ARDAŠĪR I

  Multiple Authors

  (d. 242 CE), the founder of the Sasanian empire. 

• ARDAŠĪR I i. History

  Joseph Wiesehöfer

  by 224 extended his sway over Persis and beyond into Elymais (Ḵūzestān) and Kermān, forcing to submission many local kings and vassals of the Parthians. The extent of his original realm cannot be determined precisely.

• ARDAŠĪR I ii. Rock reliefs

  H. Luschey

  Ardašīr I (r. 224-41) established the Sasanian tradition of rock carving, which flourished until the reign of Šāpūr III (r. 309-88) and made an impressive resurgence under Ḵosrow II (r. 590-628).

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• ARDAŠĪR II

  A. Sh. Shahbazi

  Sasanian king of kings, A.D. 379-83; he was deposed by the nobles in favor of Šāpūr III.

• ARDAŠĪR III

  A. Sh. Shahbazi

  Sasanian king (r. September, 628-29 April, 629). His father Šērōyē (Kawād II) murdered most of the Sasanian princes and died after only a brief reign.

• ARDAŠĪR MĪRZĀ

  Ḥ. Maḥbūbī Ardakānī

  ROKN-AL-DAWLA, the ninth son of the crown prince ʿAbbās Mīrzā, b. ca.1805-06, d. 1866.

• ARDAŠĪR SAKĀNŠĀH

  A. Sh. Shahbazi

  a vassal king of the first Sasanian king of kings, Ardašīr I.

• ARDAŠĪR-ḴORRA

  C. E. Bosworth

  one of the five administrative divisions (kūra) of Fārs, in Sasanian and early Islamic times.

• ARDAŠĪR-NAMA

  A. Netzer

  a matnawī of six thousand couplets in Persian by Šāhīn Šīrāzī, a Jewish Persian poet of the 8th/14th century.