Table of Contents

  • BARTHÉLEMY, ADRIEN

    F. Richard

    French orientalist (1859-1949). A devoted linguist, he published a study of the Pahlavi Gujastag Abāliš, before a career in diplomacy led him to a monumental dictionary of eastern Arabic dialects.

  • BARTHOLD, VASILIĭ VLADIMIROVICH

    Yu. Bregel

    Russian orientalist (1869-1930). He was the first who put the study of the history of Central Asia on a firm scholarly basis and actually founded this branch of Oriental studies. But he never studied Central Asia in isolation.

  • BARTHOLOMAE, CHRISTIAN

    R. Schmitt

    German scholar of Iranian and Indo-European studies (1855-1925). Bartholomae devoted the main part of his life and work to Iranian linguistics, his chief endeavor being directed toward the integration of Iranian into the framework of Indo-European languages.

  • BARTHOLOMAE’S LAW

    M. Mayrhofer

    the name given to a rule of phonetic assimilation in the Indo-Iranian and probably also the proto-Indo-European languages first noted by Christian Bartholomae in 1882.

  • BARTUS, BERNARD AUGUST THEODOR LUDWIG

    Aloïs van Tongerloo

    (1858-1941), technician and a key figure of the Turfan expeditions because of his autodidactical development of methods of removing inscriptions and works of art from rock walls and ruins without their getting damaged, as well as methods of their conservation and preservation.

  • BĀRŪ

    W. Kleiss

    (or bāra), fortress in general, defensive wall, rampart. Defensive walls and earthworks dating from the start of human settlement in Iran still survive. Their forms evolved in parallel with the development of offensive and defensive weapons.

  • BARUCH

    Sh. Shaked

    scribe and disciple of the prophet Jeremiah, at the time of the first Jewish exile to Babylonia (586 B.C.).  Baruch was identified with Zoroaster by some Syriac authors, followed by some Arab historians.

  • BĀRŪT

    W. Floor

    “gunpowder.” Guns and cannon, and thus gunpowder, probably were first introduced in Iran during Uzun Ḥasan Āq Qoyunlū’s reign; in 1473 he asked Venice for “artillery, arquebuses, and gunners.”

  • BARZAN

    W. Eilers

    part of a town, quarter (maḥalla), street (kūča). In modern Iranian place names the forms Varzan and Varzana are common.

  • BĀRZĀNĪ

    W. Behn

    a Kurdish tribe from Bārzān, a town of northeastern Iraq. The shaikhs of Bārzān came to prominence in the disorder following sup­pression of the semi-independent Kurdish principalities in the mid-19th century.

  • BARZĪN

    Dj. Khaleghi-Motlagh

    (from Pahlavi Burzēn), the name of several figures in the Šāh-nāma.

  • BAŠĀKERD

    B. Spooner

    a roughly rectan­gular mountainous district (dehestān) east of Mīnāb and north of Jāsk. The topography and the natural conditions are similar to Makrān to the immediate east.

  • BASAWAL

    Sh. Kuwayama

    the site of a Buddhist cave temple complex in eastern Afghanistan. The caves, 150 in all, are partly hewn out in two rows and arranged in seven groups, which presumably corre­spond to the seven monastic institutions of Buddhist times.

  • BĀṢERĪ

    F. Barth

    a pastoral nomadic tribe of Fārs belonging to the Ḵamsa confederacy. The nomads keep sheep, intermingled with 10-20 percent goats, and use donkeys for transport.

  • BĀŠGĀH-E AFSARĀN

    M. Ṣāneʿī

    (Officers’ Club), an impressive building in Tehran, built in 1939.

  • BĀŠGĀH-E ARĀMENA

    ʿA.-A. Saʿīdī Sīrjānī

    (the Armenian Club), a non-profit, non-political social club, founded 1 January 1918 by Armenians in Tehran.

  • BĀŠGĀH-E MEHRAGĀN

    Ḥ. Maḥmūdī

    (Mehragān Club), an organization of the Iran Teachers Association open to teachers, students, and other in­tellectuals in Tehran and eventually in the provinces, 1952-62.

  • BASIL

    Hušang Aʿlam

    Ocimum L. ssp. (fam. Labiatae), now commonly called rayḥān in Persian, an aromatic plant. Ocimum basilicum L., sweet basil or basil royal, is named šāh-esparam “the royal herb.”

  • BASILIUS OF CAESAREA

    J. P. Asmussen

    or Basilius the Great (ca. A.D. 330-79), bishop of Caesarea in Cappadocia from 370, after Eusebius, who wrote regarding the Magi.

  • BAŠKARDI

    P. O. Skjærvø

    (Bašākerdī), collective designation for numerous dialects spoken in southeastern Iran from Bandar-e ʿAbbās eastward, forming a transition from the dialects spoken in Fārs and Lārestān to Baluchi.