Table of Contents

• BALʿAMĪ, ABU’L-FAŻL MOḤAMMAD

  C. E. Bosworth

  B. ʿOBAYD-ALLĀH B. MOḤAMMAD BALʿAMĪ TAMĪMĪ, vizier to the Samanid amir Naṣr b. Aḥmad (r. 913-42), father of the vizier and historian Amirak Baḷʿamī.

• BĀLANG

  W. Eilers

  citron, the fruit of a species of citrus tree (Citrus medica cedrata). This article discusses the history of the word.

• BALĀŠ

  M. L. Chaumont, K. Schippmann

  the name of a number of kings and several dignitaries and notables during the Parthian and Sasanian periods. The Parthian form of the name, the oldest, is Walagaš. In Middle Persian it is Wardāxš, in Pahlavi Walāxš.

• BALĀSAGĀN

  M. L. Chaumont, C. E. Bosworth

   “country of the Balās,” designating a region located for the most part south of the lower course of the rivers Kor (Kura) and the Aras (Araxes), bordered on the south by Atropatene and on the east by the Caspian Sea.  i. In pre-Islamic times.  ii. In Islamic times.

• BALĀSĀḠŪN

  C. E. Bosworth

  a town of Central Asia, in early Islamic times the main settlement of the region known as Yeti-su or Semirechye “the land of the seven rivers,” now mainly within the eastern part of the Republic of Kazakhstan.

• BALĀSĀNĪ, MAJD-AL-MOLK ABU’L-FAŻL ASʿAD

  C. E. Bosworth

  B. MOḤAMMAD QOMĪ (d. 1099), mostawfī or financial intendant to the Saljuq sultan Berk-yaruq (Barkīāroq) b. Malekšāh and then vizier.

• BĀLĀSARĪ

  D. M. MacEoin

  term used by the Shaikhis to distinguish ordinary Shiʿites from members of their own sect. The history of conflicts between the Shaikhi and Shiʿite communities is reviewed.

• BĀLAVĪ

  cross-reference

  See BĀLAWĪ FAMILY.

• BALAWASTE

  G. Gropp

  a ruin site in the eastern part of the Khotan oasis, near the village of Domoko. Fragments of manuscripts, pottery, and plaster were found at this site by Sir Mark Aurel Stein on his first and second expeditions in 1900.

• BĀLAWĪ FAMILY

  R. W. Bulliet

  prominent scholars in Nīšāpūr in the 10th-11th centuries.