Table of Contents
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BOLOD
Bertold Spuler
CHʿENG-HSIANG (Pers. Pūlād Čīnksāng; d. 1313), the representative of the Great Khan Qubilai at the court of the Il-khans of Iran.
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BOLOḠĀN ḴĀTŪN
Charles Melville
(Būlūḡān Ḵātūn), the name of three of the royal wives of the Mongol Il-khans in Iran. Of Mongol origin, the word Boloḡān, variously spelled in the Persian sources, means “sable.”
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BOLŪḠ
cross-reference
See BĀLEḠ.
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BOLŪR
cross-reference
(Ar. ballūr, bellawr) “rock crystal.” See CRYSTAL.
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BOMBAY
John R. Hinnells, Momin Mohiuddin and Ismail K. Poonawala
Persian communities of Bombay.
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BOMBAY PARSI PANCHAYAT
John R. Hinnells
the largest Zoroastrian institution in modern history, originally founded in the 17th century in order to maintain Zoroastrian family and social values at a time of dramatic change, when Parsis were migrating from rural Gujarat to cosmopolitan Bombay.
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BONDĀR RĀZĪ
Zabihollah Safa
(or Pendār), poet in the 10th-11th centuries, named as the author of a small number of surviving poems, some in literary (Darī) Persian, others in his local dialect.
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BONDĀRĪ, FATḤ B. ʿALĪ
Cross-Reference
b. Moḥammad EṢFAHĀNĪ. See SUPPLEMENT.
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BONGĀH-E ḤEMĀYAT-E MĀDARĀN O KŪDAKĀN
EIr
(Institute for the protection of mothers and infants), founded 16 December 1940 on the order of Reżā Shah, originally funded by charitable contributions.
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BONGĀH-E MOSTAQELL-E ĀBYĀRĪ
EIr
(Independent irrigation agency), established by the Majles on 19 May 1943 to improve irrigation in Iran.
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BONGĀH-E TARJOMA WA NAŠR-E KETĀB
Edward Joseph
“The [Royal] Institute for Translation and Publication,” founded 1953, since 1986 called the Scientific and Cultural Publication Company (Šerkat-e Entešārāt-e ʿElmī wa Farhangī).
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BONĪČA
Willem Floor
a tax assessed on a group as a single unit and particularly the base on which the tax was calculated—in Iran: a tax on guilds, an agricultural tax on villages and tribes, and a military tax on villages.
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BONYĀD-E FARHANG-E ĪRĀN
Aḥmad Tafażżolī
The "Iranian Culture Foundation" was established 16 September 1964.
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BONYĀD-E MOSTAŻʿAFĀN
cross-reference
See MOSTAZAFAN FOUNDATION.
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BONYĀD-E PAHLAVĪ
cross-reference
See PAHLAVI FOUNDATION.
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BONYĀD-E ŠĀH-NĀMA-YE FERDOWSĪ
Aḥmad Tafażżolī
a research institute, 1971-78, intended for preparation of a new critical edition of the Šāh-nāma.
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BONYĀD-E ŠAHĪD
EIr
The Bonyād officially started work on 9 April 1980. A decision taken by the Revolutionary Council on 13 June 1980 attached the Martyrs’ Foundation to the National Health Organization (Sāzmān-e Behzīstī-e Kešvar), itself administered under the supervision of the prime minister.
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BOOK OF ZAMBASTA
Ronald E. Emmerick
a Khotanese poem on Buddhism. It is the longest indigenous literary composition in the Khotanese language and played a crucial role in the decipherment of the Khotanese language.
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BOOKBINDING (article 1)
Duncan Haldane
(tajlīd, ṣaḥḥāfī) in Iran at first followed the pattern of previous Near Eastern book covers, but subsequently Persian craftsmen developed new types.
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BOOKBINDING (article 2)
Iraj Afshar
(ṣaḥḥāfi, jeld-sāzi), the traditional craft of binding new books and decorating the cover with embossed or painted designs, or of repairing worn out volumes by restoring their cover.
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BOQʿA
Hamid Algar
the mausoleum of a sacred or revered personage, sometimes taken to include additional structures adjoining the tomb or the open space surrounding it.
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BORAGE
cross-reference
See GĀV-ZABĀN.
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BŌRĀN
Marie Louise Chaumont
(Pers. Pōrān, Pūrān), Sasanian queen ca. 630-31, daughter of Ḵosrow II (r. 590, 591-628). There are extant coins of Bōrān dated from the first, second, and third years of her reign.
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BORĀQ (1)
Bertold Spuler
ruler of the Chaghatay khanate in Transoxiana (1266-71), a great-grandson of Jengiz Khan and a son of Yesün-Toʾa.
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BORĀQ (2)
Cross-Reference
See MEʿRĀJ.
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BORĀZJĀN
ʿAlī-Akbar Saʿīdī Sīrjānī
town and county (šahrestān) in Bushehr Province in southern Iran. The present town came into being in the late 12th/18th century.
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BORHĀN BALḴĪ
Zabihollah Safa
BORHĀN-AL-DĪN MOẒAFFAR b. Šams b. ʿAlī b. Ḥamīd-al-Dīn, a poet of the 14th century from Balḵ. He was descended from Ebrāhīm b. Adham, the renowned Iranian Sufi of the 2nd/8th century.
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BORHĀN NAFĪS
Zabihollah Safa
BORHĀN-AL-DĪN NAFĪS b. ʿEważ b. Ḥakīm Kermānī, a physician of great renown in the 15th century.
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BORHĀN, MOḤAMMAD-ḤOSAYN
cross-reference
See BORHĀN-E QĀṬEʿ.
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BORHĀN-AL-DĪN MOḤAQQEQ TERMEḎĪ
cross-reference
See MOḤAQQEQ TERMEḎĪ.
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BORHĀN-AL-DĪN NASAFĪ
Wilferd Madelung
(d. 1288), ABU’L-FAŻĀʾEL MOḤAMMAD b. Moḥammad b. Moḥammad b. ʿAbd-Allāh, Hanafite theologian, logician, and expert on legal points of disagreement (ḵelāf) and dialectic (jadal).
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BORHĀN-AL-DĪN, ḴᵛĀJA ABŪ NAṢR FATḤ-ALLĀH
F. R. C. Bagley
a vizier (d. 1358) eulogized by Ḥāfeẓ in two ḡazals (nos. 374 and 478).
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BORHĀN-AL-MAʾĀṮER
Cross-Reference
See Supplement.
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BORHĀN-E JĀMEʿ
Moḥammad Dabīrsīāqī
(Comprehensive proof), title of a dictionary (completed 1833) by Moḥammad-Karīm b. Mahdīqolī Garmrūdī Šaqāqī.
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BORHĀN-E QĀṬEʿ
Moḥammad Dabīrsīāqī
(Conclusive proof), the title of a Persian dictionary compiled in India in the 11th/17th century by Moḥammad-Ḥosayn b. Ḵalaf Tabrīzī, who used the pen-name Borhān.
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BORHĀNIDS
Cross-Reference
See ĀL-E BORHĀN.
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BORHĀNPŪRĪ, BORHĀN-AL-DĪN
Richard M. Eaton
Indo-Persian Sufi of the Šaṭṭārī order (d. 1089/1678).
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BÖRI
C. Edmund Bosworth
or Böritigin, name of a Turkish commander in Ḡazna and of the ruler of the western branch of the Qarakhanid dynasty of Transoxania.
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BORJ
Abbas Daneshvari, David Pingree
The use of a word meaning “tower” in this special astronomical sense presumably arose from the conception of the zodiac as a barrier between heaven and earth through which access was gained by means of twelve zodiacal gates, each of which was assumed to be guarded by a tower.
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BORJ-E ṬOḠROL
Bernard O’Kane
name commonly applied to a large tomb tower of the Saljuq period situated near Ray.
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BORJ-NĀMA
Žāla Āmuzgār
maṯnawi by Anuširavān b. Marzbān Rāvari (17th century), who wrote poems on several subjects relating to the Zoroastrian religion and uses several Zoroastrian terms here.
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BOROUGH, Christopher
Parvin Loloi
(fl. 1579-1587), English merchant and linguist who traveled to Russia and Persia as an interpreter with the sixth voyage by the Muscovy Company to establish trade with these countries.
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BOROWSKY, ISIDORE
Bo Utas
(ca. 1770-ca. 1838), Polish officer in the Persian army, said to have been fatally injured by a bullet in the abdomen during the second siege of Herat in 1837-38.
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BORQAʿĪ
Hamid Algar
(Ar. Borqoʿī), AYATOLLAH ʿALĪ-AKBAR (b. 1900), religious leader of the postwar period to whom leftist tendencies were imputed and whose name became embroiled in a significant incident in Qom in January, 1953.
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BORŪJ
cross-reference
See BORJ.
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BORŪJERD
Eckart Ehlers
(or Barūjerd), town and šahrestān in the province of Lorestān in western Iran. It has always been a road and railway junction of great strategic importance.
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BORUJERD
Multiple Authors
town and sub-province in Lorestan Province in western Iran.
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BORUJERD ii. Population, 1956-2011
Mohammad Hossein Nejatian
This article deals with the following population characteristics of Borujerd: population growth from 1956 to 2011, age structure, average household size, literacy rate, and economic activity status.
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BORŪJERDĪ, ḤOSAYN
Hamid Algar
b. Moḥammad-Reżā Ḥosaynī, Shiʿite scholar of the Qajar period (d. ca. 1860); his main work was a collection of chronograms on the deaths of famous transmitters of ḥadīṯ.
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BORŪJERDĪ, ḤOSAYN ṬABĀṬABĀʾĪ
Hamid Algar
(1875-1961), AYATOLLAH ḤĀJJ ĀQĀ, director (zaʿīm) of the religious teaching institution (ḥawza) at Qom for seventeen years and sole marjaʿ-e taqlīd of the Shiʿite world for fifteen years.
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Borumand - Daramads of šur
music sample
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BORŪMAND, NŪR-ʿALĪ
Bruno Nettl
(1905-1977), one of the foremost authorities on the performance and history of Persian classical music in the 20th century.
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BORZMEHR
Djalal Khaleghi-Motlagh
(Pahlavi, lit. “deep affection”) one of the priests (mōbed) and scribes who served Ḵosrow I (r. 531-79).
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BORZŪ-NĀMA (article 1)
William L. Hanaway, Jr.
an epic poem of ca. 65,000 lines recounting the exploits and adventures of the legendary hero Borzū, son of Sohrāb.
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BORZU-NĀMA (article 2)
Gabrielle van den Berg
an epic poem named after its main hero, Borzu, son of Sohrāb and grandson of Rostam. The Borzu-nāma belongs to the cycle of epics dealing with the dynasty of the princes of Sistān.
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BORZŪYA
Djalal Khaleghi-Motlagh
(also transcribed Burzōē), a physician of the time of Ḵosrow I (r. 531-79) and responsible for a translation of the Pañcatantra from Sanskrit to Pahlavi, the Persian translation of which is known as the Kalīla wa Demna.
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BOSḤĀQ AṬʿEMA
Heshmat Moayyad
(d. 1420s), FAḴR-AL-DĪN ḤALLĀJ ŠĪRĀZĪ, satirical poet who used Persian culinary vocabulary and imagery and kitchen terminology to create a novel style of poetry.
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BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA
Hamid Algar
The Muslims of Bosnia-Herzegovina came to assimilate virtually all the cultural habits and interests of the Ottoman Turks; for the learned elite, this included an acquaintance with Persian language and literature.
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BOŠRŪʾĪ, Mollā Moḥammad-Ḥosayn
Denis M. MacEoin
Shaikhi ʿālem who became the first convert to Babism, provincial Babi leader in Khorasan, and organizer of Babi resistance in Māzandarān (1814-49).
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BOST
Klaus Fischer, Xavier de Planhol
archeological site and town located near the confluence of the Helmand and Arḡandāb rivers in southwest Afghanistan.
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BOSTĀN AL-SĪĀḤA
ʿAlī-Akbar Saʿīdī Šīrjānī
a descriptive geography book by a mystic writer of the early 19th century, Mast-ʿAlīšāh, Ḥājī Zayn-al-ʿĀbedīn b. Mollā Eskandar Šīrvānī.
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BOSTĀNAFRŪZ
Ahmad Parsa
amaranth, a medicinal and ornamental plant of the family Amaranthaceae.
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BOSTĪ, ABU’L-FATḤ
Zabihollah Safa
NEẒĀM-AL-DĪN ʿAMĪD ʿALĪ b. Moḥammad b. Ḥosayn b. Yūsof Kāteb, a notable bilingual secretary and poet of the 10th century.
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BOSTĪ, ABU’L-QĀSEM
Wilferd Madelung
ESMĀʿĪL b. Aḥmad JĪLĪ, Muʿtazilite and Zaydī author of the late 10th and early 11th century.
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BOT
William L. Hanaway, Jr.
a term frequent in poetry with meanings ranging from an idol in the literal sense to a metaphor for ideal human beauty. These senses have been used since the earliest surviving Persian poetry.
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BOTANICAL JOURNAL OF IRAN
Valiolla Mozaffarian
(Žurnāl-e giāhšenāsi-e Irān), begun in 1976 as an outcome of the National Botanical Garden of Iran. The contributions are in English with brief abstracts in Persian.
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BOTANICAL STUDIES
Hūšang Aʿlam, S.-W. Breckle, Hūšang Aʿlam and Aḥmad Qahramān
ON IRAN i. The Greco-Islamic tradition. ii. The Western tradition. iii. Persian Studies in the Western tradition. In the Islamic period, generally speaking, botany was an ancillary branch of medicine or, more precisely, pharmacology.
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BOUNDARIES
Multiple Authors
i. With the Ottoman empire. ii. With Russia. iii. Boundaries of Afghanistan. iv. With Iraq. v. With Turkey.
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BOUNDARIES i. With the Ottoman Empire
Keith McLachlan
shaped by conflict over an ill-defined strip of territory with constantly shifting outlines extending from the Caucasus to the Persian Gulf.
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BOUNDARIES ii. With Russia
Xavier de Planhol
West of the Caspian. The problem of drawing a stable territorial boundary between the Russian and Iranian powers must have arisen with the first arrival of the Russians in the Caspian area, after the conquest of Astrakhan in 1556.
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BOUNDARIES iii. Boundaries of Afghanistan
Daniel Balland
None of these boundaries was established before the last third of the 19th century. It was the “great game,” the rivalry between Britain and Russia in Central Asia, that led the latter two states to contemplate creating a buffer state between their dependencies, a kind of defensive barrier.
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BOUNDARIES iv. With Iraq
Joseph A. Kechichian
Efforts by Algeria to mediate during the summit meeting of OPEC on 6 March 1975 brought the shah together with Ṣaddām Ḥosayn, then vice-president of the Iraqi Revolutionary Council, to redefine their common frontier. In the resulting settlement 593 new border points were designated.
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BOUNDARIES v. With Turkey
Richard N. Schofield
The Mixed Commission of 1914, on which Britain and Russia were vested with powers to arbitrate, had settled the line of the Perso-Ottoman frontier in detail for almost its whole length from the Persian Gulf to Mount Ararat.
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BOWAYH
cross-reference
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BOWAYHIDS
cross-reference
See BUYIDS.
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BOXTREE
Hūšang Aʿlam
Buxus L. spp., šemšād, common name for numerous species of evergreen shrubs or trees of the family Buxaceae. The species B. sempervirens grows wild in lowland or plain forests of the Caspian provinces.
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BOYCE, MARY
John Hinnells
(1920-2006), scholar of Zoroastrianism and its relevant languages, and Professor of Iranian Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) of the University of London. In addition to her own contribution, Boyce was an outstanding teacher and supervised the research of many who went on to hold professorships.
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BOYEKAN
Marie Louise Chaumont
the name of a mec naxarar “great satrap,” defeated and killed at Ṭʿawrēš (Tabrīz) by the Armenian general Vasak under Šāpūr II (r. 309-79).
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BOYLE, JOHN ANDREW
Peter Jackson
(1916-78), British orientalist, will perhaps best remembered for his work on the Mongol period of Iranian history.
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BOYŪTĀT-E SALṬANATĪ
Birgitt Hoffmann
(lit. royal houses), in the Safavid period (1501-1732) departments and production workshops within the royal household serving primarily the needs of the court.
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BOZ
Jean-Pierre Digard
the domestic goat. The earliest evidence for domestication of the goat has been found in Iran (ca. 10,000 B.C.), as have the largest number of prehistoric sites (ca. 7000 B.C.) showing traces of the systematic breeding of this animal.
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BOZBĀŠ
Mohammad R. Ghanoonparvar
Azeri Turkish name for an Iranian dish usually called ābgūšt-e sabzī (green vegetable stew).
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BOZGŪŠ
Djalal Khaleghi-Motlagh
the traditional reading of the name of a mythical tribe in Māzandarān mentioned in the Šāh-nāma.
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BOZKAŠĪ
G. Whitney Azoy
(lit. “goat-dragging”), an equestrian folk game played by Turkic groups in Central Asia. Its origins are obscure; quite probably the game first developed as a recreational extension of livestock raiding.
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BOZORG
Jean During
one of the modes in traditional Iranian and Arabic music, mentioned for the first time by Ṣafī-al-Dīn ʿOrmavī among the twelve šodūd, later on called maqāmāt.
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BOZORG, MĪRZĀ
cross-reference
See QĀʾEMMAQĀM, MĪRZĀ BOZORG.
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BOZORG-OMĪD, KĪĀ
Wilferd Madelung
the second Ismaʿili ruler of Alamūt (1124-38). He was of Deylami origin from the region of Rūdbār.
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BOZORGĀN
Aḥmad Tafażżolī
the third class-rank of the four or five divisions of the early Sasanian aristocracy, namely šahryār “landholders,” wispuhr “princes” or members of the royal house, wuzurg “grandees,” āzād “nobles,” and kadag-xwadāy “householders.”
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BOZORGMEHR-E BOḴTAGĀN
Djalal Khaleghi Motlagh
identified in literature and legend as a vizier of Ḵosrow I Anōšīravān (r. 531-78). According to Persian and Arabic sources, he was characterized by exceptional wisdom and sage counsels.
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BOZPAR
Louis Vanden Berghe
a valley situated about 100 km southwest of Kāzerūn and 11 km by donkey path through the mountains from Sar Mašhad, Fārs. The most important ruin in the Bozpār valley is the building known locally as Gūr-e Doḵtar.
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BOZPAYIT
James R. Russell
Middle Persian name, attested only in Armenian, of a Zoroastrian school or body of religious teaching in the Sasanian period.
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BRAHM
Werner Sundermann
“manner, fashion, costume,” Middle Persian word used in connection with human beings, referring either to mode of behavior or to outward appearance.
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BRĀHMĪ
Douglas A. Hitch
Indian script used for a variety of languages in Chinese Turkestan, including Iranian languages. From the Tarim Basin (Xinjiang, China) we have first-millennium documents in Brāhmī script in several Iranian languages.
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BRAHUI
Josef Elfenbein
As “long-distance cattle-herders” in 1880 no fewer than 80 percent of these tribesmen were tent-dwelling nomads; fewer than 20 percent were described as settled. In 1975 the proportions were almost exactly the reverse, and Brahui settlement in large towns has been increasing ever more rapidly.
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BRASS
cross-reference
See BERENJ.
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BRAZIER
Asadullah Souren Melikian-Chirvani, Jaʿfar Šahrī
two distinct types of utensil traditionally used in Iran. One type is a closed container on legs, a kind of stove that holds slowly burning coals for heating.
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BRAZMANIY(A)
cross-reference
See AŠA ii.
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BREAD
Hélène Desmet-Grégoire
Persian nān. In modern Iran bread is the dietary staple food for the population and accounts, on the average, for 70 percent of the daily caloric intake.
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BRĒLVĪ
cross-reference
See BARĒLVĪ.
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BREST-LITOVSK TREATY
Joseph A. Kechichian
treaty signed by the Central Powers and Soviet Russia on 3 March 1918 that was consequential in the history of modern Iran.