Table of Contents

• COSMOGONY AND COSMOLOGY iii. In Manicheism

  Werner Sundermann

  Manicheism, like contemporary Zoroastrianism and various gnostic sects, offered a detailed cosmogonic myth, or cosmology.

• COSMOGONY AND COSMOLOGY iv. In the Mazdakite religion

  Werner Sundermann

  The most important source for modern knowledge of Mazdakite cosmogony is the description of the Mazdakite religion in Ketāb al-melal wa’l-neḥal, writ­ten by Abu’l-Fatḥ Moḥammad b. ʿAbd-al-Karīm Šahrestānī, in 624/1227, several hundred years after the period in which the sect flourished. 

• COSMOGONY AND COSMOLOGY v. In Twelver Shiʿism

  Mohammad Ali Amir-Moezzi

  Imami traditions contain a chaotic abundance of material portraying the origin and structure of the universe. Book XIV, “On the heavens and the earth,” of Moḥammad-Bāqer Majlesī’s Beḥār al-anwār, fills ten volumes (LVII-LXVI) in the most recent edition and contains several thousand traditions.

• COSMOGONY AND COSMOLOGY vi. In Ismaʿilism

  Wilferd Madelung

  The physical world consists of nine celestial spheres, the highest sphere, the sphere of the fixed stars, the seven spheres of the planets, as well as the sublunar world of generation and corruption.

• COSMOGONY AND COSMOLOGY vii. In Shaikhism

  Denis M. MacEoin

  It is in some respects redundant to speak of a “Shaikhi cosmology” distinct from that of Imami Shiʿism as a whole. Shaikhi ideas never developed independently of ordinary Shiʿite thought but were either part of it or in dialogue or conflict with it.

• COSMOGONY AND COSMOLOGY viii. In the Bahai faith

  Moojan Momen

  First, the human mind is strictly finite and limited in knowledge and understanding. Second, no absolute knowledge of God or reality or the cosmos is therefore available to man. Third, from the above it follows that all conceptualizations and attempts by men to portray cosmology are “but a reflection of what has been created within themselves.”

• COSSACK BRIGADE

  Muriel Atkin

  a cavalry unit in the Persian army established in 1879 on the model of Cossack units in the Russian army. The formation of the Cossack Brigade was part of a larger process in which the Persian government, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, engaged various European soldiers to train units of the Persian armed forces.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• COSSAEANS

  Rüdiger Schmitt

  a tribe of mountain people settled in western Iran; their land was called Cossaea/Kossaîa.

• COSTE, Pascal-Xavier

  Cross-Reference

  (1787-1879), French architect, famous for the illustrated account of his travels in Persia. See FLANDIN AND COSTE.

• COTTAM, Richard

  Susan Siavoshi

  Cottam was convinced of the moral superiority of U.S. and allied forces in their fight against fascism in Europe and the Far East. This belief lingered for some time after the end of the war, allowing him to form an idealistic view of the validity of U.S. values in its post-war struggle against communism.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• COTTON

  Multiple Authors

  Cotton (panba < Mid. Pers. pambag; katān; in Isfahan kolūza; genus Gossypium), particularly the short-staple species Gossypium herbaceum, is cultivated in almost all parts of Persia, and is of great economic importance both for home consumption and for export.

• COTTON i. Introduction

  Eckart Ehlers and Ahmad Parsa

  Cotton (panba < Mid. Pers. pambag; katān; in Isfa­han kolūza; genusGossypium), particularly the short-staple species Gossypium herbaceum, is cultivated in almost all parts of Persia, and is of great economic importance both for home consumption and for export.

• COTTON ii. Production and Trade in Persia

  Hassan Hakimian

  Cotton was one of the first vegetable fibers used to make textiles, and, despite competition from synthetic fibers in recent times, it remains the most important nonfood agricultural commodity in the world.

• COTTON iii. In Afghanistan

  Daniel Balland

  Two Iranian words, paḵta (< Tajik) and pomba (Pers. panba < Pahl. pambag), are currently used in Afghani­stan to designate raw cotton. Most people use them fairly indiscriminately, but specialists tend to confine the former to unginned, or seed, cotton and the latter to ginned, or fiber, cotton (Pashto mālūǰ/č).

• COUP D’ETAT OF 1299/1921

  Niloofar Shambayati

  the military coup that eventually led to the founding of the Pahlavi dynasty.

• COUP D’ETAT OF 1332 Š./1953

  Mark J. Gasiorowski

  the appointment of Moḥammad Moṣaddeq as prime minis­ter of Persia on 9 Ordībehešt 1330 Š./29 April 1951 and the nationalization two days later of Persia’s British-owned oil industry initiated a period of tense confrontation between the Persian and British govern­ments.

• COURTS AND COURTIERS

  Multiple Authors

  Courts and courtiers i. In the Median and Achaemenid periods, ii. In the Parthian and Sasanian periods, iii. In the Islamic period to the Mongol conquest, iv. Under the Mongols, v. Under the Timurid and Turkman dynasties, vi. In the Safavid period, vii. In the Qajar period, viii. In the reign of Reżā Shah Pahlavī, ix. In the reign of Moḥammad-Reżā Shah. See SUPPLEMENT, x. Court poetry

• COURTS AND COURTIERS i. In the Median and Achaemenid periods

  Muhammad A. Dandamayev

  From Herodotus’ report of the child Cyrus’ playing at being king it seems that the Median court included bodyguards, messengers, the “king’s eye," and builders, for it is likely that the game was modeled on the existing court.

• COURTS AND COURTIERS ii. In the Parthian and Sasanian periods

  Philippe Gignoux

  In the absence of records, a full picture of court life under the Parthians and Sasanians cannot be pieced together.

• COURTS AND COURTIERS iii. In the Islamic period to the Mongol conquest

  C. E. Bosworth

  In Persia the organization of courts (Pers. bār, bādrgāh, dargāh, darbār; in Arabic, there exists no more precise designation than majles, lit. “session”), including the formation of a circle of courtiers in the early centuries after the Islamic conquest, was directly inspired by the court life of the ʿAbbasid caliphs at Baghdad and Sāmarrāʾ.