Table of Contents

  • CHRISTIANITY viii. Christian Missions in Persia

    Yahya Armajani

    Christianity was introduced in Persia in the Parthian period, and several bishoprics were established there. The Persian church was itself active in proselytizing abroad at the end of the Sasanian period (224-651) and immediately after.

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  • CHRISTIE, CHARLES

    Kamran Ekbal

    Captain (d. 1812), of the Bombay Regiment, an Anglo-Indian officer under the command of Sir John Malcolm.

  • CHROMITE

    Raḥmat-Allāh Ostovār

    FeCr2O4, a dark-brown or black mineral from which chromium is refined.

  • CHRONICLE OF ARBELA

    Peter Kawerau

    a Syriac church history of Adiabene, written in the 6th century by Mĕšīḥā-Zĕḵā. A remarkable account from the Parthian period is that of the Feast of the Magi in the month of Iyyār. Equally noteworthy is the account of the fall of the Arsacids and the beginning of the reign of the Sasanians in 224.

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  • CHRONICLE OF EDESSA

    Sebastian P. Brock

    a short local history of Edessa (modern Urfa), written in Syriac by an anonymous author and covering chiefly the period from 201-540 C.E. Events such as incursions by the Huns (403-04, 531) and relations be­tween the Byzantine and Sasanian empires are noted briefly.

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  • CHRONOGRAMS

    J. T. P. de Bruijn

    dates incorporated into Persian texts in disguised form, espe­cially those in which the letters of the alphabet have numerical value.

  • CHRONOLOGY

    Cross-Reference

    See CALENDARS.

  • CH’ÜAN-CHOU

    Cross-reference

    (Quan-zhou, formerly Jin-jiang; in Islamic sources Zaytūn), Chinese city in southeastern Fu-jian (Fukien) province on the lower reaches of the Jin-jiang river. See CHINA VIII. PERSIAN SETTLEMENTS IN SOUTHEASTERN CHINA.

  • CHUBAK, Sadeq

    Mohammad Reza Ghanoonparvar

    (1916-1998), one of most acclaimed Persian short story writers and novelists of the 20th century.

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  • CHUPANIDS

    Cross-Reference

    See CHOBANIDS.

  • CHURCH OF ENGLAND IN PERSIA

    Cross-reference

    IN PERSIA. See ENGLAND, CHURCH OF, IN PERSIA.

  • CHURNS AND CHURNING

    Marcel Bazin and Christian Bromberger

    There are three distinct ways in which milk is normally processed. In the first it is heated, pressed, and squeezed dry to make cheese (panīr). Cheese making is uncommon in the Persian world. The other two methods begin with conversion of the milk into yogurt.

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  • CIA

    Cross-Reference

    See CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY (CIA) IN PERSIA.

  • ČIÇANTAXMA

    Rüdiger Schmitt

    an Iranian personal name signifying “brave in lineage.”

  • CICAST

    Cross-Reference

    See ČĒČAST.

  • CICERO

    Michael Weiskopf

    as a source for Parthian history; letters written by Roman statesman and political philosopher Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 b.c.e.) preserve a virtually unique con­temporary extra-Iranian source on Parthian military and diplomatic activities and the Roman response to them, particularly during the military-campaign season of 51­-50 b.c.e.

  • ČĪDAG ANDARZ Ī PŌRYŌTKĒŠĀN

    Mansour Shaki

    (Selected precepts of the ancient sages), a post-Sasanian compendium of apothegms intended to instruct every Zoroastrian male, upon his attaining the age of fifteen years, in fundamental religious and ethical principles, as well as in the daily duties incumbent upon him.

  • CIGARETTES

    Cross-Reference

    See DOḴĀNĪYĀT.

  • ČIHRDĀD NASK

    D. N. MacKenzie

    one of the lost nasks of the Avesta.

  • CILICIA

    Michael Weiskopf

    the southeastern portion of the present Turkish coast, a satrapy of the Achaemenid empire (6th-4th centuries BCE, subsequently incorporated into the Macedonian and Roman empires.

  • ČĪM Ī DRŌN

    Cross-Reference

    See DRŌN.

  • ČĪM Ī KUSTĪG

    Cross-Reference

    See KUSTĪG.

  • CIMMERIANS

    Sergei R. Tokhtas’ev

    a nomadic people, most likely of Iranian origin, who flourished in the 8th-7th centuries B.C.

  • ČĪN TĪMŪR

    Peter Jackson

    the first governor of Khorasan and Māzandarān on behalf of the Mongols.

  • CINEMA

    Multiple Authors

    This series of articles treats the history of cinema in Persia, Persian feature film, Persian documentary films, film censorship in Persia, and filmography in Persia.

  • CINEMA i. History of Cinema in Persia

    Farrokh Gaffary

    Regularly scheduled film screenings were introduced in Tehran by Ārdāšes Batmāngarīān, known as Ardašīr Khan, who had worked at Pathé in Paris at the turn of the century.

     

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  • CINEMA ii. Feature Films

    Jamsheed Akrami

    Feature-film production in Persia spans six decades and can be divided into four distinct periods, each reflecting contemporary social, cultural, and political realities.

  • CINEMA iii. Documentary Films

    Hamid Naficy

    Be­fore World War I most Persian documentaries were sponsored and viewed only by the Qajar ruling family and the upper classes. They were apparently technically primitive and in a simple narrative format, consisting of footage of news events, topics of current interest, and spectacles, usually filmed in long shot.

  • CINEMA iv. Film Censorship

    Jamsheed Akrami

    Persian cinema has been subject from its beginnings to official censorship responding to the concerns of the government, religious establishments, professional groups, and even film distributors.

  • CINEMA v. Filmography

    EIr

    A list of films discussed in i-iv above, listed here by year of release and alphabetically within each year. When the information is available producers are listed after the translated titles.

  • ČĪNĪ

    John Carswell

    (lit. “Chinese”; borrowed in Arabic as ṣīnī), generic term for Chinese ceramic wares, including porcelain, a translucent, white-bodied ware fired at very high temperatures.

  • CINNAMON

    Cross-reference

    See DĀRČĪNĪ.

  • CINNAMUS

    Marie Louise Chaumont

    putative rival of Artabanus II (12-38) as king of the Arsacids.

  • CINTĀMAṆI

    Priscilla Soucek

    the “wish-fulfilling jewel,” a motif consisting of either a single globe with a pointed extension at the apex or three such globes; either version could be surrounded by a flaming halo.

  • ČINWAD PUHL

    Aḥmad Tafażżolī

    traditionally thought to mean “the bridge of the separator” but recently shown to be “the bridge of the accumulator/collector,” the name of a bridge that, according to a Mazdayasnian/Zoroastrian eschatological myth, leads from this world to the next and must be crossed by the souls of the departed.

  • CIRCASSIANS

    Cross-Reference

    See ČARKAS.

  • CIRCESIUM

    Joseph Wieseh

    a Roman border fortress in Mesopotamia, on the spit of land formed where the Ḵābūr, the present-day al-Boṣayra, flows into the Euphrates (see maps in Kettenhofen).

  • CIRCUMCISION

    Ebrāhīm Šakūrzāda and Mahmoud Omidsalar

    Pers. ḵatna, sonnat (formally also taṭhīr or ḵetān), ḵatnakonān, and sonnatkonān; the last two terms also refer to the festivities associated with the circumcision ritual.

  • ČIŠPIŠ

    Rüdiger Schmitt

    (ca. 675-640 BCE), the son of Achaemenes, legendary founder of the Achaemenid dynasty and father of Darius’s great-grandfather Ariaramnes.

  • CISSIANS

    Rüdiger Schmitt

    a name for the Susians, the Elamite inhabitants of Susiana.

  • ČISTĀ

    Jean Kellens

    and Čisti; Avestan derivatives of the verb cit “to notice, to understand.”

  • ČĪSTĀN

    Cross-Reference

    See RIDDLE.

  • CISTERN

    Cross-Reference

    See  ĀB-ANBAR.

  • ČĪT

    Jennifer M. Scarce

    cotton cloth decorated with block-printed or painted designs in multiple colors.

  • CITIES

    Multiple Authors

    i. Geographical introduction. ii. City planning, construction, and architecture. See Supplement. iii. Administration and social organization. iv. Modern urbanization and modernization in Persia. v. Modern urbanization and modernization in Afghanistan. vi. Urban Informal Settlements in Modern Iran.

  • CITIES i. Geographical Introduction

    Xavier De Planhol

    There is a long history of settlement on Persian territory, where urban life was firmly established in antiquity, and cities continued to proliferate, though, owing to fluctuations in the population, they were highly unstable.

  • CITIES iii. Administration and Social Organization

    Ann K. S. Lambton

    This article on the administration and social organization of Persian cities in the Islamic period discusses the following terms and offices: aḥdāṯ, amīr, amīr al-sūq, beglarbegī, ʿasas, čerāḡčī, dārūḡa, dārūḡa-šāgerd, dārūḡačī, dīvānbegī, farrāš, gazma, goḏaṛčī, ḥākem, kadḵodā, kalāntar, mehmāndār-bāšī, mīr-šab, mīrāb, moḥaṣṣes, moḥtaseb, moqtaʿ, naqīb, naqīb al-ašrāf, raʾīs, ṣāḥeb al-šorṭa, šeḥna, wālī.

  • CITIES iv. Modern Urbanization and Modernization in Persia

    Eckart Ehlers

    Over a period of decades the rapidly growing popula­tion of Persia has simultaneously become increasingly urbanized. More and more people live in increasingly larger cities, and the largest cities tend to grow at a rate above the average.

  • CITIES v. Modern Urbanization and Modernization in Afghanistan

    Erwin Grötzbach

    Since 1359 Š./1980 the flight of millions of Afghans, not only out of the country but also to relatively secure cities like Kabul and Mazār-e Šarīf, has been reflected in a sharp increase in the level of urbanization.

  • CITIES vi. Urban Informal Settlements in Modern Iran

    Pooya Alaedini

    This article discusses the development of informal settlements in Iran and the evolution of government policies and programs dealing with them.

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