Table of Contents

  • GONĀBĀD

    Minu Yusuf-Nežād

    a town and a sub-province (šahrestān) in the province of Khorasan.

  • GONĀBĀDI ORDER

    Hamid Algar

    an offshoot of the Neʿmat-Allāhi Sufi order, still active in Persia.

  • GONĀBĀDI, ʿEMĀD-AL-DIN MOḤAMMAD

    Shiro Ando

    or Jonābādi, b. Zayn-al-ʿĀbedin b. Neẓām-al-Din Moḥammad (b. 1415), Timurid financial officer and vizier.

  • GONĀBĀDI, Mirzā ABU’L-QĀSEM QĀSEMI

    Cross-Reference

    poet. See QĀSEMI Gonābādi, Mirzā Abu’l-Qāsem.

  • GONĀBĀDI, MOḤAMMAD PARVIN

    Cross-Reference

    Persian scholar and translator. See PARVIN GONĀBĀDI.

  • GONBAD -E ʿALAWIĀN-E Hamadān

    Cross-Reference

    See HAMADĀN, vii. MONUMENTS.

  • GONBĀD-E KĀVUS

    Cross-Reference

    See GONBAD-E QĀBUS.

  • GONBAD-E QĀBUS

    E. Ehlers, M. Momeni, and EIr, Habib-Allāh Zanjāni, Sheila S. Blair

    (now referred to officially as Gonbad-e Kāvus) is the administrative center of the sub-province (šahrestān) of the same name and the urban center of the Turkman tribal area in northern Persia. It is named after its major monument, a tall tower that marks the grave of the Ziyarid ruler Qābus b. Vošmgir (r. 978-1012).

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  • GONBAD-E SORḴ

    Marcus Milwright

    the “Red Tomb,” completed on 4 March 1148, the earliest of five medieval mausolea located in Marāḡa in Azerbaijan. It combines elements of the two common forms of Islamic Iranian monumental tomb, the domed cube, and the conically-roofed circular or polygonal tower. 

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  • GONDĒŠĀPUR

    A. Shapur Shahbazi, Lutz Richter-Bernburg

    in the Sasanian epoch, Gondēšāpur was one of the four major cities of Ḵuzestān, the other three being Karḵa, Susa, and Šuštar. The extensive irrigation systems developed there by the early Sasanians were probably aimed at supplying a large population.

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  • GONDOPHARES

    A. D. H. Bivar

    Indo-Parthian king (20-46 C.E.) in Drangiana, Arachosia, and especially in the Punjab.

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  • GŌR

    Cross-Reference

    the historical name for present-day Firuzābād in Fārs. See ARDAŠIR ḴORRA; FIRUZĀBĀD.

  • GŌRĀN

    Cross-Reference

    a tribe in Kurdistan. See GURĀN.

  • GORĀN, ʿABD-ALLĀH SOLAYMĀN

    Keith Hitchins

    (1904-62), the leading Kurdish poet of the twentieth century.

  • GORĀZ

    Cross-Reference

    See BOAR.

  • GORBA

    Cross-Reference

    See CAT I; CAT II.

  • ḠŌRBAND

    M. Jamil Hanifi

    or ḠURBAND; a major valley of Kōhestān/Kuhestān and a sub-province (woloswāli) of Parvān province in the southern foothills of the Hindu Kush massif, located approximately 50 miles north of Kabul.

  • ḠORBATI

    Cross-Reference

    See GYPSY.

  • GORDĀFARID

    Djalal Khaleghi-Motlagh

    daughter of Gaždaham, the castellan of Dež-e Sapid, the Iranian fortress on the frontier with Turān.

  • GORDIA

    Cross-Reference

    a female character in the Shah-nama. See BAHRĀM (2) vii. Bahrām VI Čōbīn.

  • GORDIANUS III

    Cross-Reference

    Roman emperor. See Šāpur I.

  • GORDON, THOMAS EDWARD

    Rose L. Greaves

    (1832–1914), General Sir, British intelligence officer, director of the Imperial Bank of Persia (Bānk-e šāhi-e Irān) from 1893 to 1914, author, and apparently the first person to use the term Middle East, which meant particularly Persia and Afghanistan.

  • GORDUENE

    Cross-Reference

    See KORDUK.

  • GORG

    Cross-Reference

    See WOLF.

  • GORGĀN

    Multiple Authors

    OVERVIEW of the entry: i. Geography, ii. Dašt-e Gorgān, iii. Population, iv. Archeology, v. Pre-Islamic history, vi. History from the rise of Islam to the beginning of the Safavid Period, vii. To the end of the Pahlavi era.

  • GORGĀN i. Geography

    Ḥabib-Allāh Zanjāni

    the ancient Hyrcania, an important Persian province at the southeast corner of the Caspian sea.

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  • GORGĀN ii. Dašt-e Gorgān

    Eckart Ehlers

    the designation of a steppe-region of approximately 10,000 km2 near the southeastern edge of the Caspian Sea, stretching for almost 200 km east-west between Morāva Tappa and the coast of the Caspian Sea near Gomišān.

  • GORGĀN iii. Population

    Ḥabib-Allāh Zanjāni

    Over the past four decades, the population of Golestān Province as a whole has increased 4.5 times, 8.5 times in the urban and 3.3 times in the rural areas. In the same period, the number of its cities has increased from 5 to 16.

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  • GORGĀN iv. Archeology

    Muhammad Yusof Kiani

    The Greek historian Arrian, recording Alexander’s expedition to the East, speaks of Alexander’s march to the city of Zadracarta, the largest town in the region and the capital of Hyrcania, where the royal palace was situated.

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  • GORGĀN v. Pre-Islamic history

    A. D. H. Bivar

    The area comprises two distinct climatic zones: the rainforest of the Alborz northern slopes and the Gorgān plain, well-watered and fertile close to the mountains but passing into increasingly desert steppe as the distance from the foothills increases.

  • GORGĀN vi. History From The Rise Of Islam To The Beginning Of The Safavid Period

    C. Edmund Bosworth

    formed in Sasanian and pre-modern Islamic times a transitional zone, a corridor, between the subtropical habitat and climate of Māzandarān to its west, and the arid steppes of Dehestān and beyond them, the Qara Qum Desert to its northwest.

  • GORGĀN vii. History from the Safavids to the end of the Pahlavi era

    Jawād Neyestāni and EIr

    Two characteristics dominated the history of Gorgān in the period between the 16th and early 19th centuries: incessant tribal unrest and power politics.

  • GORGĀN BAY

    Cross-Reference

    See ASTARĀBĀD BAY.

  • GORGANAJ

    Cross-Reference

    See CHORASMIA.

  • GORGĀNI DIALECT

    Cross-Reference

    See MĀZANDARĀNI.

  • GORGĀNI, ABU’L-HAYṮAM AḤMAD

    Cross-Reference

    See ABU’L-HAYṮAM GORGĀNI.

  • GORGĀNI, FAḴR-AL-DIN ASʿAD

    Julie Scott Meisami

    (fl. ca. 1050), poet, best known for his verse romance Vis o Rāmin, completed in 1055 or shortly thereafter and dedicated to the Saljuq governor of Isfahan, the ʿAmid Abu’l-Fatḥ Moẓaffar b. Moḥammad.

  • GORGIJANIDZE, PARSADAN

    Jemshid Giunashvili

    (1626-1696), a Georgian literary figure and historian who served in the Safavid administration as deputy governor of Isfahan and royal chamberlain.

  • GORGIN

    Djalal Khaleghi-Motlagh

    son of Milād, one of the heroes of the reigns of Kay Kāvus and Kay Ḵosrow and the head of the Milād family.

  • GORGIN KHAN

    Rudi Matthee

    also known as Giorgio XI and Šāhnavāz Khan II; Georgian prince (d. 1709), who was alternately ruler of Georgia and holder of high positions in the Safavid administration and military.

  • GORGIN, IRAJ

    Mandana Zandian

    (1935-2012), radio and television broadcaster, journalist, and the founder of several Persian radio and television networks, whose life and career unfolded in two distinct sociopolitical milieus, in Iran in the two decades that culminated in the Revolution of 1979 and in exile over the subsequent three decades of his life.

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  • GORJESTĀN

    Cross-Reference

    See GEORGIA.

  • GORUH-E FARHANGI-E HADAF

    Cross-Reference

    See HADAF EDUCATIONAL GROUP.

  • GORUH-E FARHANGI-E ḴᵛĀRAZMI

    Cross-Reference

    See ḴᵛĀRAZMI SCHOOLS.

  • GORZ

    Jalil Doostkhah

    or gorza, gorz-e gāvsār/sar, lit. "ox-headed club/mace,"  a weapon often mentioned and variously described in Iranian myths and epic. In classical Persian texts, particularly in Ferdowsi’s Šāh-nāma, it is characterized as the decisive weapon of choice in fateful battles.

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  • GORZEVĀN

    C. Edmund Bosworth

    a town in the medieval Islamic region of Guzgān in northern Afghanistan.

  • GŌŠ YAŠT

    W. W. Malandra

    the title of the ninth Yašt of the Avesta, also known as Drwāsp Yašt, after the goddess Druuāspā (see DRVĀSPĀ) to whom, in fact, it is dedicated.

  • GŌSĀN

    Mary Boyce

    a Parthian word of unknown derivation for “poet-musician, minstrel.”

  • GOŠASB BĀNU

    Djalal Khaleghi-Motlagh

    or Bānu Gošasb; entitled savār (knight), Rostam’s daughter and the wife of Gēv.

  • GŌSFAND

    Cross-Reference

    See GUSFAND.

  • ḠOSL

    Cross-Reference

    See CLEANSING.

  • GOŠNASP ASPĀD

    Cross-Reference

    Sasanian military commander. See ḴOSROW II.

  • GŌSPAND

    Cross-Reference

    See  CATTLE.

  • GOSPEL

    Cross-Reference

    See BIBLE.

  • GOSTAHAM

    Djalal Khaleghi-Motlagh

    name of two heroes in the Šāh-nāma.

  • GOŠTĀSP

    A. Shapur Shabazi

    Kayanian king of Iranian traditional history and patron of Zoroaster.

  • GŌŠURUN

    William W. Malandra

    the Pahlavi name for the soul of the Sole-created Bull.

  • GOTARZES

    Cross-Reference

    See GŌDARZ.

  • GOTTHEIL, RICHARD JAMES HORATIO

    Dagmar Riedel

    Gottheil’s tenure at the New York Public Library (NYPL) is of relevance to the field of Iranian studies because he oversaw the development of its Near Eastern and Asian collections, first as Chief of Semitica and Orientalia (1897-1901), and afterwards as Chief of the Oriental Division.

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  • GÖTTINGEN, UNIVERSITY OF, HISTORY OF IRANIAN STUDIES

    Ludwig Paul

    History of Iranian Studies at the University of Göttingen.

  • GOUVEA, ANTONIO DE

    Rudi Matthee

    (b. Beja, Portugal, 1575; d. Manzanares, Spain, 1628), Augustinian missionary and Portuguese envoy who visited Persia three times between 1602 and 1613 and who wrote on Persia.

  • GOVĀḴARZ

    Cross-Reference

    a district in the medieval province of Qohestān in Khorasan. See BĀKARZ.

  • GOWD-E ZEREH

    Cross-Reference

    See HĀMUN;

  • GOWDIN TEPE

    Cross-Reference

    an archeological site in western Persia. See GODIN TEPE.

  • GOWHAR

    Nasereddin Parvin

    a cultural journal published monthly from January 1973 to December 1978 (issue no. 72) of the philanthropic organization of Mortażā Nuriāni.

  • GOWHAR ḴĀTUN

    C. Edmund Bosworth

    a Saljuq princess who became the second wife of the Ghaznavid Sultan Masʿud III (r. 1099-1115).

  • GOWHAR-ĀʾĪN, Saʿd-al-dawla

    C. Edmund Bosworth

    (d. 1100), Turkish eunuch slave commander of the Great Saljuqs.

  • GOWHAR-E MORĀD (1)

    Cross-Reference

    philosopher and poet. See ʿABD-AL-RAZZĀQ LĀHĪJĪ

  • GOWHAR-E MORĀD (2)

    Cross-Reference

    pen name of the 20th-century author Ḡolām-Ḥosayn Sāʿedi. See SA'EDI, GHOLAM-HOSAYN.

  • GOWHAR-ŠĀD ĀḠĀ

    Beatrice Forbes Manz

    wife of Sultan Šāhroḵ b. Timur (r. 1409-47) and daughter of Ḡiāṯ-al-Din Tarḵān, a ranking amir under Timur.

  • GOWHAR-ŠĀD MOSQUE

    Lisa Golombek

    constructed in the early 15th century, the Friday mosque for pilgrims to the tomb of Imam ʿAli al-Reżā in Mašhad, so named after this famous shrine.

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  • GOWHARIN, SAYYED SĀDEQ

    Peter Avery

    Gowharin came from an old and distinguished family which traced its lineage back to the eponymous founder of the Nurbaḵšiyya, Sayyed Moḥammad Nurbaḵš (1392-1464). Himself a Sufi of the Ḵāksār order, his interest in mysticism went far beyond that of an academic.

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  • GOWJA FARANGI

    Cross-Reference

    See TOMATO.

  • GOWRAK

    Pierre Oberling

    a Kurdish tribe in northwestern Persia.

  • GOWZ

    Cross-Reference

    See WALNUT.

  • GŌZEHR

    Cross-Reference

    Bazarangid ruler in Fārs. See ARDAŠĪR I.

  • GŌZIHR

    D. N. Mackenzie

    the Middle Persian development of an old Iranian compound adjective *gau-čiθra-, recorded in the Younger Avesta in the form gaočiθra-, as an epithet of the moon, “bearing the seed, having the origin of cattle” (or, “the ox”).

  • ḠOZZ

    Peter B. Golden, C. Edmund Bosworth

    a significant Turkic tribe in western Eurasia in the 5th century.

  • GRAND LODGE OF IRAN

    Cross-Reference

    See FREEMASONRY, iii-iv.

  • GRANICUS

    Ernst Badian

    river (mod. Kocabaş Çay) flowing into the Sea of Marmara.

  • GRANT DUFF, Sir EVELYN MOUNTSTUART

    Denis Wright

    (b. 1863; d. Bath, 1926), British diplomat serving successively in Rome, Tehran, St. Petersburg, Stockholm, Berlin, then London.

  • GRANT, Captain NATHANIEL PHILIP

    Denis Wright

    (b. New York, 1774; k. Ḵorramābād, 1810), a military officer of the East India Company.

  • GRANTOVSKIĬ, EDVIN ARVIDOVICH

    Mohammad Dandamayev

    Grantovskiĭ specialized in the history of ancient Iranian tribes (especially the Medes, Persians and Scythians) and their civilizations. His research was based on Akkadian and Urartian inscriptions, Iranian texts, and classical sources  and on evidence of archaeology, ethnography, and folklore.

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  • GRAPES

    Cross-Reference

    See ANGŪR.

  • GRAPHIC ARTS

    Mortażā Momayyez, Peter Chelkowski

    Broadly speaking, graphic art and design have a long history in Persia; their antecedents can be seen in graphic motifs and patterns on ancient clay and metal vessels, stone reliefs, seals, brickwork, glazed tiles, plaster and wood carvings, cloths, carpets, marquetry, miniature paintings, calligraphy, and illumination of manuscripts.

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  • GRAY, BASIL

    John Michael Rogers

    Gray's initiation into eastern art, for which there was then no provision at any British university, came in 1928, when he worked for a season on the excavations at the great palace of the Byzantine emperors in Constantinople, followed by study in Vienna under Josef Strzygowski, who was, however, already sunk deep in diffusionism.

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  • GRAY, LOUIS HERBERT

    William W. Malandra

    In 1921 Gray was appointed associate professor of philology at the University of Nebraska, where he remained until his appointment at Columbia University as professor of Oriental Languages in 1926. In 1935, he became Professor of Comparative Linguistics, a position he held until his retirement in 1944.

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  • GREAT BRITAIN

    Multiple Authors

    OVERVIEW of the entry: i. Introduction, ii. An Overview of Relations: Safavid to the Present, iii. British influence in Persia in the 19th century, iv. British influence in Persia, 1900-21, v. British influence during the Reżā Shah period, 1921-41, vi. British influence in Persia, 1941-79, vii. British Travelers to Persia, viii. British Archeological Excavations, ix. Iranian Studies in Britian, Pre-Islamic, x. Iranian Studies in Britain, the Islamic Period, xi. Persian Art Collections in Britain, xii. The Persian Community in Britain, xiii. The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), xiv. The British Institute of Persian Studies, xv. British Schools in Persia.

  • GREAT BRITAIN i. INTRODUCTION

    EIr

    During the 16th century, several unsuccessful attempts were made by the Muscovy (or Russia) Company of London to develop trade between London and Persia via Russia.

  • GREAT BRITAIN ii. An Overview of Relations: Safavid to the Present

    Denis Wright

    Prior to the Safavid period, contacts between Britain and Persia were confined to the 13th century, and were infrequent and of short duration.

  • GREAT BRITAIN iii. British influence in Persia in the 19th century

    Abbas Amanat

    British imperial interests in Persia in the Qajar period were primarily determined by the concern for the security of colonial India and, secondarily, by trade, telegraphic communication, and financial or other conces-sionary agreements.

  • GREAT BRITAIN iv. British influence in Persia, 1900-21

    Mansour Bonakdarian

    In the late 1890s, the Foreign Office in London came to regard Germany as the main threat to the European balance of power and British imperial hegemony around the globe.

  • Great Britain v. British influence during the Reżā Shah period, 1921-41

    Stephanie Cronin

    During the reign of Reżā Shah (1925-1941) a profound transformation took place in both the character and the scope of British influence in Persia.

  • Great Britain vi. British influence in Persia, 1941-79

    Fakhreddin Azimi

    For the greater part of the Qajar era (1796-1924) Persia was the scene of intense rivalry between the Russian and British empires.

  • Great Britain vii. British Travelers to Persia

    Denis Wright

    The British, more than any others, have been prolific authors of travelogues, and memoirs about Persia.

  • Great Britain viii. British Archeological Excavations

    St. J. Simpson

    excavations began in Persia before the so-called “French monopoly” on archeological excavations.

  • Great Britain ix. Iranian Studies in Britain, Pre-Islamic

    A. D. H. Bivar

    Several fields of pre-Islamic Iranian Studies have seen great expansion during recent centuries, and to these, scholars and travelers from Great Britain have made substantial contributions.

  • Great Britain x. Iranian Studies in Britain, the Islamic Period

    Charles Melville

    British interest in, and scholarship on, Persia and Persian culture in the Islamic period goes back to the first formal contacts between the two countries, that is, at least to the 16th century and the growth of Britain’s involvement in the Levant and East Indian trades.

  • Great Britain xi. Persian Art Collections in Britain

    J. Michael Rogers

    The collecting of Persian art in Great Britain goes back at least to the missions despatched by the Safavid Shah ʿAbbās I (1588-1629) and the activities of the Sherley brothers at his court in Isfahan. The early 17th century also saw the growth of trade with Persia through the East India Company.

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  • Great Britain xii. The Persian Community in Britain (1)

    Kathryn Spellman

    This entry will be treated in two separate articles: (1) Persian Community and (2) The Library for Iranian Studies.