Table of Contents

  • KAʿBA-YE ZARDOŠT

    Gerd Gropp

    “Kaʿba of Zoroaster,” an ancient building at Naqš-e Rostam near Persepolis.

  • KABĀB

    Etrat Elahi

    popular dish which traditionally consists of meat cut in cubes, or ground and shaped into balls; these are threaded onto a skewer and broiled over a brazier of charcoal embers.

  • KABIR-KUH

    Majdodin Keyvani

    one of the long ranges of the Zagros mountains, lying between Iran’s two western provinces of Loristan and Ilām.

  • KABISA

    Simone Cristoforetti

    Arabic term used in calendrical context; “intercalary,” “embolismal.” It is applied to several readjustments that occurred in the Iranian solar calendar.

  • KĀBOL MAGAZINE

    Wali Ahmadi

    a monthly magazine with the full title Kābol:ʿElmi, adabi, ejtemāʿi, tariḵi. The periodical was founded by the Kabul Literary Society (Anjoman-e Adabi-e Kābol), 1931-40.

  • KĀBOLI

    Rawan Farhadi and J. R. Perry

    the colloquial Persian spoken in the capital of Afghanistan, Kabul, and its environs. It has been a common and prestigious vernacular for several centuries, since Kabul was long ruled by dynasts of Iran (the Safavids) or India (the Mughals) for whom Persian was the language of culture and administration.

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  • KĀBOLI, ʿAbdallāh Ḵᵛāja

    Maria Szuppe

    (also known as Kāboli Naqšbandi and Heravi), historiographer and poet of the late 16th and early 17th centuries. 

  • KABUL

    Multiple Authors

    (Kābol), capital of Afghanistan, also the name of its province and a river.

  • KABUL i. GEOGRAPHY OF THE PROVINCE

    Andreas Wilde

    Kabul is part of a system of high level basins, the elevation of which varies from 1,500 to 3,600 meters, extends—geographically speaking—beyond the administrative borders of the present-day province.

  • KABUL ii. HISTORICAL GEOGRAPHY

    Xavier de Planhol

    Before the period of war and unrest in Afghanistan that started in 1978, almost all the functions concerned with governing the country and directing its international relations were concentrated in Kabul. This primacy among Afghan cities is due to an exceptionally favorable geographical site.

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  • KABUL iii. HISTORY FROM THE 16TH CENTURY TO THE ACCESSION OF MOḤAMMAD ẒĀHER SHAH

    May Schinasi

    Kabul was a small town until the 16th century, when Ẓahir-al-Din Bābor (1483-1530), the first of the Great Mughals, made it his capital.

  • KABUL iv. URBAN POLITICS SINCE ẒĀHER SHAH

    Daniel E. Esser

    The first master plan marked an important attempt to reorganize the spatial structure of the city. A first revision was authorized in 1971.

  • KABUL v. MONUMENTS OF KABUL CITY

    Jonathan Lee

    This article focuses on the major monuments in and around the Old City of Kabul and the most significant Dorrāni dynastic monuments and mausolea.

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  • KABUL LITERARY SOCIETY

    Wali Ahmadi

    (Anjoman-e adabi-e Kābol), the first official academic and cultural association of Afghanistan, 1930-40.

  • KABUL MUSEUM

    Carla Grissmann

    popular name of the National Museum of Afghanistan. A modest collection of artifacts and manuscripts already existed in the time of King Ḥabib-Allāh (r. 1901–19). In 1931 the collection was finally installed in a building in rural Darulaman (Dār-al-amān), eight kilometers south of Kabul City.

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  • KABUL RIVER

    Andreas Wilde

    in eastern Afghanistan. It forms one of Afghanistan’s four major river systems and is the only Afghan river that flows, as tributary of the Indus, into the sea.

  • KĀČI

    Etrat Elahi and Majdodin Keyvani

    a traditional Persian dish generally made of rice flour, cooking oil, sugar diluted in water, and turmeric or saffron with a sprinkling of golāb (rosewater) to give it a pleasant scent.

  • KADAGISTĀN

    Nicholas Sims-Williams

    an eastern province of the Sasanian empire. The clearest evidence for the existence of such a province is provided by a bulla bearing the impression of a seal.

  • ḴĀDEM MIṮĀQ

    Amir Hossein Pourjavady

    (1907-1958), musician, teacher, conductor, and composer.

  • ḴĀDEM-E BESṬĀMI

    Kioumars Ghereghlou

    Moḥammad Ṭāher b. Ḥasan, local historian, calligrapher, and poet of the reign of Shah ʿAbbās I.