Table of Contents

• KAY KĀVUS

  Cross-reference

  See KAYĀNIĀN.

• KAY ḴOSROW

  Cross-reference

  See KAYĀNIĀN.

• KAY-ḴOSROW KHAN

  Hirotake Maeda

  (1674-1711), Georgian royal prince of the Kartlian branch, also known as Ḵosrow Khan.

• KAY QOBĀD

  Cross-reference

  See KAYĀNIĀN.

• ḴAYĀL, Mir Moḥammad-Taqi

  Mohammad Sohayb Arshad

  (d. 1759), Indian author of a collection of historical and fictitious stories composed in Persian in fifteen volumes over fourteen years and titled Bustān-e ḵayāl.

• KAYĀNIĀN

  Prods Oktor Skjærvø

  (Kayanids), in the early Persian epic tradition a dynasty that ruled Iran before the Achaemenids, all of whom bore names prefixed by Kay from Avestan kauui.

• KAYĀNIĀN i. Kavi: Avestan kauui, Pahlavi kay

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  Kavi is the Indo-Iranian term for “(visionary) poet.”  The term may be older than Indo-Iranian, if Lydian kaveś and the Samothracean title cited by Hesychius as koíēs or kóēs are related.

• KAYĀNIĀN ii. The Kayanids as a Group

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  References to the kauuis in the Avesta are found in the yašts in the lists of heroes who sacrificed to various deities for certain rewards.

• KAYĀNIĀN iii. Kauui Kauuāta, Kay Kawād, Kay Kobād (Qobād)

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  Kauui Kauuāta (Figure 1) has no epithets in the Avesta to describe him, and the descriptions in the Pahlavi sources are mostly vague.

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• KAYĀNIĀN iv. “Minor” Kayanids

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  The Avesta contains no information on Aipi.vahu, Aršan, Pisinah, and Biiaršan, but, according to the Pahlavi tradition, Abīweh was the son of Kawād and the father of Arš, Biyarš (spelled <byʾlš>), Pisīn, and Kāyus.

• KAYĀNIĀN v. Kauui Usan, Kay-Us, Kay Kāvus

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  With Kauui Usan (Usaδan), Pahlavi Kay Us (Kāy Us), Persian Kay Kāvus, the sources become a bit more substantial. His name corresponds to Old Indic Kāvya Uśánas.

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• KAYĀNIĀN vi. Siiāuuaršan, Siyāwaxš, Siāvaš

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  Siiāuuaršan, “the one with black stallions,” is listed in the Avesta in Yašt 13.132 as a kauui and the third with a name containing aršan “male.” 

• KAYĀNIĀN vii. Kauui Haosrauuah, Kay Husrōy, Kay Ḵosrow

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  The name Haosrauuah is a vriddi formation of *husrauuah “he who has good fame” and ought to mean “good fame” by itself.

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• KAYĀNIĀN viii. Kay Luhrāsp, Kay Lohrāsb

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  In the Avesta, Vištāspa’s father is Auruuaṯ.aspa, who is mentioned only once, when Zarathustra asks Anāhitā for the ability to make Vištāspa, son of Auruuaṯ.aspa, help the daēnā along with thoughts, words, and deeds, a wish he is granted.

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• KAYĀNIĀN ix. Kauui Vištāspa, Kay Wištāsp, Kay Beštāsb/Goštāsb

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  The name Vištāspa presumably means “he who gives the horses free rein” (cf. Rigveda 6.6.4víṣitāso áśvāḥ “horses let loose or given free rein”).

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• KAYĀNIĀN x. The End of the Kayanids

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  In the Pahlavi texts. The Bundahišn only records that, when Wahman, son of Spandyād, came to the throne, Iran was a wasteland, and the Iranians were quarreling with one another.

• KAYĀNIĀN xi. The Kayanids and the Kang-dez

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  According to the Pahlavi texts, Kay Siāwaxš built the Kang castle (Kang-diz) by miraculous power (Pahlavi Rivāyat: with his own hands, by means of the [Kavian] xwarrah and the might of Ohrmazd and the Amahrspands).

• KAYĀNIĀN xii. The Kavian XVARƎNAH

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  The nature of the Avestan xᵛarənah and its three subtypes, the Aryan (airiiana), the “unseizable” (? axᵛarəta), and the Kavian (kāuuaiia).

• KAYĀNIĀN xiii. Synchronism of the Kayanids and Near Eastern History

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  The desire of the medieval historians to fit all the ancient narratives into one and the same chronological description of world history from the creation led them to coordinate the Biblical, Classical, and Iranian sources.

• KAYĀNIĀN xiv. The Kayanids in Western Historiography

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  In Western historiography up into the 19th century, the historicity of the pre-Achaemenid Persian dynasties was taken for granted, and the Kayanids, the “second dynasty of Persian kings,” were commonly identified with the Babylonian, Assyrian, and Median kings.

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