Table of Contents

• MĀ WARĀʾ AL-NAHR

  C. Edmund Bosworth

  the classical designation for Transoxania or Transoxiana. It was defined by the early Arabic historians and geographers as the lands under Muslim control lying to the north of the middle and upper Oxus or Āmu Daryā.

• MAʿĀYEB AL-REJĀL

  Afsaneh Najmabadi

  a treatise written in 1894 by Bibi Ḵānom Estarābādi/Astarābādi as a counterargument to the anonymous Taʾdib al-neswān/Taʾdib al-nesāʾ, a tract on how to discipline women, published in the mid-19th century.

• MACHALSKI, FRANCISZEK

  Anna Krasnowolska

  (1904-1979), Polish Iranist. Some of his best papers are devoted to cultural and political life in Pahlavi Persia.

• MACKENZIE, DAVID NEIL

  Desmond Durkin-Meisterernst

  (1926-2001), distinguished British scholar of Middle and Modern Iranian languages with an impressive record of publications.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MADĀʾEN

  Michael Morony

  the Sasanian metropolitan area of several contiguous cities, on both sides of the Tigris and connected by floating bridges, about 35 km southeast of Abbasid Baghdad.

• MADĀR AL-AFĀŻEL

  Solomon Bayevsky

  dictionary of the Persian language compiled in 1001/1593 by the poet and historian Allāh-dād Fayżī b. Asad al-ʿOlamāʾ ʿAli-šir Serhendi.

• MĀDAR-E SOLAYMĀN

  Cross-Reference

  "Solaymān's mother," local name of the tomb of Cyrus. See CYRUS v. The Tomb of Cyrus. 

• MĀDAYĀN Ī HAZĀR DĀDESTĀN

  Maria Macuch

  (Book of a Thousand Judgements), Pahlavi Law-Book from the late Sasanian period (first half of the seventh century).

• MĀDDA TĀRIḴ

  Paul Losensky

  chronogram poem, a poetic genre characterized by the inclusion of the year in which an event occurred.

• MAGI

  Muhammad A. Dandamayev

  the only recorded designation of priests of all western Iranians during the Median, Achaemenid, Parthian (mgw), and Sasanian periods.

• MAGIC i. MAGICAL ELEMENTS IN THE AVESTA AND NĒRANG LITERATURE

  Antonio Panaino

  The presence of magical elements in the strict sense  in Avestan literature has been considered rare.

• MAGIC ii. IN LITERATURE AND FOLKLORE IN THE ISLAMIC PERIOD

  Mahmud Omidsalar

  Magic can be briefly described as the art of influencing the course of events by the occult control of natural phenomena through the application of ritual observances acquired through a study of esoteric and often closely guarded corpus of knowledge and traditions.

• MAGOPHONIA

  Muhammad A. Dandamayev

  An appropriate Iranian word for magophonia is the Sogdian mwγzt- (killing of the Magi).

• MAḤALLĀTI, Moḥammad

  Javad Golmohammadi

  a master calligrapher of the Timurid period, known only through three surviving works on wood and stone (a cetanoph, a door, and a stone plaque), which reflect the stylistic influence of the Timurid prince and master calligrapher Ḡiāṯ-al-Din Bāysonqor (d. 1493).

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MAHĀRLU LAKE

  Karāmat-Allāh Afsar

  a picturesque, rather extensive body of water to the southeast of Shiraz.

• MAḤFEL-E RUḤĀNI

  Moojan Momen

  current designation of the Bahai governing councils elected at local and national level.

• MAHJUB, MOHAMMAD JA’FAR

  Mahmoud Omidsalar

  prominent scholar of Persian literature, essayist, translator, university teacher, and one of the founders of the discipline of folklore in Iran.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MAḤJUBI, Morteżā

  Morteżā Ḥoseyni Dehkordi and EIr

  (1900-1965), composer and pianist,  noted for his use of the piano to perform traditional Iranian music.

• MAḤJUBI, Reżā

  Morteżā Ḥoseyni Dehkordi and EIr

  (1898-1954) composer and violinist, brother of Morteżā.

• MAḤMUD MIRZĀ

  Dominic Parviz Brookshaw

  (b. 1799, d. between 1854 and 1858), fifteenth son of Fatḥ-ʿAli Shah Qajar (r. 1797-1834), calligrapher, poet, and anthologist.

• MAJALLA-ye JAMʿIYAT-e NESWĀN-e WAṬANḴᵛĀH-e IRĀN

  Nassereddin Parvin

  magazine of the women's association of that name, 1923-26.

• MAJALLA-ye RASMI-e ṮABT

  Nassereddin Parvin

  official journal of the Ministry of Justice from 1928.

• MAJD, Loṭf-Allāh

  Morteżā Ḥoseyni Dehkordi and EIr

  tār player known for his brilliant virtuosity and distinctive style (1917-1978).

• MAJD-AL-MOLK II

  M. Dabirsiāqi

  , Mirzā Taqi Khan Monši-e Hożur (b. 1278/1861) a high ranking Qajar official and poet with the pen name ʿAbqari.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MAJLESI, Moḥammad-Bāqer

  Rainer Brunner

  (b. 1627; d. 1699 or 1700), an eminent Twelver Shiʿite jurist in Safavid Iran (1501-1722) and one of the most important hadith scholars of Twelver Shiʿism.

• MAJLESI, MOḤAMMAD-TAQI

  Rainer Brunner

  b. Maqṣud-ʿAli Eṣfahāni, commonly referred to as Majlesi-ye Awwal, an important Twelver Shiʿite jurist and Hadith scholar of the Aḵbāri school.

• MAKRĀN

  C. E. Bosworth

  (also Mokrān) the coastal region of Baluchistan, extending from the Somniani Bay to the northwest of Karachi in the east westwards to the fringes of the region of Bashkardia/Bāšgerd in the southern part of the Sistān and Balučestān province of modern Iran.

• MAKTAB

  Cross-Reference

  See EDUCATION iii. The Traditional Elementary School.

• MĀKŪLĀ DYNASTY

  Cross-Reference

  See ĀL-E MĀKŪLĀ.

• MALAKUT

  Saeed Honarmand

  the highly acclaimed and the only published novella by the noted modernist fiction writer Bahram Sadeqi.

• MALEKŠĀH

  David Durand-Guédy

  the Great Saljuq sultan, during whose reign the Saljuq empire attained its maximum extension.

• MALIĀN

  Kamyar Abdi

  an important archeological site in the Kor River basin in central Fārs, identified as ancient Anshan, the highland capital of Elam. At nearly 200 ha, Maliān is the largest pre-Achaemenid settlement in Fārs and one of largest archeological sites in Iran.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MAMIKONEAN

  Nina Garsoian

  the most distinguished family in Early Christian Armenia after the ruling Arsacid house. Their power survived the fall of the dynasty in 428 and began to wane only from the end of the 6th century.

• MAMSIRATI, DÄBE

  F. Thordarson

  (Russian: Dabe Mamsurov), Ossetic author (1909-1966).

• MAḤMUD B. SEBÜKTEGIN

  C. Edmund Bosworth

  the first fully independent ruler of the Turkish Ghaznavid dynasty, who reigned (388-421/998-1030) over what had become by his death a vast military empire.

• MAʾMUN

  C. Edmund Bosworth

  , Abu’l-ʿAbbās ʿAbd-Allāh, the seventh Abbasid caliph (r. 813-833), son of Hārun-al-Rašid (d. 809) by a Persian concubine.

• MANDAEANS i. HISTORY

  Edmondo F. Lupieri

  an ethnic group (also called Nasoreans or Ar. Ṣābeʾin) belonging to one of the less represented religions of the Near East.

• MANDAEANS ii. THE MANDAEAN RELIGION

  Kurt Rudolph

  A major characteristic of the Mandaeans is the frequent ritual use of (running) water (for baptisms and ritual purifications); another is the possession of a rich literature

• MANDAEANS iii. INTERACTION WITH IRANIAN RELIGION

  Kurt Rudolph

  assimilation and corresponding processing of Iranian (Persian) components within the Mandaean religion can be demonstrated on different levels: in the vocabulary, in the mythology or theology, in the cultic-ritual realm, and in the calendar.

• MANDAEANS iv. COMMUNITY IN IRAN

  Jorunn Jacobsen Buckley

  According to the 15 September 2004 United States Department of State International Religious Freedom Report for Iran, Section 1, the current Mandaean population in Persia comprises between 5,000 and 10,000 persons.

• MANDAEANS v. MANDAIC LANGUAGE

  Christa Müller-Kessler

  Mandaic is the term for the Aramaic dialect of the last remaining non-Christian Gnostics from Late Antiquity, the Mandaeans of Iraq and Iran (Ḵuzestān). It belongs to the Southeastern Aramaic dialect group with Babylonian Talmudic Aramaic (Babylonian Jewish Aramaic) and Koiné Babylonian Aramaic.

• MANDAEANS vi. NEO-MANDAIC LANGUAGE

  Charles Häberl

  or modern Mandaic, the contemporary form of Mandaic, the language of the Mandaean religious community of Iraq and Iran. As such, it is the only known form of any of the classical literary dialects of Aramaic to survive to the present date, but it is severely endangered today.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MANDANE

  Rüdiger Schmitt

  name of a daughter of the Median king Astyages.

• MANGHITS

  ANKE VON KÜGELGEN

  self-denomination of Mongol and Turkic tribes which played an eminent role in the Golden Horde.

• MANI

  Werner Sundermann

  the founder of the religion of Manicheism in the 3rd century CE.

• MANICHEAN ART

  Zsuzsanna Gulacsi

  term referring to objects with aesthetic appeal that were made for, and/or used in association with,  the Manichean religion. With the exception of a rock-crystal seal in the collection of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France in Paris,  no other item of Manichean art is known from Sasanian Mesopotamia, where the religion had originated.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MANICHEAN SCRIPT

  Desmond Durkin-Meisterernst

  a right-to-left Semitic script, used by adherents of Manicheism to write texts in Middle Persian, Parthian, Sogdian, Early New Persian, Bactrian, and Uighur (Old Turkish). It is closely related to the Palmyrene script of Aramaic and the Estrangelo script of Syriac; some of its orthographical conventions are also to be found in the Mandaean script.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MANICHEISM i. GENERAL SURVEY

  Werner Sundermann

  Manicheism is the only world religion that has become completely extinct. Its founder, Mani, lived in the third century CE. His religion spread over the continents from the Atlantic to the Chinese Sea.

• MANICHEISM ii. THE MANICHEAN PANTHEON

  Werner Sundermann

  In this article, the gods of the Manicheans are considered collectively with regards to their names and functions.

• MANICHEISM iii. BUDDHIST ELEMENTS IN

  P. Bryder

  Mani, who came to be considered himself to be the seal of the prophets, named Buddha, Zarathustra, and Jesus as his forerunners.

• MANICHEISM iv. MISSIONARY ACTIVITY AND TECHNIQUE

  Werner Sundermann

  The main primary sources on the beginning of Manichean missionary work are the Cologne Mani Codex and the Kephalaia.

• MANICHEISM v. IN CHINA

  Sammuel L.C. Lieu

  Manicheism arrived in China in the sixth century, but its history in there was little known until the first decade of the 20th century, when a genuine Manichean text in Chinese was discovered in the Cave of Thousand Buddhas in Tun-huang.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MANJIL

  Marcel Bazin

  town in the Rudbār district, Gilān province. Located at lat 36°44′ N, long 49°24′ E, where the Qezel-owzan (Kızıl-uzun) and Šāhrud rivers unite into the Safidrud.

• MANNEA

  Ran Zadok

  (Neo-Assyrian Mannāyu), name refering to a region southeast of Lake Urmia centered around modern Saqqez.

• MANṢUR B. NUḤ

  C. Edmund Bosworth

  the name of two of the later Amirs of the Samanids (q.v.), the first ruling in both Transoxiana and Khorasan, and the second in Transoxiana only.

• MĀR ABĀ

  Manfred Hutter

  Zoroastrian convert to Christianity, catholicos for the Church of the East, 540-52 CE.

• MĀR MĀRI

  Florence Jullien

  the Christian apostle, considered as the first missionary in the Arsacid Empire.

• MARĀ BEBUS

  Morteza Hosayni Dehkordi and EIr.

  (Kiss me), the title of one of the most popular songs (taṣnif) of mid-twentieth century Iran.

• MARATHI LANGUAGE, PERSIAN ELEMENTS IN

  S. H. Qasemi and EIr

  the southernmost Indo-Aryan language, is spoken by more than 40 million speakers, including inhabitants of Bombay and the state of Maharashtra (Mahāraštrā) in west-central India.

• MARD-E ĀZĀD

  Nassereddin Parvin

  a daily newspaper published in Tehran  to support Reżā Khan (the future Reza Shah) in his bid for power, 1923.

• MARD-e EMRUZ

  Ḥasan Mirʿābedini

  a controversial and highly popular newspaper published weekly in Tehran, with frequent interruptions, from 19 August 1942 to 14 February 1947, by Mohammad Mas’ud.

• MARDONIUS

  Rüdiger Schmitt

  Name of several Persians in Achaemenid times, as OPers. M-r-d^u-u-n-i-y- /Mr̥duniya-/ (DB 4.84) is rendered in Greek (Mardónios) and Latin (Mardonius).

• MARICQ, André

  Philippe Gignoux

  gifted epigrapher who died prematurely at the age of 34 (1925-1960).

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MARITIME TRADE i. PRE-ISLAMIC PERIOD

  Daniel T. Potts

  In comparison with Mesopotamia, Persia has far less proof that maritime trade was an important factor in her ancient economy.

• MĀRLIK

  Kamyar Abdi

  an elite burial ground of the late 2nd-early 1st millennium BCE in the western Caspian basin. In total, fifty-three tombs were discovered. The grave goods, numbering over 25,000 individual items, constitute the largest collection discovered from any cemetery of the Early Iron Age anywhere in the Near East.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MARR, NIKOLAĭ YAKOVLEVICH

  I. Yakubovich

  Russian philologist and archeologist, the founder of the “New Linguistic Doctrine” (ca. 1864-1934).

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MARRIAGE i. THE MARRIAGE CONTRACT IN THE PRE-ISLAMIC PERIOD

  Ilya Yakubovich

  a formal, written agreement as part of the process of establishing a marriage bond between two families is documented in both eastern and western Iranian practice.

• MARRIAGE ii. NEXT OF KIN MARRIAGE IN ZOROASTRIANISM

  Prods Oktor Skjærvø

  xwēdōdah, said to refer to marital unions of father and daughter, mother and son, or brother and sister (next-of-kin or close-kin marriage, nuclear family incest).

• MARTYRS, BABI

  Peter Smith and Moojan Momen

  adherents of the Babi religion who were killed for their faith during the period up to about 1866, when the Bahai faith emerged.

• MARTYRS, CHRISTIAN

  Christelle Jullien

  in the Iranian lands, as related in the surviving corpus of Persian Christian Acts.

• MAʿRUFI, Jawād

  Morteżā Ḥoseyni Dehkordi and EIr

  Persian composer and pianist (1915-1993).

• MARYAM KHANOM

  Dominic Parviz Brookshaw

  thirty-ninth wife of Fatḥ-ʿAli Shah Qajar (r. 1797-1834), mother of Żiāʾ-al-Salṭana and Maḥmud Mirzā.

• MĀSĀL

  Marcel Bazin

  small town and sub-provincial district (šahrestān) in the western part of Gilān Province.  The town is located at lat 37°22′ N, long 49°02′ E.

• MASISTES

  Rüdiger Schmitt

  Greek rendering (Masístēs) of an Old Iranian name *Masišta- (reflected also in Bab. Ma-si-iš-tu₄) based on the superlative YAv. masišta-, OPers. maθišta- “greatest, supreme”.

• MASJED-E SANGI

  Dietrich Huff

  a rock-cut mosque near the ancient site of Dārābgerd.

• MAŠREQ AL-AḎKĀR

  Moojan Momen

  (the Dawning-Place of the Remembrance [of God]), a Bahai term having three meanings.  The first meaning is a gathering which is held, ideally at dawn, to say prayers and recite from scripture; the second meaning is a building to be constructed in every community in which this dawn gathering takes place; and the third meaning is a complex of edifices centered around the prayer building but including other auxiliary social and humanitarian institutions as well. 

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MASRUR, Hosayn

  Ḥasan Mirʿābedini

  (1890-1968), novelist, poet, and literary scholar.

• MASSON, Charles

  Elizabeth Errington

  alias of James Lewis (1800-53), traveler, pioneering archeologist and numismatist, who in 1832-38 produced the first comprehensive archeological records of eastern Afghanistan.

• MASʿUD (III) B. EBRĀHIM

  C. Edmund Bosworth

  recorded on his coins with various other honorifics. He seems to have had generally peaceful relations with his western neighbors, the Great Saljuqs.

• MAS’UD, MOHAMMAD

  Ḥasan Mirʿābedini

  novelist and editor of the controversial and highly popular newspaper Mard-e emruz.

• MASʿUD-E SAʿD-E SALMĀN

  Sunil Sharma

  (b. Lahore 1046-49?; d. 1121-22), Persian poet of the later Ghaznavid period. The first major Indo-Persian poet, Masʿud-e Saʿd-e Salmān is best known for the poetry he wrote in prison and in exile.

• MASʿUDI

  Michael Cooperson

  a tenth-century geographer and historian and an important source of information on pre-Islamic and early Islamic Iran.

• MĀSULA

  Marcel Bazin

  township and district (baḵš) in western Gilān.

• MATHESON, Sylvia Anne

  Yolande Crowe

  (1916-2006), writer, traveler and archeologist, especially remembered for her pioneering work, Persia: An Archaeological Guide, first published in 1972.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MAWDUD B. MASʿUD

  C. Edmund Bosworth

  sultan of the Ghaznavid dynasty, recorded on his coins with the honorifics Šehāb-al-Din wa’l-Dawla and Qoṭb-al-Mella.

• MAWLAWI, ʿAbd-al-Raḥim Maʿdumi

  Keith Hitchins

  (1806-1882/83), a leading Kurdish poet of the 19th century who wrote in the Gurāni dialect of southeastern Kurdistan. He benefited from the support of Sufi shaikhs, who were generous patrons of writers and scholars. Mawlawi also formed long-lasting relationships with leaders of the Jaf tribe, who were prominent in Kurdish public life.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MAYMANA

  cross-reference

  See FĀRYĀB.

• MECQUENEM, ROLAND DE

  Laurianne Martinez-Sève

  (1877-1957), French archeologist, director of the excavations of the Mission Archèologique de Susiane at Susa from 1913 to 1946.

• MEDḤAT PASHA

  Necati Alkan

  A liberal Ottoman statesman of the 19th century, who served both as provincial governor and grand vizier (b. Istanbul, 18 October 1822; d. Ṭāʾef, 8 May 1884).

• MEDIA

  M. Dandamayev and I. Medvedskaya

  ancient population region (from the end of the 2nd millennium BCE) and kingdom in northwestern Iran.

• MEDICINE i. INTRODUCTION OF WESTERN MEDICINE TO IRAN

  Shireen Mahdavi

  Western medicine was introduced to Iran by European physicians who began to arrive there from early nineteenth century onwards.

• MEGABATES

  Rüdiger Schmitt

  Greek rendering of the well-known name OIran. *Baga-pāta- “protected by the gods” (which is attested in El. Ba-qa-ba-(ad-/ud-)da, Bab. Ba-ga-pa-a-ta/tu₄, Ba-ga-(’)-pa-a-tú, etc., Aram. bgpt, Lyc. Magabata).

• MEHR-NARSEH

  Touraj Daryaee

  The grand vizier (Mid. Pers. wuzurg framādār) during the reigns of the Sasanian kings Yazdgerd I (r. 399-421 CE), Bahrām V (r. 421-39), Yazdgerd II (r. 439-57), and Pērōz (r. 459-84).

• MEIER, FRITZ

  Gudrun Schubert

  (1912-1998), Swiss Islamicist renowned for his influential and wide-ranging writings on Sufism.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MEILLET, (PAUL JULES) ANTOINE

  Rüdiger Schmitt

  French linguist and scholar of Iranian and Armenian studies (1866-1936).

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MELZER, UTO

  Nosratollah Rastegar

   (1881-1961), teacher, author, and independent scholar.

• MEM-Ê ALAN

  Philip G. Kreyenbroek

  (Kurdish romance), probably the best-known Kurdish tale, and the one most often regarded as representative of Kurdish verbal art generally. 

• MENHAJ-e SERAJ

  C. E. Bosworth

  author of a general history in Persian valuable as a first-hand source for the history of the Ghurids, the Šamsi Delhi Sultans, and the irruption of the Mongols into the eastern Islamic lands.

• MENOSTANES

  Rüdiger Schmitt

  Achaemenid prince, son of Artaxerxes I’s brother Artarios, who was satrap of Babylon; he was a “eunuch” at Artaxerxes’ court and during the troubles about the succession after Artaxerxes’ death in 424/23 BCE.

• MENTOR and MEMNON

  Ernst Badian

  Rhodian brothers, condottieri of the late Achaemenid period.

• MEʿRĀJ i. DEFINITION

  Mohammad Ali Amir-Moezzi

  Derived from the Arabic instrumental form mefʿāl, the term meʿrāj means “instrument of ascension,” either a “ladder” or a “stairway;” it can also designate the place one revolves or from where one climbs. However, in a technical sense and often accompanied by the article al-, it designates “heavenly or celestial ascent,” more specifically that which Muslim tradition attributes to the Prophet Mohammad, an ascension soon associated with the “nocturnal or night journey” (esrāʾ) of the latter.

• MEʿRĀJ ii. Illustrations

  Christiane J. Gruber

  From the turn of the 14th century onward, depictions of the Prophet Moḥammad’s night journey (esrāʾ) and heavenly ascent (meʿrāj) were integrated into illustrated world histories and biographies.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MESKAVAYH, ABU ʿALI AḤMAD

  C. Edmund Bosworth

  , ABU ʿALI AḤMAD b. Moḥammad [ebn], Persian chancery official and treasury clerk of the Buyid period, boon companion, litterateur and accomplished writer in Arabic.

• MESSINA, GIUSEPPE

  Carlo G. Cereti

  , SJ (1893-1951), Italian scholar of Middle and Modern Iranian studies.

• Meʿyār-e Jamāli wa meftāḥ-e Abu Esḥāqi

  Solomon Bayevsky

  (‘Jamāl’s touchstone and Abu Esḥāq’s key’), a dictionary of the Persian language (comp. ca. 745/1344).

• MEYBOD

  Ali Modarres

  name of a sub-province (šahrestān) and town in Yazd Province (32°14′45″ N, 54°2′10″ E; elev. 3,637 ft.) on the road to Tehran, at a short distance south of Ardakān (see ARDAKĀN-e YAZD) and about 48 km northwest of the city of Yazd.

• MEYBODI, ABU'L-FAŻL RAŠID-AL-DIN

  Annabel Keeler

  (fl. early 12th cent.), Sunni scholar, mystic and author of a monumental Persian Sufi commentary on the Qurʾān.

• MEYMA i. The District

  Habib Borjian

  The district rests on a high plain on the western foothills of the Kargas range, which separates Meyma from Naṭanz on the east.

• MEYMA ii. The Dialect

  Habib Borjian

  district is at the heart of the area where the Central dialects are spoken.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MICHAEL THE SYRIAN

  Florence Jullien

  Jacobite patriarch of Antioch (1166-99), who wrote a universal chronicle in Syriac, covering events from the Creation until 1195.

• MICROCOSM and MACROCOSM

  Philippe Gignoux

  in pre-Islamic Iranian thought: the theory of the correspondence between the different parts of the human being and those of the cosmos.

• MIDDLE PERSIAN LITERATURE i. PAHLAVI LITERATURE

  Carlo G. Cereti

  the writings of the Zoroastrians in the Middle Persian language and Book Pahlavi script, which were compiled in the 9th and the 10th centuries CE.

• MĪKĀL DYNASTY

  Cross-Reference

  See ĀL-E MĪKĀL.

• MILĀN

  Pierre Oberling

  a Kurdish tribe in western Persian Azerbaijan.

• MILLET

  Cross-Reference

  See ARZAN.

• MINARET

  W. Kleiss

  (manāra), a tower, usually attached to a mosque, from which the muezzin (moʾaḏḏen) summons Muslims to prayer. In Arabic, manāra originally denotes a lighthouse or signaling tower at sea. The minaret was not part of the architecture of the early Islamic period. It appeared first in the 8th and 9th centuries.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MINBĀŠIĀN, Ḡolām-Ḥosayn

  Morteżā Ḥoseyni Dehkordi and EIr

  violinist, pianist, and conductor (1907-1978).

• MINING IN IRAN

  Multiple Authors

  i. Mines and Mineral Resources, ii. Mineral Industries

• MINING IN IRAN i. MINES AND MINERAL RESOURCES

  Mansur Qorbani and Anoshirvan Kani

  The ancient and pre-modern period is evidenced by abandoned mines,  which can be grouped into three categories based on the materials extracted: (1) mines of metallic ores: iron, copper, gold, lead, zinc, and silver; (2) non-metallic mines and quarries of china clay (used in ceramic and tile making), gel-e saršuy (a variety of bentonite used as soap), and bentonite and serpentine (used in clayware); (3) mines of precious and semi-precious stones.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MINING IN IRAN ii. MINERAL INDUSTRIES

  Willem Floor

  Commercial exploitation of the known resources, which are mainly located in inaccessible locations, was discouraged by the lack of cost-effective infrastructure.

• MINORSKY, Vladimir Fed’orovich

  C. E. Bosworth

  (1877-1966), outstanding Russian scholar of Persian history, historical geography, literature and culture.

• MIR FENDERESKI

  Sajjad H. Rizvi

  , Sayyed Amir Abu’l-Qāsem b. Mirzā Beg b. Ṣadr-al-Din Moḥammad Ḥosayni Astarābādi, renowned philosopher and mystic during the Safavid revitalization of philosophy (b. 1562-63,  d. 1640).

• MIRʿALĀʾI, Aḥmad

  Jalil Doostkhah

  (1942-1995), editor of three literary magazines and translator of works of Western literature.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MIRATH-E MAKTUB

  Ali Mir-Ansari

  a research center in Tehran, focused on editing manuscripts (including those concerned with the history of science), cataloguing Persian and Arabic manuscripts in Iran and the wider Persianate cultural area, and studying related codicological issues.

• MIRDREKVANDI, ʿALI

  Philip G. Kreyenbroek

  nicknamed “Gunga Din,” author of “Irradiant,” a popular epic written in broken English in the mid-20th century.

• MIRZA MOḤAMMAD ĀḠĀ JĀN

  Cross-Reference

  Author of Avīmāq-e Moḡol (publ. 1900), see ʿABD-AL-QĀDER KHAN.

• MITHRA

  Multiple Authors

  i. Mitra in Old Indian and Mithra in Old Iranian   ii. Iconography in Iran and Central Asia   iii. in Manicheism

• MITHRA i. MITRA IN OLD INDIAN AND MITHRA IN OLD IRANIAN

  Hanns-Peter Schmidt

  Indo-Iranian god, with name based on the common noun mitrá “contract” with the connotations of “covenant, agreement, treaty, alliance, promise.”

• MITHRA ii. ICONOGRAPHY IN IRAN AND CENTRAL ASIA

  Franz Grenet

  There is no known iconography of Mithra in the Achaemenid period. On coins of the Arsacids the seated archer dressed as a Parthian horseman has been interpreted as Mithra. In the Kushan empire Mithra is among the deities most frequently depicted on the coinage, always as a young solar god.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MITHRA iii. IN MANICHEISM

  Werner Sundermann

  The Iranian Manicheans adopted the name of the Zoroastrian god Mithra (Av. Miθra; Mid. Pers.Mihr)and used it to designate one of their own deities.

• MITHRADATES VI

  Brian McGing

  Eupator Dionysos (r. 120-63 BCE), last king of Pontus, the Hellenistic kingdom that emerged in northern Asia Minor in the early years of the 3rd century BCE.

• MITHRAISM

  Roger Beck

  the cult of Mithra as it developed in the West, its origins, its features, and its probable connection with Mithra worship in Iran.

• MOʾAYYAD FI’L-DIN ŠIRĀZI

  Verena Klemm

  (ca. 1000-87), outstanding and multitalented representative of the Fatimid religious and political mission (daʿwa) in the service of the Caliph/Imam Mostanṣer bi’llāh (r. 1036-94).

• MOʾTAMEN, Zeyn-al-ʿĀbedin

  Ali Gheissari

  A teacher, writer, and scholar of Persian literature.

• MODARRESI, Taqi

  Nasrin Rahimieh

  (1931-1997), Persian novelist and psychiatrist.

• MOʿEZZ-AL-DAWLA

  Claude Cahen

  , ABU’L-ḤOSAYN, Aḥmad ebn Abi Šojāʿ (d. 356/967), 4th/10th century Buyid prince, the youngest of the three brothers who conquered western, southern, and central Persia.

• MOʿEZZI Nišāburi

  Hormoz Davarpanah

  Šāburi, Abu ʿAbd-Allāh Moḥammad b. ʿAbd-al-Malek (b. ca. 1048-49, d. ca. 1125-27), a major poet at the court of the Saljuqs in Khorasan in the 12th century.

• MOFAŻŻAL al-JOʿFI

  Mushegh Asatryan

  a prominent member of the Kufan ḡolāt and companion of the sixth and seventh Shiʿite imams Jaʿfar al-Ṣādeq and Musa al-Kāẓem.

• MOḠĀN

  Richard Tapper

  (or Dašt-e Moḡān, also Muqān), a lowland steppe in Azerbaijan.

• MOHALLABI, Abu Moḥammad

  Maurice Pomerantz

  vizier and literary patron.

• MOḤAMMAD b. ʿABD-ALLAH

  C. Edmund Bosworth

  , Abu’l -ʿAbbās (b. 824-25, d. 867), high official in Iraq and the central lands of the caliphate.

• MOḤAMMAD B. NOṢAYR

  Yaron Friedman

  Abu Šoʿayb al-Nomayri/al-Namiri (d. after 868), the founder and eponym of the Nomayriya/Namiriya sect.

• MOḤAMMAD NĀDER SHAH

  May Schinasi

  (1883-1933), king of Afghanistan, first representative of the new Dorrāni dynasty.

• MOḤAMMAD SHAH QĀJĀR

  Jean Calmard

  (1808-1848), the third ruler of the Qajar dynasty after his grandfather Fatḥ-ʿAli Shah.

• MOḤAMMAD-AYYUB KHAN

  R. D. McChesney

  born Amir Šēr-ʿAli Khan, a prominent Afghan political figure of the Moḥammadzi clan (1857-1914).

• MOḤSENI, Akbar

  Morteżā Ḥoseyni Dehkordi

  (1912-1995) composer and prominent performer of the Ud (lute).

• MOḤTĀJ DYNASTY

  Cross-Reference

  See ĀL-E MOḤTĀJ.

• MOḤTAŠAM KĀŠĀNI

  Paul Losensky

  , Šams-al-šoʿarā Kamāl-al-Din, Persian poet of the Safavid period (b. Kashan, 1528-29, d. Kashan, 1588).

• MOʿJEZ ŠABESTARI

  Hasan Javadi

  (1874-1934), a satirical poet in Azerbaijani, fairly unknown during his lifetime. A social problem is addressed in every one of his poems.

• MOJMAL al-TAWĀRIḴ wa’l-QEṢAṢ

  Siegfried Weber and Dagmar Riedel

  an anonymous chronicle from the 12th century in the Persian tradition of literary historiography.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MOKRI TRIBE

  Pierre Oberling

  a Kurdish tribe of western Iranian Azerbaijan.

• MOḴTĀR-NĀMA

  Daniela Meneghini

  a wide-ranging collection of quatrains (2,088 in number) attributed to the mystic poet Farid-al-Din ʿAṭṭār (d. ca. 1221).

• MOLLA NASREDDIN i. THE PERSON

  Hasan Javadi

  character who appears in thousands of stories, always witty, sometimes wise, even philosophic, sometimes the instigator of practical jokes on others and often a fool or the butt of a joke.

• MOLLA NASREDDIN ii. POLITICAL AND SOCIAL WEEKLY

  Hasan Javadi

  a political and social weekly in Azeri Turkish (1906-31, with interruptions), with tremendous impact on the course of journalism and development of ideas.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MOLLĀ ṢADRĀ ŠIRĀZI

  Sajjad H. Rizvi

  , Ṣadr-al-Din Moḥammad b. Ebrāhim b. Yaḥyā Qawāmi Širāzi (b. 1571-72, d. 1635-36?), arguably the most significant Islamic philosopher after Avicenna.

• MOMAYYEZ, Morteżā

  EIr

  (1936-2005), illustrator, painter, teacher and writer who played a pivotal role in the development of graphic design in contemporary Iran.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MONʿEMĪ

  Cross-Reference

  18th-century historian of Kashmir. See ABU’L-QĀSEM MOḤAMMAD ASLAM.

• MONGOLS

  Peter Jackson

  an Altaic people who conquered an empire that embraced China, Central Asia, the south Russian steppe, Iran, Afghanistan and Iraq.

• MONGOLS ii. Mongolian Loanwords in Persian

  Michael Knüppel

  early Turkic and Mongolian have many common features that were occasionally interpreted as indications to a genetic relationship between the two language families.

• MONKEY

  Cross-Reference

  See BŪZĪNA.

• MOOREY, Peter Roger Stuart

  John Curtis

  (1937-2004), British archeologist and curator at the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MOQANNAʿ

  Patricia Crone

  (lit. “the veiled one,” d. 163/780 or later), leader of a rebellious movement in Sogdiana.

• MORḠ-E SAḤAR

  Morteza Hosayni Dehkordi and Parvin Loloi

  (Dawn bird), a taṣnif (song) in māhur mode,  probably written for its music around 1921, when the first signs of dictatorship were appearing.

• MORGENSTIERNE, Georg Valentin von Munthe af

  Fridrick Thordarson

  Norwegian linguist and orientalist, specializing in Indo-Iranian languages, particularly those spoken in Afghanistan, the Pamirs, and the northwest of the Indian subcontinent (1892-1978).

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MOSAFERIDS

  C. Edmund Bosworth

  a dynasty of Deylamite origin.  Its original center of power was at Šamirān in the district of Ṭārom on the middle course of the Safidrud river in the region of Deylam, but it subsequently extended its authority over a large part of northwestern Iran.

• MOSHFEQ-e KAZEMI, SAYYED MORTAZA

  Ḥasan Mirʿābedini

  (1904-1978), author of Iran’s first social novel.

• MOSHIRI, FEREYDUN

  Saeid Rezvani

  poet (1926-2000). The majority of his most celebrated poems are composed in Nimaic meters; they are usually romantic in imagery and tone, and contain beautiful and easily accessible images.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MOSTA’AN, Hosayn-Qoli

  Ḥasan Mirʿābedini

  (1904-1983), noted serial writer, journalist, and translator.

• MOTʿA

  Shahla Haeri

  in Islamic law, the word (lit. “pleasure”) used as a technical term for a marriage contracted for a definite period of time.

• MOVSĒS XORENAC‘I

  Nina Garsoïan

  from the later Middle Ages, and down to the present, honored as the “Father of Armenian History” (Patmahayr). According to his own words, he was a pupil of St. Maštoc‘, the inventor of the Armenian alphabet, writing in the 5th century CE. 

• MO’AYYERI, Mohammad Hasan

  Kāmyār ʿĀbedi

  (1909-1968), prominent poet and lyricist, better known as Rahi.

• MUELLER, Friedrich W. K.

  Desmond Durkin-Meisterernst

  (1863-1930), scholar of oriental cultures and languages, a major contribution to the establishment of the philological and historical study of texts in Middle Iranian and Old Turkish.

• MUGH, MOUNT

  Gregory Semenov

  site of the 7th-8th-century refuge of the rulers of Penjikent in Sogdiana, where an important archive of documents written in Sogdian was discovered in the 1930s.

• MUHAMMADIEV, Fazliddin

  Keith Hitchins

  Tajik writer (1928-1986). Numerous works of his were translated into Russian and other languages of the Soviet Union and of Eastern Europe.

• MUNICH, PERSIAN ART IN

  Avinoam Shalem

  The collecting of Persian art in Munich goes back at least to the reign of Duke Albrecht V (r. 1516-75). Artifacts of oriental origin were mainly registered as exotica. For example, between 1545 and 1550, Hans Mielich (1516-73), the court painter of Albrecht V, provided the duke with an illustrated inventory of the varied treasures in the court, among which is depicted an Ottoman vessel decorated with precious stones.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MUSĀ YABḠU

  Osman G. Özgüdenli

  the eponymous strongman of a Ḡozz clan, whose nephew Toḡrel founded the Saljuq dynasty.

• MUSHFIQI, ABDURAHMON

  Keith Hitchins

  (Mošfeqi, ʿAbd-al-Raḥmān), Tajik poet (1525-1588).

• MUSIC HISTORY i. Pre-Islamic Iran

  Bo Lawergren

  The documentation is largely archeological with a sprinkling of textual sources, and some evidence is here assembled to outline Iran’s pre-Islamic music history.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• MUSIC HISTORY ii. CA. 650 TO 1370 CE

  Eckhard Neubauer

  When in 31/651 Yazdgerd III, the last Sasanian king, left Iran, fleeing from the Arab troops, he took with him “1,000 cooks and 1,000 musicians.”