Table of Contents

• MOḤAMMAD AL-JAWĀD, ABU JAʿFAR

  Louis Medoff

  (811-835), ninth imam of the Twelver Shiʿites, the only child of Imam ʿAli al-Reżā, was only seven years of age at the time of his father's death; The prospect of a non-adult imam brought about widespread confusion in the community.

• MOḤAMMAD b. ʿABD-ALLAH

  C. Edmund Bosworth

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

• MOḤAMMAD B. BOZORG-OMID

  Farhad Daftary

  the third lord of Alamut. He had been designated as heir by his father, Kiā Bozorg-Omid, only three days earlier.  Moḥammad duly received the allegiance of all the Nezāri territories in Persia and Syria.

• 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).

• MOḤAMMAD-TAQI WAKIL-AL-DAWLA ŠIRĀZI

  Soli Shahvar

  (1830-1911), prominent Iranian Bahai merchant from Shiraz.

• MOHASSESS, ARDESHIR

  Nicky Nodjoumi

  The youngest of four children, Ardeshir was born to ʿAbbās-Qoli and Sorur Mahkāma Moḥaṣṣeṣṣ. His father was a judge and died when Ardeshir was an infant.  His mother, an educator and the principal of the first school for girls in Rasht, was a poet and literary figure and a close acquaintance of Parvin Eʿteṣāmi.

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• 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

  (1528/29-1588), Šams-al-Šoʿarā Kamāl-al-Din, Persian poet of the Safavid period who was born and died in Kashan.

• MOʿIN-AL-DIN NAṬANZI

  D. Aigle

  early 15th-century historian, author of the Montaḵab al-tavāriḵ, a general chronicle on dynastic history of Iran in the pre-Islamic and Islamic periods, dedicated to the Timurid ruler Šāhroḵ (1405-47).

• MOʿIN-E MOṢAVVER

  Robert Eng

  (b. ca.1610-15; d. ca 1693), Safavid manuscript and album painter, arguably the most prominent artist of the second half of the 17th century.

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• 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.

• MOJIR-AL-DIN BAYLAQĀNI

  Anna Livia Beelaert

  Persian poet of the 12th century, born in Baylaqān in Arrān (now part of the Republic of Azerbaijan); and a contemporary of Khāqāni Šervāni, Aṯir-al-Din Aḵsikati, and Jamāl-al-Din Eṣfahāni.

• 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. The work concentrates on the Persian rulers before the advent of Islam, the Muslim conquests, and events related to Hamadān, indicating that the work probably originated there.

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• MOJTAHED

  Cross-Reference

  “jurist” in Arabic. For the religious-legal sciences in Shiism, see EJTEHĀD.

• MOḴAMMESA

  Mushegh Asatryan

  an early extremist Shiʿite (ḡolāt) sect who divinized five members (ahl al-kesāʾ/Āl-e ʿabā “the family of the cloak”) of the Prophet Moḥammad’s family.

• 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).

• MOLÉ, MARIJAN 

  Philippe Gignoux

  (1924-63), distinguished scholar of ancient Iran and Persian Sufism.

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• 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.

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• MOLLĀ ṢADRĀ ŠIRĀZI

  Sajjad H. Rizvi

  (1571/72-1635/36?), Ṣadr-al-Din Moḥammad, 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.

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• MONĀJĀT

  Multiple Authors

  a prayer genre which is often associated with the mystical verses of the Persian poet ʿAbdallāh Anṣāri (d. 1089) compiled in his famous Monājāt-nāma.

• MONĀJĀT i. In Zoroastrianism

  Beate Schmermbeck

  The Arabic word monājāt is often translated as “intimate conversation” referring to a Qurʾanic verse (19:52) in which the verb nājā describes Moses talking confidentially with God at the Sinai.

• MONCHI-ZADEH, DAVOUD

  Siamak Adhami

  (Dāvud Monšizāda; b. Tehran, 28 August 1914; d. Uppsala, 13 July 1989), Iranian linguist and political activist.

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• 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.

• MONJIK TERMEḎI

  Ehsan Shavarebi

  a Persian-language poet of the late 10th century.

• MONKEY

  Cross-Reference

  See BŪZĪNA.

• MONẒEM, Mirzā ʿAbd-al-Wāḥed

  Keith Hitchins

  (1875 or 1877-1934), a Tajik poet, social activist, and journalist. Raised and influenced by Ṣadr-e Żiāʾ, he eventually embarked upon a career as a poet and commentator on public issues as an ardent proponent of education and general enlightenment, and a resolute opponent of the emir of Bokhara’s regime.

• MOOREY, Peter Roger Stuart

  John Curtis

  Moorey sat on various administrative bodies and received many distinctions. He was elected a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries in 1967. Reflecting his involvement with Iranian studies and related fields, he was a member of the Governing Council of the British Institute of Persian Studies. 

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• 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.

• MORḠĀB

  Habib Borjian

  district covering the Pamir Plateau in eastern Tajikistan, of which it is the administrative center. 

• 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).

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• MOSADDEQ, HAMID

  Saeed Rezaei

  (1940-1998), Persian poet, lawyer, and university professor.

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• 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.

• MOSAHEB, GHOLAM-HOSAYN

  Hormoz Homayounpour

  (1910-1979), mathematician, logician, university professor, the founder and general editor of the Dāyerat al-maʿāref-e fārsi, and one of the few scholars honored both before and after the Islamic Revolution of 1978-79 for their achievements.

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• MOSES OF CHORENE

  Cross-Reference

  (5th century), priest and bishop, to whom is attributed the work, History of Armenia (Patmut‘iwn Hayoc‘); see MOVSĒS XORENAC‘I.

• MOSHFEQ-e KAZEMI, SAYYED MORTAZA

  Ḥasan Mirʿābedini

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

• MOSHIRI, FEREYDUN

  Saeid Rezvani

  In 1945 Moshiri began to work for the Ministry of Post and Telegraph. He continued to pursue his education while employed. He received his diploma in 1965 and enrolled at the then Faculty of Literature of Tehran University, but never completed the course of study, switching to journalism instead.

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• 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.

• MOʾTAMEN, Zeyn-al-ʿĀbedin

  Ali Gheissari

  A teacher, writer, and scholar of Persian literature.

• 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.