Table of Contents

  • MAYRHOFER, MANFRED

    RÜDIGER SCHMITT

    Austrian scholar of comparative Indo-European linguistics and Indo-Iranian studies.

  • MAZAEUS

    Ernst Badian

    member of the highest Achaemenid aristocracy, who had a long career under Artaxerxes III, Darius III, and Alexander of Macedon. At Gaugamela, Mazaeus commanded the right wing of the Persian line with “the best of the cavalry.”

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  • MAZĀR-E ŠARIF

    Xavier de Planhol

    the largest city of northern Afghanistan and site of an important religious shrine.

  • MAZDAK, MAZDAKISM

    Cross-Reference

    See  IRAN ix. RELIGIONS IN IRAN (1) Pre-Islamic (1.1) Overview, COSMOGONY AND COSMOLOGY iv. In the Mazdakite religion, ḴORRAMIS, BĀBAK ḴORRAMĪ, SASANIAN DYNASTY, CLASS SYSTEM iii. In the Parthian and Sasanian Periods, IRAN ii. IRANIAN HISTORY (1) Pre-Islamic Times,  ZOROASTRIANISM i. Historical Review Up To The Arab Conquest.

  • MAẒHAR-E ELĀHI

    Moojan Momen

    (Manifestation of God), a key Bahai term designating the prophets/founders of the world’s religions as the manifestations of the names and attributes of God.

  • 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).

  • MEHRAGĀN

    Simone Cristoforetti

    an Iranian festival apparently dedicated to the god Miθra/Mehr, occurring also in onomastics and toponymy.

  • MEHRAJĀN

    Habib Borjian

    oasis and the seat of Naḵlestān district in Ḵur-Biābānak sub-province, Isfahan province.

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  • MEIER, FRITZ

    Gudrun Schubert

    In 1937, Meier went for the first time to Iran, where he visited Tehran, Isfahan and Shiraz. In 1938, he was awarded a prize at the University of Basel for his research on the Persian mystic Najm-al-Din Kobrā, and in the same year returned to Istanbul to continue his study of manuscripts of Islamic mystical texts.

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  • MEILLET, (PAUL JULES) ANTOINE

    Rüdiger Schmitt

    Meillet called himself a comparatist, and probably he would have called himself a born comparatist. At the same time, he was an acknowledged philologist with a good grounding not only in Greek and Latin, but also in less common languages such as Armenian and Old Church Slavic.

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  • 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. 

  • MENASCE, JEAN PIERRE DE

    Philippe Gignoux

    (1902-1973), an eminent Iranist and historian of religions. His masterpiece was the explication of the Dēnkard, book III, a text of philosophical and theological content. 

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  • MENHĀJ-e SERĀJ

    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.