ĀL-E BŪ KORD, a tribe of Ḵūzestān, of uncertain origin. It formerly belonged to the Baḵtīārī tribal confederacy, but some 180 years ago it moved from the Rāmhormoz and Jarrāḥī districts to the Ahvāz district. In time, the Āl-e Bū Kord settled down in the villages of Ḵerša, Kūt ʿAbdallāh, Kūt Sayyed Ṣāleḥ, Kūt-al-ʿamīra, Abū Dobīs and Moẓaffarī on the left bank of the Kārūn river and at Kerīšān on the opposite side. When they migrated to the Ahvāz district, they totaled some 400 or 500 individuals. By the early 1900s, their number had increased to 1,500 or 2,000 individuals. In their new quarters, the Āl-e Bū Kord became dependents of the Bāwīya tribe (J. G. Lorimer, Gazetteer of the Persian Gulf, ʿOman and Central Arabia, Calcutta, 1908, II, pp. 1042-43). A. T. Wilson, in his list of the tribes of Ḵūzestān, includes the Āl-e Bū Kord among the sections of the Bāwīyas. According to him they numbered some 300 families shortly after World War I (“Tribes of Khuzistan,” in H. Field, Contributions to the Anthropology of Iran, Chicago, 1939, p. 190). Lorimer tells us that in the Ahvāz district the Āl-e Bū Kord at first had resembled Iranians in their habits, but they gradually became arabicized and adopted Arab dress (Gazetteer, p. 1043).
Bibliography: Given in the text.
(P. Oberling)
Originally Published: December 15, 1984
Last Updated: July 29, 2011
This article is available in print.
Vol. I, Fasc. 7, p. 754
P. Oberling, “ĀL-E BŪ KORD,” Encyclopædia Iranica, I/7, p. 754; an updated version is available online at http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/al-e-bu-kord-a-tribe-of-kuzestan-of-uncertain-origin (accessed on 14 May 2014).
