Table of Contents

• BAAT

  N. Sims-Williams, J. Russell

  an Iranian middle personal name; Baat is the name of a disciple of Mani mentioned in the Coptic “crucifixion narrative”. The word is borrowed in Armenian in the form “Bat” which translates to the name of the “nahapet” (family head).

• BĀB (1)

  D. M. MacEoin

  “door, gate, entrance,” a term of varied application in Shiʿism and related movements.

• BĀB (2)

  H. Algar

  Title given to certain Sufi shaikhs of Central Asia.

• BĀB AL-ABWĀB

  cross-reference

  Ancient city in Dāḡestān on the western shore of the Caspian Sea, located at the entrance to the narrow pass between the Caucasus foothills and the sea. See DARBAND (1).

• BĀB AL-BĀB

  cross-reference

  Shaikhi ʿālem who became the first convert to Babism, provincial Babi leader in Khorasan, and organizer of Babi resistance in Māzandarān (1814-49). See BOŠRŪʾĪ.

• BĀB, ʿAli Moḥammad Širāzi

  D. M. MacEoin

  (1819-1850), the founder of Babism, from a mercantile family with activities in Shiraz and Būšehr.

• BĀB-E FARḠĀNĪ

  cross-reference

  title given to certain Sufi shaikhs of Central Asia. See BĀB (2).

• BĀB-E HOMĀYŪN

  A. Sh. Shahbazi

  name of a gate and its connecting street in the Qajar citadel of Tehran. Once known as “Sardar Almasiya”, the gate was renamed to Bab-E Homayun and rebuilt as a two-storied structure.

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• BĀB-E MĀČĪN

  cross-reference

  title given to certain Sufi shaikhs of Central Asia. See BĀB (2).

• BĀBĀ AFŻAL-AL-DĪN

  William Chittick

  (d. ca. 1213-14) poet and author of philosophical works in Persian. His works suggest a disdain for officials, and his tomb in Maraq is still a place of pilgrimage.

• BĀBĀ BEG

  cross-reference

  See JŪYĀ.

• BĀBĀ FAḠĀNI

  Z. Safa

  Persian poet of the 15th and 16th centuries, who wrote under his last name and also the pen-name Sakkaki.

• BĀBĀ FARĪD

  Cross-Reference

  a major Shaikh of the Češtīya mystic order, born in the last quarter of the 12th century in Kahtwāl near Moltān, Punjab. See GANJ-E ŠAKAR, Farid-al-Din Masʿud.

• BĀBĀ ḤĀTEM

  A. S. Melikian-Chirvani

  11th-century mausoleum in northern Afghanistan, some 40 miles west of Balḵ. It follows the simple plan of the earliest Islamic mausoleums in the Iranian world—a single square room with a cupola resting on squinches.

• BĀBĀ JĀN ḴORĀSĀNI

  Priscilla Soucek

  16th-century calligrapher, poet, and craftsman, also known as Ḥāfeẓ Bābā Jān Torbatī.

• BĀBĀ JĀN TEPE

  R. C. Henrickson

  an archeological site in northeastern Luristan, on the southern edge of the Delfān plain, near Nūrābād, important primarily for excavations conducted by C. Goff from 1966 to 1969.

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• BĀBĀ KUHI

  M. Kasheff

  popular name of Shaikh Abū ʿAbdallāh Moḥammad b. ʿAbdallāh b. ʿObaydallāh Bākūya Šīrāzī, Sufi of the 10th-11th centuries.

• BĀBĀ ŠAMAL

  L. P. Elwell-Sutton

  a weekly satirical periodical, 1943-45, founded by Reżā Ganjaʾī. It was impartially opposed to all foreign intervention and influence in Iran. It had a wide circulation and dealt with the political issues of the day.

• BĀBĀ SAMMĀSĪ

  H. Algar

  (d. 1354), Central Asian Sufi of the line known as selsela-ye ḵᵛājagān (line of the masters) which was inaugurated by Ḵᵛāja Abu Yaʿqūb Hamadānī.

• BĀBĀ SANKŪ

  H. Algar

  ecstatic Central Asian dervish of disorderly habits, contemporary with Timur (d. 1405) and one of several Sufis with whom Timur chose to associate for reasons of state.

• BĀBĀ SHAH ESFAHĀNI

  Pricilla Soucek

  calligrapher and poet who lived in Isfahan and Baghdad where he died in 1587-1588. He was a famous nastaʿlīq script writer.

• BĀBĀ ṬĀHER ʿORYĀN

  L. P. Elwell-Sutton

  medieval dervish poet from the area of Hamadān, best known for his do-baytīs, quatrains composed  in a simpler meter still widely used for popular verse.

• BĀBĀ-YE DEHQĀN

  Anna Krasnowolska

  a mythological and ritual character whose cult has been reported in agrarian communities of mountainous and lowland Tajikistan, northern Afghanistan, and adjacent countries.

• BĀBĀʾĪ BEN FARHĀD

  Amnon Netzer

  18th-century author of a versified history of the Jews of Kāšān with brief references to the Jews of Isfahan and one or two other towns.

• BĀBĀʾĪ BEN LOṬF

  Amnon Netzer

  Jewish poet and historian of Kāšān during the first half of the 17th century (d. after 1662).

• BĀBĀʾĪ BEN NŪRĪʾEL

  Amnon Netzer

  rabbi (ḥāḵām) from Isfahan;  at the behest of Nāder Shah Afšār (r. 1736-47), he translated the Pentateuch and the Psalms of David from Hebrew into Persian.

• BABĀJĀʾĪ

  Cross-Reference

  See KURDISTAN TRIBES.

• BĀBAK (1)

  R. N. Frye

  (Mid. Pers. Pāpak, Pābag), a ruler of Fārs at the beginning of the third century, father of Ardašīr, the founder of the Sasanian dynasty.  

• BĀBAK

  Touraj Daryaee

  reformer of the Sasanian military and in charge of the department of the warriors (Diwān al-moqātela) during the reign of Ḵosrow I Anušervān in the 6th century CE. 

• BĀBAK ḴORRAMI

  Ḡ. -Ḥ. Yūsofī

  leader of the Ḵorramdīnī or Ḵorramī uprising in Azerbaijan in the early 9th century (d. 838), which engaged the forces of the caliph for 20 years before it was crushed in 837.

• BĀBAKĪYA

  Cross-Reference

  See ḴORRAMĪS.

• BABAN

  C. E. Bosworth

  (or Bavan), a small town in the medieval Islamic province of Bāḏḡīs, to the north and west of Herat.

• BĀBĀN

  W. Behn

  (or Baban), Kurdish princely family in Solaymānīya, ruling an area in Iraqi Kurdistan and western Iran (17th—19th centuries) and actively involved in the Perso-Ottoman struggles.

• BĀBĀN DYNASTY

  Cross-Reference

  See ĀL-E BĀBĀN.

• BĀBAY

  A. Vööbus

  catholicos of the Persian Church elected at the synod at Seleucia in 497 (d. 502).

• BĀBAY OF NISIBIS

  N. Sims-Williams

  Christian Syriac writer who flourished about the beginning of the seventh century CE; a homily of his is attested in Sogdian.

• BĀBAY THE GREAT

  A. Vööbus

  (d. 628), abbot and prominent leader in the Nestorian church in Iran under Ḵosrow II.

• BĀBEL

  Cross-Reference

  See BABYLON.

   

• BABILLA, ASHUR BANIPAL IBRAHIM

  Khosro Shayesteh

  In acting also, just as did Artaud, Bani placed heavy emphasis on invoking deeply rooted feelings of the actors and argued that “while actors are wearing masks in their daily lives, in theater, these masks are torn off and we are facing the inner self of the actor.”

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• BĀBIRUŠ

  Cross-Reference

  See BABYLON.

• BABISM

  D. M. MacEoin

  a 19th-century messianic movement in Iran and Iraq under the overall charismatic leadership of Sayyed ʿAlī-Moḥammad Šīrāzī, the Bāb (1819-1850). Babism was the only significant millenarian movement in Shiʿite Islam during the 19th century.

• BABISM iii. Babism in Neyriz

  Hussein Ahdieh

  In 1850, Sayyed Yaḥyā Dārābi, a Babi named as Waḥid arrived in Neyriz, a town in Fars south of Iran. There was a violent confrontation between those who had converted to Babism and the governor of Neyriz. There were more periods of friendly relations with Bahais and Muslims as well as mayhem to come.

• BĀBŌĒ

  A. Vööbus

  catholicos (d. 481 or 484), orthodox leader of the Christian church in Iran under Pērōz, one of Barṣaumā’s chief opponents. 

• BĀBOL

  Multiple Authors

  town in Māzandarān, formerly Bārforūš.

• BĀBOL ii. Islamic Monuments

  S. Blair

  Once the largest town in Māzandarān, Bābol was the site of numerous monuments, including mosques, quarters, madrasas, takias, shrines and so on; Yet today only two small ninth/fifteenth-century emāmzādas are classified as historical monuments.

• BĀBOL iii. Population, 1956-2011

  Mohammad Hossein Nejatian

  This article deals with the following population characteristics of Bābol city: population growth from 1956 to 2011, age structure, average household size, literacy rate, and economic activity status.

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• BĀBOL i. The Town

  X. de Planhol

  a small, local market-place, as indicated by its original name, Bārforūš; The settlement developed in early Safavid times on the site of the old town of Māmṭīr, and was favored by Shah ʿAbbās who built a garden there, Bāḡ-e Šāh or Bāḡ-e Eram.

• BĀBOLSAR

  X. de Planhol

  town on the Caspian coast in the province of Māzandarān.

• BĀBOR, ABUʾL-QĀSEM MĪRZĀ

  M. E. Subtelny

  Timurid prince (1422-1457), the youngest son of Bāysonqor and a great-grandson of the conqueror Tīmūr.

• BĀBOR, ẒAHĪR-AL-DĪN MOḤAMMAD

  F. Lehmann

  (1483-1530), Timurid prince, military genius, and literary craftsman, founder of the Mughal Empire in India.