Explore Iranica

BATRAKATAŠ, place name which appears on the Elamite fortification tablets found at Persepolis, apparently the same as Pasargadae. The name is found in various spellings: h.bat-ra-qa-taš (PF 44, 62, 774, 908, 1134, 1942; Fort. 1016, 6575, 7090), h.ba-iš-ra-qa-da (PF 43), h.ba-iš-sir-qa-da (PF 42), h.bat-ra-qa-da (PF 63). These variants point to…

BATS (Pers. šabpara, mūš(-e)kūr; Ar. ḵoffāš). Surveys of the Iranian bat (Mammalia: Chiroptera) fauna have been published by Blanford (1876), Misonne (1959), Lay (1967), Eʿtemād (1969), and DeBlase (1980). DeBlase (1980) recognized thirty-eight species of Chiroptera from within the political boundaries of Iran, and this study is the primary basis…

BAṬṬAI YAZDĀNĪ, the founder or reformer of the Kantheans, a sect related to the Mandeans. According to the account of the Nestorian heresiographer Theodore Bar Konai, Baṭṭai was originally a slave of a chief of the Kanthean sect, Papa, son of Klilaye, from Gaukai in Babylonia. He ran away and…

Battle between Rostam and Sohrāb, The title Battle between Rostam and Sohrāb, The genre/topic Šāh-nāma ḵwāni language   performer Sayyed Ḥasan Naqib Zādeh, age 43 in 1995 instrument   composer   author/poet Ferdowsi first line of poem konun razm-e Sohrāb bā Rostam šenaw recorded by Stephen Blum place of recording Sabzevār,…

BATTLE-AXES in Eastern Iran. Battle-axes made of bronze appeared in Eastern Iran during the Bronze Age. One such object comes from a burial at the Sapalli-tepa settlement in southern Uzbekistan. It has a shaft-hole, an elongated hammer butt, and its cutting edge largely widens towards the lower side. It is…

BAUR, FERDINAND CHRISTIAN (21 June 1792-2 December 1860), German theologian and scholar of Manicheism. Born at Schmiden near Stuttgart, he was the son of a Protestant pastor. In the course of training for the ministry, he attended the theological colleges at Blaubeuren and Maulbronn (1805-09). Next he studied theology, philosophy,…

BAUSANI, ALESSANDRO (b. Rome, Italy, 29 May 1921; d. Rome, 11 March 1988), prolific Italian Orientalist in several fields: Persian Literature, Islam, linguistics, the history of Islamic science, Urdu, Indonesian, and other Islamic literatures. His family was Roman Catholic and his father, who exerted a strong influence over him, was…

BAVĀNĀTĪ, MĪRZĀ MOḤAMMAD-BĀQER, also called Ebrāhīm Jān Moʿaṭṭar and known as Mr. Bakir of Persia, Persian man of letters, poet, instructor of Persian in London, and self-styled prophet. He was born in Šeydān in Bavānāt, Fārs, most likely between the years 1230-35/1814-20 and died in 1310/1892-93 (Aḥmad; Shaikh Mofīd, s.v….

Search terms:  باوندیان bavandian bawandian bavandiyan baavandian baawandian    

BĀVĪ (or Bābūʾī), a Luri-speaking tribe of the Kohgīlūya (Kūh[-e] Gīlūye). According to Ḥasan Fasāʾī, it is an offshoot of the Arab Bāwīya tribe of Ḵūzestān (Fārs-nāma II, p. 270), but V. Minorsky suggests that the name Bāvī could also have come from a mountain by that name south of…

BĀWĪYA, a Shiʿite tribe of Ḵūzestān. They range east and south of Ahvāz, between the Kārūn and Jarrāḥī rivers, to the south of Band-e Qīr and north of Māred. Estimated at 20,000 individuals in the early years of this century, of which 18,500 were nomadic, and 2,320 families in the…

BÄX FÄLDISỊN “horse dedication” (from bäx “horse” and fäldisịn “to dedicate or consecrate to the dead”), a funeral rite practiced by the Ossetes until recent times. At the burial of a chieftain or other prominent man a horse was dedicated to the soul of the dead as a means of…

BAYĀN, a noun common to Arabic and Persian meaning “statement,” “exposition,” “explanation.” From an early date onward, it also encompassed the various arts of expression in speech and writing. As a critical term, bayān refers especially to clarity of expression (ḥosn-e bayān); this quality was reckoned among the essential characteristics…

BAYĀN (declaration, elucidation), term applied to the writings of the Bāb in general (Bayān-e fārsī 3:17, p. 102; 6:1, pp. 184-85) and to two late works in particular, the Bayān-e fārsī and al-Bayān al-ʿarabī. The Bāb’s first full-length work was a tafsīr of the sūra al-Baqara, begun in late 1259/1843 or…