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BESṬĀMĪ (Basṭāmī), SHAIKH ŠEHĀB-AL-­DĪN (d. 807/1405), a Sufi shaikh of Herat during the Timurid period. He began his career as an ʿālem, studying Hadith with Qoṭb-al-Dīn Yaḥyā Jāmī and feqh with Sayyed Jalāl-al-Dīn Kermānī. He then turned to asceticism, and soon became renowned for his piety. Numerous followers attached themselves…

BESṬĀMĪ (Basṭāmī), BĀYAZĪD (Abū Yazīd Ṭayfūr b. ʿĪsā b. Sorūšān; d. 234/848 or 261/875), early Muslim mystic of Iran. A descendant of a Zoroastrian family converted to Islam during the life of his grandfather Sorūšān, Bāyazīd spent most of his active life in his native town of Besṭām (Basṭām) in…

BESṬĀMĪ (Basṭāmī), ʿABD-AL-RAḤMĀN b. Moḥammad b. ʿAlī, al-Ḥanafī, al-Ḥorūfī (d. 858/1454), Ottoman polymath of Khorasanian ances­try. Some recent sources attribute to him a birth in Besṭām (Dehḵodā, s.v.; Moḥammad-ʿAlī Modarres, Rayḥānat al-ādab, Tabrīz, n.d., I, p. 267), but it seems certain he was born in Anṭākīa (Antioch). He studied in…

BĒṮ ĀRAMAYĒ, lit. “land of the Arameans,” the region and Sasanian province of Āsōristān in Iraq between the Jabal Ḥamrīn and Maysān. It is called Balad al-Nabaṭ in the Arabic Chronicle of Sīrt. A marzbān of this province is attested under Šāpūr II (r. 309-79), Yazdegerd I (r. 399-421), Pērōz (r….

BĒṮ DARAYĒ (Arabic Bādarāyā), a district southeast of the lower Nahrawān canal in Gōḵē (Arż Jūḵā), Iraq, linked administratively with Bākosāyā. Fiey identified it with Tell al-ʿAqr near the village of Badra ca. 150km east-southeast of Baghdad. It lay between al-Bandanījayn and the environs of Wāseṭ and produced excellent dried…

BĒṮ GARMĒ, a region and province in northeast­ern Iraq named after a people, possibly a Persian tribe, called Garamaioi by Ptolemy, Garmaqāyē by early Syriac writers, Garamīkān (glmykn), adjective Gara­mīkčān (glmykcʾn) in Middle Iranian, Garmakan in Armenian, and Jarāmeqa in Arabic. Streck identified them with the Gurumu of cuneiform sources….

BĒṮ LAPAṬ, the Syriac name for Vēh Antiōk Šāpūr (Gondēšāpūr), founded in ca. 260 by Šāpūr I in Ḵūzestān with the Roman captives from Valerian’s army. The site has been identified with the ruins called Šāhābād, eight farsaḵs northwest of Tostar on the road to Dezfūl. Since there is no…

BĒṮ SELŌḴ, “house of Seleucos,” abbreviation of Karkā ḏe Bēṯ Selōḵ, “fortress of the house of Seleucos,” the capital city (modern Kirkuk) of the district of Bēṯ Garmē in Iraq. The main source for its early history is the sixth-century Syriac account of the martyrs of Karkā ḏe Bēṯ Selōḵ, according…

BĒṬANĪ (ṭ = retroflex t; singular Bēṭanay), a Pash­tun tribe on the eastern edge of the Solaymān moun­tains, where it is particularly concentrated at the western end of the Gabarḡar (the Marwat range in Anglo-Iranian toponymy), a low, though very broken, mountain range that separates the Bannū basin from the…

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BHADRA, the name of a magician, who according to Buddhist legend tried to deceive the Buddha by means of his magic powers in order to disprove the Buddha’s claim to omniscience. A Khotanese verse paraphrase of the story is contained in chapter 2 of the Book of Zambasta (see the…

BHADRACARYĀDEŚANĀ, the name of a Buddhist text belonging to the Mahāyāna Tantric tradition of which a Khotanese translation is extant. The Bhadracaryādeśanā has been widely recited among Mahayanists ever since the 4th century a.d. It is a devotional work stressing the merits of good conduct (Sanskrit bhadracaryā) and containing a…

BHADRAKALPIKASŪTRA, the name of a Buddhist Mahayanist text. Due to an error introduced by S. Konow it has usually been incorrectly called Bhadrakalpikāsūtra in Khotanese studies. It is a sacred text (Sanskrit sutra) concerning the names of the Buddhas to appear in the good aeon (Sanskrit bhadrakalpa). Originally, the good…

BHAGARIAS, the name of a group (panth) of Parsi Zoroastrian priests. Sometime after the Parsi settlement at Sanjan (q.v.) in Gujarat (a.d. 936), the laity began to spread out. Some moved a little north to the small port of Navsari (q.v.); and as their numbers grew they asked Sanjan for…