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BURIAL iii. In Zoroastrianism The Zoroastrian faith teaches that the earth, one of the seven holy creations, belongs to the aməša spənta Spəntā Ārmaitī “Bounteous Devotion.” Death being regarded as an evil brought about by Aŋra Mainyu (Ahriman), the Destructive Spirit, the corpse of a holy creature, particularly man or dog, is…

BURIAL iv. In Islam Although replete with reminders of death and its significance, the Koran is silent on the subject of funerals. The books of prophetic Hadith customarily contain chapters entitled janāʾez (e.g., Boḵārī, Ṣaḥīḥ, Cairo, n.d., II, pp. 85-109), but the instructions found there are mostly general in nature…

BURIAL v. In Bahai Communities Principles of Bahai burial. Bahai laws on burial are limited to a few basic principles that are binding on all Bahai communities around the world. Details are left to the discretion of individuals, but in general simplicity is encouraged, and care is taken to avoid…

BURNES, ALEXANDER (1805-41), the fourth son of James Burnes, a Scottish lawyer, educated at Montrose Academy and appointed ensign in the Bom­bay Army in 1821. Burnes had a natural aptitude for languages, acquired a good knowledge of Hindustani and Persian, and qualified as an interpreter, in which capacity he served…

BURNOUF, EUGÈNE (1801-52), virtually the found­er of Iranian linguistics, as well as of the study of the history of Buddhism in France. He was born in Paris the son of a Hellenist and studied Sanskrit with de Chézy at the Collège de France; in 1829 he began to teach comparative…

BURUSHASKI (Burúśaski), language spoken by the Burúśo (sing. Burúśin) in Hunza-Karakorum, North Pakistan, containing some Iranian loanwords of various origins. There are two main varieties of Burushaski: the two closely related dialects of Hunza (Húnzu) and Nager, perhaps spoken by as many as 80,000, and that of Yasin (northwest of…

Search terms:  برزین مهر borzinmehr    

BŪSALĪK,   mentioned in medieval treatises on music, notably in the Ketāb al-adwār of Ṣafī-al-Dīn Ormavī (d. 693/1294), as one of the maqāms of the Perso-Arabian musical system of the time. Its scale, within the range of an octave, was as shown in Chart 6 (Wright, 1978, p. 65). It has…

BŪŠĀSP (Young Av. Būšyąsta-, Pahl. bwšʾsp, Man. Mid. Pers. bwšyʾsp, NPers. būš(y)āsb/p, gūšāsb/p, būšyās), the name of a demon in Zoroastrianism. The final p of the Mid. Iran. forms is presumably due to popular etymology. The name occurs several times in the Younger Avesta as a proper noun and is…

BUSCARELLO DE GHIZOLFI, Genoese merchant and diplomat who served the il-khan Arḡūn (r. 683-90/1284-91). Buscarello belonged to a great family of Genoa that played an important role in the maritime trade of the city. He is mentioned for the first time in 1274 in connection with the arming of a…

BŪŠEHR (Ar. Būšahr, European spellings Bushire, Busheer, Bouchir, etc.), port city in southern Iran on the Persian Gulf. i. The city. ii. Music of Būšehr. Search terms:  بوشهر bushehr  booshehr boushehr   

BŪŠEHR  i. THE CITY Geographic conditions and the origins of the military harbor. The city is situated at the northern end of a low-lying peninsula of quaternary sandstone, situated largely parallel to the continental coast but connected to it only by an alluvial isthmus. The origin of the name is…

BŪŠEHR  ii. MUSIC OF BŪŠEHR The major characteristic of the music of Būšehr and the surrounding area is the singing of šarva, local dobaytīs (couplets) mostly sung in āvāz form in free meter and accompanied by the ney-anbān (bagpipe) and the ney-e joftī. Apparently a very old form, šarva originated in the region of Daštī, Daštestān, and Tangestān, where…

BŪŠEHRĪ, ḤĀJĪ MOḤAMMAD MOʿĪN-AL-TOJJĀR (b. 1238 Š./1859 in Būšehr, d. 1312 Š./1933 in Tehran), a merchant active in the Constitutional Revolution. He received the education common at the time and then joined the business of his father Ḥājī Moḥammad-Raḥīm Dehdaštī (Šajīʿī, p. 309). Having gone bankrupt, Būšehrī and his father…

BŪSTĀN, in early sources referred to as Saʿdī-nāma, a moralistic and anecdotal verse work consisting of some 4,100 maṯnawī couplets by Shaikh Moṣleḥ-al-Dīn Saʿdī, completed in 655/1257. The date is given by Saʿdī himself in his preamble, and from some indi­cations in two verses it may be surmised that the…