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DOMAN, city in the Roman province of Cappadocia, conquered along with the surrounding area by the Sasanian Šāpūr I (240-70) during his second campaign against Rome (ŠKZ, Parth, l. 8: dwm’n; Gk. l. 18; not extant in Middle Persian; Back, p. 305). It is probably to be identified with Domana,…

DOMES, circular vaulted roofs or ceilings. The variety of forms and decoration of Persian domes is unrivaled. The Sasanian and early Islamic periods. The dome on squinches first appeared in Persia in the Sasanian period in the palace at Fīrūzābād in Fārs and at nearby Qalʿa-ye Doḵtar, both erected by Ardašir…

DOMESTIC ANIMALS (Pers. ḥaywān-e ahlī; cf. ahlīkardan/šodan “to domesticate, be domesticated”), a group of animals raised or maintained in captivity so that they can provide products, services, or entertainment. These animals, the methods of raising and exploiting them, their general treatment, and the ways in which they are represented by…

DONALDSON, BESS ALLEN (b. Galesburg, Ill., 7 December 1879, d. Lakeland, Fla., 20 December 1974) and DWIGHT MARTIN (b. Washington, O., 16 December 1884, d. Lakeland, Fla., 11 May 1976), American Presbyterian missionaries and writers about Persia. Bess Allen went to Tehran in 1910 as a teacher at the Iran…

DONBA, the fatty part of the sheep’s tail, traditionally used as a cooking fat, sometimes in melted form, or as an inexpensive meat substitute. Nowadays it is less frequently used because of the harmful effects of animal fat.  

DONBOLĪ, name of a turkicized Kurdish tribe in the Ḵoy and Salmās regions of northwestern Azerbaijan and of the leading family of Ḵoy since the 16th century. Šaraf-al-Dīn Bedlīsī (tr., pt. 1, p. 169) reported that, according to the “most authentic” theory, the Donbolī came from Boḵtān, a region between…

i. In Persian tradition and folk belief. ii. Domestication in Iran.

DONKEY i. In Persian tradition and folk belief The donkey (Equus hydrunitinus, Equus asinus asinus, etc.; Pers. ḵar, darāz-gāš), domesticated species descended from the wild ass (Equus africanus; Uerpmann), probably first bred in captivity in Egypt and western Asia, where by 2500 B.C.E. the domesticated donkey was in use as a…

DONKEY ii. Domestication in Iran The domestication of the African ass (Equus africanus) and the development of the donkey (Equus asinus) for transport and traction have been discussed in the scholarly literature for many years.  Traditionally, North Africa, more specifically pre-Dynastic Egypt, has been considered the most likely locus of…

DONYĀ (lit., “The world”), name of several Persian journals and newspapers. 1. The earliest Donyā was a Marxist monthly journal published in Tehran from Bahman 1312 Š./February 1933 until Ḵordād 1314 Š./June 1935. Its founder and editor was Taqī Arānī, a chemist who had become a Marxist while studying in…

DONYĀ-YE EMRŪZ (Today’s world), name of a weekly magazine published in Tehran and two weekly newspapers founded in Qazvīn and Isfahan respectively. 1. A cultural weekly was published in Tehran from 26 Ṯawr 1301/16 May 1922 until mid-Asad (7 August) of that year. The licensee (ṣāḥeb-e emtīāz) and editor of…