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ESMĀʿĪL, b. Aḥmad b. Asad SĀMĀNĪ, ABŪ EBRĀHĪM (b. 234/849, d. Ṣafar 295/November 907), the first member of the Samanid dynasty to rule over all Transoxania and Farḡāna. He served almost two decades (260-79/874-92) as governor of Bukhara (q.v. ii) on behalf of his brother Naṣr, ʿAbbasid governor of Transoxania,…

ESMĀʿĪL, b. Nūḥ, ABŪ EBRĀHĪM MONTAṢER (d. 1004), last Samanid amir. After the Qarakhanids occupied Bokhara in 389/999, he led several attempts to expel them from Transoxania. See SAMANIDS.

ESMĀʿĪL, b. Seboktegīn, Ghaznavid prince and briefly amir in Ḡazna in 387-88/997-98. Esmāʿīl was one of Seboktegīn’s younger sons by a daughter of his old master Alptegīn. Seboktegīn had appointed him as his successor in Ḡazna and Balḵ, so that on his death in Šaʿbān 387/August 997, Esmāʿīl was able…

ESMĀʿĪL, b. Yasār NESĀʾĪ, a poet of Persian origin from Medina (d. before 132/750). He was the decendant of a Persian prisoner of war from Azerbaijan and lived in Medina, where he had been born, as a client (mawlā) of Taym b. Morra. The nesba Nesāʾī is said to derive…

ESPAHBOD, ALI-REZA (ʿAli-Reżā Espahbod, b. Tehran, 22 Āḏar 1330 Š./13 December 1951; d. Tehran, 5 Esfand 1385 Š./24 February 2007), painter and graphic designer (FIGURE 1). LIFE Born to Raḥmat-Allāh Espahbod and Šams-al-Moluk Sigāriān, Alireza showed artistic talent from an early age. He received his high school diploma from Tehran’s…

EŠQO RŪḤ. See ḤOSN O RŪḤ.

ʿEŠQĪ, MOLLĀ BĀBOR b. Hedāyat-Allāh, Central Asian poet writing in Persian. Born into a farmer’s family in 1792 in Vārū-ye Panjakent, he attended maktab in his native village and later studied in Bukhara and Samarkand. Returning to his village, he made his living as a farmer. He sometimes supplied wood…

EŠRĀQ ḴĀVARĪ, ʿABD-AL-ḤAMĪD (b. Mašhad 1320/1902, d. Tehran 15 Mordād 1351 Š./6 August 1972) Bahai scholar, teacher, and author. He received a traditional Islamic clerical education and studied literature, the religious sciences, and philosophy under Adīb Nīšāpūrī (q.v.), a well-known poet and man of letters. He studied in Qom and…

ESTAHBĀN (also Eṣṭahbānāt, or Eṣṭahbānān; colloquial Sābūnāt), town and district in Fārs, bordered in the north by the Baḵtagān lake, in the northeast and the east by Neyrīz/Nīrīz, in the south by Dārāb, in the southwest by Fasā, and in the west by Shiraz (qq.v.) The name was officially changed…