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ḠĪĀṮ-AL-DĪN MOḤAMMAD (d. 736/1336), Il-khanid vizier, the son of Rašīd-al-Dīn Fażl-Allāh Hamadānī (executed 718/1318), the celebrated historian and vizier of Ḡāzān Khan. On the fall of Demašq Ḵᵛāja b. Čobān (q.v.) in 727/1327, Ḡīāṯ-al-Dīn was appointed vizier by Abū Saʿīd (q.v.) in succession to Nāṣer-al-Dīn ʿĀdel, who was unjustly regarded…

ḠĪĀṮ-AL-DĪN NAQQĀŠ, a painter (naqqāš) active in Herat in about 822-30/1419-30, where he was in the employ of the Timurid Bāysonḡor b. Šāhroḵ. No Timurid author provides any personal details about his life, nor are his other names recorded. His fame derives from a rūz-nāma (diary) that he kept during a trip…

ḠIĀṮ-AL-DIN ʿEZZAT RĀMPURI, MOḤAMMAD, Persian lexicographer, literary scholar, philologist, poet, and teacher (b. ca. 1199/1785; d. Rampur, 22 Ḏu’l-ḥejja 1268/7 October 1852). Life. Ḡiāṯ-al-Din was born in Rampur to a family of scholars. His education began at home with his father, Jalāl-al-Din (pen-name Jalāl; b. ca. 1739; d. 1808), a learned scholar,…

ḠĪĀṮ-AL-DĪN ŠĪRĀZĪ, master architect in Khorasan during the reign of the Timurid Šāhroḵ (807-50 /1405-47). Next to nothing is known about him. His name appears together with that of the renowned architect of Šāhroḵ, Qewām-al-Dīn b. Zayn-al-Dīn Šīrāzī (d. 842/1438), in the inscription of the west ayvān of the Ḵargerd…

ḠĪĀṮVAND, a Kurdish tribe of the Qazvīn region. According to Parvīz Varjāvand (pp. 456-57), the Ḡīāṯvand were moved from western Persia to their present location during the reign of Āqā Moḥammad Shah Qājār (1193-1212/1779-97). They comprise the following clans (tīra): Komāsī, Darvīšvand, Salḵūrī, and Moḥammad Beygī. A Kurdish tribe by…

GĪĀʾĪ, ḤAYDAR (Heydar Ghiaï-Chamlou; b. Tehran, 23 October 1922; d. Cap d’Antibe, 6 September 1985; Figure 1), an influential pioneer of modern architecture in Persia and professor at the University of Tehran. Ḡīāʾī studied architecture at the Faculty of Fine Arts (see FACULTIES ii) and then continued his studies at…

GIBB MEMORIAL SERIES (GMS), a series of publications, which has continued for almost a century, mainly, but not exclusively, dedicated to editions and translations of Arabic, Persian, and Turkish texts. The Series is financed by the Gibb Memorial Trust, which was originally set up with money left for this purpose…

GIBBON, EDWARD (b.1737; d. 1794) and The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (London, 1776-88) as it relates to Persia and the Iranian world. The military, diplomatic, and commercial relations of Persia and the later steppe nomads, especially the Saljuqs, the Mongols, and Tīmūr, with the…

GIFT GIVING in Persia. The following articles constitute a preliminary attempt at studying various aspects of gift giving in a chronological and historical framework, from the pre-Islamic era to the early modern period. An anthropological approach, dealing with the practice of gift exchange in local communities, tribal clans, villages, extended families,…

GIFT GIVING  i. Introduction The subject of gift giving is often treated in the humanities and the social sciences under the general rubric of exchange. Gift giving and charity, barter and commerce, taxation and tribute, bribe and extortion, constitute major kinds of exchange. In many instances, these apparently distinct modes of…

GIFT GIVING ii. In Pre-Islamic Persia Although giving and receiving gifts played a part in almost all ancient societies, it appears to have assumed a particular significance and a specific manner in the ancient Near East, and especially in ancient Iran. This is already illustrated by the place it acquired in…

GIFT GIVING iv. In The Safavid Period The Frenchman Guillaume Olivier claimed at the turn of the 18th century that gift giving was more common in Persia than in the Ottoman Empire (V, p. 257). This may have been true, but it is hard to verify, because virtually all available information…