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GUNS, GUNNERY. See BĀRUT; FIREARMS.

ḠUR, a region of central Afghanistan, essentially the modern administrative province (welāyat) of Ḡōrāt. Pre-modern Ḡur comprised the basins of the upper Harirud, the Farahrud, the Rud-e Ḡōr, and the Ḵašrud, together with the intervening mountain chains. The moun-tains rise to over 10,000 feet, increasing as they merge in the…

GURĀN, a tribe dwelling in the dehestān of Gurān, between QasÂr-e Širin and Kermānšāh (Bāḵtarān), in Kurdistan. Šaraf-al-Din Bedlisi mentioned the Gurān as one of the four divisions of the Kurds, but Vladmir Minorsky has convincingly shown that the Gurān belong to a Persian-speaking people inhabiting a sizable area on…

GURĀNI. Gurāni, taking its name from the dialect now restricted to the region northwest of the village of Gahvāra (35 miles west of Kermānšāh), comprises a group of similar North-west Iranian dialects which includes that of Kandula, 25 miles north-north-west of Kermānšāh, and Bāǰalānī, in the region around Zohāb and…

GURDZIECKI, BOGDAN (known in Persia as Bohtam Beg), Polish envoy of Georgian-Armenian origin and first permanent Polish resident in Safavid Persia (d. Moscow, 12 April 1700). Little more is known about Bogdan Gurdziecki’s early life other than that he was a native of Georgia of Armenian background who until the…

Gurughli   title Gurughli genre/topic Epic Tale language Tajik Persian performer Hotam Hokimov instrument vocal, dumbra – long-necked lute recorded by Federico Spinetti place of recording Dushanbe date of recording 2003 duration 1:58 source “Falak: the Voice of Destiny, traditional, popular and symphonic music of Tajikistan. British Library TSCD932D-CD1 (2006)…

GUŠA (lit.,corner or part), a term in Persian music designating a unit of melody of variable importance, which occupies a special place in the development of one of the twelve modal systems (dastgāh or āvāz, qq.v.). This term came into use during the Safavid era, when the modal system was…

GUSFAND (Mid. Pers. gōspand, sheep, ovine). In Persian a clear distinction is made between ewe (miš), ram (quč), and lamb (barra). In certain dialects tens of words are used to describe sheep according to age, sex, and physical characteristics, such as color, pattern of its fleece, shape of its ear,…