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KAŠF AL-ẒONUN (“Unveiling of suppositions”), a major bibliographical dictionary in Arabic, composed by Kāteb Čelebi Moṣṭafā b. ʿAbd-Allāh, also known as Ḥāji Ḵalifa (1017-69/1609-57). This book, the full title of which is Kašf al-ẓonūn ʿan asāmi al-kotob wa’l-fonun, is considered the most significant contribution of the Ottoman scholarship in Arabic…

KAŠF O ŠOHUD (“unveiling and witnessing”), terms commonly used by Muslim mystics to describe the acquisition of esoteric knowledge and the constant first-hand encountering of the divine presence.  The two terms kašf and šohud, sometimes used together to describe a general experience of illuminative discovery and continued inspired perception, have…

KAŠFI, MIR MOḤAMMAD ṢĀLEḤ ḤOSAYNI (d. 14 Šaʿbān 1061/1 August 1651), calligrapher and poet in Mughal India. He was the son of the poet and calligrapher Mir ʿAbd-Allāh Termeḏi and a descendant of the Sufi master Shah Neʿmat-Allāh Wali. It is not known where he was born. His father used…

KĀŠḠARI, SAʿD-AL-DIN (d. 860/1456), propagator of the Naqšbandi order in Timurid Herat (qq.v.), noteworthy primarily as the initiator of ʿAbd-al-Raḥmān Jāmi into the path. In a manner typical for many a Sufi, he is said to have displayed a precocious degree of piety as a child. Thus one day, he reacted with…

KASHAN (Kāšān) historical city and a sub-province of the province of Isfahan on the north-south axial route of central Iran (lat 33° 59ʹ 30ʹʹ N, long 51° 27ʹ 00ʹʹ E; elev. 950 m). The city is located 260 km (189 km air) south of Tehran and 220 km (146 km air)…

i. Geography  Physical geography. Covering an area of approximately 9,647 km2, the sub-province of Kashan is situated between the Karkas mountains on the west to the Central Desert on the east (see desert; Jaʿfari, 1989, pp. 427-29, 244-45, 353). The Karkas range divides the sub-province into two distinct topographic and…

KASHAN ii. Historical Geography Geographic foundations and the origins of the urban area. To the northeast of the well-watered mountain ranges of western and southern Iran, a line of bountiful oases which have given rise to important urban areas stretches along the piedmont bordering the desert basins of central and…

KASHAN iii. History to the Pahlavi Period Kashan (Kāšān; Arabized Qāsān or Qāšān) lies at the center of an assemblage of townships and villages that occupy the narrow triangular shaped oasis on the edge of the central Iranian desert adjacent to the Karkas Mountain range. The fifth millennia BCE ruins…

KASHAN iv. Population Approximately 90 percent of the Kashan Sub-province population lives in the city of Kashan, so the demographic data for the sub-province closely resembles that of the city. Here, the two geographical areas will be discussed as one demographic entity. DEMOGRAPHIC CHARACTERISTICS In this section population size and…

KASHAN ix. The Median Dialects of Kashan   This sub-entry is divided into two sections:   (1) Rural Rāji dialects.   (2) Urban Jewish dialect.       (1) Rural Rāji Dialects  Although the city of Kashan itself is now entirely Persophonic (see part 2), many of the settlements in its proximity have…

KASHAN ix. The Median Dialects of Kashan (2) Urban Jewish Dialect  Kashan may be characterized as exclusively Persian speaking and Muslim from the time when the city was abandoned by its Jewry, who spoke a variety of Central dialects. The Jewish population of Kashan dropped dramatically from the scale of…

KASHAN  v. Architecture and Urban Design This sub-entry is divided into four sections:  (1) Urban Design.  (2) Monuments.  (3) Traditional Architecture.  (4) Historic Mansions.   (1) Urban Design The city of Kashan, similar to other older Iranian cities, preserved its traditional architectural features and urban design into the early 20th…

KASHAN V. ARCHITECTURE (2) Historical Monuments This section briefly describes nine landmark monuments of Kashan. Similar architectural features can be observed among them, with the exception of the Zayn-al-Din Minaret (Figure 1), which is unique in this context. Zayn-al-Din Minaret (Manār-e Zayn-al-Din). This monument is a rare Kashan landmark surviving…

KASHAN v. ARCHITECTURE (3) Traditional Architecture In line with the trend towards modernization in Iran’s recent history, most residential houses built by the middle classes in Kashan since 1950 comprise all or some of the following units: entrance, courtyard, living room, reception room, kitchen, lavatory, bath, bedroom, storage, staircase, and…