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KAʿBA-YE ZARDOŠT “Kaʿba of Zoroaster,” an ancient building at Naqš-e Rostam near Persepolis. It probably acquired its name in the 14th century, when sites of ruins all over Persia were associated with personalities from the Qurʾān or the Šāh-nāma. The name does not indicate that it was a shrine of…

KĒD, Pahlavi and Bactrian word with meanings ranging from “soothsayer” to “priest,” probably derived from OIran. *kaita-, Avestan kaēta-. The usage of the term kēd in the Pahlavi texts, where it may be interpreted as “soothsayer, clairvoyant,” is described under KAĒTA. In the spelling “kēdo,” with silent final -o, the…

KÉGL, SÁNDOR (b. Szúnyog, Hungary, 1 December 1862; d. Áporka, Hungary, 28 December 1920, Figure 1), Hungarian orientalist, polymath, and bibliophile who devoted a major part of his studies to Persian literature. Sources on the life of Sándor (Alexander von) Kégl, a pioneer in Iranian studies in Hungary, are relatively…

KELIDAR, a monumental novel of nearly three thousand pages in five volumes consisting of ten books published over the period 1978-84 by Maḥmud Dawlatābādi (Mahmud Dowlatabadi; b. 1940), the noted Iranian novelist and ardent social realist. Kelidar is the saga of a nomadic Kurdish family that moved to Sabzevār, Khorasan….

KELIM (GELIM), a kind of flat-woven carpet employed by settled and nomadic families for a host of uses, primarily but not exclusively for covering household items and furnishing the interior of dwellings. Gelim is a term used in Persian-speaking parts of West Asia, especially in Iran, for large tapestry-woven textiles,…

ḴELʿAT (Ar. ḵelʿa, pl. ḵelaʿ; or ḵalʿat), an Arabic term used in the Iranian cultural area (Iran, India, Central Asia) to refer to gifts in general, but in particular to a robe of honor given by a superior, especially the ruler, to a subordinate. The tradition of bestowing a garment…

KEMĀḴ (Turk. Kemah), a town in eastern Anatolia (lat. 39° 35′ N, long. 39° 01′ E), located on the southern bank of the Western Euphrates (Turk. Karasu) about 60 km west of Arzenjān (Turk. Erzincan). It was well known in medieval times for its formidable fortress, described with some rhetorical…

KENT, ROLAND GRUBB, American scholar of Indo-European studies, who specialized also in Old Persian studies (b. Wilmington, Del., 24 February 1877; d. Bryn Mawr, Penn., 27 June 1952). He was the son of a businessman and did his first studies in classics at Swarthmore College (Swarthmore, Penn.). After receiving his…

KÉPES, GÉZA (b. Mátészalka, Hungary, 1 January 1909; d. Budapest, 19 August 1989), Hungarian poet and translator of Persian poetry. He was the son of a blacksmith and proud of his origins, claiming that the legacy of his father’s craftsmanship as a skilled artisan had somehow percolated through to his…

KEPHALAIA, genre of literature developed by the Manichean communities in the early Sasanian empire that spread with the church across Eurasia and North Africa, primarily preserved by two large papyrus codices in Coptic translation from Egypt dating to the early fifth century CE (see COPTIC MANICHEAN TEXTS). The Kephalaia (Greek…

ḴERAD-NĀMA, (Book of Wisdom), the shortened title of a compilation of short didactic and philosophical texts preserved in one of a dozen extant Persian manuscripts on the subject of practical philosophy from the 6th/12th century (Monzawi, p. 286; Fouchécour, p. 24, n.6). The full title Ḵerad-nāma az maqālat-e ḥokamā is…

KEREŠMA, a musical term denoting a melodic unit (guša), or a metric section within a guša, based on any modal system (dastgāh). The Persian word kerešma literally means “wink, nod, glance, looking languishingly through half-shut eyes, an amorous gesture or blandishment, coquetry” (Steingass, p. 1023). A musical kerešma is normally…

KERIYA (Chin. name Yutian), city and county in the southern Tarim basin in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, China (see CHINESE-IRANIAN RELATIONS vi.; CHINESE TURKESTAN i. Geographical Overview). The subsistence agricultural economy of the oasis suffers from desertification and isolation, but the traditional Uighur oasis was located on the Silk…

KERMAN (Kermān), a province in southeastern Iran; also the name of one of its sub-provinces as well as that of its principal city and capital. i. Geography. ii. Historical geography. iii. Population. iv. History in the pre-Islamic period. See ii, above; see also CARMANIA. v. History from the Islamic conquest…