Explore Iranica

Nowhe of Men’s Mourning   title Nowhe of Men’s Mourning genre/topic ‘Azādāri (in Būšehr) language   performer ‘Ali Dašti instrument Voices composer   author/poet   first line of poem   recorded by   place of recording   date of recording   duration 1:43 source Ahl-e Mātam, Songs of Lamentation in…

Nowhe Zeynab title Nowhe Zeynab genre/topic ‘Azādāri language   performer Women from Bušehr instrument Voices composer   author/poet   first line of poem   recorded by Jahāngir Nasir Ašrafi place of recording   date of recording 1992-1999 duration 0:59 source Religious Music of Iranian Chiites. Mahoor Institute of Culture and…

NOWRUZ i. In the Pre-Islamic Period ii. In the Islamic Period iii. In the Iranian Calendar

NOWRUZ i. In the Pre-Islamic Period Nowruz, “New Day”, is the holiest and most joyful festival of the Zoroastrian year. It is also its focal point, to which all other high holy days relate. Its celebration has two strands, the religious and the secular, both of which have plainly evolved…

NOWRUZ ii. IN THE ISLAMIC PERIOD Introduction. The Islamic conquest altered many Iranian traditions specifically associated with national ideology, imperial institutions, and Zoroastrian rituals. Although Nowruz was an established symbol of these three aspects, it did survive while less significant festivals were eclipsed by their Islamic rivals and gradually became…

NOWRUZ iii. IN THE IRANIAN CALENDAR The day Hormoz (the first day of any Persian month) of the month of Farvardin is the New Year day in the Persian calendar; at present it coincides with the day of the vernal equinox (the day on which the Sun enters the first…

Nowruze-ḵuni title Nowruze-ḵuni genre/topic Song for Nowruz language Persian performer Mohammad-‘Ali Ḵorsandi, Mohammad Ḵorsandi, voice instrument Voices composer   author/poet   first line of poem Nowruzi āmad barf o bārān ast recorded by Armin Faridi Haftḵāni place of recording Langarud date of recording Jun 2005 – May 2006 duration 2:11…

NOWŠAHR, port city and sub-province in western Māzandarān Province. The city.  The coastal town of Nowšahr (lat 36° 39′ N, long 51°30′ E) is situated low on the Caspian shore at an elevation of 66 feet below global sea level, but still 23 feet above the Caspian Sea. It has…

NOZHAT AL-MAJĀLES, an anthology of some 4,000 quatrains (robāʿi; a total of 4,139 quatrains, 54 of which have been repeated in the text) by some 300 poets of the 5th to 7th/11th-13th centuries, compiled around the middle of the 7th/13th century by the Persian poet Jamāl-al-Din Ḵalil Šarvāni. The book…

NUḤ (II) B. MANṢUR (I), ABU’L-QĀSEM, Samanid Amir (r. 365-87/976-97), initially in both Transoxania and Khorasan, latterly in Transoxania only, called after his death Amir-e Rażi, “The Well-Pleasing Amir,” or according to Naršaḵi, Amir-e Rašid, “The Rightly-Guided Amir.” Nuḥ was the last Samanid to enjoy a reign of significant length,…

NUR-AL-DIN MOḤAMMAD II B. ḤASAN (b. Šawwāl 542/March 1148; d. 10 Rabiʿ I 607/1 September 1210), Nezāri Ismaʿili imam and the fifth lord of Alamut.  He succeeded to the leadership of the Nezāri Ismaʿili state (see ISMAʿILISM iii. ISMAʿILI HISTORY) and daʿwa (see DAʿI) at the age of seventeen, on…

NURI, Ḥājj Shaikh FAŻL-ALLĀH (b. Lāšak, a village in the Kojur district of Māzandarān, Ḏu’l-qaʿda 2, 1259/November 24, 1843; exec. Tehran, Rajab 13, 1327/July 7, 1909), a prominent jurist who campaigned in the Constitutional Revolution of 1906-1909 for constitutionalism according to the šariʿa (canonical laws of Islam), and in its…

NURISTAN (Nurestān), the “Land of Light,” a region to the northeast of Afghanistan, imbedded in the Hindu Kush valleys to the south of its main ridge. It was earlier known as Kafiristan (Kāferestān), land of the non-Islamic and thus “heathen” (kāfer), until its enforced Islamization in 1896 brought “light” or…

NYBERG, Henrik Samuel, born in Söderbärke in Southern Dalecarlia (Sweden) on the 28th of December 1889 he died aged eighty-four on the 9th of February 1974 in Uppsala. He was born in a humble family, the son of Ida Jansson and Anders Fredrik Nyberg, a learned clergymen who also was…