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N ENTRIES: CAPTIONS OF ILLUSTRATIONS   online entry caption text NABIL-AL-DAWLA Figure 1. ʿAliqoli Khan Nabil-Al-Dawla. NĀDER SHAH Figure 1. Portrait of Nāder Shah; oil on canvas, 162 x 102 cm; Persia, second quarter of the 18th century. By courtesy of the Board of Trustees of the Victoria & Albert…

OBOLLA, a port of Lower Iraq during the classical and medieval Islamic periods. It lay in the delta region of the Tigris, at the head of the Šaṭṭ al-ʿArab, on the west bank of the Tigris and on the north side of the canal, the Nahr al-Obolla which, together with…

ŌDŌ, TŌMĀ (romanized: Thomas Audo; b. Alqosh, Iraq, 1853; d. Urmia, 27 July 1918; Figure 1,

OḠUZ KHAN NARRATIVES The Oḡuz Khan narratives constitute a cycle of mythical accounts associated with the life, conquests, and descendants of Oḡuz, who is also called Oḡuz Khan, Oḡuz Qaḡan, Oḡuz Āqā, or Oḡuz Atā—the legendary ancestor of the Oḡuz tribes (see ḠOZZ). The title Oḡuz-nāma is frequently used to…

OIL AGREEMENTS IN IRAN (1901-1978): their history and evolution. Introduction. The history of Iranian oil agreements began with an unprecedented concession granted by Nāṣer-al-Din Shah in 1872 to Baron Julius de Reuter, a British subject of German origin (see CONCESSIONS ii). The concession, which covered the entire territory of Persia,…

Oil Industry i. Petroleum and its Products ii. Iran’s Oil and Gas Resources

OIL INDUSTRY i. PETROLEUM AND ITS PRODUCTS Petroleum has been known throughout historical time. It was used in mortar, for coating walls and boat hulls, and as a fire weapon in defensive warfare. By the middle of the 19th century, the Industrial Revolution had brought about a search for new…

OIL INDUSTRY ii. IRAN’S OIL AND GAS RESOURCES The Iranian oil industry is the oldest in the Middle East. Although the occurrence of numerous seeps in many parts of Iran had been known since the ancient times, the systematic exploration and drilling for oil began in the first years of…

OḴOWWAT (Brotherhood), the name of four newspapers and one magazine published in Tabriz, Rašt, Shiraz, Kermānšāh, and Baghdad in the early 1900s. 1-In Tabriz, the first issue of Oḵowwat newspaper was appeared on the 2 Ḏu’l-ḥejja, 1324/17 January 1907, and would continue to be issued three times a week.  No…

OLEARIUS, ADAM (b. Aschersleben, 1599; d. Gottorp, 23 February 1671), German author, secretary to the Holstein mission to Persia (1635-39), court mathematician and librarian at Holstein-Gottorp; noted for the detailed account of his travels in Russia and Persia during the reign of the Safavid Shah Ṣafi (r. 1629-1642), his contributions…

OLIVE TREE (zaytun). The cultivated olive tree (Olea europaea L, Oleaceae) is a long-lived, evergreen tree native to the Mediterranean basin. It is valued for its fruit and oil. Olives are picked late in autumn or winter, as the oil content and fruit characteristics change with ripening. Olive cultivars usually…

OLSHAUSEN, JUSTUS, German theologian and Oriental scholar, one of the pioneers of Iranian studies in the German-speaking countries (b. Hohenfelde, Steinburg district in Holstein, 9 May 1800; d. Berlin, 28 December 1882). Life and general survey. Being destined for theology and having learnt the rudiments of Hebrew from his father,…