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SOLAYMĀN I, SHAH (b. early 1057/February or March 1648; d. 6 Ḏu’l-ḥejja, 1105/29 July 1694), the eighth king of the Safavid dynasty (r. 1076-1105/1666-94).  Shah Solaymān was born in 1648 to a Circassian slave woman named Nekḥat or Nākeḥa Ḵānom, as the oldest son of Shah ʿAbbās II (Chick, p….

SOLAYMĀNI, Ātajān Peyrow (Tajik Otajon Payrav Sulaymoni; b. Bukhara, 15 April 1899; d. Samarqand, 9 June 1933), Tajik poet who blended the classical traditions of Tajik-Persian verse with the social themes of the new Soviet Central Asia of the 1920s and early 1930s. Solaymāni was born into a prominent Bukharan…

SOLṬĀN ḤOSAYN, the ninth and last Safavid king (1078-105/1668-1727; r. 1105-35/1694-1722). Solṭān Ḥosayn, the eldest son of Shah Solaymān I (r. 1077-1105/1666-1694), was born and reared in the royal harem, where he is said to have done little more than read the Qurʾan under the tutelage of Mir Moḥammad-Bāqer Ḵātunābādi,…

Song in praise of opium title Song in praise of opium genre/topic Luti song language   performer Gholām Lutim age 35 in 1969, vocal and dayre instrument   composer   author/poet   first line of poem zenda bād, zenda bād, taryok u šira recorded by Stephen Blum place of recording…

Song of carpet-weaving title Song of carpet-weaving genre/topic Work Song language Baktiāri performer Baktiāri women instrument Voices composer   author/poet   first line of poem   recorded by Paymān Bozorgniyā place of recording   date of recording   duration 1:10 source Regional Music of Iran. A Musical Anthology of Baktiāri…

SOPURḠĀN, Neo-Aramaic Sipūrḡān, Assyrian village in the Urmia plain, situated on the Nazlu river, 26 km northeast of the city of Urmia (Razmārā, p. 262; Dehḵodā, s.v.) and 2 km from the edge of Lake Urmia (Mālik, p. 1; see map, Figure 1). Mīrzāʾ Dāwīd Gīwargīs Mālik claims that the…

SORḴA (locally: Sur), township and sub-province in Semnān Province. Sorḵa is situated 20 km southwest of Semnān and 12 km northwest of Lāsgerd (lat 35o28′ N, long 53°13′ E, elev 1,100 m above sea level). Sorḵa and its immediate hamlets rest on a series of alluvial cones formed by clefts…

SORUŠIĀN, Jamšid Soruš (b. Kerman, 8 November 1914; d. Tehran, 28 February 1999), a Zoroastrian community leader and author. He was born in a wealthy Zoroastrian family of Kerman, as the son of Soruš and of his first cousin Iranbānu. At the time of Jamšid’s birth, the Sorušiān family counted…

SOUTH PERSIA RIFLES (SPR), a locally recruited militia, commanded by British officers, and operating in the provinces of Fārs and Kermān from 1916 to 1921. At its peak the SPR totalled approximately 8,000 men, mostly recruits from “friendly” and ethnically mixed local tribes. The remainder consisted of sedentary elements, rural…

SOUTHEAST ASIA i. PERSIAN PRESENCE IN A cohesive, comprehensive, and chronological account of the Persian cultural presence in Southeast Asia is difficult, if not impossible, to present due to the diverse and multifaceted nature of the Southeast Asian communities. Perhaps the most comprehensive study to date of Southeast Asia’s early…

SOUTHEAST ASIA i. SHIʿITES IN The historical course and circumstances of Southeast Asia’s Islamization are still the subject of heated debate among scholars (for differing views see Al-Attas, Preliminary Statement on a General Theory of the Islamization of the Malay-Indonesian Archipelago; Idem, “Indonesia. iv-History: (a) Islamic period”; Drewes, “New Light…

SPĀHBED, Sasanian title that denoted a high military rank and meant ‘chief of an army, general’; cf. New Pers. sepāhbad, Arm. loanword (a)sparapet, Chr. Sogd. spʾdpt, Khot. spāta etc., all from Old Iranian *spāda- ‘army’ and *pati- ‘chief’. This entry considers recently discovered sigillographic evidence on the title and its…