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AŠKBŌS, a Turanian hero from Kašān or Košān in the story of “Kāmūs-e Kašānī,” Šāh-nāma (Moscow) IV, p. 194, vv. 1209 ff. In the Arabic translation of the Šāh-nāma by Bondārī (I, pp. 223 ff.) the name is given as Askbōs. Aškbōs, after putting to flight the Iranian hero Rohhām…

Search terms:  اسلم، ابوالقاسم محمد aslam, aboulghasem mohammad aslam, abolghaem mohammad aslam, aboulghasem mohammad    

ĀṢLĀNDŪZ (or AṢLĀNDŪZ), a small village in the northeast of the Iranian province of East Azerbaijan (dehestān of Moḡān, baḵš of Germī, šahrestān of Ardabīl) on the south bank of the Aras river. By road it is 120 km west of Bīla-Savār. The district is mountainous but is counted as…

ĀSMĀN (sky, heavens), in Zoroastrian cosmology the first part of the material (gētīg) world created by Ohrmazd (Bundahišn, ed. B. T. Anklesaria, p. 33.2; Dēnkard, p. 124.6; Zātspram 1.25; The Pahlavi Rivâyat Accompanying the Dâdistân-î Dînkîk, ed. B. N. Dhabhar, Bombay, 1913, p. 128). The Pahlavi Rivâyat (loc. cit.), for…

ASMĀR AL-ASRĀR (Night-discourses of secrets), theosophical treatise in Persian composed by a 9th/15th century Češtī Sufi of India, Sayyed Moḥammad Ḥosaynī Gīsūdarāz (q.v., d. 825/1422), popularly known as Ḵᵛāǰa-ye Bandanavāz. Several manuscripts are extant, and the text has been edited by S. ʿAṭā Ḥosayn (Hyderabad, 1350/1931). It was originally divided…

ASMUSSEN, Jes Peter, scholar of Iranian studies (b. 2 November 1928, Aabenraa [Åbenrå], North Sleswig; d. 5 August 2002, Copenhagen). He is, after Arthur Christensen and Kaj Barr, the third great representative of the Danish school of Iranian studies, which in the 20th century made an essential contribution to the…

AṢNĀF, the plural of ṣenf (class, kind category), collective designation of guilds in Iran since the 11th/17th century. Historically the term ǰamāʿat was also used for the singular, and for the plural such phrases as moḥtarefa, ahl-e ṣaṇʿat o bāzār, or aṣnāf-e kasaba (see, e.g., J. Aubin, Deux sayyids de…

ĀSNATAR (Pahl. āsnadār, lit. “washer”), one of the eight Zoroastrian priests (ratu) necessary for the performance of the yasna ritual. According to Nīrangistān 75, it was the āsnatar’s function to wash and to strain and filter the haoma juice. At the ritual, his station within the sacrificial area was the…

AŠŌ-DĀD, Zoroastrian (Pazend) term for the remuneration to a priest for his services. The word means “what is given to the righteous or holy person,” with ašō from ašaw (Ao. ašavan, Pahl. ahlaw) and dād “given.” This ašō-dād consist of payment in money or in kind. At the ceremony on…

ĀŠOFTA, a Persian magazine published in Tehran 1325 Š./1946-1336 Š./1957. Launched in Farvardīn, 1325 Š./March, 1946 and then named Jong-e āšofta (Jumbled miscellany), it described itself as the continuator of a journal which had appeared under the title Āšofta (at Mašhad?) in 1308 Š./1929-1309 Š./1930 and reappeared under the title…

Search terms: آشوگر ashogar aashoogar  

AŚOKA, Mauryan emperor of India (ca. 272-231 B.C.). i. The life and teaching of Aśoka. ii. Aśoka and Iran. iii. The legend of Aśoka in Khotanese. iv. The legend of Aśoka and the founding of Khotan.   i. The Life and Teaching of Aśoka Aśoka was the most powerful king…

AŠŌQAR, in Syriac sources the name of a deity who together with the two deities Frašōqar and Zarōqar is coexistent and co-eternal with Zurvan (see R. C. Zaehner, Zurvan, a Zoroastrian Dilemma, Oxford, 1955, pp. 219-31; Syriac sources, ibid., pp. 219 n. 3, 439-40). The name is identical with Av….

ĀSŌRISTĀN, name of the Sasanian province of Babylonia. It is known from Šāpūr I’s inscription on the Kaʿba-ye Zardošt in the Greek form ASSYRIAN (ed. A. Maricq, Syria 35, 1958, pp. 304-05, repr. in Classica et Orientalia, Paris, 1965, pp. 46-47, cf. also pp. 78, 91; M. Back, Die Sassanidischen…

ASOŁIK (or Asołnik), “the singer,” the usual name of Stephen of Tarōn, the author of the Tiezerakal patmuṭʿiwn, a Universal History from the origins to 1004 A.D. Of his life little is known. In his History 3.7, Stephen gives a vivid description of the monastic renaissance in all districts of…