KUSHAN DYNASTY ii. Inscriptions of the Kushans The inscriptions issued by the Kushan rulers or in areas under their rule…

EḴŠĪD, Arabo-Persian form of a Sogdian royal title attested in Sogdian script as (ʾ)xšyδ (more anciently and more commonly written…

BARŠABBĀ, legendary bishop of Marv and founder of the Christian church in eastern Iran. The only completely preserved versions of…

BAGA, an Old Iranian term for “god,” sometimes designating a specific god. i. General. ii. In Old and Middle Iranian….

BACTRIAN LANGUAGE, the Iranian language of ancient Bactria (northern Afghanistan), attested by coins, seals, and inscriptions of the Kushan period…

BĀBAY OF NISIBIS (BĀBAY BAR NṢIBNĀYE), also known as Bābay the Less, Christian Syriac writer who flourished about the beginning…

BAAT , Middle Iranian personal name, borrowed in Armenian as Bat. i. Baat in Iranian sources. ii. Armenian Bat. i….

APOSTOLIC CANONS, fragmentary Christian Sogdian text. The early Christian Church possessed many collections of “canons” (regulations governing the conduct of…

APOPHTHEGMATA PATRUM (Maxims of the fathers), Graeco-Latin name customarily used to refer to a species of Christian literature consisting of…

ANCIENT LETTERS, name conventionally applied to a group of Sogdian paper documents; discovered in 1907 by Sir Aurel Stein. They…

ABBĀ (“Father”) ISAIAH, late 4th century A.D., author of Christian ascetical texts; from these it appears that he was a…

IDEOGRAPHIC WRITING, the representation of language by means of “ideograms,” i.e. symbols representing “ideas,” rather than (or usually side by…