Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition

[see ibn māʾ al-samāʾ ].

, ʿAyn Ubāg̲h̲ , the name of a spring or watercourse on the eastern, sc. ʿIrāḳī, fringes of the Syrian Desert which was the scene of a pre-Islamic yawm or battle of the Arabs. The confused Arabic sources take this as being the battle of A. D. 554 in which the Lak̲h̲mid al-Mund̲h̲ir III b. al-Nuʿmān II was killed fighting the G̲h̲assānid al-Ḥārit̲h̲ b. Ḏj̲abala [ q.v.], in fact, the yawm al-Ḥalīma (see e.g. al-Bakrī, Muʿd̲j̲am mā ’staʿd̲j̲ama , i, 95; Yāḳūt, Buldān , ed. Beirut, iv, 175. Cf. A. P. Caussin de Perceval, Essai sur l’histoire des arabes avant l’Islamisme , Pari…

[see al-mahdī ʿubayd allāh ].

b. ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib , Abū Muḥammad, Companion and paternal cousin of the Prophet Muḥammad and younger brother of the famed scholar and reciter of traditions ʿAbd Allāh b. al-ʿAbbās [ q.v.], born in the year of the Hid̲j̲ra , died in the reign of Yazīd b. Muʿāwiya or in 85/704 or in 87/706. He was further related to the Prophet in that his mother Umm al-Faḍl bt. al-Ḥārit̲h̲ al-Hilāliyya was the sister of Muḥammad’s wife Maymūna [ q.v.] (Ibn Ḳutayba, Maʿārif , ed. ʿUkās̲h̲a, 121, 367; al-Balād̲h̲urī, Ansāb al-as̲h̲rāf , iii, ed. al-Dūrī, 447). Unlike his brother,…

[see fuḳahāʾ al-madīna al-sabʿa. V., in Suppl.].

, Abū Ḥātim, Arab commander of the Umayyads and governor in Sīstān, d. 79/698. The Abū Bakra family were of mawlā origin, Abū Bakra’s father being apparently an Abyssinian slave. Although he married a free Arab wife from the Banū ʿId̲j̲l, ʿUbayd Allāh himself retained a dark and swarthy complexion, being described as adg̲h̲am ; an attempted filiation of the family to al-Ḥārit̲h̲ b. Kalada [ q.v. in Suppl.], the so-called "Physician of the Arabs", was later disallowed by the caliph al-Mahdī. The family prospered in Basra as partisans of the Umayyads and through…

, Abu ’l-Ḥusayn, son of the historian, littérateur and bookman Ibn Abī Ṭāhir (d. 280/893 [ q.v.]), and a historian and author in his own right. Ibn al-Nadīm describes the father as a superior author ( Fihrist , 147) but al-Ḳifṭī considers him equally "assiduous in [his] reporting" ( Ḥukamāʾ , 111). He died in his home town, Bag̲h̲dād, in 313/925; his date of birth is unknown. The mention of ʿUbayd Allāh in the biographical literature rests on the fact that he is his father’s son and that he wrote a continuation of his father’s K. Bag̲h̲dād , a history, properly a regnally-organised ak̲h̲bār …

(or Bus̲h̲ayr) b. al-Māḥūz, leader of the Azāriḳa [ q.v.] sect of the Ḵh̲ārid̲j̲ites. (Al-)Māḥūz was the nickname of Yazīd b. Musāḥiḳ of the Banū Salīṭ b. al-Ḥārit̲h̲ b. Yarbūʿ of Tamīm. Several of the Banu ’l-Māḥūz, among them ʿUbayd Allāh, were among the Baṣran Ḵh̲ārid̲j̲ites who went to Mecca to support ʿAbd Allāh b. al-Zubayr [ q.v.] in 64/683 but deserted him when he would not denounce the caliph ʿUt̲h̲mān. They returned to Baṣra together with Nāfiʿ b. al-Azraḳ [ q.v.] and then joined his revolt. After Nāfiʿ was killed during fighting at Dūlāb (Ḏj̲umādā II 65/Dec.-Jan. …

, Umayyad governor of Egypt, Ifrīḳiya and al-Andalus, b. at an unknown date, d. after 123/741. He was chief of the tribe of Salūl of northern ʿIrāḳ and famed for his talent as an orator. Beginning a career in the administration, he was first appointed head of taxation in Egypt, and as such, told the caliph His̲h̲ām that the land of Egypt could yield more money, thereby provoking a revolt of the Copts in several districts. His links with the caliph seem to have been close, since at his request, His̲h̲ām dismisse…

, a son of the second caliph and Companion of the Prophet, d. 37/657. ʿUbayd Allāh was the son of ʿUmar b. al-Ḵh̲aṭṭāb by his wife Umm Kult̲h̲ūm Mulayka bt. Ḏj̲arwal of the Ḵh̲uzāʿa, who, divorced by ʿUmar after he converted to Islam, married a kinsman and remained pagan in Mecca. ʿUbayd Allāh is known principally for having avenged his father’s death in Ḏh̲u ’l-Ḥid̲j̲d̲j̲a/23 November 644 at the hands of Abū Luʾluʾa, a Persian slave of al-Mug̲h̲īra b. S̲h̲uʿba [ q.v.]. According to most accounts, once captured, Abū Luʾluʾa killed himself, so ʿUbayd Allāh turned his wrath on…

, Umayyad governor of Baṣra, Kūfa and the East, d. 67/686. The son of Ziyād b. Abīhi [ q.v.], ʿUbayd Allāh seems to have been groomed by his father for a successful life in politics, and in both policy and style, father and son are frequently paired by the sources. Some accounts explicitly connect ʿUbayd Allāh’s appointment as governor of Ḵh̲urāsān to his father’s death (thus al-Yaʿḳūbī, Taʾrīk̲h̲, ii, 281; al-Balād̲h̲urī, Futūḥ al-buldān , 410), but a precise chronology is elusive. According to Ḵh̲alīfa b. Ḵh̲ayyāṭ, Muʿāwiya appointed ʿUbayd Al…

, ruler in Transoxania of the Uzbeks or Özbegs [ q.v.] 940-6/1533-9. He was the son of Maḥmūd Sulṭān, son of S̲h̲āh-Būdāg̲h̲, son of the founder of the Uzbek confederacy, Abu ’l-Ḵh̲ayr Ḵh̲ān, a descendant of Čingiz Ḵh̲ān’s grandson S̲h̲ībān (hence the epithet “S̲h̲ībānī,” or “S̲h̲aybānī” [see s̲h̲ībānids ]). During his youth, ʿUbayd Allāh accompanied his uncle Muḥammad S̲h̲ībānī Ḵh̲ān ( r. 905-16/1500-10) on his sweeping victories over the Tīmūrids throughout Central Asia and Ḵh̲urāsān in order to re-establish Čingizid rule in the area. On 7 Muḥarram 913/…

[see ibn s̲h̲arya ].

, or Niẓām al-Dīn ʿUbayd Allāh al-Zākānī, Persian poet of the Mongol period who became especially famous for his satires and parodies. He was born into a family of scholars and state officials descending from Arabs of the Banū Ḵh̲afād̲j̲a [ q.v.] settled in the area of Ḳazwīn since early Islamic times. In 730/1329-30 the historian Ḥamd Allāh Mustawfī described him as a talented poet and a writer of learned treatises. A collection of Arabic sayings by prophets and wise men, entitled Nawādir al-amt̲h̲āl , belongs to this early period. When later in the same …

al-Anṣārī al-Madanī, a member of the Banū Ḥudayla of the Medinan clan of al-Nad̲j̲d̲j̲ār, secretary to Muḥammad in Medina and early collector of the Ḳurʾān; his date of death may have been anywhere between 19/640 and 35/656, according to Ibn al-Ḏj̲azarī, Ṭabaḳāt , no. 131. Known as sayyid al-ḳurrāʾ and renowned for his memory (he was able to recite the entire Ḳurʾān in 8 nights), Ubayy is said to have collected his own copy of the Ḳurʾān prior to the collection commanded by ʿUt̲h̲mān, while also having been involved in the latter’s collection. Both the contents and the sūra …

, conventionally El Obeid , the administrative centre of the Northern Kordofan Province in the modern Republic of the Sudan and the main town of the whole region of Kordofan (lat. 13° 10’ N., long. 30° 14’ E.). For its part in the history of the region, see kordofān .

, Ubbad̲h̲at/Ubbadat al-ʿArab , modern Úbeda in Spain, a small town, in the province of Jaén, some 12 km/7 miles from Bayyāsa/Baeza, said to have been founded in the time of ʿAbd al-Raḥmān II (206-38/822-52) and completed under his son Muḥammad I by the governor of Jaén, Hās̲h̲im b. ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz. The designation "of the Arabs" allegedly distinguished it from Ubbad̲h̲at Farwa in the kūra of Ilbīra/Elvira. Despite its supposedly new foundation, recent archaeological excavations have revealed material from the Late Empire in the vicinity …

, a town of mediaeval ʿIrāḳ situated in the Euphrates-Tigris delta region at the head of the Persian Gulf and famed as the terminal for commerce from India and further east. It lay to the east of al-Baṣra [ q.v.] on the right bank of the Tigris and on the north side of the large canal called Nahr al-Ubulla, which was the main waterway from al-Baṣra in a southeastern direction to ¶ the Tigris and further to ʿAbbādān and the sea. The length of this canal is generally given as four farsak̲h̲ s or two barīd s (al-Muḳaddasī). Al-Ubulla can be identified with ’Απολόγου ’Εμπόριον, mentioned in the Periplus m…

, the name of one of three closely related peoples that inhabited the Northwest Caucasus, the other two being the Abk̲h̲āz [ q.v.] and Circassians [see čerkes ]. The Ubyk̲h̲, self-designation a-Tpakh, lived between the Black Sea shore and the watershed of the Great Caucasus near present-day Sochi; in the south they bordered on Abk̲h̲āzians, elsewhere on Circassians. The Ubyk̲h̲, Sunnī Muslims, were at least bilingual, also speaking Circassian and/or Abk̲h̲āz. Their language, originally closer to Abk̲h̲āz, moved towards Circas…

, an ancient Indian, and then mediaeval Indo-Muslim town of the southwestern Pand̲j̲ab, subsequently coming within the Bahāwalpūr [ q.v.] Native State and now in Pākistān. It is situated some 56 km/35 miles to the west of Bahāwalpūr town and not far from the junction of the Indus and Chenab-Jhelum rivers (lat. 27° 18’ N., long. 71° 12’ E.). 1. History Alexander the Great seems to have founded a city called in the Greek sources Ussa-Alexandria. Uččh ¶ was certainly an ancient Hindu centre, known up to the 12th century as Dēōgaŕh "stronghold of the gods", and it is only th…

(a.) means basically "wood, piece of wood, plank, spar" (pls. aʿwād , ʿīdān ). I. In daily life 1. ʿŪd as perfume and incense and as a medicament In the Arabic materia medica it indicates the so-called "aloe wood". This designation, used in trade, is conventional but incorrect because aloe wood is called ṣabr [ q.v.]. ʿŪd has to do with certain kinds of resinous, dark-coloured woods with a high specific weight and a strong aromatic scent, which were used in medicine as perfume and incense ( ʿūd al-bak̲h̲ūr ) and were highly coveted because of their rarity and v…

, a small settlement on the Ḵh̲awr al-ʿUdayd, a creek on the southeastern coast of the Ḳaṭar [ q.v.] peninsula on the southern Gulf shores (iat 24° 33′ N., long. 51° 30′ E.). It lies in the area of the undefined frontier between Ḳaṭar and Abū Ẓaby [ q.v.], one of the constituent shaykhdoms of the United Arab Emirates [see al-imārāt al-ʿarabiyya al-muttaḥida , in Suppl.]. (Ed.) Bibliography See those to abū Ẓaby and Ḳaṭar.

, Udaipur , the usual more recent name for the region in southwestern Rād̲j̲āsthān known in Islamic Indian times as Mēwāŕ, and the name also of its main town, actually founded in 966/1599. For this Rād̲j̲pūt state, which strenuously opposed the Muslims from the 8th/14th century onwards until its conquest by the Mug̲h̲al Akbar in the later 10th/16th century, see mēwāŕ . The subsequent Native State of Udaypūr in British India became part of the first Rajasthan Union in April 1948, and is now a District of the Rajasthan State of the Indian Union. (Ed.) Bibliography See that to mēwāŕ, and also Imper…

[see adfū ].

, a small town in South India (lat. 18° 26′ N., long. 77° 11′ E.), in British Indian times the chef-lieu of a taluk in the Bīdar District of Ḥaydarābād State [ q.v.], now coming within the Maharashtra State of the Indian Union. It has a fort dating back to the end of the 9th/15th century. It was part of the lands of the Barīd S̲h̲āhs of Bīdar [ q.vv.], and then of their successors the ʿĀdil S̲h̲āhs of Bīd̲j̲apur [ q.vv.] until it was besieged by S̲h̲āh Ḏj̲ahān’s army in 1044/1635 and then incorporated into the Mug̲h̲al empire. Its chief fame stems from the fiercely-fought ba…

, Banū , a nomadic Arabian tribe of the Ḳuḍāʿa [ q.v.] federation. Its pedigree is: ʿUd̲h̲ra b. Saʿd Hud̲h̲aym b. Zayd b. Layt̲h̲ b. Sūd b. Aslum b. al-Ḥāf b. Ḳuḍāʿa. The ʿUd̲h̲ra were the central group among the descendants of Saʿd Hud̲h̲aym, and they incorporated several brother-clans such as the Ḥārit̲h̲ b. Saʿd Hud̲h̲aym and Salāmān b. Saʿd Hud̲h̲aym. These ʿUd̲h̲ra are not to be confused with the ʿUd̲h̲ra of the Kalb b. Wabara [ q.v.], i.e. ʿUd̲h̲ra b. Zayd Allāt b. Rufayda b. T̲h̲awr b. Kalb. One of the latter ʿUd̲h̲ra was the famous genealogist, Ibn al-Kalbī [see al-kalbī …

, nisba of the Arabian tribe ʿUd̲h̲ra [ q.v.] inhabiting the northern part of al-Ḥid̲j̲āz [ q.v.] ¶ in the region of Wādī ’l-Ḳurā. In the Umayyad period an elegiac amatory genre emerged among poets of the tribe, who expressed passionate desire for an unattainable beloved, chastity and faithfulness until death. ʿUd̲h̲rī love ( al-ḥubb al-ʿud̲h̲rī ) is a favourite theme in classical Arabic poetry and prose, and influenced Islamic philosophy and mysticism. The “Benou- Azra”, who, “when loving, die”, became known in European literature through Stendhal’s treatise De l’amour (1822) and i…

, Abu ’l-ʿAbbās Aḥmad b. ʿUmar b. Anas, Ibn al-Dalāʾī, traditionist and geographer, ¶ who was born at Almeria [see al-mariyya ] in 393/ 1003, and who died in the same town in 478/1085. Shortly after the Muslim conquest, his family had settled in the village of Dalias, from where the nisba of Dalāʾī comes. It is in fact thanks to al-ʿUd̲h̲rī that information is available on one of his predecessors, Zug̲h̲ayba b. Ḳuṭba, who supported the claim to the throne of Sulaymān, the son of ʿAbd al-Raḥmān I, against his brother His̲h̲ām. He was very young when he undertook the riḥla , …

, also ʿĀd̲j̲ b. ʿAnaḳ or ʿAnāḳ , the Arabic name of the Biblical ʿŌg, the giant king of Bas̲h̲an. The Ḳurʾān does not mention him. Al-Ṭabarī tells of his great stature and death: Moses was ten cubits in height, his staff ten cubits long, he jumped ten cubits high and smote ʿŪd̲j̲ in the heel; the body of the fallen giant served as a bridge across the Nile. Al-T̲h̲aʿlabī gives more details: ʿŪd̲j̲ was 23,333 cubits high, drank from the clouds, could reach to the bottom of the sea …

, a Turkish word equivalent to the ancient Greek/Byzantine ἄκρον, and meaning the frontier districts or marches. The borderlands between the Christian and the Muslim mediaeval worlds influenced historical developments considerably. In mediaeval Eastern Anatolia, those entrusted with the defence of the marches, in which they were established, were called ὰκρῖται on the Byzantine side and g̲h̲āzī s [ q.v.] on the Muslim one. The inhabitants of these districts were obliged to be continuously in readiness to confront an attack or to organise a raid themselv…

, ʿAbbāsid army commander who served al-Maʾmūn and al-Muʿtaṣim in the first half of the 3rd/9th century, d. 223/838. Nothing is recorded of his antecedents, but he seems to have been of Ḵh̲urāsānian or Transoxanian Arab stock; at the height of his career, he had a grant of the revenues of the market at Is̲h̲tīk̲h̲ān [ q.v. in Suppl.] near Samarḳand (Yāḳūt, Buldān , ed. Beirut, i, 196). He was originally a partisan of the rebel in Transoxania Rāfiʿ b. al-Layt̲h̲ [ q.v.], during the latter part of Hārūn al-Ras̲h̲īd’s reign, but went over to the caliphal side in 192/807-8 (al-Ṭa…

[see ud̲j̲ ].

[see wad̲j̲da ].

, a town of Central India in what was the mediaeval Islamic sultanate of Mālwā [ q.v.] and at times its capital. It is now a fair-sized town in the westernmost part of Madhya Pradesh State in the Indian Union (lat. 23° 11′ N., long. 75° 50′ E.). Renowned since Mauryan and Gupta times as a sacred site for Hindus, it also played a leading role in Indian astronomy, since the ancient Indians came to calculate longitudes from the meridian of Ud̲j̲d̲j̲ayn [see al-Ḳubba ]. Hence the town appears in Ptolemy’s Geography as Ozēnē, in the geographical section of Ibn Rusta’s encyclopaedia as ʾdh. y. n for Uzza…

[see al-ifrānī ].

, Muslims in. 1. The pre-colonial period Originally, Islam came into Uganda from three directions, i.e. the east and south along the established caravan routes of what is today Tanzania and Kenya [ q.vv.] and from the north, along the Nile in what is today Sudan [see sūdān ]. Later, Indian Muslims came into Uganda. Initially the contacts were almost exclusively with the kingdom of Buganda around the north-western end of Lake Victoria. Muslim traders who had established themselves in the Tabora region of present-day Tanzania by 1825 were trading at Koki in southern Bu…