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(a.), verbal noun of nat̲h̲ara “to scatter, spread abroad”, in the pre-modern Middle East, the showering of money, jewels and other valuables on occasions of rejoicing, such as a wedding, a circumcision, the accession of a ruler, the victorious return from a military campaign, the reception of a diplomatic envoy, recovery from illness, etc. It was thus in part one aspect of the general practice of largesse and present giving by superiors to inferiors [see hiba , [see inʿām , k̲h̲ilʿa ] but also an aspect of charity to the poor. On occasion, the whole of…

, name of the Adriatic in Arabic geographical works. (Ed.)

, the name of a family of Berber “physicians”, whose ancestor, Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad (d. 1070/1658-60) left the Sūs and settled at Fās; he must have used completely empirical methods, but nevertheless obtained significant results. Ibn S̲h̲akrūn [ q.v. in Suppl.] was the pupil of a certain Aḥmad b. Muḥammad Ādarrāḳ, who was probably the son of the above-mentioned person, but the best-known member of the family was this Aḥmad’s son, abu muḥammad ʿabd al-wahhāb b. aḥmad ( b. ca . 1077/1666, d. 28 Ṣafar 1159/22 March 1746), who was attached to Mawlāy Ismā…

(a.), the verbal noun from the form II verb kaffara “to declare someone a kāfir or unbeliever”. 1. General definition. From earliest Islamic times onwards, this was an accusation hurled at opponents by sectarians and zealots, such as the K̲h̲ārid̲j̲ites [ q.v.]; but a theologian like al-G̲h̲azālī [ q.v.] held that, since the adoption of kufr was the equivalent here of apostasy, entailing the death penalty [see murtadd ], it should not be lightly made ( Fayṣal al-tafriḳa bayn al-Islam wa ’l-zandaḳa , quoted in B. Lewis, The political language of Islam, Chicago-London 1988, 85-6). It ha…

(Ar.), sea and also large perennial river.— The articles which follow treat of the principal seas known to the Arabs, but it is convenient to note here that in Islamic cosmology, on the basis of a conception generally related on the authority of Kaʿb al-Aḥbār [ q.v.], the mountain Ḳāf [ q.v.], which encircles the terrestial sphere, is itselt surrounded by seven concentric intercommunicating seas; these seas bear respectively the following names: Nīṭas (or Bayṭas̲h̲), Ḳaynas (or Ḳubays), al-Aṣamm, al-Sākin, al-Mug̲h̲allib (or al-Muẓlim), al-Muʾan…

(a.), a term of Fāṭimid administrative usage, also called the Ṣāḥib al-Bāb , i.e. head chamberlain. He was equal in status to the Isfahsālār or Muḳaddam al-ʿAskar , the commander-in-chief of the army, and the two of them setded all matters of military organisation. According to al-Ḳalḳas̲h̲andī, Ṣubḥ , iii, 483, vi, 7-8, he was second in the civilian administrative hierarchy after the wazīr himself and could hear maẓālim [ q.v.] when the wazīr was pre-occupied. (Ed.) Bibliography See also W. Björkman, Beiträge zur Geschichte der Staatskanzlei im islamischen Ä gypten, Hamburg 1928, 98.

, muḥammad b. aḥmad b. muḥammad , poet and littérateur of the 4th/10th century whose origin is unknown. He seems to have undergone many vicissitudes, since he appears in the service of Sayf al-Dawla, of al-Ṣāḥib Ibn ʿAbbād and of the ruler of K̲h̲urāsān, where he met Abu ’l-Farad̲j̲ al-Iṣfahānī, and he also resided in Egypt, in the D̲j̲abal, and in Transoxania, at S̲h̲ās̲h̲. The surviving verses of this great traveller are occasional pieces without any great originality, but he seems also to have been the author of several epistles and books, in particular, of a Tuḥfat al-kuttāb fi ’l-rasā…

This Persian term “master of the house, head of the family”, Pahlavi katak-xvatai, acquired, in addition to the above meanings, those of husband, chief of a tribe, headman of a village and tithe-officer in a town (Chardin, Voyages , ed. 1811, iv, 77, “dixenier de quartier”) responsible to the kalāntar [ q.v.] (cf. M. Muʿīn, Persian dictionary, Tehran 1345, iii, 2921). In Ottoman Turkish, it evolved into the form k y ahya , with the meanings “steward of a household”, “head of an artisans’ gild” (see below). (i) In Ottoman Turkish administrative usage Already in Il-K̲h̲ānid Persia we find the ka…

(a.), a legal term denoting a lease for agricultural planting, often treated by authors in parallel to the musāḳāt [ q.v.], agreement for the payment of rent in kind, of which it is in some ways a particular kind, more favourable to the lessee. The commentators are silent about the juridical origins of this institution, and there is not the slightest mention of it in the Ḳurʾān or Sunna. Nevertheless, mug̲h̲ārasa is one of the most-used forms of contract. Under its terms, the owner of a piece of land charges a person with the planting of tree…

, name of a certain number of Moroccan families, of Jewish origin but converts to Islam. One of the best-known of them is the family to which belonged Abū muḥammad ʿAbd al-Ḳādir b. Aḥmad , who towards the end of the 12th/18th century pursued religious studies under the direction of such famous scholars as Ibn al-Ḥād̲j̲d̲j̲ [ q.v.], Ḥamdūn, Ibn Sūda [ q.v.], Aḥmad and Ibn Kīrān [ q.v. in Suppl.]. Being an immediate disciple of Mawlāy al-ʿArbī al-Darḳāwī [see darḳāwa ], he joined the religious order which the latter had recently founded. He made his first pilgrimage, and wrote about this in a Riḥla …

(Tk. "Great Khan"), a title borne by various of the ethnically Turkish Dihlī Sultans in 7th-8th/13th-14th century Muslim India, including the Slave King G̲h̲iyāt̲h̲ al-Dīn Balban (664-86/1266-87 [ q.v. in Suppl.] and then, as a prince, Sultan Muḥammad b. Tug̲h̲luḳ (724 or 725-52/1324 or 1325-51 [ q.v.]. It was further borne by non-Turks, including several Ḥabs̲h̲īs, hence of servile black East African origin, above all in the sultanate of Gud̲j̲arāt [see Ḥabs̲h̲ī , at Vol. III, 16a]. (Ed.)

, Sirād̲j̲ al-Dīn Abū Ḥafṣ ʿUmar , S̲h̲āfiʿī scholar, d. in D̲h̲u ’l-Ḳaʿda 861/September-October ¶ 1457. He is said to be the author of the K̲h̲arīdat al-ʿad̲j̲āʾib wa-farīdat al-g̲h̲arāʾib , a sort of geography and natural history without any scientific value. In spite of the authorities mentioned in the introduction (al-Masʿūdī, al-Ṭūsī, Ibn al-At̲h̲īr, al-Marrākus̲h̲ī), the K̲h̲arīda is merely a plagiarism of the Ḏj̲āmiʿ al-funūn wa-salwat al-maḥzūn of Nad̲j̲m al-Dīn Aḥmad b. Ḥamdān b. S̲h̲abīb al-Ḥarrānī al-Ḥanbalī, who lived in Egypt circa 732/1332. The work has neverth…

(Malay), an amulet, more particularly a written amulet. The word is of Arabic origin = ʿazīma [see Ḥamāʾil ]. (Ed.)

, the name of a valley near to Mecca, a short distance from the road to al-Ṭāʾif, cited, especially in old poetry, because the tomb of Abū Rig̲h̲āl [ q.v.] was traditionally located there. The correct reading of the toponym is not however certain, with variation between al-Mag̲h̲ammas, al-Mug̲h̲ammis and al-Mug̲h̲ammas. The latter form seems to be the most plausible, for it denotes a spot covered with scrub and bushes in which it is possible to hide, and, according to a tradition, it was there that the Prophet would go asid…

, the pen name ( mak̲h̲laṣ ) used by a number of Ottoman poets whose poetry is known to date mainly through the samples found in med̲j̲mūʿa s and ted̲h̲kire s. Judging by these, they are all poets of secondary importance at best. Two should be singled out. 1. Maḥmūd Efendi of Gelibolu (Gallipoli), known as Ḳara Maḥmūd (or Ḳara Ḳāḍī-zāde according to Beyānī). A mülāzim of S̲h̲ayk̲h̲ al-Islām Abu ’l-Suʿūd Efendi [ q.v.], he first became a müderris . After being dismissed from a position with a daily salary of forty aḳče s, he was appointed in 984/1576 to the S̲h̲āh Ḵh̲ūbān medrese …

, the form found in mediaeval Indo-Muslim sources for a town of northwestern India, in the 12th century geography of Kas̲h̲mīr by Kalhaṇa called Udabhānda, now marked by the settlement of Hund some 9 km/15 miles north-east of Attock [see at́ak ] in Pakistan. It was the capital of the powerful Hindu-S̲h̲āhī dynasty of Indian princes who opposed Sebüktigin and his son Maḥmūd of G̲h̲azna in the late 4th/10th and early 5th/11th centuries, until Maḥmūd finally vanquished Rād̲j̲ā D̲j̲aypāl; for further details, see hindū-s̲h̲āhīs . (Ed.) Bibliography See that for hindu-s̲h̲āhīs, to which s…

, ruler in Transoxania, from his capital Buk̲h̲ārā, of the Turco-Mongol S̲h̲ībānid [ q.v.] or Abu ’l-Ḵh̲ayrid dynasty, ruled 968-91/1561-83. Iskandar was in fact a weak and ineffective ruler. Real power was in the hands of his son ʿAbd Allāh, who had shown his ability against rival families in Transoxania as early as 958/1551 and who became the greatest of the S̲h̲ībānids; after his father’s death he was to reign unchallenged for a further sixteen years [see ʿabd allāh b. iskandar ]. For the course of events in these decades, see s̲h̲ībānids and R.D. McChesney, EIr art. Central Asia . vi. In th…

(a.), with Ṣiyām , maṣdar from the root s-w-m; the two terms are used indiscriminately. The original meaning of the word in Arabic is “to be at rest” (Th. Nöldeke, Neue Beiträge zur sem. Sprachw ., Strassburg 1910, 36, n. 3; see previously, S. Fränkel, De vocab. ... in Corano peregrinis, Leiden 1880, 20: “quiescere” ). The meaning “fasting” may have been taken from Judaeo-Aramaic and Syriac usage, when Muḥammad became better acquainted with the institution of fasting in Medina; This is the sense of the word in the Medinan sūras. Origin ofthe rite. That fasting was an unknown practice …

(a.), the name of the fifteenth metre in Arabic prosody [see ʿarūd ]. It comprises, in each hemistich, four feet made up of one short and two longs ( faʿūlun ). A certain number of licences are possible, in particular, the omission of the fourth foot, the shortening or even the cutting out of the third syllable of a foot, etc. (Ed.) Bibliography M. Ben Cheneb, Tuḥfat al-adab 3, Paris 1954, 87-93.

(p., lit. “palace-curtain”), the term applied in the sources for the Great Sald̲j̲ūḳs and the Rūm Sald̲j̲ūḳs to the great tent carried round by the sultans, regarded, with the čatr or miẓalla [ q.v.], as one of the emblems of sovereignty. It is described in such sources as Rāwandī, Ras̲h̲īd al-Dīn and Ibn Bībī as being red, the royal colour, and as having internal curtained compartments forming rooms. (Ed.) Bibliography İ.H. Uzunçarşılı, Osmanlı devleti teşkilâtina medhal, Istanbul 1941, 31, 37, 121 Sukumar Ray, Bairam Khan, Karachi 1992, 232.