, sometimes connected with nifrīt , wicked, is an epithet expressing power, cunning and insubordination. In spite of its aberrant form, the word seems to be of Arabic origin. The lexicographers consider it to derive from the verb ʿafara , “to roll someone in the dust” and, by extension, “to bring low”. The word is used rarely in Arabic poetry of the time of the Hid̲j̲ra and is found only once in the Ḳurʾān. To Solomon’s request that he should be brought the throne of the queen of Sheba, “an ʿifrīt of the d̲j̲inns said, ‘I shall bring it to you before you can rise f…

[see ʿifrīt ].

(sometimes given in Western sources as ʿAfar ), a small tribe in Oman in eastern Arabia. ¶ The nisba is ʿIfārī. The tribesmen, who are nomads, range through the sayḥ or steppe east of the southeastern corner of al-Rubʿ al-K̲h̲ālī. One of the landmarks in This district is Ḳārat al-Kibrīt (the Sulphur Hill). West of the hill is Wādī al-ʿUmayrī, one of a number of valleys which run down to the quicksands of Umm al-Samīm [ q.v.]. North of al-ʿIfār is the tribe of al-Durūʿ [ q.v.], while to the east are sections of al-D̲j̲anaba [ q.v.] and the tribes of Āl Wahība [ q.v.] and al-Ḥikmān. Other sections o…

, the werewolf. The Arabic word goes back to Syriac ḳanṭrōpos (or ḳanṭrōpa ), which was subsequently transformed into the Arabic ḳuṭrub in the same way as other names of animals, like d̲j̲undub “locust” or ḳunfud̲h̲ “hedgehog”. Kanṭrōpos itself is the Syriac transcription of Greek λυκάνθρωπος. The saga of the werewolf is by itself indigenous to Arcadia in the central Peloponnesus (see Pausanias, viii, 2), but has many parallels amongst the Romans, Celts, Teutons and Slavs. Originally it was unknown to the Orient, and the Arabs came to know …

, a female spirit, diversely referred to as a d̲j̲inniyya (a female d̲j̲innī [ q.v.]), an ʿafrīta [see ifrīt ] or a g̲h̲ūla [see g̲h̲ūl ], by the peoples of northern Morocco. Westermarck classifies her as one of the “individual spirits” whose characteristics are more explicitly elaborated than those of the run-of-the-mill d̲j̲inn . Although there is some difference of belief in her attributes, ʿĀʾis̲h̲a Ḳandīs̲h̲a is said generally to appear as either a wondrous beauty or an old, wrinkled hag with elongated nipples, pendulous…

(originally dew , Avestan daeva , Sanskrit dēva ), in Persian the name of the spirits of evil and of darkness, creatures of Ahriman, the personification of sins; their number is legion; among them are to be distinguished a group of seven principal demons, including Ahriman, opposed to the seven Ams̲h̲aspand (Av. aməša spənta , the “Immortal Holy Ones”). “The collective name of the daiva designates ... exclusively the inimical gods in the first place, then generally other supernatural beings who, being by nature evil, are opposed to the good and true faith .... These daiva, these dēv …

(al-Maḥallī on coins) al-filālī al-sid̲j̲ilmāssī , the name by which abu ’l-ʿabbās aḥmad b. ʿabd allāh is known, one of the chief pretenders who took part in the ruin of Morocco during the agony of the Saʿdid [ q.v.] dynasty and whose brief spell of success has a useful illustrative value. We know by his autobiography, which forms the beginning of his still-unpublished book, the Kitāb Iṣlīt al-k̲h̲irrīt fi ’l-ḳaṭʿ bi-ʿulūm al-ʿifrīt , but which al-Ifrānī gives in his Nuzha , that he was born at Sid̲j̲ilmāssa in 967/1559-60 into a family of jurists, whi…

, older orthography (e.g. in Ibn Rusta, 171) K̲h̲wāb, a rustāḳ or rural district of Ḳūhistān in eastern Persia, lying between the district of Bāk̲h̲arz [ q.v.] to the north and that of Ḳāʾin to the southwest, and adjacent to the modern Iran-Afg̲h̲ānistān border. The geographers of the 4th/10th century mention the towns there of Salūmak ( Ḥudūd al-ʿālam , tr. 103, Salūmīd̲h̲), Fard̲j̲ird and Kusūy(a), the latter being especially populous. Yāḳūt, Buldān , ed. Beirut 1374-6/1955-7, ii, 399, describes the district as having 200 villages and three si…

(A., pl. g̲h̲īlān or ag̲h̲wāl ), fabulous being believed by the ancient Arabs to inhabit desert places and, assuming different forms, to lead travellers astray (sometimes, like the Bedouins, lighting fires on the hills the more easily to attract them), to fall upon them unawares and devour them; certain isolated sources (cf. al-Masʿūdī, Murūd̲j̲ , iii, 315) affirm however that it fled as soon as it was challenged; according to al-Ḏj̲āḥiẓ ( Ḥayawān , i, 309), it rode on hares, dogs and ostriches; men could kill it, but only by giving it one singl…

(a.), evil spirit, demon, devil. 1. In pre-Islamic Arabia. According to the lexicographers, s̲h̲ayṭān is derived from the verb s̲h̲aṭana “to detain somebody in order to divert him from his intention and his destination”, s̲h̲aṭan being “a cord” and s̲h̲āṭin “an evil man”. The verbs s̲h̲ayṭana and tas̲h̲ayṭana signify “to behave like the shayṭan ”. The s̲h̲ayṭān is an evil, rebellious spirit, inhabiting Hell-Fire; he cannot be seen, but he is imagined as a being of great ugliness (al-D̲j̲āḥiẓ, Ḥayawān , vi, 213). Proverbs underline his wickedness, his c…

according to the Muslim conception bodies ( ad̲j̲sām ) composed of vapour or flame, ¶ intelligent, imperceptible to our senses, capable of appearing under different forms and of carrying out heavy labours (al-Bayḍāwī, Comm. to Ḳurʾān, LXXII, 1; al-Damīrī, Ḥayawān , s.v. d̲j̲inn ). They were created of smokeless flame (Ḳurʾān, LV, 14) while mankind and the angels, the other two classes of intelligent beings, were created of clay and light. They are capable of salvation; Muḥammad was sent to them as well as to mankind…

may be considered as the maṣdar of karuma “to be generous, be beneficent, be karīm (one of the “99 Most beautiful names of God” [see al-asmāʾ al-ḥusnā ]). The root KRM appears frequently in the Ḳurʾān, and God is called there al-Karīm “the Generous One”; the actual term karāma is not however found there. If it was later adopted as a synonym of the maṣdars of forms II and IV ( takrīm and ikrām ), this seems very likely to have come about through phonetic assimilation to the Greek χάρισμα. In the technical vocabulary of the religious sciences, karāma (pl. karāmāt ) from now …

(a.), pl. of the maṣdar or verbal noun taḳlīd , the Form II verb ḳallada having the meaning, inter alia, “to mimic, imitate” (for taḳlīd in its legal and theological context, see the art. s.v.), is used in Arabic today for the ensemble of inherited folk traditions and practices, popular customs and manners, and folklore in general, although the loanword from English fulklūr , is often used, especially for the discipline and its study at large. In recent years also, the term al-turāt̲h̲ al-s̲h̲aʿbī “folk inheritance” is being used to denote the common Arabic heritage of popular culture. Accor…

i.—Geography The Republic of Indonesia comprises some four-fifths of the archipelago which, stretching eastwards from the south-eastern angle of Asia, separates the Indian from the Pacific Ocean, at the same time as it constitutes a discontinuous land link between Asia and Australasia. Extending for approximately 3,400 miles from west to east, and about 1,250 miles from north to south (in a zone bounded by longitudes 92° and 141° east and by latitudes 6° north and 11° south), it embraces some 3,0…