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, a former fortress on the Black Sea, situated on the Bugur river 40 km. S. W. of the Kuban estuary. Built by French engineers for Sultan ʿAbd al-Ḥamīd I in 1781, it was unsuccessfully attacked by the Russians in 1787 and 1790, but stormed by Gen. Gudovich in 1791. Returned to Turkey by the treaty of Yassy (1791), it was in 1808 taken by the Russians but returned to Turkey in 1812. In 1828 it was blockaded by Admiral Greig and Prince Menshikov and ceded to Russia by the treaty of Adrianople of 1…

1. The most southern group of Kurd tribes in Persia. According to Zayn al-ʿĀbidīn, their name (Läk, often Läkk) is explained by the Persian word läk (100,000), which is said to have been the original number of families of Lak. The group is of importance in that the Zand dynasty arose from it. The Lak now living in northern Luristān [ q.v.] are sometimes confused with the Lur (Zayn al-ʿĀbidīn), whom they resemble from the somatic and ethnic point of view. The facts of history, however, show that the Lak have immigrated to their present settlements from lan…

(or Ṭuwārān?), the mediaeval Islamic name for the district around Ḳuṣdār [ q.v.] or Ḳuzdār in the east-central part of what is now Balūčistān, the territory in British Indian times of the Ḵh̲ānate of Kalāt [see kilat ]. According to al-Ṭabarī, i, 820, the kings of Ṭūrān and of Makurān (Makrān) submitted to the Sāsānid Ardas̲h̲īr (224-41). The Paikuli inscription only mentions the Makurān-S̲h̲āh. Herzfeld, Paikuli, 38, thought that these princes at first owned the suzerainty of the Sakas, and their submission to Ardas̲h̲īr was the result of the conquest of Sak…

, a small town belonging to Yazd and lying on the road from S̲h̲īrāz to Yazd (at 39 farsak̲h̲s from the former and at 28 fars. from the latter) and also connected by a road with Ābādah [ q.v.]. It lies in a plain, and according to Mustawfī, Nuzha , 121, its name ("on a mountain") refers to its earlier site. In 443/1051 Ṭug̲h̲ri̊lbeg gave Yazd and Abarḳūh to the Kākūyid Farāmarz (Ibn al-At̲h̲īr, ix, 384) as a compensation for the loss of Iṣfahān. His successors continued to rule these towns as atābeks . In the 8th/14th century Abarḳūh is frequently mentioned in the …

, “those of the White Sheep”, rederation of Turkmen tribes, which rose in the region of Diyār Bakr in post-Mongol times (in the 14th century) and lasted till c. 908/1502. The name (cf. Chalcocondyles, ch. ix: Λευκοὶ ᾿Ασπρο<προ>βατάντες) is unknown in earlier times. There is some uncertainty about the origin of the name, whether it refers to the breed of sheep, or to some kind of totem; the tumular stones of the Turkmens have often the form of rams, but such a symbol is absent in Uzun Ḥasan’s ban…

, the Persian and Turkish name of a town, in Georgian ak̲h̲al tsik̲h̲e , "New Fortress", situated on the Posk̲h̲ov river (left tributary of the upper Kur), centre of the Georgian province Samtsk̲h̲e (later Sa-atabago) which is mentioned among the conquests of Ḥabīb b. Maslama (under Muʿāwiya), al-Balād̲h̲urī, 203. ¶ Under the Mongols the local rulers (of the Ḏj̲akilʿe family) became autonomous and received the title of atabegs . The name Ḳurḳūra found in Persian and Turkish sources refers to these rulers of whom several bore the name of Ḳuarḳuare (see Brosset, Histoire de la Géorgie …

, “land of the Lurs”, a region in the south-west of Persia. In the Mongol period the terms “Great Lur” and “Little Lur” roughly covered all the lands inhabited by Lur tribes. Since the Ṣafawid period, the lands of the Great Lur have been distinguished by the names of Kūh-Gīlū and Bak̲h̲tiyārī. At the beginning of the 18th century, the Mamāsanī confederation occupied the old S̲h̲ūlistān [ q.v.] and thus created a third Lur territory between Kūh-Gīlū and S̲h̲īrāz. It is however only since the 16th century that Lur-i Kūčik [ q.v.] has been known as Luristān (for greater precision it was …

(in Persian Lor with o short), an Iranian people living in the mountains in southwestern Persia. As in the case of the Kurds, the principal link among the four branches of the Lurs (Mamāsanī, Kūhgīlūʾī, Bak̲h̲tiyārī and Lurs proper) is that of language. The special character of the Lur dialects suggests that the country was Iranicised from Persia and not from Media. On the ancient peoples, who have disappeared, become Iranicised or absorbed in different parts of Luristān, see luristān . The name. Local tradition ( Taʾrīk̲h̲-i guzīda ) connects the name of the …

, a dynasty of princes of Marāg̲h̲a. Distinction must be made between the eponym Aḥmadīl and his successors. Aḥmadīl b. Ibrāhīm b. Wahsūdān al-Rawwādī al-Kurdī was a descendant of the local branch of the originally Arab family of Rawwād (of Azd) established in Tabrīz (see rawwādids ). In the course of time the family became Kurdicized, and even the name Aḥmadīl is apparently formed with an Iranian (Kurdish) diminutive suffix -īl . Aḥmadīl took part in the anti-Crusade of 505/1111. During the siege of Tell Bās̲h̲ir, Jocelyn made an arrangement …

, geographically speaking, the highlands of Gīlān [ q.v.]. In the south, the lowlands of Gīlān proper are bounded by the Alburz range; the latter forms here a crescent, the eastern horn of which comes close to the Caspian coast (between Lāhīd̲j̲ān and Čālūs). In the centre of the crescent there is a gap through which the Safīd-rūd, formed on the central Iranian plateau, breaks through ¶ towards the Caspian Sea. Before entering the gorge at Mand̲j̲īl the river, flowing here from west to east, receives a considerable tributary, the S̲h̲āh-rūd, which, rising in t…

, a Persian man of letters, who died on 19 S̲h̲awwāl 1313/3 April 1896. His honorific titles were Sanīʿ al-Dawla and later Iʿtimād al-Salṭana . Through his mother he was related to the Ḳād̲j̲ārs [ q.v.] and through his father he claimed descent from the Mongol rulers. His father, Ḥād̲j̲d̲j̲ī ʿAlī K̲h̲ān of Marāg̲h̲a, was a faithful servant of Nāṣir al-Dīn S̲h̲āh (in 1268/1852 he discovered the conspiracy of Sulaymān K̲h̲ān) and the son from his youth upwards was in the service of the court. Muḥammad Ḥasan K̲h̲ān was one of the first students at the Dār al-F…

, a district in Ād̲h̲arbāyd̲j̲ān whose precise location is unknown. According to al-Balād̲h̲urī, Futūḥ , 328, Saʿīd b. al-ʿĀṣ [ q.v.], sent to conquer Ād̲h̲arbāyd̲j̲ān, attacked the people of Mūḳān and Gīlān. A number of inhabitants of Ād̲h̲arbāyd̲j̲ān and Armenians, who had gathered in the nāḥiya of Urm and at *Balwānkarad̲j̲, were defeated by one of Saʿīd’s commanders. The leader of the rebels was hanged on the walls of the fortress of Bād̲j̲arwān (see on this place, Ḥamd Allāh Mustawfī, Nuzhat al-Ḳulūb , 181, tr. 173; Bād̲j̲arwān was 20 farsak̲h̲ s north of Ardabīl). …

, a former k̲h̲ānate in the Persian province of Ad̲h̲arbāyd̲j̲ān, and now the name of a town and of modern administrative units around it (see below). Mākū occupies the north-western extremity of Persia and forms a salient between Turkey (the old sand̲j̲aḳ of Bāyazīd, modern vilayet of Ağri) and Soviet Transcaucasia. In the west the frontier with Turkey follows the heights which continue the line of the Zagros in the direction of Ararat. The frontier then crosses a plain stretching to the south of this mountain (valle…

(i) province of Persia; (ii) Soviet Socialist Republic. (i) The great province of Persia, called in Middle Persian Āturpātākān, older new-Persian Ād̲h̲arbād̲h̲agān, Ād̲h̲arbāyagān, at present Āzarbāyd̲j̲ān, Greek ’Ατροπατήνη, Byzantine Greek ’Αδραβιγάνων, Armenian Atrapatakan, Syriac Ad̲h̲orbāyg̲h̲ān. The province was called after the general Atropates (“protected by fire”), who at the time of Alexander’s invasion proclaimed his independence (328 B.C.) and thus preserved his kingdom (Media Minor, Strabo…

, a ruined site in Transcaspia (the modern Türkmenistan SSR) north-west of the confluence of the Atrak and its right bank tributary the Sumbar, or more exactly, on the road which runs from Čat at right angles to the road connecting Čikis̲h̲ler with the railway station of Aydi̊n. The ruins are surrounded by a wall of brick and a ditch and have an area of 320 acres. The old town, situated in the steppes which are now peopled by Turkomans, received its water from a canal led from the Atrak about 40 miles above Čat. Near the latter place, the can…

, literally, “land of the S̲h̲ūl” [see s̲h̲ūl. 1. above], a district, formerly a bulūk , in the southern Persian province of Fārs. Three epochs must be distinguished in the history of the district: one before the arrival of the S̲h̲ūl, the period of their rule (from the 7th/13th centuries), and the period of its occupation by the Mamassanī Lurs about the beginning of the 12th/18th century. During the Sāsānid period, the district was included in the kūra of S̲h̲āpūr-k̲h̲ūra. The founding of its capital Nawbandagan (Nawband̲j̲ān) is attributed to S̲h̲…

, Süldüz , a Mongol tribe which played a considerable role in mediaeval Islamic history of the Mongol and II K̲h̲ānid periods. According to Berezin, the correct Mongol form would be Süldes (pl. of sülde “good fortune”; Vladimirtsov interpreted sülde as “le génie-protecteur habitant le drapeau”). L. Ligeti, Die Herkunft des Volksnamens Kirgis , in Körösi Csoma Archivum , i (1925), saw in the ending of Suld-uz, as in Ḳi̊rḳ-i̊z, the remains of an ancient Turkish plural suffix (cf. biz “we”, siz “you”, etc.) and as a hypothetical singular quoted the name of a Ḳi̊rg̲h̲i̊z clan Su…

(called in Nog̲h̲ay Turkish, Ḳuman , in Čerkes, Phs̲h̲iz ), one of the four great rivers of the Caucasus (Rion, Kura, Terek and Ḳuban). It is about 450 miles long. It rises near Mount Elburz at a height of 13,930 feet. Its three constituents (K̲h̲urzuḳ, Ulu-Ḳam, Uč-Ḳulan) join together before reaching the defile through which the Ḳuban enters the plains (at a height of 1,075 feet). The Ḳuban at first runs through the wooded outer spurs of the mountains and then, taking a westerly di…

, name of a Turkish tribe in Persia. In particular, the name refers to the ruling faroily of the Ḳarā-Ḳoyūnlū federation of Türkmen tribes (also called Bārānī). It is most probable that the name (“those of Bahār”) is connected with the village of Bahār (Ibn al-At̲h̲īr, x, 290: W. hān , read Vahār ) situated at 13 kms. north of Hamadān. According to Ḥamd Allāh Mustawfī, Nuzha , 107 (Eng. transl. 106) the castle of Bahār served as residence to Sulaymān-s̲h̲āh b. Parčam Īwāʾī, who later became one of the three chief ministers of the caliph al…

, a district of the Caspian coastlands region of Persia comprising the western half of Māzandarān [ q.v.]. Iranian tradition. According to Darmesteter, Avesta , ii, 416, Rūyān corresponds to the mountain called Raodita (“reddish”) in Yas̲h̲t , 19, 2, and Rōyis̲h̲nōmand in Bundahis̲h̲n , xii, 2, 27 (tr. West, 34). Al-Bīrūnī, Chronologie , ed. Sachau, 220, makes Rūyān the scene of the exploits of the archer Āris̲h̲ (cf. Ẓahīr al-Dīn Marʿas̲h̲ī, Taʾrīk̲h̲-i Ṭabaristān u Rūyān u Māzandarān , ed. Dorn, 18 [ Yas̲h̲t 8, 6, in this connection mentions the hill Aryō-xs̲h̲nθa]). In the …