Search

Your search for 'dc_creator:( "Bosworth, C.E." ) OR dc_contributor:( "Bosworth, C.E." )' returned 696 results. Modify search

Sort Results by Relevance | Newest titles first | Oldest titles first

Suleymān Čelebi

(430 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, Ottoman prince and eldest son of Bāyezīd I [ q.v.], ruler in Rumelia and a considerable part of northern and northwestern Anatolia in the confused years after Bāyezīd’s defeat and capture by Tīmūr at the Battle of Ankara in 804/1402, b. ?779/1377, d. 813/1411. He is heard of in 800/1398, when his father sent him against the Aḳ Ḳoyunlu Ḳara Yülük at Sivas, and he fought at Bāyezīd’s side, together with his brothers, at Ankara. He managed to escape to Europe with his retainers by being ferried across the Bosphorus by the Genoese. He had to…

Tilsam

(2,286 words)

Author(s): Ruska, J. | Carra de Vaux, B. | Bosworth, C.E.
, also tilsim , tilism , tilasm , etc. from the Greek τέλεσμα, a talisman, i.e. an inscription with ¶ astrological and other magic signs or an object covered with such inscriptions, especially also with figures from the zodiacal circle or the constellations and animals which were used as magic charms to protect and avert the evil eye. The Greek name is evidence of its origin in the late Hellenistic period and gnostic ideas are obviously reflected in the widespread use of such charms. The sage Balīnās or Balīnūs [ q.v.], i.e. Apollonius of Tyana ( fl. 1st century A.D.), is said to have been…

Ḳi̊zi̊l-Ḳum

(373 words)

Author(s): Barthold, W. | Bosworth, C.E.
(t. “Red sand”), a desert between the Si̊r-Daryā and Āmū-Daryā rivers [ qq. v., and also ḳarā-ḳum ], falling within the modern Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan SSRs. The country is less uniform, especially in the central part, than in the Ḳarā-Ḳum; the sand desert is crossed by several ranges of hills, and in some places is rocky. The Ḳi̊zi̊l-Ḳum ¶ becomes more and more inhospitable as one goes southwards. The region called Adam-Ḳi̊zi̊lg̲h̲an (“where man perishes”) between the Āmū-Daryā and the cultivated region of Buk̲h̲ārā, consisting of sandhills ( bark̲h̲ān ), is …

al-Ṭabarī

(5,580 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, Abū Ḏj̲aʿfar Muḥammad b. Ḏj̲arīr b. Yazīd, polymath, whose expertises included tradition and law but who is most famous as the supreme universal historian and Ḳurʾān commentator of the first three or four centuries of Islam, born in the winter of 224-5/839 at Āmul, died at Bag̲h̲dād in 310/923. . 1. Life. It should be noted at the outset that al-Ṭabarī’s own works, in so far as they have been preserved for us, give little hard biographical data, though they often give us leads to his teachers and authorities and help in the evaluation of his per…

Yārkand

(2,444 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, a town of the Tarim basin, Eastern Turkestan, now coming within the Sinkiang/Xinjiang Autonomous Region of the People’s republic of China and having in Chinese the (revived) name of So-chʾe/Shache (lat. 38° 27’ N., long. 77° 16’ E., altitude 1,190 m/3,900 feet). Yārkand lies on the river of the same name, which rises in the northern part of the Karakoram mountains near the imperfectly delineated border between Kas̲h̲mīr and China and then flows eastwards to join the Tarim river; with its perennial flow, it is the main source stream of …

Tamīm b. Baḥr al-Muṭṭawwiʿ

(201 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, Arab traveller in Central Asia in early ʿAbbāsid times and the only Muslim one who has left us a record of his visit to the capital of the Uyg̲h̲ur Turks (pre-840) on the Ork̲h̲on river [ q.v.] in Mongolia, most probably Ḳarabalg̲h̲asun, the Khara Balghasun of the modern Mongolian Republic. It may be assumed that Tamīm was an Arab, possibly one of those settled within K̲h̲urāsān, and his nisba implies that he had been a fighter for the faith against pagans. He certainly seems to have been a great traveller in the steppes, since he says that he also visited the Turkish Kimäk [ q.v.] and their king…

ʿUd̲j̲ayf b. ʿAnbasa

(220 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, 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…

Sūyāb

(239 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, a settlement in the Semirečye region of Central Asia [see yeti su ] mentioned in the history of the Early Turks and their connections with the adjacent Islamic lands. It apparently lay slightly to the north of the Ču river valley, hence just north of the modern Kirghizia-Kazakstan border. Minorsky suggested that the name means “canal ( āb ) on the Ču”. At the time of the Arab incursions into Central Asia, the chief ordu or encampment of the Türgesh ruler Su-lu was located at Sūyāb; it was sacked by the incoming Chinese army in 748, and then in 766 the site was occupied by the Ḳarluḳ [ q.v.] when they…

Nawbandad̲j̲ān

(194 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, Nūbandad̲j̲ān (also Nūband̲j̲ān, according to Yāḳūt, Muʿd̲j̲am , ed. Beirut, v, 307), a town of the province of Fārs in mediaeval Islamic Persia. It lay in the district of S̲h̲ābūr K̲h̲urra roughly midway between Iṣṭak̲h̲r and Arrad̲j̲ān [ q.vv.] on the road linking S̲h̲īrāz with K̲h̲ūzistān. The geographers describe the town as populous and ¶ flourishing, with fine markets and a good running water supply. It flourished under the Būyids, was destroyed by the S̲h̲abānkāra Kurds of Abū Saʿd in the 5th/11th century, but was rebuilt by the Sald̲j̲ūḳ M…

Sabzawār

(477 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, the name for two towns of the eastern Iranian world. 1. Sabzawār in western Ḵh̲urāsān was, together with Ḵh̲usrūd̲j̲ird, one of the two townships making up the administrative district of Bayhaḳ [ q.v.], the name by which the whole district was generally known in mediaeval Islamic times. It lay in the cultivable zone on the northern rim of the Das̲h̲t-i Kawīr or Great Desert. Sabzawār itself is described in the Ḥudūd al-ʿālam , tr. 102, §23.2, as a small town and as the chef-lieu ( ḳaṣaba ) of a district; the Arabic geographers merely mention it as a stage along the roads of Ḵh̲urāsān and as a rūstāḳ…

Ṭūr ʿAbdīn

(5,793 words)

Author(s): Streck, M. | Bosworth, C.E. | W.P. Heinrichs
, “mountain of the [Christian] devotees”, a mountainous plateau region of northern Mesopotamia, in early Islamic times coming within the province of Diyār Bakr [ q.v.] and now, in the Turkish Republic, coming within the il of Mardin. It has been notable throughout the Islamic period for the survival—at least until the later 20th century—of a vigorous Syriac Christianity, with many churches and monasteries. 1. Geography. Ṭūr ʿAbdīn stretches roughly from Mārdīn [ q.v.] in the west to D̲j̲azīrat Ibn ʿUmar [ q.v.], the modern Turkish town of Cizre, in the east. To its north and …

Kis̲h̲

(1,978 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, Kis̲h̲s̲h̲ , the later S̲h̲ahr-i Sabz , a town of mediaeval Transoxania, now in the Uzbekistan SSR and known simply as S̲h̲ahr, but in early times in the region of Soghdia (Ar. Ṣug̲h̲d [ q.v.]). It lay on the upper reaches of the landlocked K̲h̲as̲h̲ka Daryā in an area where several streams came down from the Sayām and Buttamān Mountains to the east, forming a highly fertile valley, intersected with irrigation canals. The town lay on the Samaḳand-Tirmid̲h̲ high road, two days’ journey from Samarḳand; after passing through Kis̲h…

Ṭog̲h̲ri̊l

(182 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
(t.), a designation in Old Turkish for a bird of prey, described by Maḥmūd al-Kās̲h̲g̲h̲arī ¶ as larger than a ṣonḳur , a possibility is the Crested Goshawk, Astur trivirgatus . It was certainly used for hunting purposes [see for this, bayzara ]. Its chief importance, however, in early Turkish history and culture, from Uyg̲h̲ur times onwards, was as a frequent personal name. In Islamic times, its most notable holder was Ṭog̲h̲ri̊l Beg [ q.v.], co-founder with his brothers Čag̲h̲ri̊ Beg [ q.v.] and Big̲h̲u (whose names are also those of avian raptors) of the fortunes of the Great Sald̲j̲ūḳs [ q.…

Yaʿḳūb b. al-Layt̲h̲

(1,282 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
al-Saffār (“the coppersmith”), Abū Yūsuf, adventurer in Sīstān and founder of the dynasty there of Ṣaffārids [ q.v.], functioned as amīr in Sīstān from 247/861 and then as ruler of an extensive military empire in the eastern Islamic lands until his death in 265/879, in practice independent of the ʿAbbāsid caliphs. The origins of Yaʿḳūb’s family in Sīstān were clearly humble, despite attempts of later historians to elevate his father al-Layt̲h̲ to the status of head of the guild of coppersmiths in the province. He was one of four brothers who were members of local bands of ʿayyārs [ q.v.], in …

Masʿūd b. Maḥmūd

(795 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, Abū Saʿīd , S̲h̲ihāb al-Dawla , D̲j̲amāl al-Milla , etc., sultan of the G̲h̲aznawid [ q.v.] dynasty, reigned 421-32/1030-40. The eldest son of the great Maḥmūd b. Sebüktigin [ q.v.], he was born in 388/998. In 406/1015-16, as walī ʿahd or heir apparent, he was made governor of Harāt and in 411/1020 led an expedition into the still-pagan enclave of G̲h̲ūr [ q.v.] in central Afg̲h̲ānistān. When in 420/1029 Maḥmūd annexed the northern Būyid amirate of Ray and D̲j̲ibāl and attacked the Kākūyids [ q.v.] of Iṣfahān and Hamad̲h̲ān. Masʿūd was placed in charge of these operations in western Persia. S…

Rūm Ḳalʿesi

(1,691 words)

Author(s): Honigmann, E. | Bosworth, C.E.
, ḳalʿat al-rūm , a fortress in mediaeval northern Syria, which lay on the right bank of the Euphrates river where it takes its great westernmost bend, hence to the north-north-west of Bīred̲j̲ik [ q.v.]. Its site accordingly comes within the modern Turkish province ( il) of Gaziantep. According to Arnold Nöldeke’s description, it is situated “on a steeply sloping-tongue of rock, lying along the right bank of the Euphrates, which bars the direct road to the Euphrates from the west for its tributary the Merziman as it breaks through the edge o…

Kilāt, Kalāt, Kelāt

(1,246 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, the name of a town and of an extensive region, formerly a K̲h̲anate, of Balūčistān, now a District of Pakistan. (1) The town (often called Kalāt-i Balūč to distinguish it from the Afg̲h̲ān Kalāt-i G̲h̲ilzay) lies in lat. 28° 53′ N. and long. 66° 28′ E. at an altitude of 6,800 feet, and has in recent centuries been the centre of the K̲h̲ānate of Kalāt; until the rise of Quetta as a military base of British India [see kwat́t́a ] it was the most important town of Balūčistān. The name Kalāt or Kilāt represents Arabic ḳalʿa and Persian ḳala / ḳalāt , often pronounced kilā / kilāt i…

Maymūn-Diz

(249 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, a castle of the Ismāʿīlīs [see ismāʿīliyya ] in the Alburz Mountains in northwestern Iran, the mediaeval region of Daylam [ q.v.]. ¶ Ras̲h̲īd al-Dīn states that it was built in 490/1097 by the Grand Master of the Assassins Ḥasan-i Sabbāḥ or by his successor Kiyā Buzurg-Ummīd in the early 6th/12th century. Ḏj̲uwaynī, tr. Boyle, II, 621-36, cf. M. G. S. Hodgson, The order of the Assassins , The Hague 1955, 265 ff., has a detailed account of the fortress’s reduction by the Il-Ḵh̲ān Hülegü in S̲h̲awwāl 654/November 1256. The Mongols besieged …

Muḳāsama

(1,417 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E. | Gerber, H.
(a.), lit. “dividing out”, a system of raising the k̲h̲arād̲j̲ or land tax. 1. In the caliphate. This involved the levy, by agreement, of a percentage or share of the crops, usually taken when these last had ripened. The early sources on law and finance, up to the time of al-Māwardī [ q.v.], distinguished it from the system of misāḥa [ q.v.] “measurement” or assessment of a fixed lump sum on the land according to its fertility, location, etc, and from the system of muḳāṭaʿa [ q.v.] which implied a fixed annual sum payable without regard to the variations of prosperity and harvest and often the ¶ sub…

Sārī

(436 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, Arabic form Sāriya, a town of the Caspian region of Persia, in mediaeval Islamic times within the province of Ṭabaristān, now in the modern province of Māzandarān [ q.v.] (lat. 36° 33′ N., long. 53° 06′ E.). It lies some 32 km/20 miles from the Caspian Sea on the Tīd̲j̲in river ( Ḥudūd al-ʿālam , tr. 77: Tīžin-Rūd̲h̲) and in the hot and humid coastal plain; the surrounding region has always been famous for its silk production and its fruits. Whether Sārī had any pre-Islamic history is unclear, though Islamic lore assigned its foundation to the legendary Pīs̲h̲dādid [ q.v.] figure, Ṭahmūrat̲h…

al-Ṭarsūsī

(202 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, Marḍī (or Murḍā) b. ʿAlī b. Marḍī, enigmatic writer in Arabic on military topics. His dates are unknown, but he flourished in the later 6th/12th century and seems to have lived in Alexandria. He composed for the Ayyūbid sultan Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn [ q.v.] a treatise, Tabṣirat arbāb al-albāb fī kayfiyyat al-nad̲j̲āt fi ’l-ḥurūb min al-aswāʾ wa-nas̲h̲r aʿlām al-iʿlām fi ’l-ʿudad , extant in the Bodleian unicum Hunt 264 ¶ (extracts ed. and tr. Cl. Cahen, Un traité d’armurerie composé pour Saladin , in BEO, xii [1947-8], 1-47, 150-63). It deals with weapons such as the sword, bow, lance,…

Sirhind

(226 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, a town of India in the easternmost part of the Pand̲j̲āb, situated in lat. 30° 39′ N. and long. 76° 28′ E. and lying some 36 km/24 miles north of Patiāla city. In the mediaeval Islamic Persian chronicles, the name is usually spelt S.h.r.n.d , and the popular derivation from sar-Hind “the head of India”, from its strategic position, is obviously fanciful. The town must have had a pre-Islamic, Hindu past, but became important from G̲h̲ūrid times onwards and was developed by the Tug̲h̲luḳid sultan Fīrūz S̲h̲āh (III) at the b…

Sipāhī

(2,094 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E. | Temimi, Abdeljelil | Haig, T.W.
(p.), from the Persian sipah , sipāh “army”, hence basically meaning soldier. It has given such European words as English sepoy (see below, 2.) and French spahi (see below, 3.). 1. In the Ottoman empire. Here, sipāhī had the more specific meaning of “cavalryman” in the feudal forces of the empire, in contrast to the infantrymen of the professional corps of the Janissaries [see yeñi čeri ]. Such feudal cavalrymen were supported by land grants ( dirlik “living, means of livelihood”) at different levels of income yield. Below the k̲h̲āṣṣ [ q.v.] lands granted to members of the higher ech…

al-G̲h̲azzī

(647 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C. E.
, Abū Isḥāḳ Ibrāhīm [ b. Yahyā ?] b. ʿUt̲h̲mān b. ʿAbbās al-Kalbī al-As̲h̲habī (441-524/1049-1129), Arabic poet of the Sald̲j̲ūk period. He was born in G̲h̲azza [ q.v.] at a time when that town was still under Fāṭimid rule, but as a S̲h̲āfiʿī Sunnī and as a person especially proud of emanating from the Imām al-S̲h̲āfiʿī’s own birthplace, his life was to be orientated towards the East, where the establishment of the Sald̲j̲ūḳs favoured a resurgence of Sunnī orthodoxy. He was studying in Damascus in 481/1088 as a pupil of t…

S̲h̲īrwān

(1,300 words)

Author(s): Barthold, W. | Bosworth, C.E.
, S̲h̲irwān or S̲h̲arwān , a region of eastern Caucasia, known by this name in both mediaeval Islamic and modern times. S̲h̲īrwān proper comprised the easternmost spurs of the Caucasus range and the lands which sloped down from these mountains to the banks of the Kur river [ q.v.]. But its rulers strove continuously to control also the western shores of the Caspian Sea from Ḳuba (the modern town of Kuba) in the district of Maskat (< *Maskut, Mas̲h̲kut, to be connected with the ancient Eurasian steppe people of the Massagetes) in the north, to Bākū [ q.v.] (modern Baku) in the south. To the …

Kābulistān

(112 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, the upper basin of the Kābul River (see preceding article), vaguely defined in early Islamic times as the region between Bāmiyān in the west and Lamg̲h̲ān in the east. The geographer Muḳaddāsī (c. 375/985) includes within it all the country north of G̲h̲azna and Zābulistān, i.e., the Lōgar valley, cf. Le Strange, Lands of the Eastern Caliphate , 349; and it is only about this time that the term “Kābul” becomes specialised for the name of the town rather than being applied to the whole region of Kābulistān. In contemporary Afg̲h̲…

Sulaymān

(174 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, the name of a range of mountains running roughly south-north and to the west of the Indus river in modern Pākistān. The Sulaymān rise from the low tract of the Dērad̲j̲āt [ q.v.] which lie along the right bank of the Indus and run, in a series of long, sharp-backed ridges and jagged peaks, from the Bugt́ī and Marī districts of north-east Balūčistān in the south to the Gomal Pass [see gūmāl in Suppl.] and river in the north, thereafter continuing as the Wazīristān hills (i.e. they lie between latitudes 28° 50′ and 32° 20′ N.). It is at the northern end that the hig…

K̲h̲uttalān

(1,244 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, K̲h̲uttal , a region on the right bank of the upper Oxus river, in what is now Soviet Central Asia, lying between the Wak̲h̲s̲h̲ river and the Pand̲j̲ river (sc. the head waters of the Oxus), called the Wak̲h̲s̲h̲āb and D̲j̲aryāb in mediaeval times. It was bounded on the west by the topographically similar regions of Čag̲h̲āniyan and Wak̲h̲s̲h̲ [ qq.v.], and was often administratively linked with Wak̲h̲s̲h̲ (Yāḳūt, Buldān , ii, 402). K̲h̲uttal was a land of rich pastures in both the river valleys and on the upper slopes of the hills, where t…

Māzandarān

(7,117 words)

Author(s): Minorsky, V. | Bosworth, C.E. | Vasmer, R.
, a province to the south of the Caspian Sea bounded on the west by Gīlān [ q. v.] and on the east by what was in Ḳad̲j̲ār times the province of Astarābād [ q.v., formerly Gurgān); Māzandarān and Gurgān now form the modern ustān or province of Māzandarān. 1. The name. If Gurgān to the Iranians was the "land of the wolves" ( vәhrkāna , the region to its west was peopled by "Māzaynian dēws" (Bartholomae, Altir . Wörterbuch , col. 1169, under māzainya daēva ). Darmesteter, Le Zend-Avesta , ii, 373, n. 32, thought that Māzandarān was a "comparative of direction" (* Mazana-tara ; c…

Sāwa

(1,839 words)

Author(s): Minorsky, V. | Bosworth, C.E. | Schaeder, H.H.
(older form Sāwad̲j̲, cf. the nisba Sāwad̲j̲ī, found at the side of Sāwī), a town of northern Persia some 125 km/80 miles to the southwest of Tehran (lat. 35° 00′ N., long. 50° 22′ E., altitude 960 m/3,149 feet). It was formerly on the Ḳazwīn-Ḳumm road used in mediaeval times but now replaced by the modern paved roads-system centred on Tehran, and on the main caravan and pilgrimage route from southwestern Persia a…

al-Walīd b. ʿUḳba

(216 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
b. Abī Muʿayṭ , Companion of the Prophet and member of the Abū ʿAmr family of the Umayyad clan in Mecca, d. 61/680. His father ʿUḳba fell at Badr opposing Muḥammad, but al-Walīd became a Muslim at the conquest of Mecca in 8/630. He acted as collector of the ṣadaḳa [ q.v.] from the Banū Muṣṭaliḳ under the Prophet and that from the Christian Banū Tag̲h̲lib [ q.v.] in al-D̲j̲azīra under ʿUmar. Through his mother, he was a half-brother of the ʿUt̲h̲mān b. ʿAffān, and when the latter became caliph he appointed al-Walīd governor of Kūfa after Saʿd b. Abī Waḳḳāṣ (29/6…

ʿUrwa b. Masʿūd

(316 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
b. Muʿattib al-T̲h̲aḳafī , Abū Yaʿfur, a leader of the Aḥlāf group in al-Ṭāʾif [ q.v.] at the time of the rise of Islam and considered technically as a Companion of the Prophet, d. 9/630. He was descended through his mother from ʿAbd S̲h̲ams of Ḳurays̲h̲ and married a daughter, Āmina or Maymūna, of the Meccan head of resistance against Muḥammad, Abū Sufyān [ q.v.]. ʿUrwa took part in the negotiations between the Prophet and the Meccans for the truce of al-Ḥudaybiya [ q.v.] in 6/628 as an ally of Ḳurays̲h̲. When the men of al-Ṭāʾif, from both the component groups of the Aḥlāf a…

Tekis̲h̲

(527 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
b. Il Arslan , Abu ’l-Muẓaffar Tād̲j̲ al-Dunyā wa ’l-Dīn, one of the K̲h̲wārazm S̲h̲āhs of Anūs̲h̲tigin’s line, reigned 567-96/1172-1200. The name (thus vocalised in Maḥmūd al-Kās̲h̲g̲h̲arī, tr. Atalay, i, 368) means something like “confronted, attacked, struck [in battle]”; see Hikmet Bayur, Harizmşah Alâüʾd-DînTekiş ” ʾ in adi hakkinda, in Belleten , xiv, no. 56 [1950], 589-95. ¶ Tekis̲h̲ had been governor of D̲j̲and [ q.v. in Suppl.] during his father’s lifetime, and only succeeded to the throne after a struggle with his younger brother Sulṭān S̲h̲āh, who…

Uways

(741 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, the name of two rulers of the D̲j̲alāyirids [ q.v.], a dynasty of Mongol origin which succeeded to the heritage of the II K̲h̲ānids in ʿIrāḳ and Ād̲h̲arbayd̲j̲ān. 1. S̲h̲ayk̲h̲ Uways (I) b. Ḥasan-i Buzurg (r. 757-76/1356-74), was the son of the founder of the line and of the Čopanid princess Dil-S̲h̲ād K̲h̲ātūn bt. Dimas̲h̲ḳ K̲h̲wād̲j̲a b. Čopan. Succeeding to power on his father’s death, he probably also brought under his control the fiefs allotted to his brother Sulṭān Ḥusayn when the latter died in 760/1359. Uways made Bag̲h̲dād his capital, at …

Walwālīd̲j̲

(248 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, Warwālīd̲j̲ , a town of mediaeval Ṭuk̲h̲āristān, in what is now northern Afg̲h̲ānistān, mentioned in the Ḥudūd al-ʿālam , tr. 72, 109, as the ḳaṣaba or administrative centre of the ¶ province. It lay on the road from Balk̲h̲ and K̲h̲ulm [ q.vv.] to Ṭālaḳān and Badak̲h̲s̲h̲ān [ q.vv.] between the confluence of the Dōs̲h̲ī (Surk̲h̲-āb) and Ṭālaḳān rivers, whose united stream then flowed into the Oxus. It seems to be the A-hua of Hiuen-tsang, attesting to its existence in pre-Islamic, Hephthalite times. E.G. Pulleyblank suggested that the element wal-/war-reflects the name of the Cent…

Sībī

(461 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
(also spelt Sīwī in mediaeval Islamic sources, e.g. the Ḥudūd al-ʿālam ) a town and district of northeastern Balūčistān, lying on the plain below the entrance to the Bolān Pass and the route to Quetta [see kwat́t́a ], which is some 140 km/88 miles beyond Sībī town. The town is situated in lat. 29° 31′ N. and long. 67° 54′ E. Because of its strategic position between the mouths of the Bolān and Harnaī Passes, and on the way down to the Indus valley, it has always played a part in history. In early Islamic times, Sībī was one of the towns of the district of Bālis(h) or Wālis̲h̲ān, althou…

Raʿiyya

(3,019 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E. | Faroqhi, Suraiya
(a.), pl. raʿāyā , literally “pasturing herd of cattle, sheep, etc.”, a term which in later Islam came to designate the mass of subjects, the taxpaying common people, as opposed to the ruling military and learned classes. 1. In the mediaeval Islamic world. Ḳurʾānic use of the verb raʿā and its derivatives ¶ covers the two semantic fields of “to pasture flocks” (e.g. XX, 56/54; XXVIII, 23) and “to tend, look after someone’s interests” (e.g. XXIII, 8; LVII, 27; LXX, 32). Since other Near Eastern religions and cultures have evolved the image of the …

Wahriz

(327 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, son of Kāmd̲j̲ār, a Persian general of K̲h̲usraw Anūs̲h̲arwān (A.D. 531-79 [see kisrā ]). The name would apparently stem from MP vēhrēz “having a good abundance”, see Nöldeke, Gesch . der Perser und Araber , 223 n. 2, and Justi, Iranisches Namenbuch , 340, but was in origin a title, since the Byzantine historian Procopius names the commander of the Sāsānid emperor Kawād’s expedition into Georgia and Lazica (early 5th century) as having the title Ouarizēs (< * wahriz ); see daylam, at Vol. II, 190a. In response to an appeal ca. 570, via the Lak̲h̲mids [ q.v.], from Sayf b. D̲h̲ī Yazan, the …

Warāmīn

(636 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, a small town of northern Persia (lat. 35° 19’ N., long. 51° 40’ E.) lying in the fertile Warāmīn plain, which benefits from a good water supply from the D̲j̲ād̲j̲a Rūd and has been much frequented by Turkmen nomads up to modern times. 1. History. The mediaeval Islamic geographers place it at two stages from al-Rayy (al-Muḳaddasī, 401) or at 30 mīl s from it (Yāḳūt, Buldān , ed. Beirut, v, 370). Already in Būyid times it was a flourishing little town with a bazaar, but it developed especially after the Mongols sacked al-Rayy in 617/1220 an…

Ṣaff

(1,862 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E. | Shinar, P.
(a.), pl. ṣufūf , literally “rank, row or line, company of men standing in a rank, row or line” (Lane, 1693 col. 3), a term with various usages. 1. In religious practice. Here, ṣaff is used for the lines of worshippers assembled in the mosque or elsewhere for the prescribed worship; see on This, ṣalāt . 2. In military organisation. In the traditional formation of armies on the march or on the battlefield ( taʿbiya ), there was a classic five-fold division of a centre, its left and right wings, a vanguard and a ¶ rearguard (whence the term k̲h̲amīs for an army). In actual…

Mustak̲h̲rid̲j̲

(212 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
(a.), the active participle of the verb istak̲h̲rad̲j̲a in the sense of “to extract”, used in the mediaeval Islamic terminology for the person responsible for collecting money, such as that of the ṣadaḳa or poor-tax (al-Ṭabarī, i, 2746) or of the k̲h̲arād̲j̲ or land-tax; thus in ʿAbbāsid times he was an offical of the Dīwan al-K̲h̲arād̲j̲ charged with the latter task ( ibid., hi, 1856, year 257/871, caliphate of al-Muʿtamid). In Muslim Spain, it seems to have been the original of the Latin term exceptor , the official who collected on behalf of the Muslim s…

Fasāʾī

(459 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C. E.
, Ḥād̲j̲d̲j̲ī Mīrzā Ḥasan , Persian scholar of the 19th century and author of a historicalgeographical work on his native province of Fārs, the Fārsnāma-yi Nāṣirī (the latter part of the book’s title being a reference to the Ḳād̲j̲ār sultan Nāṣir al-Dīn S̲h̲āh, in whose reign Ḥasan Fasāʾī wrote). He was born, according to the autobiography inserted into his book, in 1237/1821-2 in the small town of Fasā [ q.v.] in Fārs, of a family which had been prominent in the intellectual and religious life of S̲h̲īrāz for at least four centuries; various members of it had be…

al-Rass

(376 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, the name in Arabic geographical writing for the Araxes River (Perso-Turkish form Aras, Armenian Eraskʿ, Georgian Rak̲h̲s̲h̲ī, modern Aras). It rises in what is now eastern Turkey near Erzurum and flows generally in an eastwards direction for 1,072 km/670 miles into the Caspian Sea. Its middle reaches, from a point near Mount Ararat, today form the boundary between the former Azerbaijan SSR and Persia, with the lower stretch receiving the Kur River and flowing through the Mūḳān [ q.v.] steppes and what is now wholly Azerbaijani territory. The early Arabic name al-Rass led the Musl…

Payās

(333 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, the Ottoman Turkish form of modern Turkish Payas, a small town at the head of the Gulf of Alexandretta 18 km/12 miles north of Iskandarūn [ q.v.] (lat. 36° 46′ N., long. 36° 10′ E.). Lying as it ¶ does in the very narrow coastal corridor between the sea and the Amanus Mts. or D̲j̲abal al-Lukkām [ q.v.], the modern Turkish Gavur Dağlari, Payās has always been a strategically important point on the route from Cilicia to Antioch; the name itself goes back to that of the classical Greek town of Baiae (see PW, ii/2, col. 2775 (Ruge)). In the early Islamic period, Payās was on the road connecting…

Zamīndāwar

(467 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, the name found in pre-modern usage for a region of what is now eastern Afgh̲ānistān, also appearing in mediaeval Arabic usage as its Arabic equivalent Bilād al-Dāwar. The region straddled the courses of the upper Helmand river and the Arg̲h̲andāb to the north of their confluence at Bust, hence it was bounded on the north by Zābulistān and al-Ruk̲h̲k̲h̲ad̲j̲ [ q.vv.] on the south and southeast, but the boundaries of all these regions were indeterminate, and Zamīndāwar, in particular, seems often to have been confused in the sources with that of Zābulistān. The early Arabic geographers …

al-Bis̲h̲r

(305 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, scene of a battle in eastern Syria in 73/692-3 between the Arab tribes of Sulaym and Tag̲h̲lib. Ḵh̲ālid b. al-Walīd campaigned here in 12/633 (Ṭabarī, i, 2068, 2072-3). Yāḳūt describes it as a range of hills stretching from ʿUrḍ near Palmyra to the Euphrates, corresponding to the modern D̲j̲ebel el-Bis̲h̲rī. The battle is also sometimes called after al-Raḥūb, a local water-course. The “Day of al-Bis̲h̲r” was the climax of several clashes between the two tribes. This strife lay to some extent outside the Ḳays-Kalb tribal feud of the period; both tribes we…

Mihrān

(1,082 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, the name generally given by the classical Islamic geographers to the Indus river (Skr. Sindhu, Σίνθος, “Ινδς, Lat. Sindus, Indus), but Nahr al-Sind, Sind-Rūdh, Nahr Multān, etc. were also used by them. There was, in fact, considerable confusion over the precise nomenclature of the Indus and its constituents, with, in particular, uncertainty over what was to be regarded as the main river channel. Thus al-Iṣṭak̲h̲rī, followed by Ibn Ḥawḳal, records the Nahr Multān or Mihrān as rising in the mountains of Central Asia. They compa…

Mik̲h̲lāf

(279 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
(a., pl. mak̲h̲ālīf ), a term of mediaeval Islamic administrative geography used particularly in Yemen. The sources usually state that it is the equivalent of Arabic kūra [ q.v.] “administrative province” (Nas̲h̲wān al-Ḥimyarī, Die auf Südarabien bezüglichen Angaben im Šams al-ʿulūm , Leiden-London 1916, 34) or Persian rustāḳ [ q.v.] “rural area” (al-K̲h̲alīl b. Aḥmad, cited by Yāḳūt, Buldān , Beirut 1374-6/1955-7, i, 37, tr. Wadie Jwaideh, The introductory chapters of Yāqūt’s Muʿjam al-buldān , Leiden 1959, 56-7), with a fanciful explanation tha…

Ziyād b. Ṣāliḥ al-K̲h̲uzāʿī

(397 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, Arab commander in the service of Abū Muslim at the time of the ʿAbbāsid Revolt (d. 135/752-3). He was one of the naḳībs [ q.v.] chosen by Abū Muslim from the leaders of the Arabs in K̲h̲urāsān in 1340/747-8. With the triumph of the ʿAbbāsid cause, Abū Muslim appointed Ziyād governor of Buk̲h̲ārā and Sogdia, where he suppressed a rebellion of the discontented Arab garrison in Buk̲h̲ārā led by S̲h̲arīk (or S̲h̲urayk) b. S̲h̲ayk̲h̲ al-Mahrī (133/750-1). Shortly afterwards he commanded the Arab expedition sent into the la…

Bahāʾ al-Dawla Wa-ḍiyāʾ al-Milla, Abū Naṣr Fīrūz

(1,921 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C. E.
Ḵh̲ārs̲h̲ād̲h̲ b. ʿAḍud al-Dawla Fanā-Ḵh̲usraw , Būyid supreme amīr , who ruled in ʿIrāḳ and then in southern Persia also from 379/989 to 403/1012) after 381/992 with the further honorific, granted by the caliph al-Ḳādir, of G̲h̲iyāt̲h̲ al-Umma, and towards the end of his life, those of Ḳiwām al-Dawla and Ṣafī Amīr al-Muʾminīn). He was the third son, after Ṣamṣām al-Dawla Marzubān and S̲h̲araf al-Dawla S̲h̲īrzīl, of the great amīr ʿAḍud al-Dawla [ q.v.], who had built up the Būyid confederation into the mightiest empire of its time in the Islamic east. On ʿAḍud al-Dawla’s death in S̲h̲…

Maʾṣir

(285 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, a technical term of fiscal practice in the hydraulic civilisation of early Islamic ʿIrāḳ, doubtless going back to earlier periods there. It is defined by al-K̲h̲wārazmī in his Mafātīḥ al-ʿulūm , 70, as “a chain or cable which is fastened right across a river and which prevents boats from getting past”, and more specifically by Ibn Rusta, 185, tr. Wiet, 213, as a barrier across the Tigris at Ḥawānīt near Dayr al-ʿĀḳūl [ q.v.] consisting of a cable stretched ¶ between two ships at each side of the river, preventing ships passing by night (and thus evading the tolls levied b…

Rūd̲h̲bār

(562 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, rūdbār , meaning literally in Persian, a district along a river or a district intersected by rivers, and a frequent toponym in Islamic Persia. Yāḳūt, Buldān , ed. Beirut, iii, 770-8, and al-Samʿānī, Ansāb , ed. Ḥaydarābad, vi, 187-90, list Rūd̲h̲bārs at Iṣfahān, Ṭūs, Balk̲h̲, Marw, Hamad̲h̲ān and Bag̲h̲dād, and in the provinces of S̲h̲āsh and Daylam. As homes or places of origin of noted scholars, the most significant of these were the Rūd̲h̲bār by the gate of Ṭābarān, one of the two townships making up Ṭūs [ q.v.]; the one near Bag̲h̲dād; and the one near Hamad̲h̲ān. In the historical geog…

al-S̲h̲ābus̲h̲tī

(307 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, Abu ’l-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. Muḥammad, littérateur of the Fāṭimid period, and librarian and boon-companion to the caliph al-ʿAzīz (365-86/975-96 [ q.v.]), died at Fusṭāṭ in 388/988 or possibly in the succeeding decade. Ibn K̲h̲allikān explains the unusual cognomen S̲h̲ābus̲h̲tī as being a name of Daylamī origin, and not a nisba ; an origin in s̲h̲āh pus̲h̲tī “he who guards the king’s back” has been somewhat fancifully suggested. Al-S̲h̲ābus̲h̲ī’s works included a K. al-Yusr baʿd al-ʿusr , a Marātib al-fuḳahāʾ , a K. al-Tawḳīf wa ’l-tak̲h̲wīf , a K. al-Zuhd wa ’l-mawāʿiẓ

Ork̲h̲on

(198 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, a river of the northern part of what is now the Mongolian People’s Republic; it joins the Selenga to flow northwards eventually into Lake Baikal. ¶ For Turcologists, the banks of this river are of supreme importance as the locus for the Old Turkish inscriptions, carved in the middle decades of the 8th century in a so-called “runic” script, in fact derived ultimately from the Aramaic one [see turks. Languages]. These inscriptions are the royal annals of the Köktürk empire, centred on this region till its fall in 744 and supersession by a Uyg̲h̲ur [ q.v.] grouping based on Ḳara Balg̲h̲asun…

Marw al-Rūd̲h̲

(535 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, a town on the Murg̲h̲āb river in mediaeval K̲h̲urāsān, five or six stages up river from the city of Marw al-S̲h̲āhid̲j̲ān [ q.v.], where the river leaves the mountainous region of G̲h̲arčistān [see g̲h̲ard̲j̲istān ] and enters the steppe lands of what is now the southern part of the Ḳara Ḳum [ q.v.]. The site seems to be marked by the ruins at the modern Afg̲h̲ān town of Bālā Murg̲h̲āb (inlat. 35° 35′ N. and long 63° 20′ E.) described by C. E. Yate in his Northern Afghanistan or letters from the Afghan Boundary Commission , Edinburgh and London 1888, 208; the modern…

al-Muwaḳḳar

(402 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, a place in the desert fringes of the early Islamic region of the Balḳāʾ [ q.v.], in what is now Jordan, some 22 km./14 miles southeast of ʿAmmān and 16 km./10 miles northeast of the Umayyad palace of Ms̲h̲attā or Mus̲h̲attā [ q.v.]. Visible there are the remains of an Umayyad settlement. These include traces of a palace, a tower which may have been part of a mosque, and signs of an extensive irrigation system in the form of sites of three dams nearby plus a fine stone-lined cistern, still much used by Bedouins of the Banū Ṣak̲h̲r for wa…

Turbat-i [S̲h̲ayk̲h̲-i] Ḏj̲ām

(334 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, a small town in northeastern Persia in the modern province of K̲h̲urāsān. It is on the Mas̲h̲had-Harāt highway, 150 km/96 miles from Mas̲h̲had and 75 km/48 miles from the Afg̲h̲ān frontier (lat. 35° 16′ N., long. 60° 36′ E.). The earlier Islamic name of Turbat-i D̲j̲ām was Būzad̲j̲ān or Pūčkān (both names in Mustawfī, Nuzha , 177, tr. 171, cf. also 143-4, tr. 151-2, where he calls it D̲j̲ām); it was here that the great mathematician Abu ’l-Wafāʾ al-Būzad̲j̲ānī (d. 368/998 [ q.v.]) was born. The geographers describe it being four stages from Nīs̲h̲āpūr, in a fertile agricultu…

Pickthall

(694 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, Mohammed Marmaduke William (1875-1936), English traveller, novelist, polemicist and educationist, who became a convert to Islam at a time when British converts to Islam were much rarer than later in the 20th century, and is now best remembered for his Ḳurʾān translation, The meaning of the Glorious Koran . Born in London, the son of an Anglican clergyman and with two step-sisters who were Anglican nuns, his boyhood and formative years were spent in rural Suffolk, from which he acquired a nostalgic view of a countryside way of life which was t…

Yūsufī

(389 words)

Author(s): Berthels, E. | Bosworth, C.E.
, the tak̲h̲alluṣ or pen-name of Yūsuf b. Muḥammad b. Yūsuf K̲h̲urāsānī, native of K̲h̲wāf and émigré to India, where he became physician to the Mug̲h̲al emperors Bābur and Humāyūn [ q.vv.] and a prolific writer on medical topics. It is also very probably the same Yūsufī who is the author of an ins̲h̲āʾ collection (see below). Several of his Persian medical works are extant, including a Dalāʾil al-bawl on diagnosis through examination of the urine; a Dalāʾil al-nabḍ on interpretation of the pulse; various ḳaṣīda s and ḳiṭʿa s on medical topics; rubāʿiyyāt , on which…

Wezīr Köprü

(219 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, modern Vezirköprü, a small town of northern Anatolia, situated 35 km/21 miles north of Merzifon [see merzifūn ] and 18 km/12 miles south of the lowest stretch of the Kizil Irmak [see Ḳi̊zi̊l-i̊rmāḳ ] (lat. 41° 09’ N, long. 35° 27’ E). There was apparently a town there or nearby, in classical times, in what was then southern Pamphylia, and in Byzantine times, the town of Gedegara (in Kātib Čelebi’s Ḏj̲ihān-nümā , Kedeg̲h̲ara). In high Ottoman times, from the 10th/16th century onwards, it came within the sand̲j̲aḳ of Amasya in the eyālet of Sivas. Ewliyā Čelebi vi…

Rukn al-Dawla

(1,248 words)

Author(s): Bowen, H. | Bosworth, C.E.
, abū ʿalī al-ḥasan b. būya , second in age of the three brothers that founded the Būyid dynasty [see buwayhids ]. His fortunes followed those of the elder brotherʿAlī (later ʿImād al-Dawla [ q.v.]) …

S̲h̲ār

(240 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, a tide of rulers in Central Asia and what is now Afg̲h̲ānistān during the early Islamic period ¶ and, presumably, in pre-Islamic times also. The form s̲h̲ār must be an attempt to render in Arabic orthography the MP and NP form s̲h̲ēr/s̲h̲īr (< OP k̲h̲s̲h̲at̲h̲riya

Sanandad̲j̲

(820 words)

Author(s): Minorsky, V. | Bosworth, C.E.
or sinandad̲j̲ , older form sinna, the administrative capital of the modern Persian province of Kurdistān and the general name for the district round it. l. The town. The name Sinna came into historical prominence only from the 9th/15th century onwards, the main urban centre of the district having preciously been Sīsar [ q.v.], as the seat of the Kurdish wālīs or local rulers of Ardalān [ q.v.]. Under the year 988/1580, the 10th/16th century historian of the Kurds, S̲h̲araf al-Dīn K̲h̲ān Bidlīsī [ q.v.], speaks in his S̲h̲araf-nāma (ed. V. Véliaminof-Zernof, S…

S̲h̲arīf Pas̲h̲a

(773 words)

Author(s): Kramers, J.H. | Bosworth, C.E.
, Muḥammad (1823-87), Egyptian statesman in the reigns of the Khedives Ismāʿīl and Tawfīk. He was of Turkish origin and was born in Cairo, where his father was then acting as ḳāḍī ’l-ḳuḍāt sent by the sultan. When some ten years later the family was again temporarily in Cairo, Muḥammad ʿAlī [ q.v.] had the boy sent to the military school recently founded by him. Henceforth, his whole career was to be spent in the Egyptian service. S̲h̲arīf was a member of the “Egyptian mission” sent to Paris for …

Ḳarluḳ

(1,159 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, early Arabic form K̲h̲arluk̲h̲, Persian K̲h̲alluk̲h̲ (whence frequent confusion in the sources with the K̲h̲alad̲j̲ [ q.v.], Chinese Ko-lo-lu (northwestern Middle Chinese *Kâr-lâ-luk), a Turkish tribal group in Central Asia. They were originally a small federation of three tribes (whence the name given to them in the Uyg̲h̲ur Shine-usu inscription ca. 760 of Uč Ḳarli̊ḳ; the Ḥudūd al-ʿālam , 98, on the other hand, mentions seven tribes of the Ḳarluḳ), and comparatively unimportant. Their paramount chief never bore the title of

S̲h̲ūrā

(2,676 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E. | Marín, Manuela | Ayalon, A.
(a.), together with mas̲h̲wara , mas̲h̲ūra , a nominal form connected with the form IV verb as̲h̲āra “to point out, indicate; advise, counsel” (see Lane, s.v.), with the meaning “consultation”. 1. In early Islamic history. Here, s̲h̲ūrā is especially used of the small consultative and advisory body of prominent Ḳuras̲h̲īs which eventually chose ʿUt̲h̲mān b. ʿAffān as the third caliph over the Muslim community after the assassination of ʿUmar b. al-K̲h̲aṭṭāb [ q.v.] in D̲h̲u ’l-Ḥid̲j̲d̲j̲a 23/November 644. The practice of consultation by the sayyid or s̲h̲ayk̲h̲ of a tribe with his lea…

Mahisur, Maysūr

(3,067 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E. | Andrews, P.A.
, conventional spelling Mysore , a former princely state of British India, now the core of a component state of the Indian Union called Karnataka, with its capital at Bangalore, and also the name of the town which was the dynastic capital of the state.…

Zirih

(552 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, Zarah , an inland lake in Sīstān [ q.v.], now straddling the borders of Persia and Afg̲h̲ānistān and the largest stretch of inland fresh water on the Iranian plateau. The name comes from Avestan zrayah-, O Pers. drayah- “sea, lake”. The lake played a role in ancient Iranian legend about a Saos̲h̲yant or Redeemer, a son of Zoroaster, who would arise ¶ from it; Islamised versions of such legends describe King Solomon as commanding his army of jinn to lower the surface of the lake so that the land masses thereby appearing could be used for agriculture (see Bosworth,

Ḳurḥ

(703 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, al-Ḳurḥ , a town and district of mediaeval Islamic times in the northern Ḥid̲j̲āz, mentioned in early Islamic sources as of prime importance, but not now known under this name. …

Fak̲h̲r-i Mudabbir

(637 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C. E.
, the s̲h̲uhra of Fak̲h̲r al-Dīn Muḥammad b. Manṣūr Mubārak S̲h̲āh al-Ḳuras̲h̲ī , Persian author in India during the time of the last G̲h̲aznawids, the G̲h̲ūrids and the first Slave Kings of Dihlī (later 6th/12th century-early 7th/13th century). His birth date and place are both unknown, but he was a descendant, so he says, on his father’s side from the caliph Abū Bakr and on his mother’s from the Turkish

Muʾayyid al-Dawla

(224 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, Abū Manṣūr Būya b. Rukn al-Dawla Ḥasan , Būyid ruler in Iṣfahān, Rayy and most of D̲j̲ibāl 366-73/976-84. His father Rukn al-Dawla had before his death partitioned his lands between Muʾayyid al-Dawla (in Iṣfahān, Rayy and their dependencies) and another son Fak̲h̲r al-Dawla ʿAlī [ q.v.] (in Hamadān and Kurdish D̲j̲ibāl). In the event, Muʾayyid al-Dawla acknowledged the overlordship of their other brother, ʿAḍud al-Dawla [ q.v.] of Fārs, and with the latter’s support prevented Fak̲h̲r al-Dawla from assuming control in the greater part of his allotted territori…

Rād̲j̲mahāl

(242 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, a former city of Muslim Bengal during Mug̲h̲al times, now a small town 6 km/4 miles to the east of the ruinous Mug̲h̲al site, in the Santāl Parganas District of Bihar Province in the Indian …

D̲h̲ikrīs

(508 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C. E.
, Zikrīs , a Muslim sect of southern Balūčistān, especially strong amongst the Balūč of Makrān [ q.v.], but also with some representation amongst the Brahūīs of further north. The sect’s name derives from the fact that its adherents exalted the liturgical recitations of formulae including the name and titles of God, sc. d̲h̲ikr [ q.v.], above the formal Muslim worship, the ṣalāt or namāz . The D̲h̲ikrīs were believed by Hughes-Buller to stem from the North Indian heterodox movement of the Mahdawiyya, the followers of Sayyid Muḥammad Mahdī of D̲j̲awnpūr (847-910/1443-1505), who claimed to be an imām with a revelation superseding that of Muḥammad the Prophet [see al-d̲j̲awnpūrī and EI 1 art. mahdawīs ]. Adherents of the Mahdawiyya would have brought their doctrines to the remote region of Makrā…

Mog̲h̲ols

(363 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, an ethnie and, until recently, a linguistic group originally concentrated in westcentral Afg̲h̲ānistān, in the modern province of G̲h̲ōrāt, and carrying on there a semi-pastoral and semi-agricultural way of life; now however groups of them have become dispersed throughout northern and central Afg̲h̲ānistān. They number at most 10,000 souls. For other communities in Afg̲h̲ānistān of mixed Turkish-Mongol origin, see hazāras in Suppl. Unlike the S̲h̲īʿī Hazāras, the Mog̲h̲ols are Sunnī. The origins of these Mog̲h̲ols probably lie in the appearance in Afg̲h̲ānistān o…

Milla

(429 words)

Author(s): Buhl, F. | Bosworth, C.E.
(a.), religion, sect. Although the Arab philologists claim this term as a native Arabic word (cf. Nöldeke, in ZDMG, lvii ‘903], 413), their explanations are so farfetched as to render it almost certain that the term stems from Hebrew and Jewish and Christian Aramaic milla , Syriac melltā “utterance, word”, translating the Greek logos . It does not seem to have any pre-Islamic attestations, hence may have been a borrowing by Muḥammad himself. In the Ḳurʾān, it always means “religion”. It occurs fifteen times, including three ti…

Sūmanāt

(367 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, the spelling in the Indo-Muslim sources for the ancient Indian town of Somnāth , properly Somanātha “lord of soma” (the hallucinogenic drink of the early Indo-Iranians), referring to Siva (S̲h̲iva), and, by extension, “lord of the moon”. It is now an ancient ruined town on the southwestern coast of the Kāt́hīāwāŕ peninsula of western India, in what was the older Indo-Muslim sultanate of Gud̲j̲arāt [ q.v.]. Recent excavations have revealed settlement there dating back to 1500 B.C., and Somnāth plays a part ¶ in the story of the death of Kṛṣna (Kris̲h̲na) in the Mahābhārata

Murg̲h̲āb

(303 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, a river of Inner Asia, and like many rivers in that region, one without outlet to the sea or to any more extensive river system. It rises in the Kūh-i Ḥiṣār mountains in north-central Afg̲h̲ānistān, flows westwards and receives tributaries from the Band-i Turkistān and Paropamisus mountains in north-western Afg̲h̲ānistān. Some 250 miles from its source, it reaches the town of Bālā-Murg̲h̲āb in the modern Bādg̲h̲īs province of Afg̲h̲ānistan, and then enters the Turkmen SSR and flows for another 250 miles northwards towards the Ḳara Ḳum desert [ q.v.] to New Marw (Russ. Mary), and t…

Mutaṭawwiʿa

(956 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, Muṭṭawwiʿa (a.), lit. “those who perform supererogatory deeds of piety, those over and above the duties laid upon them by the S̲h̲arīʿa ” echoing the use of the verb taṭawwaʿa in Ḳurʾān, II, 153/158, 180/184, IX, 80/79, the term used in military contexts for volunteer fighters. Al-Samʿānī defines them ( Ansāb , ed. Haydarābād, xii, 317) as “a group who devote themselves to g̲h̲azw and d̲j̲ihād , station themselves in ribāṭs along the frontiers ( t̲h̲ug̲h̲ūr) and who go beyond the call of duty ¶ ( taṭawwaʿū ) in g̲h̲azw and undertake this last in the lands of u…

Yazīd b. Abī Sufyān

(295 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
b. Ḥarb b. Umayya, Arab commander of the conquests period, son of the Meccan leader Abū Sufyān [ q.v.] by his wife Zaynab bt. Nawfal and half-brother of the subsequent caliph Muʿāwiya I [ q.v.], d. 18/639 without progeny (Ibn Ḳutayba, Maʿārif ed. ʿUkās̲h̲a, 344-5). With his father and brother, he became a Muslim at the conquest of Mecca in 8/630, took part in the ensuing battle of Ḥunayn [ q.v.] and was one of “those whose hearts are won over”, receiving from the Prophet a gift of 100 camels and 40 ounces of silver (Ibn Saʿd, ii/1, 110, vii/2, 127; al-Wāḳidī, iii, 944-5; and see al-muʾallafa ḳulūbuh…

K̲h̲āṣṣ Oda

(319 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, the “Privy Chamber” of the Ottoman palace organisation and the most important of the four departments comprising the Enderūn or Inside Service (the others being, in decreasing order of importance, the Treasury or K̲h̲azīne [ q.v.] the Privy Larder or Kilār-i̊ K̲h̲āṣṣ and the Great and Little Chambers or Büyük ve Küčük Odalar . The K̲h̲āṣṣ Oda as we know it was created by Meḥemmed the Conqueror, who in his Ḳānūn-nāme mentions by title its four chief officers and its staff of 32 pages or Ič Og̲h̲lam [ q.v.], who became known as the K̲h̲āṣṣ Oda g̲h̲ilmāni̊ or K̲h̲āṣṣ Odali̊lar

al-Ṣug̲h̲d

(1,173 words)

Author(s): Barthold, W. | Bosworth, C.E.
or al-Ṣug̲h̲d, the name in early Islamic geographical and historical sources for the Soghdia of classical Greek authors, a region of Central Asia lying beyond the Oxus and extending across the modern Republics of Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kirghizia in its wider acceptation. The same name (Old. Pers. Sugudu, late Avestan Sug̲h̲da, Greek Sogdioi or Sogdianoi (the people) and Sogdianē (the country) was applied in ancient times to a people of Iranian origin subject to the Persians (at least from the time of Darius I, 522-486 B.C.) whose lands stretched from the Oxus [see āmū daryā …

Sayābid̲j̲a

(816 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, for Sayābiga, the name given in early Islamic historical sources to a group of non-Arab emigrants, proximately from Sind in India but, most probably, ultimately from South-East Asia and established on the Arab shores of the Persian Gulf and at Baṣra in the first two centuries or so of Islam. ¶ Arabic authors often link them with the Zuṭṭ [ q.v.] or Jhāts [see d̲j̲āt́ ] from northwestern India (see e.g. al-Ṭabarī, i, 1961, 3125, 3134, 3181), although two distinct ethnic groups are in fact involved here. De Goeje was the first to discuss the Sayabid̲j̲a at length, in his Mémoire sur les migrati…

Bas̲h̲kard, Bas̲h̲ākard

(530 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C. E.
, Europeanised form Bas̲h̲kardia , a region of south-eastern Iran, falling administratively today within the 8th ustān or province of Kirmān and in the s̲h̲ahrastān or district of D̲j̲īruft, of which it comprises one of the nine constituent rural areas ( dihistānhā ), see Farhang-i d̲j̲ug̲h̲rāfiyā-yi Īrān , viii, Tehran 1332/1953, 49. It is the mountainous hinterland of western Makrān, lying to the east of Mīnāb near the Straits of Hormuz and bounded on the north by the southern fringes of the D̲j̲āz-Muryān depression; …

T́́hat́́t́ā

(512 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, in Persian orthography T.t.h , conventionally Thatta or Tatta, a town of lower Sind, situated by the Indus some 100 km/60 miles from its debouchment into the Indian Ocean and about the same distance to the east of Karachi (lat. 24° 44′ N., long. 67° 58′ E.). In mediaeval Islamic times, it was a city of considerable political and commercial significance, but is now a small town, the cheflieu of a district of that name in the Haydarābād Division of Sind in Pākistān. 1. History. The actual name seems to have the general connotation of a settlement on the bank of a river. T́hat́t́ā…

Pīr

(1,240 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E. | Nizami, K.A.
(p.), literally, “old person, elder” ( = Ar. s̲h̲ayk̲h̲ ). In Islamic law, these terms were used for people in their fifties or even in their forties (see al-Tahānawī, Kas̲h̲s̲h̲āf iṣṭilāḥāt al-funūn , Calcutta 1862, 731), whilst those even older are often qualified as harim , fānī “decrepit, worn out”. 1. In the Persian and Turkish worlds In general Persian usage, pīr is often, as with Arabic s̲h̲ayk̲h̲, used in compound expressions by metonymy, e.g. pīr-i dihḳān “well-matured wine” (see Vullers, Lexicon persico-latinum, i, 392a), or in a title, e.g. pīr-i Sarandīb = Adam, pīr-i Kanʿān

Ismāʿīl b. Sebüktigin

(206 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, G̲h̲aznavid amīr, third son of the founder of the G̲h̲aznavid empire and last of the family to recognize the suzerainty of the Sāmānids. When Sebüktigin died in S̲h̲aʿbān 387/August 997, he left the provinces of G̲h̲azna and Balk̲h̲ to Ismāʿīl, and command of the army in Ḵh̲urāsān to his eldest son Maḥmūd; this allocation of G̲h̲azna to Ismāʿīl was probably influenced by the fact that he was Sebüktigin’s son by a daughter of Alptigin [see Alp-Takīn ], the original commander of the Turks in G̲h̲azna. Maḥmūd refused to accept these arrangements, and demanded recognition …

Ustān

(348 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
(p.), a term of administrative geography in the eastern Islamic world dating from Sāsānid times and surviving into mediaeval Islamic usage. In later Sāsānid times, ustān could denote the state domains, administered by an ustāndār [ q.v.], and this usage was taken over by the Arabs when they conquered ʿIrāḳ, so that we find the term ṣawāft al-ustān ¶ for the estates taken over by the caliph ʿUmar for the Islamic state (see Morony, 68-9). It also had a wider sense in Sāsānid times, as “province”, with its subdivisions being s̲h̲ahrs [ q.v.] or, in ʿIrāḳ, kūras [ q.v.], and this again was taken…

Muṣādara

(1,439 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E. | Müge Göçek, F.
(a.). 1. In mathematics, muṣādarāt are premisses or postulates (Grk. αἰτήματα). See al-K̲h̲wārazmī, Mafātīḥ al-ʿulūm , ed. van Vloten, 203; E. Wiedemann, Beitrag XIV , in SBPMS Erl ., xl (1908), 4 and n. 2= Aufsätze zur arabischen Wissenschaftsgeschichte , Hildesheim 1970, i, 403. 2. In the administrative terminology of the mediaeval Islamic caliphate, muṣādara is firstly “an agreement with someone over the payment of taxation due”, according to al-K̲h̲wārazmī, op. cit., 62 (the synonym of mufāraḳa ); cf. C.E. Bosworth, Abū ʿAbdallāh al-K̲h̲wārazmī on the technical terms of th…

D̲j̲alālābād

(1,255 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C. E.
, a town of eastern Afghānistān, situated in lat. 34° 26′ N. and long. 70° 27′ E. at an altitude of 620 m./1, 950 ft. It lies in the valley of the Kābul River some 79 miles from Pes̲h̲āwar to the east and 101 miles from Kābul city to the west, and is on the right bank of the river. As well as being roughly midway along the historic route connecting Kābul with the beginning of the plains of northern India, D̲j̲alābād is also strategically situated to command routes into Kāfiristān [ q.v.] (modern Nūristān) and today, routes run northwards from it up to the Kānur and Alingār River valleys. The area around…

Tug̲h̲ra

(5,218 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E. | Deny, J. | Siddiq, Muhammad Yusuf
(t.), in mediaeval Arabic and Ottoman Turkish orthography, ṭug̲h̲rā , a calligraphic emblem of Turkish rulers, from the time of the chiefs of the Og̲h̲uz to the Sald̲j̲ūḳs and succeeding rulers in Persia, the Mamlūks and the Ottoman sultans. Under the latter’, in particular, it became a highly stylised and artistic representation of the name and tides of the ruler or of princes from the royal family. Indeed, in Ottoman practice it became in effect the emblem of the state, being placed as a heading on official documents such as fermāns [see farmān. ii] but also on legal documents like p…

al-Muṣʿabī

(233 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E.
, Abu ’l-Ṭayyib Muḥammad b. Ḥātim , official and poet in both Arabic and Persian in Buk̲h̲ārā under the Sāmānids, flor . early 4th/10th century. Better-known in his time as a statesman than as a poet, he was a boon-companion, then chief-secretary ( ʿamīd-i dīwān-i risālat ) and finally vizier in the reign of Amīr Naṣr b. Aḥmad (301-31/914-43); but he fell from power, and opposing the appointment of the new vizier Abū ʿAlī al-D̲j̲ayhānī [see al-d̲j̲ayhānī in Suppl.] in ca. 326/938, was executed (Bayhaḳī, Taʾrīk̲h̲-i Bayhaḳī , ed. G̲h̲anī and Fayyāḍ, 107; Gardīzī, Zayn al-ak̲h̲bār

Urmiya

(4,267 words)

Author(s): Minorsky, V. | Bosworth, C.E. | Coakley, J.F.
, the name of a lake and of a town and district in western Ād̲h̲arbāyd̲j̲ān. 1. The lake Lake Urmiya, also called Daryā-yi S̲h̲āhī or, in the Pahlawī period, Daryā-yi Riḍāʾiyya or Lake Reza’iyeh, is the largest lake in the Middle East. It is about 140 km/87 miles long and from 40 km/25 miles to 56 km/35 miles wide and lies at an altitude of 1,275 km/4,183 feet. Its maximum depth is 16 m/53 feet, and the southern part of the lake contains numerous small islands, but most important is the mountainous S̲h̲āhī penins…

Nahr

(878 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C.E. | Burton Page, J.
(a.), pis. anhār , anhur , etc., running water, hence a perennial watercourse, river, stream of any size (thus opposed to a wādī , a watercourse filled only at certain times of the year or a sayl , periodic torrent). 1. In the Middle East. Al-Masʿūdi lays down that “all running water is a nahr , the place where water flows out is a spring ( ʿayn ); and the place where a great amount of water is found is a baḥr’ ” ( Murūd̲j̲ , i, 281 = §304). In fact, the latter term [ q.v.], or its equivalent borrowed from the Hebrew, yamm , was accordingly applied not only to the seas and oce…

Mohmand

(1,153 words)

Author(s): Davies, C. Collin | Bosworth, C.E.
, the name of a Pat́hān or Afg̲h̲ān tribe on the North-West Frontier of what was formerly British India, now forming the boundary between Pakistan and Afg̲h̲anistān. The Mohmands in fact straddle the frontier, and their members, estimated at ca. 400,000, are divided between the two countries. The Mohmand territories extend from northwest of the Pes̲h̲āwar district, with Mālākand and the Yūsufzay territories on the east, up to and beyond the Afg̲h̲an frontier on the west, and northwards towards the princely state of Dīr [ q.v.]. The Mohmand Agency, created by Pakistan (see below)…

Firrīm

(676 words)

Author(s): Bosworth, C. E.
, Pirrīm , a stronghold in the Elburz Mountains mentioned in mediaeval Islamic times as held by the Iranian native princes of the Caspian region, firstly the Ḳārinids and then the Bāwandids [ q.vv.]. Its exact position is unfortunately not fixed in the itineraries of the geographers, and an authority like Ibn Ḥawḳal, ed. Kramers, 377, tr. Kramers-Wiet, 367, following Iṣṭak̲h̲rī, merely mentions it as the capital of the Kārinids since pre-Islamic times, where their treasuries and materials of war were stored; Yāḳūt adds to this …
▲   Back to top   ▲