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the usual name in the sources for ʿALĪ B. ḤASAN or HĀRŪN BOḠRA KHAN, member of the Hasanid or eastern branch of the Qarakhanid family, ruler in Transoxania during the early 5th/11th century (d. 425/1034). A version of this article is available in print Volume I, Fascicle 8, pp. 887-888…

lit. “Persian Iraq”; the name given in medieval times to the largely mountainous, western portion of modern Persia. A version of this article is available in print Volume VIII, Fascicle 5, pp. 538 ʿERĀQ-EʿAJAM(Ī) “Persian Iraq,” the name given in medieval tim…

Arabic broken plural form of a singular oswār(ī), eswār(ī), early recognized by Arab philologists as a loanword from Persian meaning “cavalryman.” A version of this article is available in print Volume II, Fascicle 7, pp. 706-707 ASĀWERA, Arabic broken…

b. Masʿūd b. Maḥmūd, Ghaznavid sultan of Afghanistan and northern India (r. 1052-59). A version of this article is available in print Volume IX, Fascicle 3, pp. 323-324 FARROḴZĀD, ABŪ ŠOJĀʿ, b. Masʿūd b. Maḥmūd, Ghaznavid sultan of Afghanistan and northern India (443-52/1052-59). He succeeded in Ḡazna after the traumatic events of the reign of his uncle ʿAbd al-Rašīd (q.v.; ca. 440-43/1049-52), whose power had been usurped by the slave commander Ṭo…

(d. 818), high official of the early ʿAbbasids and vizier to the caliph al-Maʾmūn (r. 813-33). A version of this article is available in print Volume IX, Fascicle 5, pp. 464-466 FAŻL, b. SAHL b. Zādānfarrūḵ (d. 202/818), high official of the early ʿAbbasids and vizier to the caliph al-Maʾmūn (r. 198-218/813-33). His father Sahl was a Zoroastrian from the vicinity of Kūfa who became a Muslim and attached himself to the Barmakids (q.v.), seeking employment also for his two sons Fażl and Ḥasan. At Yaḥyā Barmakī’s prompting, Fażl himself also became a M…

ABU’L ḤASAN (d. ca. 1040), Ghaznavid military commander under Sultan Masʿūd I. A version of this article is available in print Volume I, Fascicle 8, pp. 853 ʿALĪ B. ʿOBAYDALLĀH ṢĀDEQ, ABU’L ḤASAN, called by Bayhaqī and Ebn Bābā Qāšānī ʿALĪ DĀYA (probably day “maternal uncle,” bestowed by the ruler on a servant as a term of endearment or special confidence), Ghaznavid military commander under Sultan Masʿūd I b. Maḥmūd. The form of his name indicates a Tajik origin rather than a Turkish one, but nothing is known of his early career, which must have begun under Sultan Maḥmūd. It may be that he was one of the commanders who abandoned Moḥammad for Ma…

(r. 311-52/923-63), amir in Sīstān of the Saffarid dynasty (that part of it sometimes called “the second Saffarid dynasty”). A version of this article is available in print Volume I, Fascicle 6, pp. 641-642 AḤMAD B. MOḤAMMAD B. ḴALAF B. Layṯǰ, ABŪ JAʿFAR (r. 311-52/923-63), amir in Sīstān of the Saffarid dynasty (that part of it sometimes called “the second Saffarid dynasty”). The vast military empire built up by Yaʿqūb and ʿAmr b. Layṯ had been shattered by the Samanids of Transoxania, who had in 298/910-11 and again in 301/913…

princely title of the rulers of Ošrūsana at the time of the Muslim conquest, the most famous of whom was Ḵeyḏār (Ḥaydar) b. Kāvūs, d. Šaʿbān, 226/May-June, 841. A version of this article is available in print Volume I, Fascicle 6, pp. 589-591 AFŠĪN, princely title of the rulers of Ošrūsana at the time of the Muslim conquest, the most famous of whom was Ḵeyḏār (arabicized Ḥaydar) b. Kāvūs, d. Šaʿbān, 226/May-June, 841. The term is an arabicized form of middle Persian Pišīn, Avestan Pisinah-, a proper name of uncertain etymology ( AirWb., col. 907). In pre-Islamic Iranian tradition, it is the name of a grandson of Kayanid king Kavād ( Yt. 13.132, 19.71). In the Islamic period, it is found as a proper name attested by Armenian historians in the form Ōšin (from Awšin; see Justi, Namenbuch, pp. …

Samanid Amir (r. 365-87/976-97), initially in both Transoxania and Khorasan, latterly in Transoxania only, called after his death Amir-e Rāżi, “The Well-Pleasing Amir,” or according to Naršaḵi, Amir-e Rašid, “The Rightly-Guided Amir.”Nuḥ was the last Samanid to enjoy a reign of significant length, but within it he had little freedom to act independently. NUḤ (II) B. MANṢUR (I), ABU’L-QĀSEM, Samanid Amir (r. 365-87/976-97), initially in both Transoxania and Khorasan, latterly in Transoxania only, called after his death Amir-e Rāżi, “The Well-Pleasing Amir,” or according to…

b. Żaḥḥāk b. Maḥmūd, Persian historian of the early 5th/11th century. He was clearly connected with the Ghaznavid court and administration and close to the sultans. A version of this article is available in print Volume X, Fascicle 3, pp. 314-315 GARDĪZĪ, ABŪ SAʿĪD ʿABD-al-ḤAYY b. Żaḥḥāk b. Maḥmūd, Persian historian of the early 5th/11th century whose exact dates of birth and death are unknown. His life is almost wholly obscure, although his nesba implies a connection with Gardīz (q.v.) in eastern Afghanistan, and the name Zahāk/Żaḥḥāk seems to have been a popular on…

second son of the Kakuyid amir of Jebāl, ʿAlāʾ-al-dawla Moḥammad b. Došmanzīār, ruled in Hamadān and parts of what are now Kurdistan and Luristan, 433-37/1041-42 to 1045, d. 443/1051-52. A version of this article is available in print Volume I, Fascicle 3, pp. 328 ABŪ KĀLĪJĀR GARŠĀSP (I), ʿALĀʾ-AL-DAWLA, second son of the Kakuyid amir of Jebāl, ʿAlāʾ-al-dawla Moḥammad b. Došmanzīār, ruled in Hamadān and parts of what are now Kurdistan and Luristan, 433-37/1041-42 to 1045, d. 443/1051-52. When ʿAlāʾ-al-dawla died in 433/1041-42, Abū Kālīǰār Garšāsp’s elder brother, Abū Manṣūr Farāmarz, succeeded in the Kakuyid capital of Isfahan as head of the family and supreme chief. Abū Kālīǰār Garšāsp had alre…

an extensive general history composed in Persian by b. Serāj-al-Din Jowzjāni, who for the first part of his career lived in Ḡur under the Ghurid sultans and latterly in Muslim India under the Moʿezzi or Šamsi Delhi sultans.…

the last sultan of the Ghaznavid dynasty, in northwestern India, essentially in the Panjab, with his capital at Lahore. Various honorifics are attributed to him in the historical sources, in the verses of poets eulogizing him, and in the legends of his coins in the collections of the British Museum and Lahore ḴOSROW MALEK b. Ḵosrowšāh, ABU’L-MOŻAFFAR (r. ca. 555-82/1160-86), the last sultan of the Ghaznavid dynasty, in northwestern India, essentially in the Panjab, with his capital at Lahore. Various honorifics (Tāj-al-Din wa’l-Dawla, Serāj-al-Daw…

administrative and then military office in the pre-modern Iranian world. A version of this article is available in print Volume XI, Fascicle 5, pp. 544-548 ḤĀJEB, an administrative and then military office in the pre-modern Iranian world. ḤĀJEB i. IN THE MEDIEVAL ISLAMIC PERIOD…

by the 10th century, one of the towns of the Farighunid princes of Gūzgān, vassals of the Samanids. The medieval name was revived when the high governorate ( ḥokūmat-e ʿalā) of Maymana was elevated to the rank of province ( welāyat). Its cities, besides Maymana, are Andḵūy and Dawlatābād.…

During the first century of Islam, Bāḏḡīs passed into Arab hands, together with Herat and Pūšang, around 652-53, under the caliph ʿOṯmān, for already in that year there is mentioned a rebellion against the Arabs by an Iranian noble Qāren, followed by further unrest in these regions in 661-62. A version of this article is available in print Volume III, Fascicle 4, pp. 370-372 i. General and the Early Period The region of Bāḏḡīs is bisected in an east-west direction by the Paropamisus mountains, which rise towards the east to 11,791 ft/5,535 m; the southern slopes drain towards the Harīrūd, and the rather gentler northern ones into the Morḡāb basin via such streams as the Kūšk and Kāšān. The medieval geographers describe Bāḏḡīs as being considerably wooded and a noted source for pistachios (see, e.g., …

name of two towns: (1) a fortified city in the medieval Islamic province of Ḡūr in Central Afghanistan, which was the capital of the senior branch of the Ghurid sultans (see GHURIDS) for some sixty years in the later 6th/12th and 7th/13th centuries; (2) fortress and surrounding settlement in the Damāvand region of the Alborz mountains in northern Persia. A version of this article is available in print…

(or ABARQŪYA), a town in northern Fārs; it was important in medieval times, but, being off the main routes, it is now largely decayed. A version of this article is available in print Volume I, Fascicle 1, pp. 64-67 ABARQUH i. History The Islamic geographers of the 4th/10th century describe Abarqūh as lying in the Shiraz-Isfahan-Eṣṭaḵr road, at a point where another road led off northeastwards to Yazd, and as 28 farsaḵs from Yazd, 20 from Isfahan, and 39 from Shiraz. According to Ebn Ḥawqal, Abarqūh was administratively the chief town of the nāḥīa or district of Rūdān; formerly dependent…

a significant Turkic tribe in western Eurasia in the 5th century. A version of this article is available in print Volume XI, Fascicle 2, pp. 184-187 ḠOZZ, a significant Turkic tribe in western Eurasia in the 5th century. i. ORIGINS Ḡozz is the rendering by Muslim geographers of the Turkic Oḡuz. Oḡur, the Bulḡaro-Čuvašic form of this term, is noted as the name of a Turkic people in Western Eurasia in the 5th century. Oḡur/Oḡuz is probably a term denoting some kind of tribal confederation, perhaps signifying a union of related tribes or clans. Chinese sources sometimes …

these centers played important diplomatic and administrative roles in Iranian history, closely linked to the fortunes of the ruling families. A version of this article is available in print Volume IV, Fascicle 7, pp. 768-774 i. In Pre-Islamic Times Iranians most probably first coalesced into an organized community in the Jaxartes and Oxus basins (see most recently Francfort, pp. 165ff.) and gradually migrated westward, eventually reaching as far west as Babylonia on the Mesopotamian plain (Pahl. (A)sōristān, q.v.). This region was to become their cultural and political center, Del-…