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Abū ʿĪsā al-Warrāq, Muḥammad b. Hārūn b. Muḥammad al-Warrāq al-Baghdādī (d. 247/861), was a well-known theologian of the first half of the 3rd/9th century. Initially he was a Muʿtazilī, but later he disagreed with their doctrines, which led to his being rejected ¶ and declared an apostate by them. None of the books and articles attributed to him have survived, and those of his sayings that are available are the ones quoted in the works of others, in particula…

Abū Saʿīd Gūrakān, Mīrzā Sulṭān Abū Saʿīd, son of Mīrzā Sulṭān Muḥammad, son of Mīrzā Mīrānshāh, who was the third son of Emir Tīmūr Gūrakān (r. 854–873/1450–1469), ruled over Transoxania and Khurāsān. The works on the Tīmūrid period do not list the name of Mīrzā Sulṭān Muḥammad among the sons of Mīrānshāh, nor do the accounts of events after the death of Tīmūr—when his descendants were engaged in bloody strife for control of the Tīmūrid lands—contain any mention of him. Even his grandson Bābur, the son of ʿUmar Shaykh, whilst…

Abāqā Khān, also known as Abqā Khān or according to Arab historians Abghā, was the second of the Mongol Īlkhāns, who ruled Persia in the 7th/13th and 8th/14th centuries, and the eldest son of Hūlāgū Khān. He was born in Jumādā I 631/February 1234 and ascended the throne on 3 Ramaḍān 663/19 June 1265 (Rashīd al-Dīn, ed. ʿAlī Zādah, 3/95). Abāqā was in Māzandarān when Hūlāgū died on 19 Rabīʿ II 663/8 February 1265 near the River Jaghātū (now also called the Zarrīnarūd) in the vicinity of Marāgha. As was common Mongol practice, the emirs immediately ordered…

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Abū al-Qāsim al-Balkhī, ʿAbd Allāh b. Aḥmad b. Maḥmūd (d. 319/931), was a well-known Muʿtazilī theologian from Baghdad. He was also known as al-Kaʿbī, deriving from the name of one of his forebears, Kaʿb (al-Samʿānī, 11/122). …

Ādharbāyjān, a region in north-west Iran (at the present time lat. 35°45’ to 40°39’N, long. 44°5’ to 48°50’E) with an area of 109,074 square kilometres (Sāzmān-i Barnāmah, 3), 6 per cent of the total area of Iran. It borders the Republic of Azerbaijan to the north, Turkey and Iraq to the west, the Republic of Azerbaijan and Gīlān to the east, and the Iranian provinces of Zanjān and Kurdistān to the south. Ādharbāyjān constitutes a distinct geographical region; politically it is divided into the provinces of East Ādharbāyjān and West Ādharbāyjān.Ādharbāyjān after the Ṣafawids…

Baghdad, whose official name was originally Madīnat-al-Salām, the City of Peace, was founded in 762 by the second ʿAbbasid caliph, Abū Jaʿfar al-Manṣūr as his official capital.A version of this article is available in printVolume III, Fascicle 4, pp. 412-415i. Before the Mongol InvasionBaghdad, whose official name was originally Madīnat-al-Salām, the City of Peace, was founded in 145/762 by the second ʿAbbasid caliph, Abū Jaʿfar al-Manṣūr as his official capital. From this time until the sack of the city in 656/1258 by the Mongols, apart from a brief period in the third/ninth century, Baghdad was …