, Abū Bakr Muḥammad b. D̲j̲aʿfar b. Muḥammad b. Sahl al-Sāmarrī , traditionist and man of letters, originally from Surra man raʾā (Sāmarrā; Ziriklī, Aʿlām , vi, 297, makes him a native of Samaria/Sāmira), who was, in particular, the pupil of ʿUmar b. S̲h̲abba [ q.v.]. In 325/937 he went to Damascus and taught there ḥadīt̲h̲ , dying at ʿAsḳalān (at Jaffa, according to Ziriklī) in 327/939 aged ca. 90 years. He left behind several works on ethics and on belles-lettres, one of which has been printed at Cairo in 1350/1931-2, the Kitāb Makārim al-ak̲h̲lāḳ wa-maʿālihā . Othe…

(d. 235/849), a K̲h̲azar military slave or g̲h̲ulām [ q.v.] who had been bought in 199/815 by the future caliph al-Muʿtaṣim, and who played an important role in the reigns of his master, of al-Wāt̲h̲iḳ and of al-Mutawakkil. At the opening of al-Wāt̲h̲iḳ’s caliphate, he was, with As̲h̲nās, the “mainstay of die caliphate”. After being commander of die guard in Sāmarrā, in 233/847 he was made governor of Egypt, but delegated his powers there to Hart̲h̲ama b. Naṣr (Ibn Tag̲h̲rībardī, Nud̲j̲ūm , ii, 265; al-Maḳrīzī, K̲h̲iṭaṭ , ed. Wiet, v, 136). It was he who, in…

, Abū l-Faḍl Ḏj̲aʿfar b. Muḥammad, calife ʿabbāside. Il naquit en s̲h̲awwāl 206/février-mars 822 du calife al-Muʿtaṣim [ q.v.] et d’une esclave k̲h̲wārazmienne du nom de S̲h̲ud̲j̲āʿ Rien n’indique qu’il ait eu des ambitions politiques précoces, et il semble qu’il ait vécu dans l’ombre jusqu’à la mort de son frère, le calife al-Wāt̲h̲iḳ [ q.v.], en d̲h̲ū l-ḥid̲j̲d̲j̲a 232/août 847. Al-Wàt̲h̲ik laissait un fils en bas âge, mais pas de successeur adulte désigné. La succession fut réglée par un conseil comprenant le wazīr Ibn al-Zayyāt, le grand-Aaaī Aḥmad b. Abī Duʾād [ q.vv.], deux autre…

, Is̲h̲tik̲h̲an, ville et district de la Transoxiane musulmane médiévale, située à sept farsak̲h̲s au Nord de Samarḳand et pourtant administrativement séparée de celle-ci. Les champs cultivables y sont abondants, irrigués par un canal émissaire de la rivière Zarafs̲h̲ān [ q.v.]. Au IVe/Xe s., la ville comptait une citadelle, un s̲h̲āhristān [ a.v.], et un rabad ou faubourg. Un village du même nom subsiste aujourd’hui sur le site. Quand les Arabes conquirent Samarḳand dans le second quart du VIIIe s., les Ik̲h̲s̲h̲īds de Sogdiane transférèrent leur capitale à Is̲h̲tīk̲h̲ān. Au IIIe/IX…

, Abū Bakr Muḥammad b. Ḏj̲aʿfar b. Muḥammad b. Sahl al-Sāmarrī, traditionniste et homme de lettres originaire de Surra man raʾā (Sāmarrā; Ziriklī, Aʿlām, VI, 297, le déclare natif de Samarie/Sāmira), qui fut notamment l’élève de ʿUmar b. S̲h̲abba [ q.v.]; en 325/937, il se rendit à Damas où il enseigna le ḥadīt̲h̲ et mourut en 327/939 à ʿAsḳalān (à Jaffa d’après Ziriklī), âgé de près de 90 ans. Il a laissé plusieurs ouvrages d’éthique et de belles-lettres dont l’un a été imprimé au Caire en 1350, le Kitāb Makārim al-akhlāḳ wa-maʿālīhā; d’autres sont conservés en ms. (voir Brockelmann,…

, ʿAmr, célèbre chanteur, poète et musicien de Bag̲h̲dād, mawlā des T̲h̲aḳif, mort en 278/891 à Sāmarrā. Son père était un secrétaire notable et un haut fonctionnaire. Sa mère, Bāna, dont il porte le nom, était la fille de Rawḥ, secrétaire de Salāma al-Waṣif. Ce fut un homme très cultivé et fort orgueilleux. Partisan et protégé d’Ibrāhīm b. al-Mahdī, il comptait parmi les adversaires les plus acharnés d’Isḥāḳ al-Mawṣilī, à qui il reprochait de faire de la musique par métier alors que, pour lui, elle étai…

(m. 235/849), g̲h̲ulām k̲h̲azarī qui, acheté en 199/815 par lé futur al-Muʿtaṣim, joua un rôle important sous les califats de son maître, d’al-Wāt̲h̲iḳ et d’al-Mutawakkil. Au début du règne d’al-Wāt̲h̲iḳ, il était, avec As̲h̲nās, le «pivot du califat». Chef de la police de Sāmarrā, il fut nommé en 233/847, gouverneur d’Egypte, mais il délégua ses pouvoirs à Hart̲h̲ama b. Naṣr (Ibn Tag̲h̲rībardī, Nud̲j̲ūm, II, 265; al-Maḳrīzī, Ḵh̲iṭaṭ, éd. Wiet, V, 136). C’est lui qui, la même année, arrêta et soumit à la torture le vizir Ibn al-Zayyāt. A cette époque, il cumulait les fonctions de ḥād̲j̲ib…

b. Sābūr , Christian physician and pharmacologist (d. 21 Dhu ’l-Ḥid̲j̲d̲j̲a 255/30 November 869). Sābūr grew up in the Nestorian milieu of Ḵh̲ūzistān [ q.v.]. He must have been educated at the "Academia Hippocratica" in Gondēs̲h̲āpūr [ q.v.], where he later held a position in the famous local hospital, and rose to be one of the leading physicians of his time. In Gondēs̲h̲āpūr he practised medicine and pharmacology until he was appointed court physician by the ʿAbbāsid caliph al-Mutawakkil [ q.v.] and his successors. Sābūr died "as a Christian" ( naṣrāniyy an ), perhaps in Sāmarrāʾ [ q.v.]. T…

, vizier to the ʿAbbāsid al-Muʿtaṣim, and an ʿIrāḳi of Christian origin. He began his career modestly as a retainer of Hart̲h̲ama, the commander of Hārūn al-Ras̲h̲īd’s guard. Later, as a result of his particular talents, he became a secretary in the Land Tax office under the same caliph and subsequently he retired to ʿIrāḳ to the estates he had acquired during the civil war. It was there, in the region of al-Baradān, that he had an opportunity, during the reign of al-Maʾmūn, to gain the attentio…

b. Ṭūlūn, founder of the dynasty of the Ṭūlūnides [q. v.], the first governor of Egypt and Syria who was only nominally dependent upon the caliph. The career of this Turk is typical — the founders of all the small states on the ruins of the Caliphate, crumbled to pieces, acted in the same way. — His father Ṭūlūn was brought in 200 (815-816) as a slave to the Court of Bagdad, but rose soon to an important position. Aḥmed is supposed to have been born on the 23d Ramaḍān 220 (20th September 835), but perhaps a little later, and he received a thorough military and theological education — …

, Ḳaṣr , the name of a palace of the early ʿAbbāsids in Bag̲h̲dād, so-called because of its being compared in splendour with the d̲j̲annat al-k̲h̲uld “garden of eternity”, i.e. Paradise. It was built by the founder of the new capital Bag̲h̲dād, al-Manṣūr [ q.v.], in 158/775 on the west bank of the Tigris outside the walled Round City, possibly on the site of a former Christian monastery (al-Ṭabarī, iii, 273; Yāḳūt, Buldān , ed. Beirut, ii, 382). It was strategically placed between the two great military areas of the Ḥarbiyya and al-Ruṣāfa on the eastern side [see al-ruṣāfa. 2.] and adjacent …

, a town in ʿIrāḳ in ʿAbbāsid times. According to the Arab geographers it was situated some 15 miles north of Bag̲h̲dād on the main road to Sāmarrā and at some distance from the east bank of the Tigris, a little above the confluence of the Nahr al-Ḵh̲āliṣ and the latter. The Ḵh̲āliṣ canal, a branch of the Nahrawān (or Ḏj̲yāla) flowed immediately past Baradān. The caliph al-Manṣūr held his court here for a brief period, before he definitely resolved on building a new capital on the site of the modern Bag̲h̲dād (cf. Yaʿḳūbī, Buldān , 256). There was a bridge in Bag̲h̲d…

, a Turkish slave, mother of the ʿAbbāsid caliph al-Nāṣir li-Dīn Allāh [ q.v.] (575-622/1180-1225). She was politically active and continued the religious policy of her husband al-Mustaḍīʾ [ q.v.] (566-75/1170-80) by favouring Ḥanbalīs, e.g. Ibn al-D̲j̲awzī [ q.v.], and interceding for them with her son. The sources praise her piety and generosity. She endowed madrasas , ribāṭs and mosques, and had a turba erected at the grave of the mystic Maʿrūf al-Kark̲h̲ī [ q.v.], together with a madrasa . On the occasion of her pilgrimage she allegedly spent 300,…

, Abū Isḥāḳ Muḥammad b. Hārūn al-Ras̲h̲īd, calife ʿabbāside qui régna de 218 à 227/833-42. Sa mère était une concubine esclave du nom de Mārida. Sous le règne de son frère et prédécesseur al-Maʾmūn [ q.v.], al-Muʿtaṣim acquit une réputation de grand capitaine en Anatolie et comme gouverneur d’Égypte. Lorsque al-Maʾmūn mourut dans les marches byzantines en rad̲j̲ab 218/août 833, al-Muʾtaṣim fut reconnu comme calife malgré l’appui accordé dans l’armée à son neveu al-ʿAbbās b. al-Maʾmūn (qui devait d’ailleurs conspirer contre lui en…

a loan word from Aramaic karka meaning “fortified City”, “city (Fraenkel, ¶ Fremdwörter , xx; Pauly-Wissowa, iv, 2122, 2124; Supplement, i, 275, 283). In Islamic times, the word is associated with various towns. Found in areas of Aramaic culture before the Islamic conquest, such towns are distinguished from one another by adding the name of their geographic location, e.g., Kark̲h̲ Bag̲h̲dād, Kark̲h̲ Sāmarrā (cf. Yāḳūt, Mus̲h̲tarik , 368-70; Muʿd̲j̲am , iv, 252-7). In Bag̲h̲dād, al-Kark̲h̲ refers to a specific area (Bāb al-Kark̲h̲) and more generally to the whole of …

, the nisba of a family of prominent S̲h̲īʿī ʿulamaʾ active in Persia and Irak over the last century and a half. 1. Mīrzā Muḥammad Ḥasan b. Maḥmūd, called Mīrzā-yi S̲h̲īrāzī-yi buzurg and al-Mud̲j̲addid (1230-1312/1815-95). Born in S̲h̲īrāz, he studied in Iṣfahān and Nad̲j̲af, and after Murtaḍā Anṣārī’s [ q.v. in Suppl.] death in 1281/1864, became the leading S̲h̲īʿī scholar and sole mard̲j̲aʿ al-taḳlīd [ q.v.]. He is best known for his opposition to the Tobacco Régie in Persia (1891) [see nāṣir al-dīn s̲h̲āh ], and it seems that his famous fatwā was in part prov…

, name of four places in ʿIrāḳ, viz: 1. a town on the Diyālā N. E. of Bag̲h̲dād, 2. a. village in the district of Nahr al-Malik W. of Bag̲h̲dād, 3. a village near D̲j̲abbul, S. of Bag̲h̲dād, 4. a village in K̲h̲ūzistān (cf. Yāḳūt, ii, 575; Marāṣid , i, 402; cf. Muḳaddasī, 26). Daskara is arabicized from the Pahlavi dastakarta (Dastkarta, Dastakrta), modern Persian Dastad̲j̲ird [ q.v.]; it means a post, a village, a town or simply level ground (see Herzfeld, Geschichte der Stadt Samarra , Hamburg 1948, 44; J. Markwart, A catalogue of the provincial capitals of Eranshahr , …

, Abū muḥammad Ḥasan b. ʿAlī , the eleventh Imām of the Twelver S̲h̲īʿa. He is known as al-Ṣāmit, al-Zakī, al-K̲h̲āliṣ, al-Naḳī, al-Rafīḳ and al-Hādī. He was commonly called Ibn al-Riḍā (Imām ʿAlī al-Riḍā the eighth Imām) among his followers in his lifetime. His nisba , al-ʿAskarī, like that of his father the tenth Imām, derives from ʿAskar Sāmarrā. He was born in al-Madīna. Most Twelver S̲h̲īʿī authorities give the date of his birth as Rabī I 230/November 844, but al-Kulīnī gives Ramaḍān 232/April 847 ( Uṣūl , 324) His mother was an umm walad named Ḥudayt̲h̲. Some sources name her Sūsan…

(a.), terme dont la signification (certaines recherches lexicographiques en ont prouvé l’identité avec ḥayr; cf. H. Pérès, La poésie andalouse en arabe classique, Paris 1937, 129) apparaît plus clairement lorsque l’on considère les vestiges de ḥayrs encore conservés autour d’anciennes résidences princières du moyen âge islamique. Aux fréquentes mentions des auteurs arabes qui autorisent à y voir, soit des parcs ou jardins de plaisance s’accompagnant parfois d’un luxueux pavillon, soit plus précisément des parcs zoologiques comme …

Abū l-ʿIbar Muḥammad b. Aḥmad al-Hāshimī (c. 175–252/791–866) was an unusual poet, writer, preacher, and bearer of traditions in the early ʿAbbāsid period. He was born in Baghdad and showed proficiency in composing poetry already as a youth in the reign of the caliph al-Amīn (r. 193–97/809–13), but after al-Mutawakkil (r. 232–47/847–61) came to power he turned away from serious poetry and used his talents for composing humorous, even silly, verses, for he had come to the conclusion that this kind…