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ʿAbbās Pasha, also known as ʿAbbās Ḥilmī I, was one of the khedives of Egypt (r. 1264–1270/1848–1854). ʿAbbās, born in Jeddah in 1228/1813, was the only child of Aḥmad Ṭūsun, the son of Muḥammad ʿAlī Pasha. After his father died, his grandfather Muḥammad ʿAlī Pasha became his guardian, with particular responsibility for his education (Sāmī, 1(3)/71; Fahmī 40; Jawāhir Kalām, 84; Holt, 193). During this period ʿAbbās accompanied his paternal uncle, Ibrāhīm Pasha, on campaigns in Syria, took charge of certain gover…

ʿAbdī Pāshā (Abdi Paşa) (2): ʿAbd al-Raḥmān (d. 1098/1686), a statesman and vizier in the Ottoman government, and the last governor of the city of Būdīn (Budapest). ʿAbdī Pāshā was of Albanian extraction and trained in the Janissary corps. He participated in the Ottoman expeditions to the Balkans, Poland and Crete, and performed important services ( Türkiye Diyanet, 1/156). He also served as the governor of different places such as Baghdad, Egypt, Bosnia and Aleppo, as well as Būdīn ( Türkiye Diyanet, 1/156; Süreyya, 3/316). In his second term as governor of Būdīn, the city …

ʿAbdī Pāshā (Abdi Paşa) (1) (d. 1103/1692), a historiographer and Ottoman statesman, known as the nishānchī (seal-keeper). The exact date of his birth is not known, but he was born in Istanbul (Hammer, 3/2348) and named ʿAbd al-Raḥmān. He was brought up in the private royal quarters of the Ottoman court and rising rapidly through the ranks, became one of the close attendants of the Ottoman sultan, Muḥammad (Mehmet) IV (r. 1058–1099/1648–1687). Upon presenting his translation of the classical qaṣīda by Kaʿb b. Zuhayr in praise of the Prophet (a rhyming ode on the letter ‘ Lām’, known as Lāmiyy…

Būzjānī was a disciple of Khwājah ʿAzīz Allāh Jāmī (d. 902/1497), a descendant of Aḥmad Jām and a master of the Naqshbandī Sufi order, who was connected via two intermediaries in the initiatic line ( silsila) to the founder, Bahāʾ al-Dīn Naqshband (d. 791/1389) (Būzjānī, 124).As well as being engaged in the doctrine and practice of Sufism under his master, ʿAzīz Allāh Jāmī, Būzjānī also studied fiqh, tafsīr and literary sciences under the latter, who encouraged all beginners and aspirants to study the works of Muḥammad al-Ghazālī and Ibn al-ʿArabī’s al- Futūḥāt al-Makkiyya.His Rawḍat al…

The Amīr Kiyāʾids of Gīlān, this line of sayyids, also known as the Kār Kiyāʾids, ruled Gīlān for more than 300 years following the death of their eponymous founder Sayyid Amīr Kiyā in 763/1362. They held in particular the territory to the east of the Sapīd-rūd (i.e., Biyahpīsh in eastern Gīlān). One of the ancestors of Sayyid Amīr Kiyā (d. 763/1362), was Abū Muḥammad al-Ḥasan (Ḥusayn) b. Aḥmad al-ʿAqīqī al-Kawkabī, who ruled Zanjān, Abhar and Qazwīn in the time of al-Ḥasan b. Zayd (251/865–253/867) (al…

Afrāsiyāb (family), a dynasty of three generations who ruled over Baṣra and its environs in the period 1005–1080/1597–1669: 1. Afrāsiyāb Pāshā (r. 1005–1034/1597–1625). His origins and lineage are not clearly known. Because of certain family connections to Dayr, he is said to have come from the Dayr river valley to the north of Baṣra, while it has also been suggested that he was descended from the Saljūqs. For some time, Afrāsiyāb served as a commander under ʿAlī Pāshā, the Ottoman governor of Baṣra (al-ʿAzzāwī, …

Abū al-Suʿūd, ʿAbd Allāh b. ʿAbd Allāh Abū al-Suʿūd (d. 1295/1878) was a man of letters, a translator and one of Egypt's first political journalists. His family derived from one of the Arab tribes from Barqa, a region in the east of Libya (al-Baghdādī, 1/491; al-Bustānī, 4/341). There is a difference of opinion about his date of birth. Al-Ziriklī (4/100) and al-Bustānī (4/341) say that he was born in 1236/1821, while Tarrazi (1/130) gives 1244/1828. It is known, however, that he was born into a p…

Abū Qīr or Bū Qīr is a small village and port on the peninsula of the same name, on the Mediterranean coast of Egypt. It is 23 km east of Alexandria on the railway connecting Alexandria to Rashīd (Rosetta). Al-Idrīsī, who refers to this village in Nuzhat al-mushtāq, says that it is thirty miles from both Alexandria and Rashīd (1/344). The history of Abū Qīr goes back to the third century CE, and its name is derived from that of a Christian saint called Saint Cyrus or Hagios Kyros (Ramzī, 2 (2)/317). Amélineau says that Saints Barbara and Juliana were lai…

ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ʿUthmānī (1245–1293/1830–1876) was the thirty-second Ottoman sultan and the son of sultan Maḥ- mūd (Meḥmet) II. He was born in Istanbul's Ayyūb district on 15 Shaʿbān 1245/9 February 1830 (Karal, 7/1). He was nine when his father died in 1254/1839, and his brother ʿAbd al-Majīd, the new sultan, undertook the task of educating ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz, his crown prince. ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz did not receive an adequate education for his time; his one teacher was Shaykh al-Islām Ḥasan Fahmī who taught hi…

ʿAbd al-Majīd I (Abdülmecit) ʿUthmānī, son of Sulṭān Maḥmūd II, was the thirty-first Ottoman sultan (1238–1277/1823–1861). He was born in Istanbul and, unlike previous princes, did not remain confined within the walls of royal palaces but instead received a European education under the supervision of the most experienced teachers and came to know contemporary European culture. He acquired fluency in French, read European books and journals, and debated and exchanged views with European diplomats in French. In t…

al-Dasūqī, Burhān al-Dīn Ibrāhīm b. Abī al-Majd ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz (or ʿAbd al-Majīd) (mid to late 7th/13th century), known as Abū al-ʿAynayn (‘the two-eyed one’), a prominent Egyptian Sufi who is regarded as one of the four saintly poles ( al-aqṭāb al-arbaʿa) and the eponym of the Ibrāhīmiyya Sufi order (also known as the Dasūqiyya or Burhāniyya).Biographical information about him is scarce and confused. Our major sources are Ibn al-Mulaqqin (d. 804/1402), who gives a brief notice about his tomb being visited in 786/1385 in his Ṭabaqāt al-awliyāʾ; al-Maqrīzī (d. 845/1442), who also g…

al-Baqīʿ, also known as ‘Baqīʿ al-Gharqad’ is the oldest and most famous cemetery of the Islamic era in Medina. In more recent times it is popularly known as ‘Jannat al-Baqīʿ.According to lexicographers, the name of the cemetery indicates that prior to the advent of Islam, the field in which the burial-ground lay was originally covered with prickly shrubs, called al-gharqad—possibly the boxthorn or the nitre bush ( Nitraria retusa), and that the word baqīʿ indicates ‘a place in which are roots of various kinds of trees’ (Abū ʿUbayd, 1/265; Yāqūt, 1/703; about this na…

al-Baqīʿ, also known as ‘Baqīʿ al-Gharqad’ is the oldest and most famous cemetery of the Islamic era in Medina. In more recent times it is popularly known as ‘Jannat al-Baqīʿ. According to lexicographers, the name of the cemetery indicates that prior to the advent of Islam, the field in which the burial-ground lay was originally covered with prickly shrubs, called al-gharqad—possibly ¶ the boxthorn or the nitre bush ( Nitraria retusa), and that the word baqīʿ indicates ‘a place in which are roots of various kinds of trees’ (Abū ʿUbayd, 1/265; Yāqūt, 1/703; about this n…

ʿAbbās I (Shāh), styled ‘the Great’, the fifth reigning monarch of the Ṣafawid dynasty (r. Dhū al-Qaʿda 996–Jumādā I 1038/September 1587–January 1628), a son of Shāh Muḥammad Khudā-Bandah and grandson of Shāh Ṭahmāsb I. ʿAbbās Mīrzā, the future king, who was the third son of Shāh Muḥammad Khudā-Bandah by his wife Khayr al-Nisāʾ Begum, was born on the first night of Ramaḍān 978/27 January 1571 in Herat. His mother was the daughter of Mīr ʿAbd Allāh Khān, the governor of Māzandarān (ascribed to Mīr Qawām al-Dīn Marʿashī), and he w…

Harawī, Khwājah ʿAbd Allāh Anṣārī (396–481/1006–1089) was a Sufi master, gnostic, preacher, jurist, commentator of the Qurʾān and traditionist from Khurāsān. He is variously referred to as pīr-i Harāt,pīr-i AnṣārīorShaykh al-Islām, and all the works that are ascribed to him seem to have been orally transmitted to his students and authenticated by him with a written licence ( ijāza), rather than written by him (Beaurecueil, 145; Utas, 83).  BIOGRAPHY According to Harawī himself, he was born on 2 Shaʿbān 396/4 May 1006 in the Kuhandizh (Quhandiz) neighbourhood o…

Al-Ālūsī, a Baghdad family that produced distinguished scholars in jurisprudence ( fiqh), Qurʾānic exegesis ( tafsīr) and literature in the 13th/19th and 14th/early 20th century. One of his ancestors fled Baghdad in 7th/13th century at the time of Hulāgū’s invasion and moved to Ālūs, where his descendants stayed until the 11th/17th century before returning to Baghdad (al-Atharī, 7–8). The following, in chronological order, are the best-known members of the family: 1. Sayyid Maḥmūd, who was a descendant of Ḥusayn b. ʿAlī on his father’s side and of Ḥasan b. ʿAlī th…

Al-Ālūsī, a Baghdad family that produced distinguished scholars in jurisprudence ( fiqh), Qurʾānic exegesis ( tafsīr) and literature in the 13th/19th and 14th/early 20th century. One of his ancestors fled Baghdad in 7th/13th century at the time of Hulāgū’s invasion and moved to Ālūs, where his descendants stayed until the 11th/17th century before returning to Baghdad (al-Atharī, 7–8). The following, in chronological order, are the best-known members of the family: 1. Sayyid Maḥmūd, who was a descendant of Ḥusayn b. ʿAlī on his father’s side and of Ḥasan b. ʿAlī th…

al-Ḥijāz , a toponym for the territory lying parallel to the Red Sea coast on the western side of the Arabian peninsula. From the root ḥ-j-z meaning ‘to prevent’, the word Ḥijāz means a barrier that, according to Ibn Manẓūr, demarcates the geographical area bordered to the north by the Ghawr (the Jordan Rift Valley) and al-Shām and reaching southwards into the greater Arabian desert and steppe (al-Bādiya); it may also refer to the land between the eastern uplands of Najd and the Sarāh (the Sarawāt mountain range)…

Al-Azhar, or al-Jāmiʿ al-Azhar, dating from the Fāṭimid era, is the oldest extant educational-religious establishment in Egypt. It was built within a year of the founding of the city of Cairo. After the passage of a thousand years during which many political, social and cultural changes have taken place, the institution is still active in the fields of education and learning, and is considered one of the most vibrant and important Islamic universities in the world.Part 1: HistoryThe Fāṭimid EraAl-Azhar was founded as the congregational mosque by Jawhar al-Ṣiqillī (d. 381/9…

Erzerum, the name of a province in northeastern Turkey, whose administrative capital is a city bearing the same name. This region, which the Armenians still call Karin, was part of Greater Armenia, and in some sources it is also given as Karana and Karnoi (Կարնո քաղաք Moses of Khoren [Movses Khorenatsi], 201; Pauly, 59/1924; Darkot, 341). In Armenian it can also be called Karnoi Kalak, and is also recorded as Kalak or Kalghak. According to Uzunçarşılı (p. 145, marginal notes no. 18 see also Biva…

Ayyūbid CairoAfter Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn al-Ayyūbī (Saladin) was appointed as vizier to the caliph al-ʿĀḍid (r. 555–567/1160–1171) on 25 Jumādā II 564/26 March 1169 (al-Maqrīzī, Ittiʿāẓ, 3/308), the crushing of a palace plot and of a rebellion by 50,000 caliphal troops led to the burning of the Manṣūriyya quarter south of the city. As the caliph al-ʿĀḍid’s support collapsed, he was imprisoned in his quarters, and on the second Friday of Muḥarram 567/September 1171, his name was removed from the sermon, and prayers were said ins…

Baghdad, both a historic province and a city in Iraq, and today the country’s capital. 1. Geography In its heyday, Baghdad was one of the richest centres of Muslim civilisation. The city was ravaged numerous times throughout history due to both internal conflict and invasion. During the last several decades the population of Baghdad has dramatically increased; totalling 350,000 in 1932, it reached 5,785,577 in 2007 (al-Samāwī, 83). In 2010, the total population of Baghdad province was estimated to be 7,716,960 (…

Damascus, the capital city of the Syrian Arab Republic and the centre of a province by the same name in the south-west of Syria. Introduction EtymologyThere are numerous stories, many of a mythical character, about the founding and naming of Damascus. As regards the historical record, in the Tell el-Amarna tablets of Egypt, which date back to 14th century BCE, the city is named Ta-ms-qu and in the clay tablets of Ebla (Syria, Idlib province, ca. 2500 BCE) and in Assyrian texts (9th to 8th century BC) it is referred to a…

Baṣra, a province and historic city in south-east Iraq.1. GeographyThe province has an area of 20,702 km² (Directory of the Republic of Iraq, 57), the centre of which is the historical town of Baṣra. Baṣra province is bounded by the al-Muthannā (Samāwa) province to the west, by Iran (Khūzistān province) to the east, by Maysān province (ʿAmāra) to the north-east, by the Dhīqār province (Nāṣiriyya) to the north-west, by the Persian Gulf to the south-east, and by Kuwait to the south and south-west. The city…

ʿAbd al-Ḥamīd I (Abdülhamid) (1137–1203/1725–1789) was the twenty-seventh Ottoman sultan and son of Sultan Aḥmad (Ahmet) III. He was born in Istanbul, and was just five years of age when his father, Sultan Aḥmad III, was deposed in a popular rebellion led by Khalīl Pātrūnā (Patrona Halil) (Hammer-Purgstall, 8/430–433). Most of his life was therefore spent, in accordance with Ottoman custom, under supervision and in a special residence for deposed monarchs (Shaw, 1/251; Aktepe, 213). When Sultan Muṣ…

Amīr al-Ḥājj, was a title for the leader of the Ḥajj pilgrims. There were other titles for this position: amīr al-rakb (see al-Fāsī, 260, 290), amīr al-mawsim (al-Dārimī, 434) and imām al-ḥājj (Mālik, 1/400, 404). From the Shiʿi point of view, leadership of the Ḥajj pilgrims is a duty exclusive to the Imams: the Prophet was the first leader of the Ḥajj, and he was succeeded in this first by ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib and then the other Shiʿi imams (see al-Kulaynī, 4/466). For this reason the person given leadership of the pilgrims eit…

Amīr al-Ḥājj, was a title for the leader of the Ḥajj pilgrims. There were other titles for this position: amīr al-rakb (see al-Fāsī, 260, 290), amīr al-mawsim (al-Dārimī, 434) and imām al-ḥājj (Mālik, 1/400, 404). From the Shiʿi point of view, leadership of the Ḥajj pilgrims is a duty exclusive to the Imams: the Prophet was the first leader of the Ḥajj, and he was succeeded in this first by ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib and then the other Shiʿi imams (see al-Kulaynī, 4/466). For this reason the person given leadership of the pilgrims eit…

Abbas Abdollah Garousi: Barāhūyī (Brahui) Abbas Mosallayi-pour: al-Bayḍāwī; ʿAlī b. Maymūn Abbas Saidi: Abū al-Khaṣīb Abbas Zaryab: Abāqā Khān; Abū al-Qāsim al-Balkhī; Abū ʿĪsā al-Warrāq; Abū Saʿīd Gūrakān; Abū Yaʿqūb al-Sijistānī; Ādharbāyjān Abbasali Ahmadi: Darb-i Imām Abd al-Amir Jaberizadeh: Abū Shimr (or Shamir) al-Murjiʾ; al-Basawī; Bajaliyya Abdol-Amir Salim: Abū al-ʿĀliya; Abū al-Dardāʾ; Abū al-Futūḥ al-ʿIjlī; Abū al-Ḥasan al-Jurjānī; Abū al-Walīd al-Bājī; Abū Ḥudhayfa; Abū ʿĪsā al-Iṣfahānī; Abū Umāma al-Bāhilī; Adhān and iqāma; Anas b. Mālik Abdolhamid Moradi…

Akhī Awrān (Ahi Evren), Abū al-Ḥaqāʾiq Naṣīr al-Dīn Maḥmūd b. Aḥmad (566–659/1171–1261), was the patron ( pīr) of the Turkish guild of tanners (sing. dabbāgh) and founder of Akhīlīq (Ahilik, literally ‘brotherhood’), a guild and esoteric movement, in Anatolia (Majdī, 33; Çağatay, 41, 49). Although he was undoubtedly a real historical figure and was referred to as a friend by Gulshahrī (Gülşehri), the author of a mathnawī in Turkish, Keramat-i Ahi Evran (‘The spiritual accomplishments of Akhī Awrān’) (Taeschner, ‘Beiträge’, 31, 34), his life is shrouded in myth and …

Akhī Awrān (Ahi Evren), Abū al-Ḥaqāʾiq Naṣīr al-Dīn Maḥmūd b. Aḥmad (566–659/1171–1261), was the patron ( pīr) of the Turkish guild of tanners (sing. dabbāgh) and founder of Akhīlīq (Ahilik, literally ‘brotherhood’), a guild and esoteric movement, in Anatolia (Majdī, 33; Çağatay, 41, 49). Although he was undoubtedly a real historical figure and was referred to as a friend by Gulshahrī (Gülşehri), the author of a mathnawī in Turkish, Keramat-i Ahi Evran (‘The spiritual accomplishments of Akhī Awrān’) (Taeschner, ‘Beiträge’, 31, 34), his life is shrouded in myth and …

ʿAbbās Ḥilmī II, son of Tawfīq Pasha, was the last khedive of Egypt (r. 1892–1914). He was born on 14 July 1874 in Alexandria. He studied under an English tutor until the age of six and then attended the ʿĀbidīn school, built by his father next to the ʿĀbidīn palace in Cairo, where he studied alongside other children of the country's ruling elite (ʿAbbās Ḥilmī, 56; Fahmī, 70). He and his brother were later sent to Vienna where they attended the royal college known as the Theresianum to complete th…

Ḥamza Mīrzā, Crown Prince (976–994/1568–1586), son of the Ṣafawid shah Muḥammad Khudābandah (r. 985–996/1577–1587). Killed in the prime of his youth, his short life illustrates the perpetual tribal wrangling that plagued the Ṣafawid state in the 10th/16th century.Sulṭān Ḥamza Mīrzā was the second son of Khudābandah, a ‘ mīrzā’ or prince, and Khayr al-Nisāʾ Begum, a Māzandarānī, who was given the title Mahd-i ʿUlyā after her husband ascended the throne. Ḥamza Mīrzā was born in Herat during the reign of Shāh Ṭahmāsb I (r. 930–984/1524–1576…

Abuzar Ahmadi: Dār al-Funūn; Dawāzdah Imām; Dīwān al-ʿArḍ; Epic (ḥamāsa); Evil eye Alexander Khaleeli: Abū al-Qāsim Findiriskī; al-Bāṭirqānī; al-Bursī; al-Bustī, Abū al-Qāsim; al-Dāraquṭnī; al-Dawr wa al-tasalsul; al-Dīnawarī, Abū Ḥanīfa; al-Faḍl b. Shādhān; al-Fārābī; al-Farghānī; al-Fuḍayl b. ʿIyāḍ; al-Ḥāfiẓ li-Dīn Allāh; al-Ḥāmidī; al-Ḥasan b. Nūḥ; al-Ḥasan b. Nūh al-Qamarī; al-Ḥasan b. Sahl; al-Ḥaskānī; al-Ḥurr al-ʿĀmilī; al-Ḥurr b. Yazīd al-Riyāḥī; al-Ḥuwayzī; Bakr b. Wāʾil; Banū Isrāʾīl; Bazīghiyya; B…

Al-Akhbārī, Mīrzā Muḥammad, Abū Aḥmad Jamāl al-Dīn (21 Dhū al-Qaʿda 1178–28 Rabīʿ I 1232/12 May 1765–15 February 1817), was a jurist, traditionist and one of the founders of the Akhbārī school. There is much disagreement about Mīrzā Muḥammad’s ancestry. One of his grandsons, Ibrāhīm b. Mīrzā Aḥmad, claims in the introduction to his work Īqāẓ al-nabīh (p. 313) that Mīrzā Muḥammad belonged to the Raḍawī sayyids (descen-dants of the Prophet), and traces his lineage back to Ḥusayn, son of Mūsā al-Mubarqaʿ, one of the sons of Imam al-Jawād (cf. Ibn ʿInaba, 201, wh…

Ḥassūn, Rizq Allāh (1241–1298/1820–1880), a Syrian poet and journalist of Armenian extraction who figured in the Arabic literary revival known as al-Nahḍa.Ḥassūn’s family roots were either in Iran or Diyār Bakr (q.v.), but his grandfather migrated to Aleppo, where Ḥassūn was born and began his elementary education and learnt calligraphy there. After this, he travelled to the Armenian monastery ( dayr) of Bzoummar, in the Keserwan coastal district of Lebanon, to pursue religious studies in the school run by Armenian Catholic Monks. During his time, he l…

The first set piece battle between the Ottoman and the Ṣafawid rulers, the battle of Chāldirān was, on the one hand, the result of both immediate causes and more general conditions, and on the other, it marked the beginning of a change in attitude on the part of the newly formed Ṣafawid state towards its Western neighbour.The confrontation which took place at Chāldirān arose out of the confrontation between the Ottoman empire which was expanding eastwards into Eastern Anatolia and the newly established Ṣafawid state in Persia which drew its support a…

al-Ḥāʾirī, Abū al-Fatḥ Naṣr Allāh b. Ḥusayn al-Mūsawī al-Fāʾizī, who was given the honorific ( laqab) ʿIzz al-Dīn, an Imāmī belletrist, poet, preacher, traditionist and historian of the 12th/18th century.Abū al-Fatḥ al-Ḥāʾirī was born in Karbalāʾ in 1109/1697. Even though he was quite well known during his lifetime, the precise date of his death is the subject of some uncertainty, with different sources offering a range of years between 1156/1743 and 1168/1755. However, based on the date of the Najaf Conference ( muʾtamar) and his mission on behalf of Nādir Shāh (q.v. Afshār…

Aḥmad Rasmī (Ahmed Resmi Efendi), Abū Kamāl Shihāb al-Dīn Aḥmad b. Ibrāhīm b. Aḥmad (1112–1197/1700–1783), was an Ottoman statesman, diplomat and chronicler. Born in Resmo (Rethymno), a city on the northern coast of Crete, he was known as Kirtī and Rasmī (Murādī, 1/73; Jawdat, 2/299; Thurayyā, 2/380). His date of birth is the subject of some debate, and is also recorded as 1106/1694 or 1695 (see Murādī, 1/73). After studying in his birthplace, he travelled to Istanbul in 1146/1733 (Banarlı, 2/793; Thurayyā, 2/380), completing his studies under such masters as Ḥu…

ʿAdī b. Ḥātim, Abū al-Ṭarīf ʿAdī b. Ḥātim (d. ca. 67/686), was the son of Ḥātim al-Ṭāʾī and a well-known Companion of the Prophet and ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib. ¶ His genealogy is traced to the Banū Thuʿal branch of the Ṭayy (Ṭayyiʾ) clan (Ibn Saʿd, 6/22; Ibn Ḥazm, 402; for his lineage see al-Khaṭīb, 1/202; Abū Nuʿaym, 4/35). While some mention him with the kunya Abū Wahb (see Ibn ʿAsākir, 40/66; Ibn al-Athīr, 4/8), historical reports give him the kunya Abū al-Ṭarīf (see for example Naṣr b. Muzāḥim, 359; al-Yaʿqūbī, 2/228, 276; al-Ṭabarī, 6/63). ʿAdī b. Ḥātim plays a small part in the stories and…

Banū Isrāʾīl (‘The Children of Israel’) are mentioned some forty times in the Qurʾān as a general designation for the Jewish people. The term was exclusively used during the Meccan period (the term al-Yahūd, ‘Jews’, being used in verses from the Medinan period), and mostly in reference to the story of Moses—this may help explain the form of the phrase, ‘children of Israel’, which parallels the usage bnei-yisraʾel (בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל) in the Book of Exodus. However, the Banū Isrāʾīl are not depicted in the Qurʾān simply as the historical people of Moses, but also…

Banū Isrāʾīl (‘The Children of Israel’) are mentioned some forty times in the Qurʾān as a general designation for the Jewish people. The term was exclusively used during the Meccan period (the term al-Yahūd, ‘Jews’, being used in verses from the Medinan period), and mostly in reference to the story of Moses—this may help explain the form of the phrase, ‘children of Israel’, which parallels the usage bnei-yisraʾel (בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל) in the Book of Exodus. However, the Banū Isrāʾīl are not depicted in the Qurʾān simply as the historical people of Moses, but also…

Ḥājjī Khalīfa, Muṣṭafā b. ʿAbd Allāh Ikinjī, known in Turkish as Kātib Çelebi, was a prominent 11th/17th-century Ottoman Turkish scholar, historian, belletrist, biographer, philosopher, geographer and bibliographer, who also wrote in Arabic (Karaalioğlu, 314; Subḥānī, 11; Muḥaddith, 10; al-Ziriklī, 7/236; Hammer-Purgstall, 2/248).There are two autobiographical accounts, covering two different periods of his life, these are found at the end of the first part of Sullam al-wuṣūl and in the khātima (conclusion) of Mizan ul-hakk ( Mīzān al-ḥaqq). The latter work has been f…

Āq-qūyūnlū (lit. ‘White Sheep’), were an alliance of Turkoman tribes in the Diyār Bakr region who ruled over eastern Anatolia and the west of Persia through-out the 9th/15th century until 908/1502 when the Ṣafawids took power in Persia. The tribal confederation was led by the leaders of the Bayındır tribe which is described in a rather fanciful way by Rashīd al-Dīn as meaning ‘an ever-bountiful land’ (p. 141) and is recorded as ‘Bāyīndīr’ according to Yazıcıoğlu Ali’s Tarih-i Âl-i Selçuk, written in the 9th/15th century.Cultural ConditionsĀq-qūyūnlū rule marked a brief period of…

Faḍl Allāh Ḥurūfī Astarābādī (d. 796/1394), the founder of the Ḥurūfī movement which emerged in Iran during the Tīmūrid period and was centred around his person and teachings. The Ḥurūfīs believed that the letters of the Arabo-Persian alphabet contained hidden meanings and that these meanings took primacy over the apparent meaning of the text when interpreting the Qurʾān. They also believed that human beings along with all other creatures were created from these letters and, therefore, that understa…

Diyār Bakr, a city and the capital of the eponymous province in south-east Anatolia. It is situated in a valley on a bank of the Tigris river and is bound to the north by the Taurus mountains, to the west by the Karaca Dağ mountain and to the south by the Mardin hills. Diyār Bakr lies at the intersection of major historical trade routes.The first archaeological work to be carried out in the area of south-east Anatolia took place during the late nineteenth century under the direction of Leman-Haupt and W. Belk, who examined graves in the village of Hilar nea…

Coming from a fairly humble background, al-Būṣīrī seems to have received the standard basic education of the time, but at some point he made his way to Cairo to further his studies. He evidently showed promise as a poet from a young age, and it is from his poetry that one can sketch out something of his life, although many details are missing. He is recorded as having composed a supplicatory poem to the Ayyūbid ruler of Egypt for funds to support his local mosque, and he would often recite his o…

ʿAmr b. al-ʿĀṣ, Abū ʿAbd Allāh (d. the eve of ʿĪd al-Fiṭr 43/6 January 664), was one of the most famous political figures of the first half of the first Islamic century. His kunya is also recorded as Abū Muḥammad. He was from the Banū Sahm branch of the Quraysh, hence his nisba al-Sahmī (al-Sadūsī, 87; Ibn al-Kalbī, Jamhara, 100, 104; al-Zubayrī, 400, 408–409; Ibn ʿAbd al-Barr, 3/1184). His father, al-ʿĀṣ b. Wāʾil, was considered an important member of the Quraysh and is mentioned in connection with certain events before the advent of Islam (Ibn Ḥabīb, al-Muḥabbar, 170; idem, al-Munammaq, 172…

ʿAmr b. al-ʿĀṣ, Abū ʿAbd Allāh (d. the eve of ʿĪd al-Fiṭr 43/6 January 664), was one of the most famous political figures of the first half of the first Islamic century. His kunya is also recorded as Abū Muḥammad. He was from the Banū Sahm branch of the Quraysh, hence his nisba al-Sahmī (al-Sadūsī, 87; Ibn al-Kalbī, Jamhara, 100, 104; al-Zubayrī, 400, 408–409; Ibn ʿAbd al-Barr, 3/1184). His father, al-ʿĀṣ b. Wāʾil, was considered an important member of the Quraysh and is mentioned in connection with certain events before the advent of Islam (Ibn Ḥabīb, al-Muḥabbar, 170; idem, al-Munammaq, 172…

Hujwīrī, Abū al-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. ʿUthmān b. ʿAlī Ghaznawī Jullābī (d. late 5th/11th century), known in the Indian subcontinent mainly by the name Dātā Ganjbakhsh, was one of the eminent Sufis and authors of that century. Nothing is known of his life and career apart from what he himself relates in his treatise Kashf al-maḥjūb, the work for which he is famous. Biographical works dating from, or shortly after, his lifetime merely mention his name (ʿAṭṭār, 68); those of later date do not go beyond relaying information gleaned from Kashf al-maḥjūb. The sources commonly add a title of honou…

Akhī (Ahi), is a name which was given to the heads of groups of young men ( jawānmardān, fityān) and followers of the way of futuwwa, who were mostly artisans and craftsmen and were particularly active in Anatolia between the 7th/13th and 8th/14th centuries. This organisation, which had both a socio-economic and a religious dimension, was called the ¶ Akhiyya or Akhīgarī (Akhīlīq or Ahilik in Turkish). Ibn Baṭṭūṭa (703–779/1304–1377), whose travelogue ( Riḥla) is one of the prime sources on the Akhīs and their practices, says when describing al-Akhiyya al-fityān [‘the young Akhīs’] t…

Akhī (Ahi), is a name which was given to the heads of groups of young men ( jawānmardān, fityān) and followers of the way of futuwwa, who were mostly artisans and craftsmen and were particularly active in Anatolia between the 7th/13th and 8th/14th centuries. This organisation, which had both a socio-economic and a religious dimension, was called the Akhiyya or Akhīgarī (Akhīlīq or Ahilik in Turkish). Ibn Baṭṭūṭa (703–779/1304–1377), whose travelogue ( Riḥla) is one of the prime sources on the Akhīs and their practices, says when describing al-Akhiyya al-fityān [‘the young Akhīs’] th…

ʿAbd al-Dār, Banū, Meccan clan, named after ʿAbd al-Dār, son of Quṣayy b. Kilāb, which was one of the most important clans of the tribe of Quraysh. Its foremost members were in charge of the affairs of Mecca for a considerable period of time, and were influential in shaping events of social and political significance in the period immediately preceding the advent of Islam. During this period, the function of sadāna (overseeing the Kaʿba, and the opening and locking of its door) was held by the Banū ʿAbd al-Dār (al-Masʿūdī, 8). ʿAbd al-Dār, who was the eldest son of Quṣayy b. Kilāb, in…

Abū Aḥmad al-ʿAskarī, al-Ḥasan b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Saʿīd Abū Aḥmad al-ʿAskarī (293–Ḍhū al-Ḥijja 382/906–February 993) was a lexicologist, man of letters and traditionist ( muḥaddith) from Persia. He lived in ʿAskar Mukram, a town in Khūzistān, hence the nisba al-ʿAskarī (al-Samʿānī, 9/298; al-Qifṭī, 1/310; Abū al-Fidāʾ, 4/26). Early sources make no direct reference to his place of birth, but certain contemporaneous accounts (al-Ziriklī, 2/196) maintain it was ʿAskar Mukram. It seems that Abū Aḥmad began his education with his father and uncle (see Abū Aḥmad, al-Maṣūn, 64, 99, 176 et…

Bābāʾī Movement, a socio-religious insurrectionist movement that arose in Anatolia during the reign of the Saljūqs of Rūm in the first half of the 7th/13th century, at the time of the Mongol invasion. The founder of this movement seems to have been one Bābā Ilyās Khurāsānī (q.v.), a prominent Turkoman Sufi shaykh, who came to Anatolia from Khurāsān at the beginning of the 7th/13th century. Ibn Bībī, the contemporary court chronicler of the Saljūqs of Rūm, refers instead to a certain Bābā Isḥāq of…

Bābāʾī Movement, a socio-religious insurrectionist movement that arose in Anatolia during the reign of the Saljūqs of Rūm in the first half of the 7th/13th century, at the ¶ time of the Mongol invasion. The founder of this movement seems to have been one Bābā Ilyās Khurāsānī (q.v.), a prominent Turkoman Sufi shaykh, who came to Anatolia from Khurāsān at the beginning of the 7th/13th century. Ibn Bībī, the contemporary court chronicler of the Saljūqs of Rūm, refers instead to a certain Bābā Isḥāq of Kafarsūd in northern Syri…

Abū al-Suʿūd, Muḥammad b. Muḥammad b. Muṣṭafā ʿImādī (in modern Turkish, Ebussuud Efendi) (17 Ṣafar 896–5 Jumādā I 982/30 December 1490–23 August 1574), known also as Khwājah al-Chalabī, was a Ḥanafī jurist and exegete as well as the most famous Shaykh al-Islām of the Ottoman empire. He served under both Sultan Sulaymān I ‘the Magnificent’ (Kanuni Süleyman) and his son Salīm (Selim) II. He was born in the village of Mudarris, near Istanbul (ʿAṭāʾī, 183), situated among lands given as an endowment to the zāwiya (Sufi lodge; in Turkish, tekke) built for his father by Sultan Bāyazīd II…

Ashraf-ughlī (Eşrefoğlu), ʿAbd Allāh b. Aḥmad Ashraf b. Muḥammad al-Rūmī, was a Sufi and poet of the 8th/14th and 9th/15th centuries and founder of the Ashrafiyya order in Ottoman Turkey. With reference to his father’s name he is known as Ashraf-ughlī, Ibn Ashraf or Ashraf-zādah; and with reference to his birthplace, İznik, as al-Iznīqī (Kufralı, 4/396; ‘Eşrefoğlu Rûmî’, Yeni Türk, 859; Parmaksızoğlu, 15/476). When Shaykh Ḥusayn al-Ḥamawī first met him, he addressed him as ‘Rūmī’, and so he is often called Ashraf-zādah-yi Rūmī (Eşrefzâde-i Rûmî) (Pakalı…

Abū al-Ghāzī Bahādur Khān, was the son of ʿArab Muḥammad Khān b. Ḥājj Muḥammad Khān or Ḥājim Khān (1014–Ramaḍān 1074/1605–March 1664), a historian and one of the rulers of the Uzbek Shaybānid dynasty in Khwārazm. The sole reliable source on his life is a book called Shajara-yi Turk of which he himself is the author. He was born in Urgench and died in Khīwa (Abū al-Ghazī, 291, 334; see below). His father thought the victory over the invading Russian Cossacks in Urgench forty days after his birth was a good omen, and therefore named him Abū al…

Cultural BackgroundBahrain is a region of the Persianate world which, arguing on the basis of the most authentic historical sources and traditions, could be regarded as having been a part of the geographical and cultural realm of Persia since the most ancient times. Though Bahrain happened to be a region that was intermittently alienated from central government control from a cultural point of view, however, it maintained a constant relationship with the mainland at all times. This connection and…

Ḥakīm Muʾmin, Muḥammad Muʾmin b. Mīr Muḥammad Zamān Ḥusaynī Daylamī Tunkābunī, was a physician and pharmacologist at the court of the Ṣafawid Shāh Sulaymān I (r. 1077–1105/1666–1694) and the author of the well-known Persian medical treatise Tuḥfat al-muʾminīn.In spite of Tuḥfat al-muʾminīn’s popularity as a medical text and the relatively wide circulation it enjoyed, comparatively little information is available about the life of its author. Most of what is known to scholars about Ḥakīm Muʾmin has been gleaned from the brief autobi…

Abū ʿAmr al-Dānī, ʿUthmān b. Saʿīd b. ʿUthmān al-Umawī al-Qurṭubī al-Dānī (371–444/981–1053), a renowned muqriʾ (reader) and muḥaddith (traditionist) of al-Andalus. His family, kinsfolk of the Umayyad rulers of al-Andalus, came from the village of Qūta Rāsha on the outskirts of Córdoba (see Ibn Bashkuwāl, 2/405; al-Dhahabī, Maʿrifa, 1/325). Abū ʿAmr was also known as Ibn al-Ṣayrafī (al-Ḥumaydī, 2/483). The sparse information we have on his life is gleaned from a text he wrote himself which was related by Yāqūt (12/125–127). According to this report and …

Al-Būsnawī’s ThoughtThe major feature of al-Būsnawī’s thought is the depth and subtlety of his understanding of the metaphysical dialectic of the Oneness of Being ( waḥdat al-wujūd), and the extraordinary clarity with which he was able to interpret works by Ibn al-ʿArabī, Rūmī and other authors for his audience. As Ceyhan observes (p. 37 n. 4), al-Būsnawī ‘managed to synthesise the wisdom of Ibn al-ʿArabī, al-Qūnawī and Mawlānā at a very high intellectual level.’ In this he can be compared to his equally famous Ottoman c…

al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī, Abū Saʿīd b. Abī al-Ḥasan Yasār al-Baṣrī (21–110/642–728), known as Abū Muḥammad, Abū ʿAlī and Abū Saʿīd, a narrator of ḥadīth, Qurʾān commentator, theologian, preacher, one of the eight ascetics ( al-zuhhād al-thamāniya) of the generation known as the tābiʿūn (Followers), and described by later generations as an early Sufi master with such honorific titles as sayyid al-zuhhād wa al-ʿubbād wa al-ʿulamāʾ wa al-fuṣaḥāʾ (master of the ascetics, pious worshippers, scholars and purist speakers).Al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī was one of the most celebrated scholars an…

In the 4th/10th century, the Persians, the Georgians and the Arabs referred to this people by the name ‘Kashak’ (Akiner, 231). Al-Masʿūdī (p. 287) and Ibn al-Wardī (p. 47) refer to the Kashak when they speak of those living in the northern Caucasus. ‘Kashak’ seems to have been a Georgian name derived from ‘Kasogi’ in Ossete (Ossetian). The Turks called them ‘Cherkas’, a name which has been prevalent since the 7th/13th century: originally it did not designate the Adygei but rather the people livi…

Ḥabīb Iṣfahānī, Mīrzā, also known as Ḥabīb Allāh Iṣfahānī (1251–1310/1835–1893), an Iranian poet, man of letters, grammarian and translator. He was regarded as one of the pioneers of literary modernisation ( tajaddud-i adabī) in Iran.He was born in the village of Bin in Chahār Maḥāl wa Bakhtiyārī province and received his primary education in Bin, before continuing his studies in Iṣfahān. He then set off for Tehran where he completed his education. Some time around 1279/1862 he went to Baghdad, where he lived for four years and studied Islamic jurisprudence ( fiqh) and Arabic literatu…

Adam in Islam. Muslim beliefs on Adam (Ādam), his creation as the father of humanity (Abū al-Bashar) and the first prophet are taken from the Qurʾān, with extra material found in ḥadīths and expanded in Qurʾān commentaries. Adam is explicitly mentioned twenty-five times in the Qurʾān. The Qurʾānic account describes the creation of Adam, his presence in Paradise and his consuming the fruit of the forbidden tree, his descent from Paradise and life on earth as the father of humanity. When God told the angels that He would create…

al- Ḥurūf, asrār (lit. ‘the secrets of the letters’), the association of the letters of the Arabic alphabet with a hidden mystery or symbolism. These secrets are mentioned in a very early ḥadīth, variously transmitted from Abū Bakr al-Ṣiddīq (q.v.), Imam ʿAlī (q.v.) or the Successor al-Shaʿbī (d. ca. 103/721): ‘God has a secret ( sirr) in every scripture, and His secret in the Qurʾān is the letters of the alphabet mentioned at the beginning of the sūras’ (q.v. al- Ḥurūf al-muqaṭṭaʿa) (al-Wāḥidī, 2/13–14; al-Thaʿlabī, 1/136; al-Zajjāj, 1/60; Nguyen, 8–9). While these discon…

Ḥaydar Ṣafawī (d. 893/1488) or Shaykh Ḥaydar, the eldest son of Shaykh Junayd Ṣafawī by Khadīja Begum, nephew of the Āq-qūyūnlū (q.v.) sovereign Ūzūn Ḥasan, and the fifth of Shaykh Ṣafī’s descendants to act as the spiritual leader of the Ṣafawid Sufi order which he founded in Ardabīl. Under his leadership, the order-which was largely Shiʿi in character-continued the process of militarisation which had begun under his father. Most significantly, he was the father of Shah Ismāʿīl, who was to found the Ṣafawid dynasty with the support of the qizilbāsh following that he created.Ḥaydar’s pre…

NomenclatureOpinions diverge with regard to the etymology of the name ‘Bukhārā’: some scholars hold that the word is derived from the Soghdian Bukhārak, from which came the Old Turkic buqaraq (land of the bull) (Altheim, pp. 111–112). In al-Narshakhī’s (4th/10th century) text other names are given for the city, with the 6th/12th-century Persian editors adding that it was referred to in Arabic as ‘madīnat al-ṣufriyya’ (the city of the coppersmiths) and also ‘madīnat al-tujjār’ (the city of merchants) (al-Narshakhī, English t…

Enoch (Idrīs), one of the divine messengers mentioned in the Bible who is identified with Idrīs in the Qurʾān. According to traditions he was descended from Seth (Shīth), the son of Adam, and in the period between Adam and Noah (Nūḥ) taught the doctrine of monotheism; In the brief references to Idrīs in the Qurʾān, he is called ‘a man of truth’ ( ṣiddīq) among the prophets (Q 19:56), and his name is set beside those of two other prophets (Ismāʿīl and Dhū al-Kifl) as examples of ‘those who have fortitude’ ( ṣābirūn) and are ‘upright’ ( ṣāliḥūn) (Q 21:85–86). It is also stated that he was adm…

Ḥāfiẓ, Shams al-Dīn Muḥammad of Shīrāz (d. ca. 791/1389), a world-renowned Persian lyrical poet, is universally regarded as one of the greatest exponents of the ghazal form. Among the most distinctive features of the poetry of Ḥāfiẓ is his exploration of mystical themes, often ambiguously couched in the language of worldly love and carousing; his espousal of the values of the Malāmatī Sufis, who actively sought public disapproval as a safeguard against ostentatious piety and hypocrisy; his exquisite sensibility as…

Types of Hand-Woven Carpets Knotted Carpets Qālī Kilims Zīlū Carpet-Weaving before Islam Non-Textile Specimens and Documents The Earliest Known Carpet-Weaving The Pazyryk Carpet: Significance Sāsānid Carpets The Bahāristān Carpet Kilims and Zīlū Carpet-Weaving during the Islamic Period up to the 9th/15th Century The Early Islamic Centuries The Mid-Islamic Centuries Early- and Middle-Islamic Written Sources The Golden Age of Carpet-Weaving The Ardabīl Carpets The Salting Carpet Carpets in Persian Miniature Paintings Centres of Persian Carpet Production The Global Rise…

Bindings and Binding. The protective outer covering of a book, manuscript or other volume in codex form; and the art and process of designing and making it. In general, bookbinding and other arts of the book have always been accorded special importance in the Muslim world (Bosch, ‘Binding’, 355), where this craft has often reached a high degree of refinement. Binders (Jild-sāzān or Mujallidūn) The sources available to us indicate that bookbinders customarily undertook a number of additional crafts as well, such as book-making ( ṣaḥḥāfī), illumination, margin ruling, dyeing and b…