, the first city to be founded in Egypt by the Muslim conquerors and the first place of residence of the Arab governors. It was built on the east bank of the Nile, alongside the Greco-Coptic township of Babylon or Bābalyūn [ q.v.], traces of which are still preserved in the ramparts of the Ḳaṣr al-S̲h̲amʿ. A bridge of boats, interrupted by the island of al-Rawḍa [ q.v.], linked the Ḳaṣr with the city of Giza (al-D̲j̲īza) on the other bank of the Nile. Al-Fusṭāṭ was partly built beside the river, which at that time followed a more easterly course, and partly on …

[see al-fuṣtāt ].

, Abu ’l-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. al-Ḥusayn b. Ḥaydara b. Muḥammad b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Muḥammad, from the genealogical line of ʿAḳīl b. Abī Ṭālib [ q.v.]. Since ʿAḳīl was a half-brother of ʿAlī (the Prophet’s nephew), al-ʿAḳīlī was seen to belo…

, name of a family of high-officials and revenue officers, originating from ʿIrāḳ, who held important positions in Egypt and Syria between 266/879 and 335/946. The nisba is derived from a village Mād̲h̲arāya, in the neighbourhood of Wāsiṭ (see al-Samʿānī, Kitāb al-Ansāb , fol. 499a; Yāḳūt, Muʿd̲j̲am , iv, 381). Abū Bakr Aḥmad b. Ibrāhīm al-Mād̲h̲arāʾī with the nickname al-Aṭras̲h̲ ("the partially deaf one", see Lane, Lexicon , s.v.), was given the control of finances of Egypt and Syria in 266/879 by Aḥmad b. Ṭūlūn, and so became the founde…

, Abū Manṣūr (Abū Naṣr in al-Dānī, Abu ’l-Ḳāsim in al-Maḳrīzī, see Bibl .) b. al-Ḳāsim al-Barḳī, Fāṭimid poet from Alexandria. His father was from D̲j̲ud̲h̲ām and his mother from Lak̲h̲m, tribes which had migrated to Egypt in early Islamic times. His date of birth is unknown. He died in D̲h̲u ’l-Ḥid̲j̲d̲j̲a 528/Sept.-Oct. 1134 or Muḥarram 529/Oct.-Nov. 1134.…

, amīr, probably a native of Ḵh̲ars̲h̲ana in Cappadocia, sometimes designated (through a factitious genealogy?) by the name of Badr b. ʿAmmār al-Asadī. Chamberlain to the caliph al Ḳāhir and in high favour under al-Rāḍī, he followed the amīr al-umarā…

(a.), pl. of k̲h̲iṭṭa , the various quarters of the newly-founded early Islamic towns which the Arab-Islamic chiefs laid out (root k̲h̲.ṭ.t ) for the population groups which they attracted thither or for their respective leaders. Historical-administrative concerns led fairly quickly to the appearance of a literary genre which consisted of a description of the historical topography of these k̲h̲iṭaṭ . This happened in regards to Bag̲h̲dād, and one finds chapters of this nature in the “geographical” works of Ibn al-Faḳīh al-Hamad̲h̲ān…

b. al-Ḥakam b. Yūsuf al-Balk̲h̲ī , governor and financial controller of Egypt from 1 Ramaḍān 200/3 April 816. On 1 Rabīʿ I 201/27 Sept. 816, the troops openly mutinied against him, and al-Maʾmūn was forced to remove al-Sarī from his post and replace him by Sulaymān b. G̲h̲ālib; al-Sarī was put in prison and Sulaymān entered upon his office on Tuesday, 4 Rabīʿ I 201/30 Sept. 816. He was removed from office as early as 1 S̲h̲aʿbān 201/22 Feb. 817, as the result of a repeated revol…

, Abū S̲h̲ujāʿ b. Mud̲j̲īr al-Saʿdī, a vizier of the last Fāṭimid caliph, al-ʿĀḍid li-Dīn Allāh [ q.v.], and the statesman who involved the forces of Nūr al-Dīn Maḥmūd [ q.v.] in the affairs of Egypt. He belonged to the Banī Saʿd, semi-settled Bedouin of D̲j̲ud̲h̲ām [ q.v.], a tribal grouping both politically and militarily influential in the first half of…

, the eocene limestone plateau that borders the city of Cairo to the east, between Ṭurā near the Nile in the south and al-D̲j̲abal al-Aḥmar in the north, the Red Mountain which is near the modern quarter of ʿAbbāsiyya. In Islamic tradition, the Muḳaṭṭam is considered as a sacred mountain. Before Islam, in Christian tradition, al-Muḳaṭṭam, ¶ like all the desert mountains of Egypt, was associated with monasteries, oratories and caves for meditation and seclusion. Abū Ṣāliḥ the Armenian, who wrote in the early 7th/13th century, also designates it, perha…

, an ancient town and seaport on the Red Sea (A. Baḥr al-Ḳulzum [ q.v.], Baḥr al-Hind or Baḥr al-Ḥabas̲h̲a ), now administratively in the province ( muḥāfaẓa ) of al-Suways. It appears to have been a fort as well as a town, and was, ¶ perhaps, the spot where the troops destined to guard the sluices of the canal were stationed. It was called Castrum by Hierocles and Epiphanius ; and κλύσμα (Clysma), or κλεῖσμα is first mentioned by Lucian. Ḳulzum is a corruption of the Greek name κλύσμα (in both Arabic and Greek almost always without the article; the Greek refers to the “sluice” at the mouth of the canal, whic…

, the river Nile. The Nile is one of the large rivers (length ca. 6,648 km./4,132 miles) which from the beginning have belonged to the territory of Islam, and the valleys and deltas of which have favoured the development of an autonomous cultural centre in Islamic civilisation. In the case of the Nile, this centre has influenced at different times the cultural and political events in the Islamic world. Thus the Nile has, during the Islamic period, continued to play the same part as it did during the centuries that preceded the coming of Islam. The name al-Nīl or, very often, Nīl Miṣr, goe…

, also s̲h̲ad̲h̲irwān , is an Arabised Persian word which originally meant a precious curtain or drapery suspended on tents of sovereigns and leaders and from balconies of palaces and mansions. But in mediaeval sources it often occurs as an architectural term designating either a wall fountain or its most important element—the inclined and carved marble slab upon which water flows—perhaps in reference to the fabric-like texture of water rippling down the oblique surface (Laila Ibrahim and M.M. Amin, Architectural terms in Mamluk documents, Cairo 1990, 66, 68-9; G. Marçais, Salsabīl e…

, like al-ṣaydalānī , primarily meant a perfume merchant or druggist; but as most scents ( ʿiṭr , pl. ʿuṭūr ) and drugs (usually ʿaḳḳār , pl. ʿaḳāḳīr ) were credited with some healing properties, ʿaṭṭār also came to mean chemist and homoeopath ( mutaṭabbib ). His activities combine commerce with science and medicine. He has to know the diverse drugs, curatives, drafts and scents, their good and bad varieties, as well as what is fraudulent; he must know which things change quickly or go bad, and which do not, and what means there are for their preservation or reconstitution. Finally, he must ¶ kno…

, the name of a k̲h̲ānḳāh or establishment for Ṣūfīs at Cairo founded during the Ayyūbid period in a former Fāṭimid house within al-Ḳāhira, now in the modern D̲j̲amāliyya street ( Index des monuments historiques , no. 480). In Fāṭimid times it was a dwelling facing the Dār al-wizāra , at that period the ministry of justice. Some famous persons dwelt there, such as the vizier Ṭalariʾiʿ b. Ruzzīk [ q.v.], who had a tunnel dug to connect it with the Dār al-wizāra. It was at this point that it acquired its name of Saʿrd al-Suʿadāʾ “the Supremely-happy one”, from the name of the person thus styled, the ustād̲h̲ Ḳanbar (or ʿAnbar), an instructor at the great palace under al-Mustansir [ q.v.] (al-Maḳrīzī, K̲h̲iṭaṭ , ii, 415).…

(or al-Maʿāfir ), the name of a South Arabian tribe, the genealogy of which is given as Yaʿfur b. Mālik b. al-Ḥārit̲h̲ b. Murra b. Udad b. Humaysaʿ b. ʿAmr b. Yas̲h̲d̲j̲ib b. ʿArīb b. Zayd b. Kahlān b. Sabaʾ; they are included among the Ḥimyar. The name was also given to the territory which the tribe inhabited and this corresponded roughly with the Turkish ḳaḍāʾ of Taʿizziyya and the present Yemen Arab Republic province ( ḳaḍāʾ) of al-Ḥud̲j̲ariyya (pronounced locally al-Ḥugariyya), itself part of the administrative area ( liwāʾ ) of Taʿizz. In early and mediaeval times it is described as a mik̲h̲…

, (dwelling place), house. The two words most commonly used to designate a dwelling place, bayt and dār , have, etymologically, quite different meanings. Bayt is, properly speaking, the covered shelter where one may spend the night; dār (from dāra , to surround) is a space surrounded by walls, buildings, or nomadic tents, placed more or less in a circle. Dārat un is the tribal encampment known in North Africa as the duwwār . From the earliest times there has been in Muslim dwellings a tendency to arrange around a central space: the park, where t…

(268-334/882-946), governor in Egypt and Syria during the 4th/10th century. He was the third generation of his family to serve the ʿAbbāsid dynasty. He was officially designated by the caliph al-Rāḍī with the title al-Ik̲h̲s̲h̲īd in 327/939 after having requested it the preceding year. The dynasty which he established is known as the Ik̲h̲s̲h̲īdids. Born in Bag̲h̲dād on 15 Rad̲j̲ab 268/8 February 882, Muḥammad b. ṭug̲h̲d̲j̲ spent part of his youth in Ṭūlūnid [see aḥmad b. Ṭūlūn ] lands in Syria and Palestine, gaining military and administrative expe…

, the name of two brothers, Abu ’l-Ḥasan Aḥmad and Abū Isḥāḳ (Abū Yusr) Ibrāhīm b. Muḥammad b. ʿAbd Allāh b. al-Mudabbir, who played an important part as high officials, courtiers and men of letters as well as poets at Sāmarrā and in Egypt and Syria during the middle of the 3rd/9th century. The family seems to have been of Persian origin; it is not mentioned which of the two brothers was the elder. (1) Abu ’l-Ḥasan (d. 270/883 or 271/884) directed the dīwān al-diays̲h̲ in the reign of the caliph al-Wāt̲h̲iḳ (227/842-232/847); during the first years of al-M…

, the name of a kūra and of a province (formerly, ʿamal , now mudīriyya ) in Egypt. 1. The kūra of al-S̲h̲arḳiyya which replaced the Byzantine pagarchy of Aphroditopolis, was one of the few districts which received an Arabic name; the latter is explained by its situation on the eastern bank of the Nile. It is difficult to estimate the extent of its territory, which lay immediately south of the capital of the country, al-Fusṭāṭ. The first capital of the kūra, situated on the right bank of the river, was Anṣinā (Antinöe), but the small number (17) of villages in the kūra of al-S̲h̲arḳiyya allows u…