Search

, Nūr al-Dīn abu ’l-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. ʿAfīf al-Dīn ʿAbd Allāh, al-S̲h̲āfiʿī, noted Egyptian scholar in history, theology, law, tradition, etc. (844-91/1440-1506). He was born at Samhūd in Upper Egypt in Ṣafar 844/July 1440, the son of a ḳāḍī ; in his genealogy, he claimed to be a Ḥasanid sayyid . His biography is given in detail by al-Sak̲h̲āwī, resumed in Ibn al-ʿImād and other subsequent biographical sources. He studied in Cairo from 853/1449 onwards under its celebrated scholars, and also received the Ṣūfī k̲h̲irḳa or cloak. He made the Pilgrimage in 860/14…

, Ḳuwād̲h̲iyān , in mediaeval ¶ Islamic times a small province situated on the right bank of the upper Oxus, and also a town, the chief settlement of the province. The latter comprised essentially the basin of the Ḳubād̲h̲iyān (modern Kafirnihan) River, which ran down from the Buttamān Mountains and joined the Oxus at the fordingplace of Awwad̲j̲ or Awzad̲j̲ (modern Ayvad̲j̲); accordingly, it lay between the provinces of Čag̲h̲āniyān [ q.v.] on the west and Wak̲h̲s̲h̲ and K̲h̲uttal [ q.v.] on the east. Administratively, it was most often attached to K̲h̲uttal. It now falls …

(Turkish-Persian “black garden”, allegedly because of the fertility of its upland valleys, but this is probably a folk etymology), the recent name of the mountainous region lying to the north of the middle course of the Araxes River in Transcaucasia, corresponding to the southern part of the mediaeval Islamic Arrān [ q.v.]. The mountains of Ḳarābāg̲h̲ rise to over 12,000 feet, and the modern population (mostly Armenian, with some S̲h̲īʿī Azeri Turks) is concentrated in the deep valleys. The original Armenian princes of Artzak̲h̲ were dispossessed after the Sald̲j̲ūḳ drive…

, Abū K̲h̲ayt̲h̲ama al-S̲h̲aybānī al-Nasāʾī, traditionist of the early ʿAbbāsid period. He was born at Nasā in K̲h̲urāsān in 160/776-7 but lived mostly in Bag̲h̲dād, dying there in S̲h̲aʿbān 234/March 849. He was amongst the seven scholars forwarded by Isḥāḳ b. Ibrāhīm to the caliph al-Maʾmūn for questioning over the createdness or otherwise of the Ḳurʾān (al-Ṭabarī, iii, 1116; see also miḥna ). Regarded as a trustworthy, t̲h̲iḳa , narrator of traditions, he was the author of a Kitāb al-ʿIlm (publ. Damascus 1966). (C.E. Bosworth) Bibliography al-K̲h̲aṭīb al-Bag̲h̲dādī, viii, 482-…

, a well on the Mecca-Medina road, between the terri tories of ʿĀmir b. Ṣaʿṣaʿa and Sulaym, where a group of Muslims was killed in Ṣafar 4/625. The traditional account is that the chief of ʿĀmir, Abū Barāʾ (or Abū ’l-Barāʾ), invited Muḥammad to send a missionary group to his tribe, promising his personal protection for them. So a group of “Ḳurʾān-readers” ( ḳurrāʾ ) was sent from Medina. When they reached Biʾr Maʿūna, they were massacred by clans of Sulaym, led by ʿĀmir b. al-Ṭufayl, who had failed to induce his own tribe of ʿĀmir to vi…

a large tribal group, now inhabiting in the main the areas of Ḏh̲amār and Radāʿ in the modern Yemen Arab Republic. The traditional genealogy, given by e.g. Ibn Durayd, Is̲h̲tiḳāḳ , ed. ¶ Wüstenfeld, 237 ff., and by Yāḳūt, Beirut 1374-6/1955-7, v, 89, is from Mālik b. Udad b. Zayd b. Yas̲h̲d̲j̲ub b. ʿArïb b. Zayd b. Kahlān b. Sabaʾ b. Yas̲h̲d̲j̲ub b. Yaʿrub b. Ḳaḥtān. The numerous component ḳabāʾil of Mad̲h̲ḥid̲j̲ are listed in full by al-Malik al-As̲h̲raf ʿUmar, Ṭurfat al-aṣḥāb fī maʿrifat al-ansāb , ed. K. V. Zetterstéen, Damascus 1949, 9; those most frequ…

, a town in eastern Afg̲h̲ānistān situated 90 miles/145 km. south-west of Kābul in lat. 68° 18′ E. and long. 33° 44′ N. and lying at an altitude of 7,280 feet/2,220 m. The original form of the name must have been * Ganzak < gand̲j̲a “treasury”, with a later metathesis in eastern Iranian of -nz-/-nd̲j̲- to -zn-, and this etymology indicates that G̲h̲azna was already in pre-Islamic times the metropolis of the surrounding region of Zābulistān. The parallel forms G̲h̲aznī (in present-day use) and G̲h̲aznīn must go back to forms like G̲h̲aznīk and G̲h̲aznēn the geograph…

, Sāʾid (a., pls. asyād , sāda , sādāt , abstract nouns siyāda , suʾdad , etc.), originally, chief, e.g. of an Arabian tribe, and then, in Islamic times, a title of honour for descendants of the Prophet Muḥammad, being in this respect in many ways coterminous with the term s̲h̲arīf . Sayyid was used in ancient South Arabian, where it appears as s 1 wd “chieftain” (A.F.L. Beeston, etc., ¶ Sabaic dictionary, Louvain-Beirut 1982, 129), but the root seems to be largely absent from North-Western Semitic, being only dubiously attested in Elephantine Aramaic (J. Hoftijzer and K. Jongeling, Dictionar…

, Abū S̲h̲ud̲j̲āʿ ʿIzz al-Dīn , Turkish Atabeg in Fārs of the Salg̲h̲urid line [ q.v.], reigned in S̲h̲īrāz from 599/1202-3 until most probably 623/1226. On the death of his elder brother Takla/Tekele (Degele, etc.?) b. Zangī in 594/1198, Saʿd claimed power in Fārs, but his claim was contested by his ¶ cousin Ṭog̲h̲ri̊l, the son of his father’s elder brother Sunḳur, who had founded the dynasty. Ṭog̲h̲ri̊l retained the royal title for nine years, but throughout that period warfare between him and his cousin continued without a decisive result for…

(a.), Ḳismet (t.), a term used for “fate, destiny”. In Arabic, ḳisma means literally “sharing out, distribution, allotment”, and one of its usages is as the arithmetical term for “division of a number”. It later came to mean “portion, lot”, and was then particularised to denote “the portion of fate, good or bad, specifically allotted to and destined for each man”. It is in this final sense, and especially via Turkish, that ḳismet has become familiar in the West as a term for the fatalism popularly attributed to the oriental (the first attestati…

, modern spelling Nagaur, Nagor, a town and district in the division of Jodhpur in the Rajasthan state of the Indian Union, formerly within the princely state of Jodhpur in British India; the town lies in lat. 27° 12′ N. and long. 73° 48′ E. at 75 miles/120 km. to the northeast of Jodhpur [see d̲j̲ōdhpur ], and in 1971 had a population of 36,433. The walled town is said to have derived its name from its traditional founders, the Nāga Rād̲j̲puts. In the later 12th century it was controlled by the Čawhān (Čahamāna) ruler of Dihlī Pṛithvīrād̲j̲a III, then by the G̲h̲ūrid Muʿizz al-Dīn Muḥammad [see g̲h̲…

, Europeanised form Seringapatam , a town of South India (lat. 12° 25′ N., long. 76° 42′ E.). In British India, it came within the princely state of Mysore [see mahisur , maysūr ], and is now in the Mysore District, the southernmost one of the Karnataka State of the Indian Union. It is situated on an island in the Cauvery River to the north-north-east of Mysore city. Named after its shrine to the Hindu god Śri Raṅga (Viṣṇu), it became in the 17th century the capital of the Hindu Rād̲j̲ās of Mysore and then, after 1761, of the Muslim sultans Ḥaydar ʿAlī and Tīpū Sulṭān [ q.vv.]. The latter’s oppositio…

, a line of Turkmen derebey s [ q.v.] or local lords who controlled the region round Payās [ q.v.], which was strategically situated near the head of the Gulf of Alexandretta (and now in the modern Turkish il or province of Hatay), and, for a while, Adana in Cilicia [ q.vv.] for almost a century. The founder, K̲h̲alīl Bey Küčük ʿAlī Og̲h̲lu, appears ca. 1770 as a bandit chief based on Payās, preying on shipping (including the ships of European powers) in the Gulf and on the land traffic which had to pass through the narrow gap between the Gâvur Daği mountain…

, a town of northern India (lat. 29° 24′ N., long. 76° 58′ E.) situated 86 km/57 miles north of Dihlī; it is also the name of the southernmost taḥṣīl in the Karnāl District of what was in British Indian times the province of the Pand̲j̲āb [ q.v.] but has since 1947 been in the eastern or Indian part of the divided province of the former Pand̲j̲āb, at present in Haryana province of the Indian Union. On three occasions has the fate of Hindustān been decided on the plain of Pānīpat: in 1526, when Bābur ¶ [ q.v.], the Barlās Turk, defeated Ibrāhīm Lōdī [ q.v.]; in 1556, when Akbar [ q.v.] crushed the forces …

(Hebr. S̲h̲ēt̲h̲), Seth the third son of Adam and Eve (Gen. IV, 25-6, V, 3-8), regarded in Islamic lore as one of the first prophets and, like his father, the recipient of a revealed scripture. He is not mentioned in the Ḳurʾān, but plays a considerable role in the subsequent Ḳiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ [ q.v.] literature (see below). He is said to have been born when his father was 130 years of age, five years after the murder ¶ of Abel. When Adam died, he made him his heir and executor of his will. He taught him the hours of the day and of the night, told him of the Flood to come…

, Nawāb of Awadh or Oudh (regn. 1798-1814). His brother Aṣaf al-Dawla had died in September 1797, but after a four months’ interim, Āṣaf al-Dawla’s putative son Wazīr ʿAlī Ḵh̲ān was set aside and the British governor-General Sir John Shore installed in his place Saʿādat ʿAlī Ḵh̲ān, who had been living under British protection in Benares since 1776. His reign is noteworthy for the extension of British control over the Oudh territories. A treaty concluded with the late Nawāb in 1775 had placed these terri…

, Nāyin , a small town (lat. 53° 05’ E., long. 32° 52’ N., altitude 1,408 m/4.620 feet) on the southwestern edge of the Great Desert of central Persia and on the road connecting Yazd with Iṣfahān and Ḳum. The town seems to have a pre-Islamic history, but nothing is known of this. The mediaeval Islamic geographers place it in the sardsīr or cooler upland regions and describe it as administratively within Fārs (al-Iṣṭak̲h̲rī) but as dependent on either Yazd or Iṣfahān. According to Mustawfī, Nuzha , 69, tr. 77, its citadel (whose ruins are still visible) had w…

or Sūrī dynasty, a line of Dihlī Sultans (947-62/1540-55) founded by the Afg̲h̲ān commander S̲h̲īr S̲h̲āh Sūr b. Miyān Ḥasan [ q.v.], who had been in the service of the preceeding Lōdī sultans [ q.v.]. This brief Indian dynasty’s period of rule spanned the interval between the first reign of the Mug̲h̲al Humāyūn [ q.v.] (937-47/1530-40) and his second reign and the final consolidation of Mug̲h̲al rule (962/1555). From a base in Bihār, S̲h̲īr S̲h̲āh in the 1530s made himself master of northern India, including Bengal, and twice repelled invasions from Agra by Hum…

, a district in the Rohilkhand division in the north-west of Uttar Pradesh in the Indian Union (formerly the United Provinces of British India), with an area of 2,290 sq. miles/5,930 km2 and a population (1961 census) of 1,973,530 of whom 62% were at that time Hindu and 37% Muslim, the latter being stronger in the rural areas than the urban centres; the concentration of Muslims, almost wholly Sunnīs, is one of the thickest in the whole of Uttar Pradesh. Almost all the population is either Hindi- or Urdu-speaking. Nothing is k…

, al-ḳās̲h̲ī , Abu ’l-ʿAbbās Aḥmad b. ʿAlī, called Ibn Bāba or Bābā, Persian author of the Sald̲j̲ūḳ: period, and boon-companion or nadīm by profession. He apparently flourished in the second half of the 5th/11th century and early years of the next one; Bagdatli Ismail Paşa, Īḍāḥ al-maknūn , ¶ i, 546, says that he died in 510/1116-7, and this is approximately confirmed by Yāḳūt, who says that he died at Marw. Only Samʿānī, Ansāb , ff. 80a, 437b, and Yāḳūt, Buldān , ed. Beirut, i, 412, iv, 296-7, have any significant information on him. It seems that he w…