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, S̲h̲araf al-Dīn Ḥasan b. Muḥammad, Persian rhetorician and poet, who ¶ flourished in the middle of the 8th/14th century. Very little is known about his life and the few chronological indications that we possess are either imprecise or unreliable. Dawlats̲h̲āh states that he was the poet laureate ( malik al-s̲h̲uʿarāʾ [ q.v.]) of ʿIrāḳ during the reign of the Muẓaffarid S̲h̲āh Manṣūr (reigned 789-95/1387-93), but dedications in his two most important works prove that he attended the court of Sultan Abu ’l-Fatḥ Uways Bahādur or S̲h̲ayk̲h̲ Uways (757-76/1356-74) of the D̲j̲alāyirids [ q.…

, Sayyid (or Mīr) Muḥammad Ḥusayn , a modern Persian poet. He was born about 1905 at Tabrīz as the son of a lawyer, and belonging to a family of sayyid s in the village of K̲h̲us̲h̲gnāb. In his early work he used the pen name Bahd̲j̲at, which he later changed to S̲h̲ahriyār, a name chosen from the Dīwān of Ḥāfiẓ, who was his great model as a writer of g̲h̲azal s. He read medicine at the Dār al-Funūn in Tehran, but left his studies unfinished to become a government clerk in K̲h̲urāsān. After some time he returned to Tehran, where for many years…

(a.), poet. ¶ 1. In the Arab world. A. Pre-Islamic and Umayyad periods. Among those endowed with knowledge and with power in ancient Arabia stands the figure of the s̲h̲āʿir , whose role is often confused with that of the ʿarrāf ( s̲h̲aʿara and ʿarafa having the same semantic value: cf. I. Goldziher, Abhandlungen , i, 3 ff.) and of the kāhin [ q.v.]. They were credited with the same source of inspiration, the d̲j̲inns (Goldziher, Die Ǧinnen der Dichter , in ZDMG, xlv [1891], 685 ff.). However, the s̲h̲āʿir was, originally, the repository of magical rather than divinatory knowledge; …

, the principal hero of the Iranian epic, especially in the version of Firdawsī [ q.v.]. 1. In Iranian legend. Neither his name nor that of his father Zāl occur in the Avesta. In the Yas̲h̲t s, Kərəsāspa (in Persian, Kars̲h̲āsp or Gars̲h̲āsp) is the most important heroic figure. Marquait conjectured that originally “Rustam” was no more than an epithet of Kərəsāspa, which only by chance was not attested in the extant Avestan texts. The exploits later attributed to Rustam would be the result of a blend of the l…

(p.) or S̲h̲ahrās̲h̲ūb (“upsetting the town”), a genre of short love poems on young craftsmen, often related to the bazaars of specific towns. 1. In Persian In Persian literature, the genre is usually referred to under the latter name. E.J.W. Gibb’s contention that the genre was invented by the Turkish poet Mesīḥī [ q.v.] of Edirne ( HOP, ii, 232), was challenged already by E.G. Browne who, pointing to Persian specimens mentioned by the Ṣafawid anthologist Sām Mīrzā [ q.v.], concluded that “though they were probably written later than Masíḥí’s Turkish S̲h̲ahr-angíz …

(a.), anthology, selection of poetry. 1. In Arabic. Mediaeval tradition holds that the oldest anthology of Arabic poems is the small collection of celebrated pre-Islamic ḳaṣīda s variously known as “the seven long poems”, al-Muʿallaḳāt [ q.v.], al-Sumūṭ , etc. It is probably the oldest in conception. The early ʿAbbāsid period saw the compilation of the celebrated Mufaḍḍaliyyāt [ q.v.]. Al-Aṣmaʿī’s anthology of 92 ḳaṣīdas by 71 poets (44 of them D̲j̲āhilī), the Aṣmaʿiyyāt , received relatively little attention from mediaeval writers. A comment in the Fihrist ,…

, S̲h̲ams al-S̲h̲uʿarāʾ Kamāl al-Dīn , Persian poet of the early Ṣafawid period, born ca. 1500 in Kās̲h̲ān. According to the most reliable sources, he died in 996/1587-8; a ¶ less likely dating of his death, given by Abū Ṭālib Iṣfahānī in K̲h̲ulāṣat al-afkār (see Storey i/2, 878), is 1000/1591-2. For some time he was a draper ( bazzāz ) like his father, but he abandoned this trade for the more profitable career of a professional poet. His work was appreciated at the Ṣafawid court at Ḳazwīn. He seems to have continued, however, to l…

, or Niẓām al-Dīn ʿUbayd Allāh al-Zākānī, Persian poet of the Mongol period who became especially famous for his satires and parodies. He was born into a family of scholars and state officials descending from Arabs of the Banū Ḵh̲afād̲j̲a [ q.v.] settled in the area of Ḳazwīn since early Islamic times. In 730/1329-30 the historian Ḥamd Allāh Mustawfī described him as a talented poet and a writer of learned treatises. A collection of Arabic sayings by prophets and wise men, entitled Nawādir al-amt̲h̲āl , belongs to this early period. When later in the same …

, Mad̲j̲d al-Dīn Abu ’l-Ḥasan , a Persian poet of the second half of the 4th/10th century. In some later sources his kunya is given as Abū Isḥāḳ, but the form given above can be found already in an early source like the Čahār makāla . The Dumyat al-ḳaṣr by al-Bāk̲h̲arzī contains a reference to the “solitary ascetic” ( al-mud̲j̲tahid al-muḳīm bi-nafsihi ) Abu ’l-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. Muḥammad al-Kisāʾī of Marw who might very well be identical with this poet (cf. A. Ates, giriş to his edition of Kitāb Tarcumān al-balāġa , 97 f.). The pen name Kisāʾī would, according to ʿAw…

, or K̲h̲ard̲j̲ird, has been the name of at least two different places in northeastern Persia but is at present only current for one of them. 1. K̲h̲argird in the s̲h̲ahristān of Turbat-i Ḥaydariyya, or, more precisely, the dihistān of Rūd-i miyān K̲h̲wāf, is situated at about 6 km. to the southwest of the latter place. It is now a small settlement, the inhabitants of which live on the growing of cereals and cotton as well as on weaving. Archaeological remains point, however, to a much more prosperous past when K̲h̲argird was one of the main urban centres of the district of K̲h̲wāf [ q.v.]. Many m…

(a.), “memorandum” or “aidemémoire”. The word is considered a verbal noun of the form II verb d̲h̲akkara “to-remind”, but already in its nine occurrences in the Ḳurʾan it tends to mean a concrete “reminder” rather than a verbal “reminding”. 1. In Arabic literature. Tad̲h̲kira occurs not infrequentiy in the tides of books. From a closer scrutiny of these tides, two clusters of books emerge that represent two different “genres” of text presentation: (1) handbooks and (2) notebooks. It should be noted that, in most cas…

b. ʿAbd al-Ḥamīd, Niẓām al-Dīn Abu ’l-Maʿālī, also known as Naṣr Allāh Muns̲h̲ī, a Persian author and statesman who was born at G̲h̲azna in a family which came from S̲h̲īrāz. He served as a secretary in the dīwān of the G̲h̲aznawids. Under K̲h̲usraw Malik (555-82/1160-86) he rose to the rank of a vizier but he fell into disgrace with this sultan and was executed while in prison (cf. ʿAwfī, Lubāb , i, 92 ff.). Naṣr Allāh Muns̲h̲ī’s fame rests on his version ( Tard̲j̲uma ) of the Indian mirror for princes Kalīla wa Dimna [ q.v.] into Persian prose, which was based on the Arabic of ʿAbd Allā…

(a.), “King of the Poets”, honorific title of a Persian poet laureate, which is also known in other forms. It was the highest distinction which could be given to a poet by a royal patron. Like other honorifics [see laḳab ], it confirmed the status of its holder within his profession and was regarded as a permanent addition to his name which sometimes even became a hereditary title. Corresponding to this on a lower level was the privilege, given occasionally to court poets, of choosing a pen name [see tak̲h̲alluṣ ] based on the name or one of the laḳab s of their patron. Certain responsibilities we…

Celebrated Persian lyric poet (ca. 715-792/1315-1390).A version of this article is available in printVolume XI, Fascicle 5, pp. 461-507 HAFEZ (Ḥāfeẓ), ŠAMS-AL-DIN MOḤAMMAD of Shiraz (ca. 715-792/1315-1390), celebrated Persian lyric poet.HAFEZ i. An OverviewHafez is the most popular of Persian poets. If a book of poetry is to be found in a Persian home, it is likely to be the Divān (collected poems) of Hafez. Many of his lines have become proverbial sayings, and there are few who cannot recite some of his lyrics, partially or totally, by heart. His Divān is widely used in bibliomancy ( fāl; …

(1906-1985), Czech orientalist who specialized in Central Asian history, Persian historiography, and Turcology.A version of this article is available in printVolume XIV, Fascicle 4, pp. 391-392 JAHN, KARL EMIL OSKAR (b. Brno, 26 March 1906; d. Utrecht, 7 November 1985), Czech Orientalist who specialized in Central-Asian history, Persian historiography, and Turcology; he lived and worked in Czechoslovakia, Austria, Germany, and the Netherlands. His father’s family originated from German Silesia and emigrated to the Austri…

A version of this article is available in printVolume VI, Fascicle 4, pp. 356-388COURTS AND COURTIERS i. In the Median and Achaemenid periodsAvailable information on the Median and Achaemenid imperial courts is very limited and not entirely reliable. From Herodotus’ report (1.114) of the child Cyrus’ playing at being king it seems that the Median court included bodyguards, messengers, the “king’s eye” (a kind of secret agent; see below), and builders, for it is likely that the game was modeled on the existing court (…

[English edition] الصفويّون سلالة ملوك حكموا فارس حكما فعليّا بين سنتي 907–1135 هـ/ 1501–1722 م، وحكما صوريّا بين سنتي 1142–1148 هـ/ 1729–1736 م، ومن ثمّ، طالبوا بالعرش حتّى سنة 1186 هـ/ 1773 م. 1. تاريخ السلالة الحاكمة والتاريخ السياسيّ والعسكريّ يمثّل تأسيس الدولة الصفويّة سنة 907هـ/1501م على يد الشاه إسماعيل (الذي كان في البداية حاكمًا على أذربيجان فقط)، نقطة تحوّل مهمّة في التاريخ الفارسيّ. فقد قام الصفويّون في البداية باسترجاع السيادة الفارسيّة على كلّ المساحة التي كانت تعرف تاريخيّا بقلب الإمبراطوريّة الفارسيّة للمرّة الأو…

[English edition] 1. جغرافيا 1.1 الخصائص الجيولوجيّة تعتبر سلسلتا جبال البورز وجبال زاغروس اللتّان تمتدّان تباعا من الغرب إلى الشّرق ومن الشّمال الغربيّ إلى الجنوب الشّرقيّ أهمّ الوحدات الطّبوغرافيّة بإيران. فعلى نطاق واسع، تمثّل جبال البورز امتدادا للبنى الآلبيّة الأوروبيّة، بينما تعتبر جبال زاغروس تواصلا للآلب الديناريّة عبر قبرص (فيشير، 1956). وقد تأثّرت البنية الجبليّة لحاشية البلاد بشدّة الحركات البنائيّة التّي لم تسبّب فقط التواءً كبيرًا للطبقات أدّى إلى ظهور جبال مرتفعة، بل أدّت أيضاً إلى انقلاب…