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(Ar.), sea and also large perennial river.— The articles which follow treat of the principal seas known to the Arabs, but it is convenient to note here that in Islamic cosmology, on the basis of a conception generally related on the authority of Kaʿb al-Aḥbār [ q.v.], the mountain Ḳāf [ q.v.], which encircles the terrestial sphere, is itselt surrounded by seven concentric intercommunicating seas; these seas bear respectively the following names: Nīṭas (or Bayṭas̲h̲), Ḳaynas (or Ḳubays), al-Aṣamm, al-Sākin, al-Mug̲h̲allib (or al-Muẓlim), al-Muʾan…

(a.), a term of Fāṭimid administrative usage, also called the Ṣāḥib al-Bāb , i.e. head chamberlain. He was equal in status to the Isfahsālār or Muḳaddam al-ʿAskar , the commander-in-chief of the army, and the two of them setded all matters of military organisation. According to al-Ḳalḳas̲h̲andī, Ṣubḥ , iii, 483, vi, 7-8, he was second in the civilian administrative hierarchy after the wazīr himself and could hear maẓālim [ q.v.] when the wazīr was pre-occupied. (Ed.) Bibliography See also W. Björkman, Beiträge zur Geschichte der Staatskanzlei im islamischen Ä gypten, Hamburg 1928, 98.

, muḥammad b. aḥmad b. muḥammad , poet and littérateur of the 4th/10th century whose origin is unknown. He seems to have undergone many vicissitudes, since he appears in the service of Sayf al-Dawla, of al-Ṣāḥib Ibn ʿAbbād and of the ruler of K̲h̲urāsān, where he met Abu ’l-Farad̲j̲ al-Iṣfahānī, and he also resided in Egypt, in the D̲j̲abal, and in Transoxania, at S̲h̲ās̲h̲. The surviving verses of this great traveller are occasional pieces without any great originality, but he seems also to have been the author of several epistles and books, in particular, of a Tuḥfat al-kuttāb fi ’l-rasā…

(a.), a legal term denoting a lease for agricultural planting, often treated by authors in parallel to the musāḳāt [ q.v.], agreement for the payment of rent in kind, of which it is in some ways a particular kind, more favourable to the lessee. The commentators are silent about the juridical origins of this institution, and there is not the slightest mention of it in the Ḳurʾān or Sunna. Nevertheless, mug̲h̲ārasa is one of the most-used forms of contract. Under its terms, the owner of a piece of land charges a person with the planting of tree…

, name of a certain number of Moroccan families, of Jewish origin but converts to Islam. One of the best-known of them is the family to which belonged Abū muḥammad ʿAbd al-Ḳādir b. Aḥmad , who towards the end of the 12th/18th century pursued religious studies under the direction of such famous scholars as Ibn al-Ḥād̲j̲d̲j̲ [ q.v.], Ḥamdūn, Ibn Sūda [ q.v.], Aḥmad and Ibn Kīrān [ q.v. in Suppl.]. Being an immediate disciple of Mawlāy al-ʿArbī al-Darḳāwī [see darḳāwa ], he joined the religious order which the latter had recently founded. He made his first pilgrimage, and wrote about this in a Riḥla …

(Tk. "Great Khan"), a title borne by various of the ethnically Turkish Dihlī Sultans in 7th-8th/13th-14th century Muslim India, including the Slave King G̲h̲iyāt̲h̲ al-Dīn Balban (664-86/1266-87 [ q.v. in Suppl.] and then, as a prince, Sultan Muḥammad b. Tug̲h̲luḳ (724 or 725-52/1324 or 1325-51 [ q.v.]. It was further borne by non-Turks, including several Ḥabs̲h̲īs, hence of servile black East African origin, above all in the sultanate of Gud̲j̲arāt [see Ḥabs̲h̲ī , at Vol. III, 16a]. (Ed.)

, Sirād̲j̲ al-Dīn Abū Ḥafṣ ʿUmar , S̲h̲āfiʿī scholar, d. in D̲h̲u ’l-Ḳaʿda 861/September-October ¶ 1457. He is said to be the author of the K̲h̲arīdat al-ʿad̲j̲āʾib wa-farīdat al-g̲h̲arāʾib , a sort of geography and natural history without any scientific value. In spite of the authorities mentioned in the introduction (al-Masʿūdī, al-Ṭūsī, Ibn al-At̲h̲īr, al-Marrākus̲h̲ī), the K̲h̲arīda is merely a plagiarism of the Ḏj̲āmiʿ al-funūn wa-salwat al-maḥzūn of Nad̲j̲m al-Dīn Aḥmad b. Ḥamdān b. S̲h̲abīb al-Ḥarrānī al-Ḥanbalī, who lived in Egypt circa 732/1332. The work has neverth…

(Malay), an amulet, more particularly a written amulet. The word is of Arabic origin = ʿazīma [see Ḥamāʾil ]. (Ed.)

, the name of a valley near to Mecca, a short distance from the road to al-Ṭāʾif, cited, especially in old poetry, because the tomb of Abū Rig̲h̲āl [ q.v.] was traditionally located there. The correct reading of the toponym is not however certain, with variation between al-Mag̲h̲ammas, al-Mug̲h̲ammis and al-Mug̲h̲ammas. The latter form seems to be the most plausible, for it denotes a spot covered with scrub and bushes in which it is possible to hide, and, according to a tradition, it was there that the Prophet would go asid…

, the form found in mediaeval Indo-Muslim sources for a town of northwestern India, in the 12th century geography of Kas̲h̲mīr by Kalhaṇa called Udabhānda, now marked by the settlement of Hund some 9 km/15 miles north-east of Attock [see at́ak ] in Pakistan. It was the capital of the powerful Hindu-S̲h̲āhī dynasty of Indian princes who opposed Sebüktigin and his son Maḥmūd of G̲h̲azna in the late 4th/10th and early 5th/11th centuries, until Maḥmūd finally vanquished Rād̲j̲ā D̲j̲aypāl; for further details, see hindū-s̲h̲āhīs . (Ed.) Bibliography See that for hindu-s̲h̲āhīs, to which s…

, ruler in Transoxania, from his capital Buk̲h̲ārā, of the Turco-Mongol S̲h̲ībānid [ q.v.] or Abu ’l-Ḵh̲ayrid dynasty, ruled 968-91/1561-83. Iskandar was in fact a weak and ineffective ruler. Real power was in the hands of his son ʿAbd Allāh, who had shown his ability against rival families in Transoxania as early as 958/1551 and who became the greatest of the S̲h̲ībānids; after his father’s death he was to reign unchallenged for a further sixteen years [see ʿabd allāh b. iskandar ]. For the course of events in these decades, see s̲h̲ībānids and R.D. McChesney, EIr art. Central Asia . vi. In th…

(a.), the name of the fifteenth metre in Arabic prosody [see ʿarūd ]. It comprises, in each hemistich, four feet made up of one short and two longs ( faʿūlun ). A certain number of licences are possible, in particular, the omission of the fourth foot, the shortening or even the cutting out of the third syllable of a foot, etc. (Ed.) Bibliography M. Ben Cheneb, Tuḥfat al-adab 3, Paris 1954, 87-93.

(p., lit. “palace-curtain”), the term applied in the sources for the Great Sald̲j̲ūḳs and the Rūm Sald̲j̲ūḳs to the great tent carried round by the sultans, regarded, with the čatr or miẓalla [ q.v.], as one of the emblems of sovereignty. It is described in such sources as Rāwandī, Ras̲h̲īd al-Dīn and Ibn Bībī as being red, the royal colour, and as having internal curtained compartments forming rooms. (Ed.) Bibliography İ.H. Uzunçarşılı, Osmanlı devleti teşkilâtina medhal, Istanbul 1941, 31, 37, 121 Sukumar Ray, Bairam Khan, Karachi 1992, 232.

(t.) “vizier of the dome” was the name given, under the Ottomans, to the members of the imperial Dīwān ( dīwān-i hümāyūn [ q.v.]) who came together on several mornings each week around the Grand Vizier in the chamber of the Topkapi Palace called Ḳubbe alti̊ because it was crowned by a dome. The ḳubbe wezīrleri were the ḳāḍī-ʿaskers [ q.v.] of Rumelia and Anatolia, the ḳāḍī of Istanbul, the defterdār [see daftardār ], the nis̲h̲ānd̲j̲l [ q.v.], the ag̲h̲as of the Janissaries, the commander of the cavalry and, when he happened to be in the capital, the ḳapudan pas̲h̲a [ q.v.]. This institution wa…

or D̲j̲andār, the name given to certain guards regiments serving the great Sald̲j̲ūḳs and subsequent dynasties. Attached to the royal household, they provided the sovereign’s bodyguard, and carried out his orders of execution. Their commander, ¶ the amīr d̲j̲āndār , was a high-ranking officer; some of them are reported as becoming atābaks [ q.v.]. Under the Sald̲j̲ūḳs of Rūm, they formed an élite cavalry guard, and wore their swords on a gold-embroidered baldric. At the accession of ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Kayḳobād I in 616/1219 he is said to have had a bodyguard of 120 d̲j̲āndārs (Ibn Bībī, El-Evāmi…

, Arabic term for a man whose foot-joints can be heard cracking when he walks, but often found as a proper name in the first days of Islam and particularly among the Tamīmīs; the last to bear this name seems to have been al-Ḳaʿḳāʿ b. Ḍirār al-Tamīmī, chief of police for ʿĪsā b. Mūsā [ q.v.], governor of Kūfa from 132/750 to 147/764 (Ibn al-Kalbī-Caskel, ii, 465; al-Ṭabarī, iii, 131, 347). Among those who bore this name, apart from al-Ḳaʿḳāʿ b. ʿAmr [see the following article] and the poets cited by al-Marzubānī ( Muʿd̲j̲am , 329-30), especially noteworthy was the Co…

b. Abī Numayy , Abū ʿAwn , S̲h̲arīf of Mecca in the early 11th/17th century. He was born in 974/1566, and became S̲h̲arīf and governor of the Ḥid̲j̲āz in 1011/1602-3 after his brother Abū Ṭālib and in conjunction with his nephew Muḥsin. This division of power ended, however, in a fierce internal family dispute, apparently over Idrīs’s retinue and followers ( Ḵh̲uddām ), and in 1034/1624-5 the family deposed Idrīs from the governship of the Ḥid̲j̲āz in favour of Muhsin. The conflict was resolved by a truce, during the time of which Idr…

, eldest son of Aḥmad b. Ṭūlūn [ q.v.]. When the latter set off for the conquest of Syria, he entrusted the government of Egypt to al-ʿAbbās, his designated heir, but al-ʿAbbās was very soon persuaded to take advantage of his father’s absence to supplant him. Warned by the vizier al-Wāsiṭī, Ibn Ṭūlūn got ready to return to Egypt, and his son, after having emptied the treasury and got together considerable sums of money, went off with his partisans to Alexandria, and then to Barḳa. As soon as he got back…

, the name of a celebrated Persian collection of biographies of Muslim Indian commanders from the reign of the Mug̲h̲al Emperor Akbar (963-1014/1556-1605) till the time of its author, Ṣamṣām al-Dawla Mīr ʿAbd al-Razzāḳ S̲h̲āh-Nawāz K̲h̲ān Awrangābādī (1111-71/1700-58). Born at Lahore, he soon settled in the Deccan in the service of the first Niẓām of Ḥaydarābād [ q.v.], Niẓām al-Mulk Āṣaf-Ḏj̲āh. and filled offices in Berār [ q.v.] and then as Dīwān or chief minister of the Deccan. His policy in the latter post aimed at checking the growing influences in that state …

(Rīda, Rēda) is the name of a number of places in ʿAsīr, in the Yemen and in Ḥaḍramawt. The word rayd (pl. aryād/ruyūd ) means a ledge of a mountain, resembling a wall, or a resting upon ledges of mountains (Lane, Lexicon , s.v.). At least in Ḥaḍramawt, it is the term for the centre of the territory of a Bedouin tribe, which is generally a depression in the rocky plateau (D. van der Meulen and H. von Wissmann, Hadramaut , some of its mysteries unveiled, Leiden 1932, 22, n. 1). There are several places of this name ( Rēda) in Hadramawt: Raydat al-Ṣayʿar, Raydat Arḍayn, Raydat al-ʿIbād, Raydat …