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, a small and ancient town situated on the north-eastern bank of Lake Van, which in the Middle Ages was still called the Lake of Ard̲j̲īs̲h̲. Its existence seems to be vouched for since the Urartaean period, and more expressly by the Graeco-Roman geographers. It was occupied for a time by the Arabs during the time of ʿUt̲h̲mān, but remained an integral part of the Armenian principalities up to the 8th century A.D.; from 772 onwards, it was incorporated into the Ḳaysite emirate of Ak̲h̲lāṭ [ q.v.]. In the 10th century A.D., it belonged to the Marwānids, but about 1025 it was taken…

(Ar. pl. umanā ), "trustworthy, in whom one can place one’s trust", whence al-Amīn, with the article, as an epithet of Muḥammad in his youth. As a noun, it means "he to whom something is entrusted, overseer, administrator": e.g. Amīn al-Waḥy , "he who is entrusted with the revelation", i.e. the angel Gabriel. The word also frequently occurs in titles, e.g. Amīn al-Dawla (e.g. Ibn al-Tilmīd̲h̲ others), Amīn al-Dīn (e.g. Yāḳūt), Amīn al-Mulk, Amīn al-Salṭana. In addition to these general and undefined uses of the word amīn , there are other more technical uses,…

Name of the dynasty founded by Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn b. Ayyūb, which, at the end of the 6th/12th century and in the first half of the 7th/13th century, ruled Egypt, Muslim Syria-Palestine, the major part of Upper Mesopotamia, and the Yemen. The eponym of the family, Ayyūb b. S̲h̲ād̲h̲ī b. Marwān, born in the village of Ad̲j̲danaḳān near Dvin (Dabīl) in Armenia, belonged to the Rawwādī clan of the Kurdish tribe of the Had̲h̲bānī, and, at the beginning of the 6th/12th century, had been in the service of the S̲h̲addādid dynasty, likewise Kurdish,…

, name of three Sald̲j̲ūḳid sultans of Rūm. Kayḳubād i , ʿalāʾ al-dīn was the most distinguished of the Sald̲j̲ūḳid sultans of Rūm, to whom many later sovereigns would connect themselves. Removed from power by his brother and predecessor Kaykāʾūs I [ q.v.], he succeeded him in 618/1220. His foreign policy made his dynasty one of the most powerful of his time. In the south he expanded his power, from the very beginning of his reign, over a great part of the Cilician Taurus, where he settled Turkmens. He enlarged his maritime frontiers, i…

, prince, son; heir apparet (344/955) and successor (356/967) of Muʾizz al-Dawla in ʿIrāḳ, with the laḳab of ʿIzz al-Dawla. He appears to have had little talent for government, which, unlike his father, he entrusted to wazīrs (chosen without any great discernment) so as to be free to amuse himself, though he still impeded the conduct of affaire by his impetuous verbal or active intervention. At the beginning of his reign he continued his father’s policy of hostility to the Ḥamdānid Abū Tag̲h̲lib of Mawṣil and to the autonomous chieftain ¶ of the Baṭīḥa, ʿImrān b. S̲h̲āhīn. Furthermor…

, nūr al-dawla balak b. bahrām b. artuḳ , one of the first Artuḳids, known chiefly as a tough warrior. He appears in history in 489/1096 as commander of Sarud̲j̲ on the Middle Euphrates. This locality being taken from him by the Crusaders in the following year, and his uncle Ilg̲h̲āzī having been appointed governor of ʿIrāḳ by Sulṭān Muḥammad, he accompanied him, and is found in the following years struggling vainly for the little towns of ʿĀna and Ḥadīt̲h̲a, against Arabs, or prot…

, Claudias, a locality of ancient origin (the Claudiopolis of Pliny? cf. Pauly-Wissowa, s.v.), the exact site of which has not been determined but which almost certainly commanded the entrance to the Euphrates gorges below Malaṭya/Melitene, between the eastern Taurus and the K̲h̲anzit [ q.v.]. One of the fortified places on the frontier that were captured and re-captured by the Arabs and the Byzantines, it was restored by al-Mansūr, but again fell into Byzantine hands, together with the province of Melitene, in the middle of the 4th/10th …

ʿaḍud al-dawla abū s̲h̲ud̲j̲āʿ muḥammad b. dāʾūd čag̲h̲ribeg , celebrated Sald̲j̲ūḳ sultan, the second of the dynasty (455/1063-465/1073). Born probably in 421/1030, at an early age he led the armies of his father Čag̲h̲ribeg with great success, especially against the G̲h̲aznawids, and in 450/1058 he saved his uncle, the sultan Ṭug̲h̲rilbeg, from the revolt of Ibrāhīm Inal in Persia. Two or three years later he succeeded Čag̲h̲ribeg, who had been ill for a long time, and at the end…

, Abū Muḥammad ʿAbd al-Salām b. al-Ḥasan . . . al-Ḳaysarānī al-Miṣrī (525-617/1130-1220), high-ranking official of the later Fāṭimids, wrote in the reign of Salāḥ al-Dīn a “History of the two dynasties”, Nuzhat al-muḳlatayn fī ak̲h̲bār al-dawlatayn , an important work now unfortunately lost, to which the great compilers of the Mamlūk period, Ibn al-Furāt, al-Maḳrīzī, al-Ḳalḳas̲h̲andī, Ibn Tag̲h̲rībirdī, and even before them Ibn K̲h̲aldūn, owe the most important part of their knowledge of the history of the later Fāṭimids and of the general institutions of the régime. (Cl. Cahen) Bibl…

, by-name first given to Aḥmad b. ʿUmar (d. 415/1024), of the family of the Āl al-Raḳil, and name by which his descendants were known until the 6th/12th century. The most important member of the family was his grandson, Abu ’l-Ḳāsim ʿAlī b. al-Ḥusayn, known also by the honorific title of raʾīs al-ruʾasāʾ , vizier to the caliphate from 437 to 450/1045-58, concerning whom there have arisen a number of important questions which have not yet been satisfactorily answered. The conquest of Bag̲h̲dād by the Būyids in 334/945 had led …

, governor of Fārs under the Sald̲j̲ūḳs. Būz-Abeh was one of the amīr s of Mengubars, the governor of Fārs, for whom he administered the province of Ḵh̲ūzistān. He was also in the army of his superior when the latter, accompanied by other amīrs, moved against the Sald̲j̲ūḳ sultan Masʿūd and was made prisoner at the battle of Kurs̲h̲anba (other sources call the scene of the encounter Pand̲j̲ Angus̲h̲t), later being put to death, in 532/1137-38. Since, after their victory, the sultan’s troops began to plunder the enemy camp, Būz-Abeh attacked and dispersed them. Several prominent amīrs of th…

, the most important of the dynasties which, first in the Iranian plateau then in ʿIrāḳ, side by side with the Sāmānids of Ḵh̲urāsān and of Māwarāʾ al-Nahr, marked the “Iranian intermezzo” (Minorsky) between the Arab domination of early Islam and the Turkish conquest of the 5th/11th century. Its name derives from Buwayh or Būyeh, the father of three brothers who founded it, ʿAlī, al-Ḥasan, and the youngest, Aḥmad. Condottieri of humble birth, they belonged to the population of the Daylamites [ q.v.] who, newly won over to (S̲h̲iʿī) Islam, were at that time enlisting in large …

, Abū Yaʿlā Ḥamza b. Asad ... al-Tamīmī ( ca. 465-555/1073-1160), a member of an important family of Damascus, who for a time was raʾīs of that town, and above all was its historian for the period extending from the middle of the 4th/10th century to 555/1160. The History of Ibn al-Ḳalānisī, known simply by the title D̲h̲ayl tāʾrīk̲h̲ Dimas̲h̲ḳ , consists of two parts, the limits being somewhat imprecise. The first part, the opening pages of which are lost, and which goes down approximately to the time of the author’s youth, is based…

, better known by his laḳab of Rukn al-Dīn, one of the sons and successors of K̲h̲usraw II (1246). It was at the beginning of the period of the Mongol protectorate that, the three sons of the late sovereign all being minors, the senior amirs, in order to safeguard the unity of the state, sought to install, under their own executive power, a sultanate shared jointly between the three young princes; Ḳi̊li̊d̲j̲ Arslan was sent on a mission to the Mongol chief Batu to persuade him to accept this solution. This very mission alone established a…

, the term used to designate the sort of indefinitely renewed contract through which the Muslim community accords hospitality and protection to members of other revealed religions, on condition of their acknowledging the domination of Islam. The beneficiaries of the d̲h̲imma are called d̲h̲immīs , and are collectively referred to as ahl al-d̲h̲imma or simply d̲h̲imma. An account of the doctrinal position of Islam vis-à-vis the religions in question, and of the polemics between the two sides, is given in the article ahl al-kitāb ; for a detailed account of …

(and not Abak), was one of the chiefs of the Turkomāns (perhaps of the tribe of the Īwāī and perhaps at the beginning of the Sald̲j̲ūḳid expansion established in Ḵh̲wārizm), who in 1070 had followed Erisgen (?), husband of a daughter of Alp-Arslan, into Asia Minor in his flight to Byzantine territory; but he refused to take service in the Christian army, and had responded to the appeal made to him by the Fāṭimid government, requesting him to come and bring some of the Palestine Bedouin to heel (…

, pl. ḳaṭāʾīʿ , a Muslim administrative term designating, on the one hand, those concessions made to private individuals on state lands in the first centuries of the Hid̲j̲ra (see ḍayʿa ), and, on the other hand, the fixed sum of a tax or tribute, in contradistinction to taxation by proportional method or some variable means. The verb ḳaṭaʿa is also used to mean “to impose”, normally followed by ḳaṭīʿatan . (C. Cahen)

, son and successor of Masʿūd I, and one of the most important sultans of Rūm (1155-92). Masʿūd had, in dealing with the Greeks, succeeded in restoring the position of the Sald̲j̲ūḳs in relation to the Dānis̲h̲mendids who were divided by quarrels over the succession. Ḳi̊li̊d̲j̲ Arslan at first maintained this policy, and carried it to the extent of offering the Basileus Manuel Comnenus at Constantinople in 1162 a form of allegiance which, in concrete terms, cost him nothing. He was then able to make himself mast…

, in Persian, ‘taster’, title of an official, generally an amīr , at the court of the Muslim sovereigns (including the Mamlūks) from the time of the Sald̲j̲ūkids. It is not always clear in what way he is connected with the overseer of the food, k̲h̲ w ānsalār ; perhaps the two are often confused. The title does not appear to be found, even in Iran, under previous dynasties, although caliphs and princes did undoubtedly have overseers for their food, and even had it tasted before they eat, as the dishes were always suspected of being poisoned. The term čās̲h̲na-gīr is also…

, a mediaeval artillery engine. In general, from Europe to China, there were everywhere in existence two main types of engines of projection which were operated by more than one man. In the case of the one, the heavy type of engine, the projectile was hurled from a great distance by virtue of the centrifugal force produced by the rocking of a great arm: these were the mand̲j̲anīḳ or mangonels; in the case of the other, a lighter engine, the projectile was discharged by the impact of a shaft forcibly impelled by the release of a rope: these were the ʿarrāda . The principle of the ʿarrāda only differs…

, "gift", the term most commonly employed to denote, in the early days of Islam, the pension of Muslims, and, later, the pay of the troops. It is impossible to give here the history of the system of pay throughout the Muslim world, and this article will be confined to a general outline. The traditional starting-point is the organisation of the pensions by ʿUmar b. al-Ḵh̲aṭṭāb. The first Muslims had derived no material advantage except their share of the booty from successful expeditions. The flow of taxes into the coffers of the nascent caliphate …

Originally applied to military and religious expeditions organized in Western Europe and intended to take back from and defend against Islam the Holy Places of Palestine and nearby Syria, the term was later extended to all wars waged against "infidels" and even to any undertaking carried out in the name of a worthy or supposedly worthy cause; naturally these extensions of meaning are not part of our present concern. The first Crusade (1096-99), following on from expeditions against the Muslims in the West, led to the establishment around Jerusalem, Tripoli, Antio…

, al-malik al-amd̲j̲ad , b. Farruk̲h̲ S̲h̲āh b. S̲h̲āhāns̲h̲āh b. Ayyūb, grand nephew of Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn, was appointed by the latter to succeed his father at Baʿlbak when the latter died in 578/1182 (ʿImād al-Dīn al-Iṣfahānī, al-Barḳ al-S̲h̲āmī , Bodl. MS. Marsh 425, 36r°, followed by Abū S̲h̲āma, Rawḍatayn 1, Cairo, 33-4), and kept Baʿlbak when the Ayyūbid territories were divided up after the death of Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn. From then on he seems always to have been a faithful vassal of the Ayyūbid ruling at Damascus (Ibn Wāṣil, Mufarrid̲j̲ , years 599, 603, 606, 618, 62…

(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…

( abū saʿīd sayf al-dīn ḳasīm al-dawla ), originally a mamlūk of Bursuḳ [ q.v.], and one of the principal officers of the Sald̲j̲uḳid sultans Muḥammad and Maḥmūd. He became prominent firstly through his activities as military governor ( s̲h̲iḥna ) of al-ʿIrāḳ, and later, at the end of his life, as governor of Mosul, which office he held simultaneously with the former. Appointed s̲h̲iḥna in 498/1105. his main task was to oppose the Mazyadite Arabs of Dubays [ q.v.], who were infesting the environs of Bag̲h̲dād. In his first government of Mosul (507/1113) his chief duty was …

(not Mīsar) Tād̲j̲ al-Dīn Muḥammad b. Yūsuf . . . . b. D̲j̲alab Rāg̲h̲ib . 628-77/1231-78, Egyptian historian. He was descended, hence his by-name, from a Tunisian “imported” at the beginning of the 6th/12th century by an Egyptian amīr named Rāg̲h̲ib; under Saladin, the family, being excluded from the military career by the formation of the new army, had entered civilian life. Ibn Muyassar owed his name to a maternal ancestor who had apparently himself been ¶ an amīr under the Fāṭimids. His Annales d’Égypte (ed. H. Massé, Cairo 1919; cf. G. Wiet, in JA, 1921) have survived in a unique ma…

important right tributary of the Orontes (al-ʿĀṣī [ q.v.]), which it reaches after joining with the Nahr Yāg̲h̲rā (Murād Pas̲h̲a) in the Lake of Antioch and the Nahr al-Aswad (Ḳara-sū), in the ʿAmk. Its wide middle valley, between the Djabal Simān and the Kurd-dag̲h̲, was known in the Middle Ages as the district of the Ḏj̲ūma. The importance of the valley was due to the crossing of the road, which used it to connect Antioch with the districts of the upper Euphrates, with the roads which led from Cilicia…

, Abu ’l-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. al-Ḥasan , born in about 341/952, third son of the Buwayhid Rukn al-Dawla [ q.v.] and of a daughter of the Daylamī chief al-Ḥasan b. Fayzurān, a cousin of Mākān b. Kākī [ q.v.], received his laḳab in 364/975 and was summoned in 365/976, with his brothers ʿAḍud al-Dawla [ q.v.], the eldest, and Muʾayyid al-Dawla, to his father’s sick-bed, in order to agree what share each would receive of their father’s possessions, under the suzerainty of ʿAḍud al-Dawla; as his portion, Fak̲h̲r al-Dawla received the provinces of Hamad̲h̲ān and…

, famous preacher and historian (581/1185 or 582/1186-654/1256). Son of a Turkish freedman of the vizier Ibn Hubayra and of a daughter of the famous preacher and voluminous writer, Ibn al-D̲j̲awzī of Bag̲h̲dād, from whom he derived the name by which he is known, the young Yūsuf was in fact brought up by this grandfather; after the latter’s death (597/1201), he settled at Damascus, where he joined the Ayyūbid al-Muʿaẓẓam, then his successors al-Nāṣir Dāwūd and al-As̲h̲raf. Although he abandoned t…

, the ancient Pagrae, guarded the Syrian end of the Baylān pass on the road from Antioch to Alexandretta across the Amanus, and was thus a place of transit and a strategic position of importance. This region, which had been laid waste at the time of the first wars between the Arabs and the Byzantines, was furnished with colonists by Maslama; this initiated a recovery, and His̲h̲ām built a small fort there; it was naturally included in the region of the ʿawāṣim [ q.v.] organised by Hārūn al-Ras̲h̲īd behind the Syro-Cilician t̲h̲ug̲h̲ūr , and there existed there at …

, ruler of Sinope (700/1300? circa 730/1330 ?) known especially for his piratical exploits against the Genoese, and sometimes alliance with and sometimes against the Greeks of Trebizond (it is known that there were actions in 1313-14, 1319, 1324); there are attributed to him in these raids lack of scruples ( e.g., taking guests captive), audacity (typified by an attack on Kaffa in the Crimea), and skill (he is said to have been able, by swimming under water, to pierce the hull of enemy ships), all of which testify to his reputation (see the epis…

( Banu ), one of the families of government contractors characteristic of their period who almost completely monopolized the caliph’s vizierate during the protectorate of the Great Sald̲j̲ūḳids, and deriving their particular importance from that fact. The founder of the political fortunes of the dynasty, Fak̲h̲r al-Dawla Abū Naṣr Muḥammad b. Muḥammad b. D̲j̲ahīr, born in al-Mawṣil in 398/1007-8 of a family of rich merchants, entered the service of the S̲h̲īʿī ʿUḳaylid princes of that town; then, after one of them, Ḳirwās̲h̲, fell …

, the name of a religio-social movement which disturbed the Turkomān centres of Asia Minor a few years before the Mongol invasion, and which seems to have been of great importance in the general history of the social and cultural development of the Turkish people. It can only be understood by reference to certain general features of the development of the Sald̲j̲ūḳid state of Rūm. By the 7th/13th century, the latter had become a state with a strong administrative and cultural framework, the prod…

, a fortress, now an imposing ruin, which stands on a precipitous ridge dominating the ancient site of Arsaneia in Commagene, recently identified by F. Dörner; the name does not appear before the 6th/12th century. The region, of which Gerger, on the upper reaches of the Euphrates at the mouth of the gorges, was in reality the chief centre, played only a minimal role in the Arab-Byzantine wars during the first centuries of Islam, since the main passes lie further to the west or north, and there was ¶ no need for the fortress of Kak̲h̲tā, which commanded the outlet of a valley in the…

(Eastern Turkish = “badger”), one of the chief officers of the Great Sald̲j̲ūḳs, whose descendants also played a notable rôle at the beginning of the 6th/12th century. Bursuḳ, ¶ although youthful, entered history as one of the principal amīrs in the service of Ṭug̲h̲ril-Beg, who after restoring control in Bag̲h̲dād following the tragedies of the years 450-51/1058-59, made Bursuḳ his first s̲h̲iḥna (military commander) in Bag̲h̲dād. However, under the pacified Sald̲j̲ūḳid organisation, the essential power belonged to the ʿamīd , the civil administrator…

(Ar.), title of high officials of the Sāmānid-G̲h̲aznawid administration, which the Sald̲j̲ūḳids, the inheritors of their institutions and personnel, extended throughout their empire. The word, properly speaking, does not denote a function, but the rank of the class of officials from whom the civil governors, ʿāmil (as opposed to the military governors, sallār , s̲h̲iḥna ), were recruited; thus Sibṭ Ibn al-Ḏj̲awzī, Mirʾāt al-Zamān , MS Paris 1503, 193v: "one of the ʿumadā " is appointed governor; the same author, supplemented by Ibn al-At̲h̲īr, …

(from atā , apparently a doublet of ʿaṭā ) literally “gift”, a general term met with, especially in pre- and proto-Islamic times, meaning a vague tribu te or lump payment madt, for example, to or by a tribe or other group; later the words describes, sometimes in a denigrating way, a tip or bribe. (Cl. Cahen) Bibliography F. Løkkegaard, Islamic Taxation, index, s.v.

, the son, probably the elder son, of the ancestor and eponym of the Sald̲j̲ūḳid dynasties, Sald̲j̲ūḳ. His history is merged in that of the first contacts between the Og̲h̲uz led by his family and the Muslim states of Central Asia. His personal name was Isrāʾīl (cf. his brothers Mīk̲h̲āʾīl and Mūsā, fore-names in which it is possible to see Jewish Ḵh̲azar or Nestorian Central-Asian influence), with Arslan as a totemic name (cf. his famous nephews Ṭug̲h̲ril Muḥammad and Čag̲h̲rī Dāʾūd). The begin…

, name of the last Būyid ruler, better known by his laḳab of al-Malik al-Raḥīm. He succeeded his father Abū Kālīd̲j̲ār in ʿIrāḳ in 440/1048. Most of his reign was spent in disputing with his brother Fulād̲h̲ Sūtūn the possession of Fārs and K̲h̲ūzistān and in trying to maintain discipline amongst the Turkish troops of his general al-Basāsīrī [ q.v.]. There is no discernible doctrinal reason for his adoption, in defiance cf the caliph, of an epithet reserved for God. In any case, the enfeeblement of the Būyid dynasty allowed the caliph in question, al-Ḳā…

, Abu ’l-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. ʿUt̲h̲mān al-Ḳuras̲h̲ī , author of an important, long-forgotten fiscal treatise, al-Minhād̲j̲ fī ʿilm k̲h̲arād̲j̲ Miṣr , a large part of which was recently discovered in the acephalous ms. Add. 23,483 in the British Museum. Al-Mak̲h̲zūmī belonged to a great family dating back to the origins of Islam. He was a ḳāḍī and it was owing to this title, although he was a S̲h̲āfiʿī as were nearly all the Egyptians, that the Fāṭimids, as was their custom, entrusted him with the duties of controlling the employees of the tax office, near…

, brother of Maliks̲h̲āh who, on the death of the latter, seized possession of Ḵh̲urāsān and the province of Balk̲h̲. defeated and put to death another brother, Buribars, who had been sent against him (488/1095), but incurred odium as a result of his punitive measures against the supporters of his defeated brother and his destruction, as a preventative measure, of the ramparts of Marw, Nīs̲h̲āpūr, Sarak̲h̲s, Sabzawār etc.; he was finally killed in 490 by one of his slaves. His young son, aged seven, was easily swept aside by Sand̲j̲ar, the brother and lieutenant of the Sulṭān Barkyāruḳ. ¶ …

Dāwūd b. Mīk̲h̲āʾīl b. Sald̲j̲ūḳ was the brother of Ṭug̲h̲ri̊l-Beg [ q.v.], and the co-founder with him of the Sald̲j̲ūḳid dynasty. The careers of both brothers were, for the most part, inextricably bound together. It is difficult to ascertain which was the elder brother. They seem to have been born about 380-385/990-995, and there is no evidence whether their family was already, or only later became, Muslim. Little is known about their life before the year 416/1025. They were orphaned at an early age, and…

, the name of two viziers of the early Būyids, the first of them known also as a man of letters: (1) Abu ’l-Faḍl Muḥammad b. al-Ḥusayn b. Muḥammad was the son of a pedlar or wheat merchant in the S̲h̲īʿī town of Ḳumm in central Iran who later became a kātib in K̲h̲urāsān, where he received the title of ʿamīd [ q.v.] which was in this region usually given to high officials. He appears at Buk̲h̲ārā ( Mat̲h̲ālib , 232-6) at an unknown date, perhaps later than his appearance in 321/933 as vizier of Was̲h̲mgīr [ q.v.] in Rayy, and in 323 as one of the chief dignitaries of Mardāwid̲j̲ just before…

, Nāṣir al-Dīn Muḥammad b. ʿAbd al-Raḥīm b. ʿAlī al-Miṣrī al-Ḥanafī (735-807/1334-1405), Egyptian historian, author of a vast universal history, Taʾrīk̲h̲ al-duwal wa ’l-mulūk , of which he finished completely only the volumes covering the years after 500/1106-7. The majority of the fragments which survive (mainly in Vienna) are autographs and the work does not seem to have been much copied, or indeed much valued in its own time (perhaps because of suspicions concerning its style and orthodoxy), a…

(Muḥ. b. ʿAlī b. Muḥ., Abū ʿAbd Allāh al-Tanūk̲h̲ī. called~) (483/1090-post 556/1161), chronicler of Aleppo. A full but dry universal history—mainly Syrian—by him, which extends to the year 538/1143-44 (published by me—from the year 455/1063—in J A , 1938, 353-448), has come down to us, but in addition, he composed above all a great History of Aleppo which was used copiously especially by Kamāl al-Dīn b. al-ʿAdīm and Ibn Abī Ṭayyī (the latter up to 556/1161). The interest of the portions of al-ʿAẓimi’s work which have been prese…

, Abū Ṭāhir Muḥammad , vizier to the Būyid ʿIzz al-Dawla Bak̲h̲tiyār [ q.v.], whose history is perhaps difficult to relate objectively since the chroniclers, who wrote from the point of view of the military or bureaucratic aristocracy, were a priori hostile to a parvenu such as he. Coming from a peasant family of Awana (Upper ʿIrāḳ), he had taken advantage of the disturbances during the first half of the 4th/10th century to organize a force which had seized control of the tolls on the Tigris at Takrīt. At the time of the conquest of ʿ…

, double plural of d̲j̲ālī (through the intermediate form d̲j̲āliya which is also found, particularly in old papyri), literally “émigrés”, a term which, in administrative usage, very soon served to denote the d̲j̲izya [ q.v.]. Ancient writers believed that the word had originally been applied to the poll-tax on the d̲h̲immī s who were émigrés (driven out) from Arabia; some modern writers have thought that it could have taken on its meaning, by extension, from a term used of the tax on the Jewish community in “Exile” d̲j̲ālūt: there is no trace of any such specific use. It would se…

, literally "young men", a kind of urban militia which plays a considerable role in the cities of Syria and Upper Mesopotamia from the 4th/10th to the 6th/12th centuries, and is particularly well known at Aleppo and Damascus. Officially, its role is that of a police, charged with public order, fire-fighting, etc., and also, in time of need, with military defence in reinforcement of the regular troops. For these services the aḥdāt̲h̲ receive stipends allocated from the product of certain urban taxes. The only distinction between them and any or…

(Grk. Antizene, in Yāḳut Hinzīt), name of the province and of the basin enclosed between the great bend of the Euphrates to the NNW of Malaṭya and the D̲j̲abal Baharmaz, with the “little lake” Göld̲j̲ük (Ar. al-Buḥayra) of Dzovk (Ar. al-Baḥīratān) at its foot ; one of the great communication routes of history passes from here towards the Tigris sources. This region of K̲h̲anzīt was for long Armenian (in the 6th/12th century the Catholicos of the Armenian Church resided at Dzovk) ; after being co…

, Abū ʿAlī , one of the leading figures of the Būyid régime at the end of the 4th/10th century. His father, Ustād̲h̲-Hurmuz, one of the ḥud̲j̲d̲j̲āb of ʿAḍud al-Dawla, is said to have been born in about 300/912; on entering the service of the son and successor of the great Būyid in Fārs, S̲h̲araf al-Dawla, he became governor of ʿUmān for him and then, wishing to transfer his allegiance to the other son, Ṣamṣām al-Dawla, master of ʿIrāḳ, he had to return to private life (374/984). The son, Ḥasan, who…