Encyclopaedia of Islam, First Edition (1913-1936)
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Subject: Middle East and Islamic Studies
Edited by: M. Th.Houtsma, T.W.Arnold, R.Basset and R.Hartmann
The Encyclopaedia of Islam First Edition Online (EI1) was originally published in print between 1913 and 1936. The demand for an encyclopaedic work on Islam was created by the increasing (colonial) interest in Muslims and Islamic cultures during the nineteenth century. The scope of the Encyclopedia of Islam First Edition Online is philology, history, theology and law until early 20th century. Such famous scholars as Houtsma, Wensinck, Gibb, Snouck Hurgronje, and Lévi-Provençal were involved in this scholarly endeavor. The Encyclopedia of Islam First Edition Online offers access to 9,000 articles.
Subscriptions: see brill.com
The Encyclopaedia of Islam First Edition Online (EI1) was originally published in print between 1913 and 1936. The demand for an encyclopaedic work on Islam was created by the increasing (colonial) interest in Muslims and Islamic cultures during the nineteenth century. The scope of the Encyclopedia of Islam First Edition Online is philology, history, theology and law until early 20th century. Such famous scholars as Houtsma, Wensinck, Gibb, Snouck Hurgronje, and Lévi-Provençal were involved in this scholarly endeavor. The Encyclopedia of Islam First Edition Online offers access to 9,000 articles.
Subscriptions: see brill.com
al-Nabaʾ
(62 words)
, title of sūra lxxviii., taken from the opening verses: “Concerning what do the unbelievers ask questions of one another? Concerning the great news”. According to the commentaries the great news alluded to is the resurrection, the subject of lively discussions among the Meccans. Bibliography The commentaries and translations of the Ḳurʾān Nöldeke-Schwally,
Geschichte des Qorāns, i., Leipzig 1909, p. 104.
Nabataeans
(1,579 words)
, an Arab people who lived in ancient times in Arabia Petraea. — As early as the seventh century B. C. the Nabayāti are mentioned by Assurbanipal (
Keilinschr. Bibl., ii. 216
sqq.). Whether the Nebayōt̲h̲ of the Old Testament are to be identified with them is uncertain (against the identification: Nöldeke in Schenkel’s
Bibellexicon, s. v. Nabatäer; for it amongst others: Musil,
Arabia Deserta, New York 1927, p. 492). The Nabataeans were never completely subjected either by the Assyrians, or the Medes, Persians or the Macedonian kings (Diodor. ii. 48). In 312 b.c. Antigonos sent two expe…
Nābī
(460 words)
, Yūsuf, an Ottoman poet; Yūsuf Nābī came from Urfa (Ruhā, hence Ruhāwī, not Rūḥānī as one often finds). From there he came in the reign of Muḥammad IV to Stambul and became a favourite of the grandvizier Ḳara Muṣṭafā. He held a post as
kiaya, made the pilgrimage after Ḳara Muṣṭafā’s death and later settled in Aleppo. When the governor there, Muḥammad Balṭad̲j̲i [q. v.], became grandvizier, he took Nābī to Stambul and gave him the post of superintendent of the department of the Anatolian chief accountant (
Anadolu müḥāsebed̲j̲isi). Later he gave up this office for another and died ag…
Nabī
(555 words)
(a.), prophet, borrowed from Hebr.
nābi or Aram.
nebīʾā, is found in the Ḳurʾān from the second Meccan period in the singular and plural
nabīyūn; in the Medīna period we find also the broken plural
anbiyāʾ. Lists of the
nabīyūn are given in Sūra vi. 83
sqq.; iii. 34; iv. 161
sqq.; further information about them is given in several passages of Sūra xix. and in xvii. 57. The list consists exclusively of names from the Old and New Testaments (if we leave out Idrīs in Sūra xix. 57, whose name Muḥammad had however also learned from a Christian source; see above ii., p. 442-450; Horovitz,
Koran. Unters., p…
Nabīd̲h̲
(501 words)
(a.), a comprehensive designation for intoxicating drinks, several kinds of which were produced in early Arabia, such as
mizr (from barley),
bitʿ (from honey: Buk̲h̲ārī,
Mag̲h̲āzī, bāb 60;
As̲h̲riba, bāb 4;
Adab, bāb 80; or from spelt: Aḥmad b. Ḥanbal, iv. 402),
faḍīk̲h̲ (from different kinds of dates: Buk̲h̲ārī,
As̲h̲riba, bāb 3, 21). Grapes being scarce in Arabia, it is said that in al-Madīna “wine” was usually prepared from kinds of dates, exceptionally from grapes (Buk̲h̲ārī,
As̲h̲riba, bāb 2, 3; Muslim,
As̲h̲riba, trad. 3, 6). This may be true. Yet even these traditions…
Nābig̲h̲a al-Ḏh̲ubyānī
(1,744 words)
, a famous poet of the pre-Muḥammadan period. His real name was Ziyād b. Muʿāwiya and he belonged to the tribe of Ḏh̲ubyān. He probably flourished in the second half of the century which preceded Muḥammad and died shortly before the beginning of Islām. Caussin de Perceval (
Histoire des Arabes, 2nd ed., ii. 502) puts the date of his birth in 535 a. d. and Father Cheikho (
Poètes arabes chrétiens, p. 640) dates his death in 604 a. d. These dates however can only be conjectural. The surname Nābig̲h̲a has been variously interpreted by Arab writers. According to some, our poet was so c…
Nābulus
(1,118 words)
, a town in central Palestine, the name of which is derived from that of Flavia Neapolis built in honour of Vespanian. Its Old Testament predecessor was S h e c h e m, which however lay more to the east, on the site of the present village of Balāṭa (the name is explained by S. Klein, in
Z. D. P. V., xxxv. 38
sq.; cf. R. Hartmann,
ibid., xxxiii. 175
sq., as “platanus”, from the evidence of the pilgrim of Bordeaux and the
Midras̲h̲ Gen. rb., c. 81, § 3). According to Eusebius, the place where the old town stood was pointed out in a suburb of Neapolis. The correctness of this identi…
Nad̲h̲īr
(378 words)
(a., plural
nud̲h̲ur; Sūra liii. 57), used as a nomen agentis from
n-d̲h̲-r iv., with the meaning of warner; sometimes also as an infinitive, e.g. Sūra Ixvii. 17. The plural
nud̲h̲ur is also found in the sense of an infinitive, e. g. Sūra lxxvii. 6. The term occurs frequently in the Ḳurʾān; it is even said to be synonymous with
rasūl; its opposite is
bas̲h̲īr, mubas̲h̲s̲h̲ir. Nad̲h̲īr as well as
bas̲h̲īr are applied to the prophets, the former when they are represented as warners, the latter as announcers of good tidings (cf. Sūra xvii. 106; xxv. 58; xxxiii. 44; xlviii. 8:
mubas̲h̲s̲h̲iran wa-n…
Nad̲h̲r
(1,683 words)
, vow, was taken over into Islām from the pre-Muḥammadan Arabs and underwent modification by the new religion. The idea of dedication is associated with the root
n-d̲h̲-r which is also found in South Arabic, Hebrew and Aramaic and to some extent in Assyrian. An animal could ¶ be the object of dedication among the Arabs. For example, they dedicated by
nad̲h̲r certain of their sheep etc., for the
ʿatīra feast in Rad̲j̲ab (
Lisān al-ʿArab and Ḏj̲awharī, s.v.); the dedication which was expressed in solemn formulae signified that the animals were removed from the mundane sp…
Nadīm
(438 words)
, Aḥmad, an Ottoman poet, born in Stambul, the son of a judge named Muḥammad Bey who had come from Merzifun, His grandfather (according to Gibb,
H. O. P., iv. 30) was a military judge named Muṣṭafā. Aḥmad Rafīḳ mentions as his great-grandfather Ḳara-Čelebi-zāde [q. v.] Maḥmūd Efendi who also was a military judge. The genealogy given by Aḥmad Rafīḳ is however wrong because he confuses Ḳaramānī Muḥammad Pas̲h̲a [q. v.] with Rūm Muḥammad Pas̲h̲a. The statement that Aḥmad Nadīm is descended from Ḏj̲alāl al-Dīn is therefore simply the result of confusion. Little is known of his life. He was a
müderr…
al-Nadīm
(1,638 words)
, Abu ’l-Farad̲j̲ Muḥammad b. Abī Yaʿḳūb Isḥāḳ al-Warrāḳ al-Nadīm al-Bag̲h̲dādī, Arabic bibliographer, compiled the
Fihrist in 377 (987—988). Little is known about his life. According to a statement which goes back to Ibn al-Nad̲j̲d̲j̲ār’s (d. 643 = 1245)
Ḏh̲ail Taʾrīk̲h̲ Bag̲h̲dād (see Flügel’s edition, p. xii., note 2), he died in 385, according to another statement (see Ibn Ḥad̲j̲ar al-ʿAsḳalānī,
Lisān al-Mīzān, v. 72) probably 388 (? the figure is damaged in the Ḥaidarābād edition). Both dates are in contradiction to the fact that in the
Fihrist events of 392 (p. 87, 6) and “a…
Nadir
(94 words)
(Nahẓīr al-Samt or al-Nahẓīr κατ’ ἐξοχήν), the bottom, the pole of the horizon (invisible) under the observer in the direction of the vertical, also the deepest (lowest) point in the sphere of heaven. The nadir is the opposite pole to the zenith [q. v.]. The word
naẓīr (from
naẓara, “to see”, “to observe”) originally (and generally) means the ¶ point diametrically opposite a point on the circumference of a circle or the surface of a sphere; we find
muḳābal as a synonym of
naẓīr in this general meaning [cf. also muḳābala]. (Willy Hartner)
Naḍīr
(617 words)
(Banu ’l-), one of the two main Jewish tribes of Madīna, settled in Yat̲h̲rib from Palestine at an unknown date, as a consequence of Roman pressure after the Jewish wars. Al-Yaʿḳūbī (ii. 49) says they were a section of the Ḏj̲ud̲h̲ām Arabs, converted to Judaism and first settled on Mount al-Naḍīr, whence their name; according to the
Sīra Ḥalabīya (Cairo, iii. 2) they were a truly Jewish tribe, connected with the Jews of Ḵh̲aibar. This seems the more probable, but a certain admixture of Arab blood is possible; like the other Jews of Madīna they bore Ara…
Nādir S̲h̲āh
(5,130 words)
, king of Persia (1147—1160 = 1736—1747). Origins. Nādir b. Imām-ḳuli b. Nad̲h̲r-ḳuli belonged to the Ḳi̊ri̊ḳlu clan of the Turkoman tribe of the Afs̲h̲ārs, of which a section had settled in northern Ḵh̲urāsān, and was born on the 28th Muḥarram 1100 (Oct. 22, 1688) at Kūbkān. Entering the service of Tahmāsp II, he was called Tahmāsp-ḳuli Ḵh̲ān but after his coronation his original name was improved to Nādir, “the rare one”. At an early date Nādir distinguished himself in the incessant fighting with the Turkomans of Nasā, the Čamis̲h̲…
al-Nad̲j̲af
(1,170 words)
(Mas̲h̲had ʿAlī), a town and place of pilgrimage in the ʿIrāḳ 6 miles west of al-Kūfa. It lies on the edge of the desert on a flat barren eminence from which the name al-Nad̲j̲af has been transferred to it (A. Musil,
The Middle Euphrates, p. 35). According to the usual tradition, the Imām al-Muʾminīn ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib [q. v.] was buried near Kūfa, not far from the dam which protected the city from flooding by the Euphrates at the place where the town of al-Nad̲j̲af later arose (Yāḳūt,
Muʿd̲j̲am, ed. Wüstenfeld, iv. 760), also called Nad̲j̲af al-Kūfa (Zamak̲h̲s̲h̲arī,
Lexicon geographicum, ed. …
al-Nad̲j̲ās̲h̲ī
(584 words)
, designation in Arabic of the king of Abyssinia. It is a loanword from Aethiopic “king, prince” etc. In Arabic it is sometimes used as a proper noun, sometimes as a nomen appellativum. The word is also genuine Arabic, but as such it has the meaning of driver of game. It does not occur in the Ḳurʾān. In Ḥadīt̲h̲ it is the designation of the king of Abyssinia, just as Ḳaiṣar [q. v.], Kisrā [q. v.] and al-Muḳawḳas [q. v.] are the designations of the rulers of Rūm, Fāris and Miṣr. In their totality they represen…
al-Nad̲j̲ās̲h̲ī
(324 words)
, Ḳais b. ʿAmr al-Ḥārit̲h̲ī, an Arab poet of the seventh century a. d., lived at first in Nad̲j̲rān [q. v.] and quarrelled with ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, son of Ḥassān b. T̲h̲ābit [q. v.], because the latter had addressed in song a married female relative of Nad̲j̲ās̲h̲ī in Medīna. After an exchange of lampoons with his opponent from his native place, he met him at the annual fair at Ḏh̲u ’l-Mad̲j̲āz and again in Mecca when ʿAbd al-Raḥmān not only proved inferior as a poet but suffered bodily injury, so that his aged …