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, prince of the Ziyārid dynasty in Persia and author of a well-known “Mirror for Princes” in Persian, the Ḳābūsnāma . ʿUnṣur al-Maʿālī Kay Kāʾūs was the penultimate ruler of the line of Ziyārids [ q.v.] who ruled in the Caspian provinces of Ṭabaristān or Māzandarān and Gurgān in the 4th/10th and 5th/11th centuries. His main claim to fame lies in the Ḳābūs-nāma , written in 475/1082-3, when the author was 63 years old, for his favourite son and intended successor, Gīlān-S̲h̲āh. The little that we know of his life must be gleaned from historical sources like Ibn Isfandiyār’s Tāʾrīk̲h̲-i Ṭabaris…

(t.) (perhaps also Yavg̲h̲u, the Old Turkish so-called “runic” alphabet not differentiating b and v), an ancient Turkish title, found in the Ork̲h̲on [ q.v.] inscriptions to denote an office or rank in the administrative hierarchy below the Kag̲h̲an. The latter normally conferred it on his close relatives, with the duty of administering part of his dominions. It was thus analogous to the title S̲h̲ad̲h̲, whom the Yabg̲h̲u preceded in the early Türk empire [see turks. I. History. 1. The pre-Islamic period]. It seems to have lost some importance after this time (8th century), …

, Abū Ibrāhīm , called al-Amīr al-Māḍī or al-Amīr al-ʿĀdil, the first member of the Sāmānid family effectively to rule all Transoxania and Farg̲h̲āna as an independent sovereign. Born in 234/849, he spent 20 years as governor of. Buk̲h̲ārā on behalf of his brother Naṣr, who himself resided at Samarḳand (260/874-279/892). The unsettled conditions in Ḵh̲urāsān during the years between the fall of the Ṭāhirids and the final establishment there of ʿAmr b. al-Layt̲h̲ [ q.v.] were reflected in Transoxania also. Ismāʿīl had in Buk̲h̲ārā to fight off an invading army from Ḵh̲wārazm under one Ḥ…

the ancient capital of K̲h̲wārazm [ q.v.], situated on the east bank of the main channel of the Amū Daryā or Oxus a short distance from modern K̲h̲īwa. According to Yāḳūt, Buldān , iv, 222, Kāt̲h̲ meant in K̲h̲wārazmian a wall or rampart within the steppe, even if it enclosed no buildings, but there is nothing in what we know of K̲h̲wārazmian to confirm this; it is conceivable that there is some connection with Sogdian kat̲h̲ , kant̲h̲ , “town”, though this is wholly conjectural. The site of Kāt̲h̲ was affected by changes in the channels of the river, and was accordingly moved at various times. Litt…

, Quetta , a town and district of northern Balūčistān, now in Pakistan. In both the former British India and now in Pakistan, Quetta and Pīs̲h̲īn, some 20 miles to its north, have formed an administrative district. The region is geologically complex and is very mountainous, with peaks rising up to nearly 12,000 feet/3,850 metres, and it is centred upon the basin of the Pīs̲h̲īn-Lora river and its tributaries. The climate is temperate, with cold winters. Crops—wheat being the chief rabīʿ or spring crop and sorghum the chief k̲h̲arīf or autumn one—can only be gr…

b. Abi ’l-ʿAṣ , Abu ’l-Ḳāsim and then Abū ʿAbd al-Malik, first caliph of the Marwānid branch of the Umayyad dynasty [ q.v.], reigned for several months in 64-5/684-5. Marwān, born of al-Ḥakam’s wife Āmina bt. ʿAlḳama al-Kināniyya, stemmed from the same branch of the Umayyad clan of Ḳurays̲h̲, se. Abu ’l-ʿĀṣ, as the Rightly-guided caliph ʿUt̲h̲mān, and was in fact ʿUt̲h̲mān’s cousin. The sources generally place his birth in A.H. 2 or 4 ( ca. 623-6), but it may well have occurred before the Hid̲j̲ra in any case, he must have known the Prophet and was accounte…

, Abū Manṣūr , Daylamī soldier of fortune who played an important part in the tortuous politics and military operations in northern Persia, involving local Daylamī chiefs, the ʿAlids of Ṭabaristān and the Sāmānids, during the first half of the 4th/10th century. The house of Kākī were local rulers of As̲h̲kawar in Rānikūh, the eastern part of Gīlān in the Caspian coastlands. Mākān rose to prominence in Ṭabaristān in the service of the ʿAlid princes there, and as the ʿAlids themselves dissolved into internecine rivalries, he became the co…

, Maʿalt̲h̲ā (Syriac “gate, entrance”, Payne Smith, Thesaurus syriacus , col. 2881), modern Malthai, the name given to two villages in the former ḳaḍāʾ of Dehōk (Duhūk) in the wilāyet of Mawṣil in Ottoman times, now in the Autonomous Region of Dehōk in Republican ʿIrāḳ. The second of these two villages was formerly distinguished as Maʿalt̲h̲ā al-Naṣārā “M. of the Christians”, but has recently become largely Kurdish and Muslim, like its fellow-village. Maʿalt̲h̲āyā lies on a small affluent of the Tigri…

, a small town in South India (lat. 18° 26′ N., long. 77° 11′ E.), in British Indian times the chef-lieu of a taluk in the Bīdar District of Ḥaydarābād State [ q.v.], now coming within the Maharashtra State of the Indian Union. It has a fort dating back to the end of the 9th/15th century. It was part of the lands of the Barīd S̲h̲āhs of Bīdar [ q.vv.], and then of their successors the ʿĀdil S̲h̲āhs of Bīd̲j̲apur [ q.vv.] until it was besieged by S̲h̲āh Ḏj̲ahān’s army in 1044/1635 and then incorporated into the Mug̲h̲al empire. Its chief fame stems from the fiercely-fought ba…

, older orthography (e.g. in Ibn Rusta, 171) K̲h̲wāb, a rustāḳ or rural district of Ḳūhistān in eastern Persia, lying between the district of Bāk̲h̲arz [ q.v.] to the north and that of Ḳāʾin to the southwest, and adjacent to the modern Iran-Afg̲h̲ānistān border. The geographers of the 4th/10th century mention the towns there of Salūmak ( Ḥudūd al-ʿālam , tr. 103, Salūmīd̲h̲), Fard̲j̲ird and Kusūy(a), the latter being especially populous. Yāḳūt, Buldān , ed. Beirut 1374-6/1955-7, ii, 399, describes the district as having 200 villages and three si…

, Abū Muḥammad al-Marwazi al-Tamīmī, faḳīh who had been a pupil of al-S̲h̲āfiʿī. judge and counsellor of ʿAbbāsid caliphs, d. 242/857. A native of Marw, he became Grand Judge ( ḳāḍī ’l-ḳuḍāt ) of Bag̲h̲dād after having been being appointed judge in Baṣra by al-Ḥasan b. Sahl [ q.v.] in 202/817-18. He soon became a member of al-Maʾmūn’s court circle as an adviser and boon-companion, thus exemplifying a trend under this caliph to take legal scholars rather than administrators as political counsellors. He accompanied al-Maʾmūn to Syria and Egypt …

, in mediaeval Islamic times a town, now the city of Madurai, in South India. It lies on the Vaidai river in lat. 9° 55’ N., long. 78° 07’ E. in the region known to the mediaeval Muslims as Maʿbar and to later European traders as Coromandel. For the historical geography and Islamic history of this coastal province, roughly extending from Cape Comorin northwards to Madras, see maʿbar . In 734/1334 S̲h̲arīf Ḏj̲alāl al-Dīn Aḥsan [ q.v.], governor for the Dihlī Sultan Muḥammad b. Tug̲h̲luḳ [ q.v.], renounced his allegiance, and he and some seven of his successors ruled over a short-l…

, or Kākwayhids , a dynasty of Daylamī origin which ruled over part of D̲j̲ibāl or west-central Persia during the first half of the 5th/11th century as virtually independent sovereigns, and thereafter for more than a century as local lords of Yazd, tributary to the Sald̲j̲ūḳs. The rise of the Kākūyids is one aspect of the “Daylamī interlude” of Iranian history, during which hitherto submerged Daylamī and Kurdish elements rose to prominence. Under the dynamic leadership of the …

, Banū , or Mazyadids , an Arab dynasty of central ʿIrāḳ, which stemmed originally from the clan of Nās̲h̲ira of the Banū Asad [ q. v. ] established in the area between al-Kūfa and Hīt, and which flourished in the 4th-6th/10th-12th centuries. ¶ The origins of the Mazyadids, as established by G. Makdisi (see Bibl .) pace the older view (expressed e.g. in EI 1 mazyadīds ) that the family did not appear in history till the early years of the 5th/11th century, go back to the period soon after the establishment of Būyid domination in ʿIrāḳ. Ibn al-Ḏj̲āwzī relates that the Būyid amīr Muʿizz al-Dawla’s v…

, Ḳuzdār , the name of a town in mediaeval Islamic Balūčistān [ q.v.], modern town and district of Ḵh̲uzdār in the former Kalāt state [see kilāt ] in Pakistan. It lies in lat. 27° 48′ N. and long 66° 37′ E. at an altitude of 4,050 feet, some 85 miles south of Kalāt; the long, narrow valley of the Kolachi River in which it is situated is strategically important as a nodal point of communications, from Karāčī and Las Bēla [ q.vv.] in the south, from Kaččhī in the east, from Kalāt in the north, and from Makrān and K̲h̲ārān [ q.vv.] in the west. Ḳuṣdār was first raided by the Arabs…

, Banū , an Iranian dynasty which reigned in the districts of Rūyān and Rustamdār, the coastal plain and the mountainous interior respectively, of the western parts of the Caspian province of Māzandarān [ q.v.] in the second half of the 9th/15th century and in the 10th/16th century. The dynasty was in fact one of the two branches into which the ancient line of the Bādūspānids [ q.v.], whose genealogy went back to Sāsānid times, split in the middle years of the 9th/15th century. The Bādūspānids had been confined to the fortress of Nūr by the Caspian campaigns of Tīmūr in 794/139…

(A., also laṣş , luṣṣ , pl. luṣūṣ , with maṣdar s luṣūṣiyya , talaṣṣuṣ (see LA 1, viii, 355-6, and Lane, s.v.), one of the two main words in Arabic for thief robber (the other being sāriḳ ); in Persian we have duzd “thief”, duzdī “theft”, and in old Turkish og̲h̲ri̊ , Ottoman k̲h̲ayrsi̊z , modern hırsız . Arabic liṣṣ and the unassimilated variants li/a/uṣt must have appeared in the language during the Byzantine period, presumably via Syriac leṣtā , whilst there exists the form listīs , closer to the Greek original λῃστής in Mishnaic Hebrew and Palestine Jewish Aramaic (see S. Krauss, Griechische u…

(p.), literally “the holder of an ustān [ q.v.] or province”, an administrative term originally found in Sāsānid Persia for the governor of a province or for the official in charge of state domains (see Nöldeke, Geschichte der Perser und Araber , 448). When the Arabs conquered ʿIrāḳ, the old Sāsānid state lands were taken over as ṣawāfī al-ustān and administered by ustāndārs for the caliph ʿUmar (see M.J. Morony, Iraq after the Muslim conquest , Princeton 1984, 68-9 and index s.v. ustāndār). The title probably continued to be used meanwhile by local potentates in the un-Islami…

(t.), lit. rain stone, in Arabic texts appearing as ḥad̲j̲ar al-maṭar , this being a magical stone by means of which rain, snow, fog, etc., could be conjured up by its holder(s). In particular, knowledge and use of such stones has been widespread until very recent times in Inner Asia. Belief in the existence of stones and other means of controlling the weather has been widespread throughout both the Old and New Worlds (see Sir J.G. Frazer, The golden bough, a study in magic and religion, abridged ed., London 1922, 75-8). Belief in a stone seems to have been general amongst the e…

, a town and district in Central Asia, now the town and oblast of Leninabad in the Tadzhik SSR, the town lying in 40° 17′ lat. N. and 69° 37′ long. E. The mediaeval town was strung out along the left bank of the middle Si̊r Daryā at the southernmost bend of its course and at the entrance to the Farg̲h̲āna valley. It lay in the ill-defined borderlands between the Transoxanian districts of Īlāḳ [ q.v. in Suppl.] and Us̲h̲rūsana [ q.v.], and was generally reckoned as being connected administratively with one or other of these two in the early middle ages. Its destinies were, ho…

or al-Naws̲h̲ari , Abū Mūsā ʿĪsā b. Muḥammad, general (said to be Turkish, but perhaps an Iranian from K̲h̲urāsān, since al-Samʿānī, Ansāb , ed. Ḥaydarābād, xiii, 201-2, derives the nisba al-Nūs̲h̲ārī ( sic) from Nūs̲h̲ār, a village in the district of Balk̲h̲) from the guard of the ʿAbbāsid caliphs at Sāmarrā and governor of Damascus on various occasions during the caliphates of al-Muntaṣir, al-Mustaʿīn and al-Muʿtazz [ q.vv.] from 247/861 onwards. At the accession of al-Muʿtazz in 252/866, he expanded southwards into Palestine, displacing the Arab governor of Ramla [ q.v.], ʿĪsā b. …

“Ṭalḥa of the Ṭalḥas”, the name by which the early Islamic Arab commander Abū Muḥammad Ṭalḥa b. ʿAbd Allāh b. K̲h̲alaf al-K̲h̲uzāʿī was known. Ibn K̲h̲allikān, ed. ʿAbbās, iii, 88, tr. de Slane, ii, 53, explains that he got this cognomen because his mother’s name was Ṭalḥa bt. Abī Ṭalḥa. On his mother’s side he was connected with Ḳurays̲h̲ (Caskel-Strenziok, Ğamharat an-nasab , ii, 555). He appears in Umayyad history as governor of Sīstān around the end of the caliphate of Yazīd I, being appointed by the governor of K̲h̲urāsān Salm b. Ziyād [ q.v.] just after an Arab raid into eastern Af…

, the ancient title of the rulers of K̲h̲wārazm [ q.v.], used regularly in the early Islamic period (cf. Ṭabarī, ii, 1238, events of 93/712) until the Mongol invasions, and sporadically thereafter; hence as with the designations Afs̲h̲īn and Ik̲h̲s̲h̲īd [ q.vv.], this is an example of the survival of what was probably an ancient Central Asian Iranian title well into Islamic times. The K̲h̲wārazmian scholar Bīrūnī gives the names and genealogical sequence of the first line of K̲h̲wārazm-S̲h̲āhs, the house of Afrīg̲h̲, which began, so he says, in 305 A.D. and continued unti…

, an ancient town of northern India in the K̲h̲ad̲j̲uhā taḥṣīl of Fatḥpūr District in the former British United Provinces, now Uttar Pradesh. It lies in lat. 26° 7′ N. and long. 80° 22′ E. on the Rind River some 12 miles/20 km. from the Ḏj̲amnā (Jumna) River between Kānpūr (Cawnpore) and Fatḥpūr. In early times it was apparently held by the Rād̲j̲put line of the Rād̲j̲ās of Argal, and the fortress there may have been their ancestral centre. Under the Mug̲h̲als, Kōŕā (sometimes spelt in Marāt́hi and Persian sources as Kurrah, and to be distinguished from Kārā Manīkpūr, an adjacent but separate sar…

, Abū Isḥāḳ Muḥammad b. Hārūn al-Ras̲h̲īd , ʿAbbāsid caliph, reigned 218-27/833-42, son of the caliph Hārūn by a slave concubine Mārida. During the reign of his brother and predecessor al-Maʾmūn [ q.v.], al-Muʿtaṣim achieved a reputation as a skilful commander in Anatolia and as governor in Egypt. When al-Maʾmūn died in the Byzantine marches in Rad̲j̲ab 218/August 833, al-Muʿtaṣim was recognised as caliph despite support within the army for his nephew al-ʿAbbās b. al-Maʾmūn (who was, in fact, later to conspire against al-Muʿta…

, the name of two places in India. 1. A port on the southwestern coast of the Kāt́hiāwāŕ peninsula, in lat. 21° 28′ N. and long 70° 14′ E., formerly coming within the native state of D̲j̲unāgaŕh [ q.v.] and with a Muslim local chief there tributary to the Nawwāb of D̲j̲unāgaŕh; the mosque there carries a date 785/1383. Bibliography Imperial gazetteer of India 2, xvii, 180. 2. A town in the former British Indian territory of Rajputana, within the native state of Kotah, in lat. 25° 20′ N. and long. 70° 31′ E. and 44 miles/70 km. to the northeast of Kotah city. He…

(p.), the term applied to the days of abstinence from eating meat introduced by the Mug̲h̲al emperor of India, Akbar (963-1014/1556-1605 [ q.v.]). His chronicler Abu ’l-Faḍl ʿAllāmī [ q.v.] notes in his Āʾīn-i Akbarī (tr. H. Blochmann, i, 51-2, more accurately tr. in Shireen Moosvi, Episodes in the life of Akbar. Contemporary records and reminiscences, New Delhi 1994, 100-1) that Akbar abstained thus on Fridays and Sundays, and then on various other days of the year, including the first day of each solar month and the whole of the first month Farwar…

a settlement of early and mediaeval Islamic times in the Ču [ q.v.] valley of the Semirečye in Turkestan, during the Soviet period forming the city of Frunze (lat. 42° 54′ N., long. 74° 36′ E.). The region of Pis̲h̲pek and nearby Toḳmaḳ is known to have been in mediaeval Islamic times a centre of Nestorian Christianity, and inscribed grave stones, the oldest of which date back to the time of the Ḳara ¶ K̲h̲iṭay [ q.v.] (6th/12th century), have been found there (see W. Barthold, Zur Geschichte des Christentums in Mittel-Asien bis zur mongolische Eroberung , Tübingen and Leipzig 1901, 1-2, 37-8 et …

, the name of a Rād̲j̲pūt tribe of Lower Sind in mediaeval Islamic times. Their origins are shrouded in mystery, but they are first mentioned in Muslim historians’ account of Maḥmūd of G̲h̲azna’s return from his attack on Somnāth in 416/1026 [see sūmanāt ]. For the next three centuries, they were the leading power in Lower Sind, but in the 8th/14th century their domination was challenged by the rival tribe of the Sammās [ q.v.]. Despite attempts by the Tug̲h̲luḳid Sultan of Dihlī, Fīrūz S̲h̲āh (III), to aid the Sumerās, the Sammās finally emerged triumphant over their…

, apparently the grandson of the last Umayyad governor of K̲h̲urāsān Naṣr b. Sayyār [ q.v.] and rebel against the ʿAbbāsid caliphate in the opening years of the 9th century A.D. In 190/806 Rāfiʿ led a rising in Samarḳand which turned into a general rebellion throughout Transoxania against the harsh rule and financial exploitation of the caliphal governor of K̲h̲urāsān. ʿAlī b. ʿĪsā b. Māhān [see ibn māhān ]. As well as receiving support from the local Iranian population, Rāfiʿ secured help ¶ from the Turks of the Inner Asian steppes, the Tog̲h̲uz-Og̲h̲uz [see g̲h̲uzz ] and Ḳarluḳ [ q.v.]. Hār…

, a Balūč tribe of modern Pakistan, living partly in the Indus valley plains of the Dēra G̲h̲āzī Ḵh̲ān District of the Pand̲j̲āb [see dērad̲j̲āt ], and partly in the Mārī and Drāgal hills of the Sulaymān Mountains range and the upland plateaux of S̲h̲am and Paylāwag̲h, extending as far west as the modern Loralai District of northeastern Balūčistān. ¶ The tribe is of mixed origin, some sections being Dōdāīs of mingled Balūč-Sindh Rād̲j̲pūt extraction, whilst others are pure-blooded Balūč of the Rind and Lās̲h̲ārī groups; the chief’s family belongs to one of the Dōdāī sections. In the early …

(a. “place of securing, tying up, i.e. anchorage), a port of the South Arabian coast in Ẓufār [ q.v.] (Dhofar), lying in 17°00′N. and 54°41′E., some 40 miles/70 km east of the modern town of Salāla [ q.v.] in the Sultanate of Oman. Yāḳūṭ, ¶ Buldān , Beirut 1374-6/1955-7, v, 97, describes it as being five farsak̲h̲s from the town of Ẓufār (i.e. the modern al-Balīd) and as the only port of the coast of the region of Ẓufār; it had an independent sulṭān , and its hilly hinterland produced frankincense [see lubān ). In the early 19th century, its ruler was a corsair chi…

, a city in the delta region of the Amū Daryā [ q.v.] or Oxus river of K̲h̲wārazm [ q.v.]which was for some four centuries, from Mongol times onwards, the capital of the province. After the Mongols had totally destroyed the former capital of K̲h̲wārazm, Gurgand̲j̲ [ q.v.] in 618/1221, the conquerors founded a new city on a nearby site, presumably that of “Little Gurgand̲j̲”, three farsak̲h̲ s from the old capital. Under the pax mongolica, Ürgenč speedily became a populous and flourishing commercial centre (see Barthold, Turkestan down to the Mongol invasion , 457; idem, A short history of …

, ʿAyn Ubāg̲h̲ , the name of a spring or watercourse on the eastern, sc. ʿIrāḳī, fringes of the Syrian Desert which was the scene of a pre-Islamic yawm or battle of the Arabs. The confused Arabic sources take this as being the battle of A. D. 554 in which the Lak̲h̲mid al-Mund̲h̲ir III b. al-Nuʿmān II was killed fighting the G̲h̲assānid al-Ḥārit̲h̲ b. Ḏj̲abala [ q.v.], in fact, the yawm al-Ḥalīma (see e.g. al-Bakrī, Muʿd̲j̲am mā ’staʿd̲j̲ama , i, 95; Yāḳūt, Buldān , ed. Beirut, iv, 175. Cf. A. P. Caussin de Perceval, Essai sur l’histoire des arabes avant l’Islamisme , Pari…

, a district, and in earlier Islamic times a town, in northwestern Ḵh̲urāsān. It lies on the northern edge of the long plain which extends from Bisṭām and S̲h̲āhrūd in the west almost to Nīs̲h̲āpūr in the east and whose central section is drained by the Kāl-i S̲h̲ūr river before it turns southwards into the Das̲h̲t-i Kawīr. In mediaeval Islamic times, the route from Nīs̲h̲āpūr to Gurgān ran across this plain, and the geographers place Isfarāyīn at roughly the midpoint, five stages from Nīs̲h̲āpūr and five from Gurgān. Though allegedly founded by Isfandiyār, little is known of Isfar…

, a settlement and port on the eastern coast of Arabia in pre-Islamic and early Islamic times, situated in the region of Had̲j̲ar or Baḥrayn; its exact location is however unknown and would appear to be only discoverable by future archaeological investigations. Varying traditions attribute the foundation of al-Mus̲h̲aḳḳar to one of the kings of Kinda [ q.v.], Mūsā b. al-Ḥārit̲h̲, or to a commander of the Sāsānid heavy cavalry ( asāwira ; see on these, C.E. Bosworth, EIr art. Asāwera ) B.s.k.b. Māhbūd̲h̲ in the time of the Kisrās (al-Ṭabarī, i, 985-6, tr. Nöldeke, Geschichte der Perser und Ara…

, Arabic form of Persian Kōh-rūd “mountain river”, a village in western Persia on the summer caravan route between Ḳās̲h̲ān and Iṣfahān [ q.vv.]. In mediaeval times it fell within the province of D̲j̲ibāl, and Ḥamd Allāh Mustawfī, Nuzhat al-ḳulūb , tr. 184, places it some 8 farsak̲h̲s from Ḳās̲h̲ān, sc. 27 miles/45 km. from the latter town; cf. also Schwarz, Iran im Mittelalter , 929 n. 16. Today, Ḳuhrūd falls administratively in the bak̲h̲s̲h̲ of Ḳamṣar, in the s̲h̲ahrastān of Ḳās̲h̲ān, in the second ustān or central province of Iran, see Farhang-i d̲j̲ug̲h̲rāfiyāʾ-yi Īrān …

Muʿizzī , Turkish slave commander of the G̲h̲ūrid sultan Muʿizz or S̲h̲ihāb al-Dīn Muḥammad, who after that ruler’s death in 602/1206, made himself, with the support of a group ¶ of other Turkish soldiers, independent in G̲h̲azna in eastern Afg̲h̲ānistan. Muʿizz al-Dīn’s successor at Fīrūzkūh [ q.v.], Maḥmūd b. G̲h̲iyāth al-Dīn Muḥammad, had to manumit Yildiz and recognise him as governor in G̲h̲azna. During his nine years’ rule there, Yildiz treated another Muʿizzī slave commander Iltutmis̲h̲ [ q.v.], who had established himself in northern India, as his subordinate. Bu…

or Ḵh̲yber Pass , one of the principal passes (together with the Kurram, Tochi, Gomal and Bolan Passes) through the mountain barrier separating the Indus valley plains from Afg̲h̲ānistān. The pass runs northwestwards for ca. 33 miles/50 km. from the Shadi Bagiar opening 3 miles/5 km. beyond Fort Jamrud, itself 7 miles/12 km. from Peshawar, to the barren plain of Loi Dakka, which then stretches to the Kabul River banks. The highest point of the pass is at Landi Kotal (3,518 ft/1,280 m.), an important market centre for the region,…

, Abū Ibrāhīm al-Muntaṣir , the last of the Sāmānids of Transoxania and Ḵh̲urāsān. When in 389/999 the Ḳarak̲h̲ānid Ilig Ḵh̲ān Naṣr occupied the Sāmānid capital Buk̲h̲ārā. Ismāʿīl and other members of the family were carried off to Uzkend. He contrived, however, to escape to Ḵh̲wārazm, and for the next four years kept up a series of attacks on the G̲h̲aznavids in northern Ḵh̲urāsān and the Ḳarak̲h̲ānids in Buk̲h̲ārā. In 393/1003 he obtained the help of the Og̲h̲uz, traditional allies of the Sāmānids, and according to Gardīzī, it was at thi…

, the mustering, passing in review and inspection of troops, the official charged with his duty being known as the ʿāriḍ , pl. ʿurrāḍ . The institution of the ʿarḍ was from the start closely bound up with the Dīwān al-Ḏj̲ays̲h̲ or that departaient of the bureaucracy concerned with military affairs, and these duties of recruitment, mustering and inspection comprised one of the dīwān ’ s main spheres of activity, the other sphere being that concerned with pensions and salaries [see dīwān and d̲j̲ays̲h̲ ]. The Ṣāḥib Dīwān al-Ḏj̲ays̲h̲ of the early ʿAbbāsid Caliphate or ʿĀriḍ al-Ḏj̲ays̲h̲ …

, called Nad̲j̲m-i T̲h̲ānī (d. 1047/1637), official in the service of the Mug̲h̲als of India and the author of a Persian Mirror for Princes, the Mawʿiẓa-yi D̲j̲ahāngīrī . Of émigré Persian origin, Muḥammad Bāḳir served as a military commander and then as a provincial governor for the Emperors D̲j̲ahāngīr and S̲h̲āhd̲j̲ahān, but was clearly a highly cultivated adīb also, the patron of poets, himself a poet and master of the ins̲h̲āʾ style and author of a work of S̲h̲īʿī kalām , still in manuscript. His chief claim to fame is as the author of one of the …

, the name given in Islamic geographical and travel literature to Khmer or Cambodia. The geography and political organisation of South-East Asia early became of interest to Islamic scholars because of trade links with Further India and China, and information was brought back by, inter alios, Arab and Persian merchants and navigators. Some of this information relates to the Khmer kingdom on the lower Mekong River, an outpost of Indian cultural and religious life, which lasted from the beginning of the 9th century to the middle of the 13th century (see R. Grousset, Histoire de l’Extrème-O…

, the coastal region of the western Deccan or Peninsular India lying roughly between Thālnēr and Bombay in the north and Goa in the south, i.e. between latitudes 19° 30′ and 15° 30′ N., and extending for some 560 km/350 miles. It has been known under this name in both mediaeval Islamic and modern times. Within British India, it was formerly in the Bombay Presidency, later Province, and is now in Maharashtra State of the Indian Union. It comprises a highly-forested, low-lying plain between the Arabian Sea and the inland mountain barrier of the Western Ghats. In medieval Islamic times, the T…

, Abū S̲h̲ud̲j̲āʿ G̲h̲iyāt̲h̲ al-Dunyā wa ’l-Dīn, with the Turkish name Tapar “he who obtains, finds” (see P. Pelliot, Notes sur l’histoire de la Horde d’Or, Paris 1950, 182-3), Great Sald̲j̲ūḳ sultan in ʿIrāḳ and western Persia 498-511/1105-18. Born in S̲h̲aʿbān 474/January 1082, he was a half-brother of Malik-S̲h̲āh’s eldest son Berk-Yaruḳ [ q.v.] and a full brother of Sand̲j̲ar [ q.v.]. When Berk-Yaruḳ succeeded his father in 485/1092, he had to leave Muḥammad in Ād̲h̲arbāyd̲j̲ān and Arrān, where Muḥammad enjoyed the support of Sand̲j̲ar and of the for…

the usual name in Muslim sources of the 6th/12th and 7th/13th centuries of the Kitai people, mentioned in Chinese sources from the 4th century A.D. onwards as living on the northern fringes of the Chinese empire; during the course of the 6th/12th century a group of them migrated into the Islamic lands of Central Asia and established a domination there which endured for some eighty years. In the Ork̲h̲on inscriptions of Outer Mongolia, the royal annals of the T’u-chüeh or Turks (ca. 732 A.D.), the Kitai are mentioned as enemies of the Turks and as living to the…

, Dhū ’l-Ṣawārī , G̲h̲azwat al-Ṣawārī , “the Battle of the Masts”, the names given in the Arabic sources to a naval battle between the Arabs and Byzantines in the latter part of ʿut̲h̲mān’s caliphate. The locale of the engagement is not wholly certain, but was probably off the coast of Lycia in southern Anatolia near the place Phoenix (modern Turkish Finike, chef-lieu of the kaza of that name in the vilayet of Antalya). As governor of Syria, Muʿāwiya [ q.v.] seems to have inaugurated a policy of building up Arab naval power in order to counter Byzantine control of the Easte…

, Kis̲h̲s̲h̲ , the later S̲h̲ahr-i Sabz , a town of mediaeval Transoxania, now in the Uzbekistan SSR and known simply as S̲h̲ahr, but in early times in the region of Soghdia (Ar. Ṣug̲h̲d [ q.v.]). It lay on the upper reaches of the landlocked K̲h̲as̲h̲ka Daryā in an area where several streams came down from the Sayām and Buttamān Mountains to the east, forming a highly fertile valley, intersected with irrigation canals. The town lay on the Samaḳand-Tirmid̲h̲ high road, two days’ journey from Samarḳand; after passing through Kis̲h…

(t.), a designation in Old Turkish for a bird of prey, described by Maḥmūd al-Kās̲h̲g̲h̲arī ¶ as larger than a ṣonḳur , a possibility is the Crested Goshawk, Astur trivirgatus . It was certainly used for hunting purposes [see for this, bayzara ]. Its chief importance, however, in early Turkish history and culture, from Uyg̲h̲ur times onwards, was as a frequent personal name. In Islamic times, its most notable holder was Ṭog̲h̲ri̊l Beg [ q.v.], co-founder with his brothers Čag̲h̲ri̊ Beg [ q.v.] and Big̲h̲u (whose names are also those of avian raptors) of the fortunes of the Great Sald̲j̲ūḳs [ q.…

al-Saffār (“the coppersmith”), Abū Yūsuf, adventurer in Sīstān and founder of the dynasty there of Ṣaffārids [ q.v.], functioned as amīr in Sīstān from 247/861 and then as ruler of an extensive military empire in the eastern Islamic lands until his death in 265/879, in practice independent of the ʿAbbāsid caliphs. The origins of Yaʿḳūb’s family in Sīstān were clearly humble, despite attempts of later historians to elevate his father al-Layt̲h̲ to the status of head of the guild of coppersmiths in the province. He was one of four brothers who were members of local bands of ʿayyārs [ q.v.], in …

, Abū Saʿīd , S̲h̲ihāb al-Dawla , D̲j̲amāl al-Milla , etc., sultan of the G̲h̲aznawid [ q.v.] dynasty, reigned 421-32/1030-40. The eldest son of the great Maḥmūd b. Sebüktigin [ q.v.], he was born in 388/998. In 406/1015-16, as walī ʿahd or heir apparent, he was made governor of Harāt and in 411/1020 led an expedition into the still-pagan enclave of G̲h̲ūr [ q.v.] in central Afg̲h̲ānistān. When in 420/1029 Maḥmūd annexed the northern Būyid amirate of Ray and D̲j̲ibāl and attacked the Kākūyids [ q.v.] of Iṣfahān and Hamad̲h̲ān. Masʿūd was placed in charge of these operations in western Persia. S…

, the name of a town and of an extensive region, formerly a K̲h̲anate, of Balūčistān, now a District of Pakistan. (1) The town (often called Kalāt-i Balūč to distinguish it from the Afg̲h̲ān Kalāt-i G̲h̲ilzay) lies in lat. 28° 53′ N. and long. 66° 28′ E. at an altitude of 6,800 feet, and has in recent centuries been the centre of the K̲h̲ānate of Kalāt; until the rise of Quetta as a military base of British India [see kwat́t́a ] it was the most important town of Balūčistān. The name Kalāt or Kilāt represents Arabic ḳalʿa and Persian ḳala / ḳalāt , often pronounced kilā / kilāt i…

, a castle of the Ismāʿīlīs [see ismāʿīliyya ] in the Alburz Mountains in northwestern Iran, the mediaeval region of Daylam [ q.v.]. ¶ Ras̲h̲īd al-Dīn states that it was built in 490/1097 by the Grand Master of the Assassins Ḥasan-i Sabbāḥ or by his successor Kiyā Buzurg-Ummīd in the early 6th/12th century. Ḏj̲uwaynī, tr. Boyle, II, 621-36, cf. M. G. S. Hodgson, The order of the Assassins , The Hague 1955, 265 ff., has a detailed account of the fortress’s reduction by the Il-Ḵh̲ān Hülegü in S̲h̲awwāl 654/November 1256. The Mongols besieged …

, Arabic form Sāriya, a town of the Caspian region of Persia, in mediaeval Islamic times within the province of Ṭabaristān, now in the modern province of Māzandarān [ q.v.] (lat. 36° 33′ N., long. 53° 06′ E.). It lies some 32 km/20 miles from the Caspian Sea on the Tīd̲j̲in river ( Ḥudūd al-ʿālam , tr. 77: Tīžin-Rūd̲h̲) and in the hot and humid coastal plain; the surrounding region has always been famous for its silk production and its fruits. Whether Sārī had any pre-Islamic history is unclear, though Islamic lore assigned its foundation to the legendary Pīs̲h̲dādid [ q.v.] figure, Ṭahmūrat̲h…

, Marḍī (or Murḍā) b. ʿAlī b. Marḍī, enigmatic writer in Arabic on military topics. His dates are unknown, but he flourished in the later 6th/12th century and seems to have lived in Alexandria. He composed for the Ayyūbid sultan Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn [ q.v.] a treatise, Tabṣirat arbāb al-albāb fī kayfiyyat al-nad̲j̲āt fi ’l-ḥurūb min al-aswāʾ wa-nas̲h̲r aʿlām al-iʿlām fi ’l-ʿudad , extant in the Bodleian unicum Hunt 264 ¶ (extracts ed. and tr. Cl. Cahen, Un traité d’armurerie composé pour Saladin , in BEO, xii [1947-8], 1-47, 150-63). It deals with weapons such as the sword, bow, lance,…

, a town of India in the easternmost part of the Pand̲j̲āb, situated in lat. 30° 39′ N. and long. 76° 28′ E. and lying some 36 km/24 miles north of Patiāla city. In the mediaeval Islamic Persian chronicles, the name is usually spelt S.h.r.n.d , and the popular derivation from sar-Hind “the head of India”, from its strategic position, is obviously fanciful. The town must have had a pre-Islamic, Hindu past, but became important from G̲h̲ūrid times onwards and was developed by the Tug̲h̲luḳid sultan Fīrūz S̲h̲āh (III) at the b…

, Abū Isḥāḳ Ibrāhīm [ b. Yahyā ?] b. ʿUt̲h̲mān b. ʿAbbās al-Kalbī al-As̲h̲habī (441-524/1049-1129), Arabic poet of the Sald̲j̲ūk period. He was born in G̲h̲azza [ q.v.] at a time when that town was still under Fāṭimid rule, but as a S̲h̲āfiʿī Sunnī and as a person especially proud of emanating from the Imām al-S̲h̲āfiʿī’s own birthplace, his life was to be orientated towards the East, where the establishment of the Sald̲j̲ūḳs favoured a resurgence of Sunnī orthodoxy. He was studying in Damascus in 481/1088 as a pupil of t…

, the upper basin of the Kābul River (see preceding article), vaguely defined in early Islamic times as the region between Bāmiyān in the west and Lamg̲h̲ān in the east. The geographer Muḳaddāsī (c. 375/985) includes within it all the country north of G̲h̲azna and Zābulistān, i.e., the Lōgar valley, cf. Le Strange, Lands of the Eastern Caliphate , 349; and it is only about this time that the term “Kābul” becomes specialised for the name of the town rather than being applied to the whole region of Kābulistān. In contemporary Afg̲h̲…

, the name of a range of mountains running roughly south-north and to the west of the Indus river in modern Pākistān. The Sulaymān rise from the low tract of the Dērad̲j̲āt [ q.v.] which lie along the right bank of the Indus and run, in a series of long, sharp-backed ridges and jagged peaks, from the Bugt́ī and Marī districts of north-east Balūčistān in the south to the Gomal Pass [see gūmāl in Suppl.] and river in the north, thereafter continuing as the Wazīristān hills (i.e. they lie between latitudes 28° 50′ and 32° 20′ N.). It is at the northern end that the hig…

, K̲h̲uttal , a region on the right bank of the upper Oxus river, in what is now Soviet Central Asia, lying between the Wak̲h̲s̲h̲ river and the Pand̲j̲ river (sc. the head waters of the Oxus), called the Wak̲h̲s̲h̲āb and D̲j̲aryāb in mediaeval times. It was bounded on the west by the topographically similar regions of Čag̲h̲āniyan and Wak̲h̲s̲h̲ [ qq.v.], and was often administratively linked with Wak̲h̲s̲h̲ (Yāḳūt, Buldān , ii, 402). K̲h̲uttal was a land of rich pastures in both the river valleys and on the upper slopes of the hills, where t…

b. Abī Muʿayṭ , Companion of the Prophet and member of the Abū ʿAmr family of the Umayyad clan in Mecca, d. 61/680. His father ʿUḳba fell at Badr opposing Muḥammad, but al-Walīd became a Muslim at the conquest of Mecca in 8/630. He acted as collector of the ṣadaḳa [ q.v.] from the Banū Muṣṭaliḳ under the Prophet and that from the Christian Banū Tag̲h̲lib [ q.v.] in al-D̲j̲azīra under ʿUmar. Through his mother, he was a half-brother of the ʿUt̲h̲mān b. ʿAffān, and when the latter became caliph he appointed al-Walīd governor of Kūfa after Saʿd b. Abī Waḳḳāṣ (29/6…

b. Muʿattib al-T̲h̲aḳafī , Abū Yaʿfur, a leader of the Aḥlāf group in al-Ṭāʾif [ q.v.] at the time of the rise of Islam and considered technically as a Companion of the Prophet, d. 9/630. He was descended through his mother from ʿAbd S̲h̲ams of Ḳurays̲h̲ and married a daughter, Āmina or Maymūna, of the Meccan head of resistance against Muḥammad, Abū Sufyān [ q.v.]. ʿUrwa took part in the negotiations between the Prophet and the Meccans for the truce of al-Ḥudaybiya [ q.v.] in 6/628 as an ally of Ḳurays̲h̲. When the men of al-Ṭāʾif, from both the component groups of the Aḥlāf a…

b. Il Arslan , Abu ’l-Muẓaffar Tād̲j̲ al-Dunyā wa ’l-Dīn, one of the K̲h̲wārazm S̲h̲āhs of Anūs̲h̲tigin’s line, reigned 567-96/1172-1200. The name (thus vocalised in Maḥmūd al-Kās̲h̲g̲h̲arī, tr. Atalay, i, 368) means something like “confronted, attacked, struck [in battle]”; see Hikmet Bayur, Harizmşah Alâüʾd-Dîn “ Tekiş ” ʾ in adi hakkinda, in Belleten , xiv, no. 56 [1950], 589-95. ¶ Tekis̲h̲ had been governor of D̲j̲and [ q.v. in Suppl.] during his father’s lifetime, and only succeeded to the throne after a struggle with his younger brother Sulṭān S̲h̲āh, who…

, the name of two rulers of the D̲j̲alāyirids [ q.v.], a dynasty of Mongol origin which succeeded to the heritage of the II K̲h̲ānids in ʿIrāḳ and Ād̲h̲arbayd̲j̲ān. 1. S̲h̲ayk̲h̲ Uways (I) b. Ḥasan-i Buzurg (r. 757-76/1356-74), was the son of the founder of the line and of the Čopanid princess Dil-S̲h̲ād K̲h̲ātūn bt. Dimas̲h̲ḳ K̲h̲wād̲j̲a b. Čopan. Succeeding to power on his father’s death, he probably also brought under his control the fiefs allotted to his brother Sulṭān Ḥusayn when the latter died in 760/1359. Uways made Bag̲h̲dād his capital, at …

, Warwālīd̲j̲ , a town of mediaeval Ṭuk̲h̲āristān, in what is now northern Afg̲h̲ānistān, mentioned in the Ḥudūd al-ʿālam , tr. 72, 109, as the ḳaṣaba or administrative centre of the ¶ province. It lay on the road from Balk̲h̲ and K̲h̲ulm [ q.vv.] to Ṭālaḳān and Badak̲h̲s̲h̲ān [ q.vv.] between the confluence of the Dōs̲h̲ī (Surk̲h̲-āb) and Ṭālaḳān rivers, whose united stream then flowed into the Oxus. It seems to be the A-hua of Hiuen-tsang, attesting to its existence in pre-Islamic, Hephthalite times. E.G. Pulleyblank suggested that the element wal-/war-reflects the name of the Cent…

(also spelt Sīwī in mediaeval Islamic sources, e.g. the Ḥudūd al-ʿālam ) a town and district of northeastern Balūčistān, lying on the plain below the entrance to the Bolān Pass and the route to Quetta [see kwat́t́a ], which is some 140 km/88 miles beyond Sībī town. The town is situated in lat. 29° 31′ N. and long. 67° 54′ E. Because of its strategic position between the mouths of the Bolān and Harnaī Passes, and on the way down to the Indus valley, it has always played a part in history. In early Islamic times, Sībī was one of the towns of the district of Bālis(h) or Wālis̲h̲ān, althou…

, son of Kāmd̲j̲ār, a Persian general of K̲h̲usraw Anūs̲h̲arwān (A.D. 531-79 [see kisrā ]). The name would apparently stem from MP vēhrēz “having a good abundance”, see Nöldeke, Gesch . der Perser und Araber , 223 n. 2, and Justi, Iranisches Namenbuch , 340, but was in origin a title, since the Byzantine historian Procopius names the commander of the Sāsānid emperor Kawād’s expedition into Georgia and Lazica (early 5th century) as having the title Ouarizēs (< * wahriz ); see daylam, at Vol. II, 190a. In response to an appeal ca. 570, via the Lak̲h̲mids [ q.v.], from Sayf b. D̲h̲ī Yazan, the …

, a small town of northern Persia (lat. 35° 19’ N., long. 51° 40’ E.) lying in the fertile Warāmīn plain, which benefits from a good water supply from the D̲j̲ād̲j̲a Rūd and has been much frequented by Turkmen nomads up to modern times. 1. History. The mediaeval Islamic geographers place it at two stages from al-Rayy (al-Muḳaddasī, 401) or at 30 mīl s from it (Yāḳūt, Buldān , ed. Beirut, v, 370). Already in Būyid times it was a flourishing little town with a bazaar, but it developed especially after the Mongols sacked al-Rayy in 617/1220 an…

(a.), the active participle of the verb istak̲h̲rad̲j̲a in the sense of “to extract”, used in the mediaeval Islamic terminology for the person responsible for collecting money, such as that of the ṣadaḳa or poor-tax (al-Ṭabarī, i, 2746) or of the k̲h̲arād̲j̲ or land-tax; thus in ʿAbbāsid times he was an offical of the Dīwan al-K̲h̲arād̲j̲ charged with the latter task ( ibid., hi, 1856, year 257/871, caliphate of al-Muʿtamid). In Muslim Spain, it seems to have been the original of the Latin term exceptor , the official who collected on behalf of the Muslim s…

, Ḥād̲j̲d̲j̲ī Mīrzā Ḥasan , Persian scholar of the 19th century and author of a historicalgeographical work on his native province of Fārs, the Fārsnāma-yi Nāṣirī (the latter part of the book’s title being a reference to the Ḳād̲j̲ār sultan Nāṣir al-Dīn S̲h̲āh, in whose reign Ḥasan Fasāʾī wrote). He was born, according to the autobiography inserted into his book, in 1237/1821-2 in the small town of Fasā [ q.v.] in Fārs, of a family which had been prominent in the intellectual and religious life of S̲h̲īrāz for at least four centuries; various members of it had be…

, the name in Arabic geographical writing for the Araxes River (Perso-Turkish form Aras, Armenian Eraskʿ, Georgian Rak̲h̲s̲h̲ī, modern Aras). It rises in what is now eastern Turkey near Erzurum and flows generally in an eastwards direction for 1,072 km/670 miles into the Caspian Sea. Its middle reaches, from a point near Mount Ararat, today form the boundary between the former Azerbaijan SSR and Persia, with the lower stretch receiving the Kur River and flowing through the Mūḳān [ q.v.] steppes and what is now wholly Azerbaijani territory. The early Arabic name al-Rass led the Musl…

, the Ottoman Turkish form of modern Turkish Payas, a small town at the head of the Gulf of Alexandretta 18 km/12 miles north of Iskandarūn [ q.v.] (lat. 36° 46′ N., long. 36° 10′ E.). Lying as it ¶ does in the very narrow coastal corridor between the sea and the Amanus Mts. or D̲j̲abal al-Lukkām [ q.v.], the modern Turkish Gavur Dağlari, Payās has always been a strategically important point on the route from Cilicia to Antioch; the name itself goes back to that of the classical Greek town of Baiae (see PW, ii/2, col. 2775 (Ruge)). In the early Islamic period, Payās was on the road connecting…

, the name found in pre-modern usage for a region of what is now eastern Afgh̲ānistān, also appearing in mediaeval Arabic usage as its Arabic equivalent Bilād al-Dāwar. The region straddled the courses of the upper Helmand river and the Arg̲h̲andāb to the north of their confluence at Bust, hence it was bounded on the north by Zābulistān and al-Ruk̲h̲k̲h̲ad̲j̲ [ q.vv.] on the south and southeast, but the boundaries of all these regions were indeterminate, and Zamīndāwar, in particular, seems often to have been confused in the sources with that of Zābulistān. The early Arabic geographers …

, scene of a battle in eastern Syria in 73/692-3 between the Arab tribes of Sulaym and Tag̲h̲lib. Ḵh̲ālid b. al-Walīd campaigned here in 12/633 (Ṭabarī, i, 2068, 2072-3). Yāḳūt describes it as a range of hills stretching from ʿUrḍ near Palmyra to the Euphrates, corresponding to the modern D̲j̲ebel el-Bis̲h̲rī. The battle is also sometimes called after al-Raḥūb, a local water-course. The “Day of al-Bis̲h̲r” was the climax of several clashes between the two tribes. This strife lay to some extent outside the Ḳays-Kalb tribal feud of the period; both tribes we…

, the name generally given by the classical Islamic geographers to the Indus river (Skr. Sindhu, Σίνθος, “Ινδς, Lat. Sindus, Indus), but Nahr al-Sind, Sind-Rūdh, Nahr Multān, etc. were also used by them. There was, in fact, considerable confusion over the precise nomenclature of the Indus and its constituents, with, in particular, uncertainty over what was to be regarded as the main river channel. Thus al-Iṣṭak̲h̲rī, followed by Ibn Ḥawḳal, records the Nahr Multān or Mihrān as rising in the mountains of Central Asia. They compa…

(a., pl. mak̲h̲ālīf ), a term of mediaeval Islamic administrative geography used particularly in Yemen. The sources usually state that it is the equivalent of Arabic kūra [ q.v.] “administrative province” (Nas̲h̲wān al-Ḥimyarī, Die auf Südarabien bezüglichen Angaben im Šams al-ʿulūm , Leiden-London 1916, 34) or Persian rustāḳ [ q.v.] “rural area” (al-K̲h̲alīl b. Aḥmad, cited by Yāḳūt, Buldān , Beirut 1374-6/1955-7, i, 37, tr. Wadie Jwaideh, The introductory chapters of Yāqūt’s Muʿjam al-buldān , Leiden 1959, 56-7), with a fanciful explanation tha…

, Arab commander in the service of Abū Muslim at the time of the ʿAbbāsid Revolt (d. 135/752-3). He was one of the naḳībs [ q.v.] chosen by Abū Muslim from the leaders of the Arabs in K̲h̲urāsān in 1340/747-8. With the triumph of the ʿAbbāsid cause, Abū Muslim appointed Ziyād governor of Buk̲h̲ārā and Sogdia, where he suppressed a rebellion of the discontented Arab garrison in Buk̲h̲ārā led by S̲h̲arīk (or S̲h̲urayk) b. S̲h̲ayk̲h̲ al-Mahrī (133/750-1). Shortly afterwards he commanded the Arab expedition sent into the la…

Ḵh̲ārs̲h̲ād̲h̲ b. ʿAḍud al-Dawla Fanā-Ḵh̲usraw , Būyid supreme amīr , who ruled in ʿIrāḳ and then in southern Persia also from 379/989 to 403/1012) after 381/992 with the further honorific, granted by the caliph al-Ḳādir, of G̲h̲iyāt̲h̲ al-Umma, and towards the end of his life, those of Ḳiwām al-Dawla and Ṣafī Amīr al-Muʾminīn). He was the third son, after Ṣamṣām al-Dawla Marzubān and S̲h̲araf al-Dawla S̲h̲īrzīl, of the great amīr ʿAḍud al-Dawla [ q.v.], who had built up the Būyid confederation into the mightiest empire of its time in the Islamic east. On ʿAḍud al-Dawla’s death in S̲h̲…

, a technical term of fiscal practice in the hydraulic civilisation of early Islamic ʿIrāḳ, doubtless going back to earlier periods there. It is defined by al-K̲h̲wārazmī in his Mafātīḥ al-ʿulūm , 70, as “a chain or cable which is fastened right across a river and which prevents boats from getting past”, and more specifically by Ibn Rusta, 185, tr. Wiet, 213, as a barrier across the Tigris at Ḥawānīt near Dayr al-ʿĀḳūl [ q.v.] consisting of a cable stretched ¶ between two ships at each side of the river, preventing ships passing by night (and thus evading the tolls levied b…

, rūdbār , meaning literally in Persian, a district along a river or a district intersected by rivers, and a frequent toponym in Islamic Persia. Yāḳūt, Buldān , ed. Beirut, iii, 770-8, and al-Samʿānī, Ansāb , ed. Ḥaydarābad, vi, 187-90, list Rūd̲h̲bārs at Iṣfahān, Ṭūs, Balk̲h̲, Marw, Hamad̲h̲ān and Bag̲h̲dād, and in the provinces of S̲h̲āsh and Daylam. As homes or places of origin of noted scholars, the most significant of these were the Rūd̲h̲bār by the gate of Ṭābarān, one of the two townships making up Ṭūs [ q.v.]; the one near Bag̲h̲dād; and the one near Hamad̲h̲ān. In the historical geog…

, Abu ’l-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. Muḥammad, littérateur of the Fāṭimid period, and librarian and boon-companion to the caliph al-ʿAzīz (365-86/975-96 [ q.v.]), died at Fusṭāṭ in 388/988 or possibly in the succeeding decade. Ibn K̲h̲allikān explains the unusual cognomen S̲h̲ābus̲h̲tī as being a name of Daylamī origin, and not a nisba ; an origin in s̲h̲āh pus̲h̲tī “he who guards the king’s back” has been somewhat fancifully suggested. Al-S̲h̲ābus̲h̲ī’s works included a K. al-Yusr baʿd al-ʿusr , a Marātib al-fuḳahāʾ , a K. al-Tawḳīf wa ’l-tak̲h̲wīf , a K. al-Zuhd wa ’l-mawāʿiẓ …

, a river of the northern part of what is now the Mongolian People’s Republic; it joins the Selenga to flow northwards eventually into Lake Baikal. ¶ For Turcologists, the banks of this river are of supreme importance as the locus for the Old Turkish inscriptions, carved in the middle decades of the 8th century in a so-called “runic” script, in fact derived ultimately from the Aramaic one [see turks. Languages]. These inscriptions are the royal annals of the Köktürk empire, centred on this region till its fall in 744 and supersession by a Uyg̲h̲ur [ q.v.] grouping based on Ḳara Balg̲h̲asun…

, a town on the Murg̲h̲āb river in mediaeval K̲h̲urāsān, five or six stages up river from the city of Marw al-S̲h̲āhid̲j̲ān [ q.v.], where the river leaves the mountainous region of G̲h̲arčistān [see g̲h̲ard̲j̲istān ] and enters the steppe lands of what is now the southern part of the Ḳara Ḳum [ q.v.]. The site seems to be marked by the ruins at the modern Afg̲h̲ān town of Bālā Murg̲h̲āb (inlat. 35° 35′ N. and long 63° 20′ E.) described by C. E. Yate in his Northern Afghanistan or letters from the Afghan Boundary Commission , Edinburgh and London 1888, 208; the modern…

, a place in the desert fringes of the early Islamic region of the Balḳāʾ [ q.v.], in what is now Jordan, some 22 km./14 miles southeast of ʿAmmān and 16 km./10 miles northeast of the Umayyad palace of Ms̲h̲attā or Mus̲h̲attā [ q.v.]. Visible there are the remains of an Umayyad settlement. These include traces of a palace, a tower which may have been part of a mosque, and signs of an extensive irrigation system in the form of sites of three dams nearby plus a fine stone-lined cistern, still much used by Bedouins of the Banū Ṣak̲h̲r for wa…

, a small town in northeastern Persia in the modern province of K̲h̲urāsān. It is on the Mas̲h̲had-Harāt highway, 150 km/96 miles from Mas̲h̲had and 75 km/48 miles from the Afg̲h̲ān frontier (lat. 35° 16′ N., long. 60° 36′ E.). The earlier Islamic name of Turbat-i D̲j̲ām was Būzad̲j̲ān or Pūčkān (both names in Mustawfī, Nuzha , 177, tr. 171, cf. also 143-4, tr. 151-2, where he calls it D̲j̲ām); it was here that the great mathematician Abu ’l-Wafāʾ al-Būzad̲j̲ānī (d. 368/998 [ q.v.]) was born. The geographers describe it being four stages from Nīs̲h̲āpūr, in a fertile agricultu…

, Mohammed Marmaduke William (1875-1936), English traveller, novelist, polemicist and educationist, who became a convert to Islam at a time when British converts to Islam were much rarer than later in the 20th century, and is now best remembered for his Ḳurʾān translation, The meaning of the Glorious Koran . Born in London, the son of an Anglican clergyman and with two step-sisters who were Anglican nuns, his boyhood and formative years were spent in rural Suffolk, from which he acquired a nostalgic view of a countryside way of life which was t…

, modern Vezirköprü, a small town of northern Anatolia, situated 35 km/21 miles north of Merzifon [see merzifūn ] and 18 km/12 miles south of the lowest stretch of the Kizil Irmak [see Ḳi̊zi̊l-i̊rmāḳ ] (lat. 41° 09’ N, long. 35° 27’ E). There was apparently a town there or nearby, in classical times, in what was then southern Pamphylia, and in Byzantine times, the town of Gedegara (in Kātib Čelebi’s Ḏj̲ihān-nümā , Kedeg̲h̲ara). In high Ottoman times, from the 10th/16th century onwards, it came within the sand̲j̲aḳ of Amasya in the eyālet of Sivas. Ewliyā Čelebi vi…

, a tide of rulers in Central Asia and what is now Afg̲h̲ānistān during the early Islamic period ¶ and, presumably, in pre-Islamic times also. The form s̲h̲ār must be an attempt to render in Arabic orthography the MP and NP form s̲h̲ēr/s̲h̲īr (< OP k̲h̲s̲h̲at̲h̲riya “ruler”, and not from s̲h̲ēr “lion”; see Marquart, Ērānšahr , 79). The title appears in early Islamic texts on the geography and history of the eastern Iranian fringes. Thus the Ḥudūd al-ʿālam , tr. Minorsky 105, comm. 327-8, gives S̲h̲ār as the tide of the ruler of the district of G̲h̲arčistān in northern Afg̲h̲ānistān [see g̲h̲ard…

, early Arabic form K̲h̲arluk̲h̲, Persian K̲h̲alluk̲h̲ (whence frequent confusion in the sources with the K̲h̲alad̲j̲ [ q.v.], Chinese Ko-lo-lu (northwestern Middle Chinese *Kâr-lâ-luk), a Turkish tribal group in Central Asia. They were originally a small federation of three tribes (whence the name given to them in the Uyg̲h̲ur Shine-usu inscription ca. 760 of Uč Ḳarli̊ḳ; the Ḥudūd al-ʿālam , 98, on the other hand, mentions seven tribes of the Ḳarluḳ), and comparatively unimportant. Their paramount chief never bore the title of k̲h̲ag̲h̲an or k̲h̲an , but i…

, Zarah , an inland lake in Sīstān [ q.v.], now straddling the borders of Persia and Afg̲h̲ānistān and the largest stretch of inland fresh water on the Iranian plateau. The name comes from Avestan zrayah-, O Pers. drayah- “sea, lake”. The lake played a role in ancient Iranian legend about a Saos̲h̲yant or Redeemer, a son of Zoroaster, who would arise ¶ from it; Islamised versions of such legends describe King Solomon as commanding his army of jinn to lower the surface of the lake so that the land masses thereby appearing could be used for agriculture (see Bosworth, The Saffarids of Sistan , 36). The…

, al-Ḳurḥ , a town and district of mediaeval Islamic times in the northern Ḥid̲j̲āz, mentioned in early Islamic sources as of prime importance, but not now known under this name. It seems very likely that the place had a role in the pre-Islamic history of the Wādī ’l-Ḳurā [ q.v.], where the settlement of later Ḳurḥ was situated, although the principal towns then were Dēdān (modern al-K̲h̲urayba) and al-Ḥid̲j̲r [ q.v.] or Madāʾin Ṣāliḥ (modern al-ʿUlā). According to Yāḳūt, Buldān , Beirut 1374-6/1955-7, iv, 320-1, and al-Samhūdī, Wafāʾ al-wafaʾ , ed. M. M. ʿAbd a…

, the s̲h̲uhra of Fak̲h̲r al-Dīn Muḥammad b. Manṣūr Mubārak S̲h̲āh al-Ḳuras̲h̲ī , Persian author in India during the time of the last G̲h̲aznawids, the G̲h̲ūrids and the first Slave Kings of Dihlī (later 6th/12th century-early 7th/13th century). His birth date and place are both unknown, but he was a descendant, so he says, on his father’s side from the caliph Abū Bakr and on his mother’s from the Turkish amīr Bilgetigin, the immediate predecessor in G̲h̲azna of Sebüktigin and father-in-law of Maḥmūd of G̲h̲azna; he may …

, Abū Manṣūr Būya b. Rukn al-Dawla Ḥasan , Būyid ruler in Iṣfahān, Rayy and most of D̲j̲ibāl 366-73/976-84. His father Rukn al-Dawla had before his death partitioned his lands between Muʾayyid al-Dawla (in Iṣfahān, Rayy and their dependencies) and another son Fak̲h̲r al-Dawla ʿAlī [ q.v.] (in Hamadān and Kurdish D̲j̲ibāl). In the event, Muʾayyid al-Dawla acknowledged the overlordship of their other brother, ʿAḍud al-Dawla [ q.v.] of Fārs, and with the latter’s support prevented Fak̲h̲r al-Dawla from assuming control in the greater part of his allotted territori…

, a former city of Muslim Bengal during Mug̲h̲al times, now a small town 6 km/4 miles to the east of the ruinous Mug̲h̲al site, in the Santāl Parganas District of Bihar Province in the Indian ¶ Union (lat. 25° 3ʹ N, long. 87° 50′ E.). To its west run the basaltic Rād̲j̲mahāl Hills of central Bihār. Rād̲j̲mahāl city grew up in the strategically important gap between the Hills and the right bank of the Ganges, a corridor defended in Mug̲h̲al times by the fortress of Teliāgarhi. When the Rād̲j̲put governor of the Mug̲h̲als, Mān Singh [ q.v.], had in 1000/1592 conquered Orissa [see úrisā …

, Zikrīs , a Muslim sect of southern Balūčistān, especially strong amongst the Balūč of Makrān [ q.v.], but also with some representation amongst the Brahūīs of further north. The sect’s name derives from the fact that its adherents exalted the liturgical recitations of formulae including the name and titles of God, sc. d̲h̲ikr [ q.v.], above the formal Muslim worship, the ṣalāt or namāz . The D̲h̲ikrīs were believed by Hughes-Buller to stem from the North Indian heterodox movement of the Mahdawiyya, the followers of Sayyid Muḥammad Mahdī of D̲j̲awnpūr (847-91…

, an ethnie and, until recently, a linguistic group originally concentrated in westcentral Afg̲h̲ānistān, in the modern province of G̲h̲ōrāt, and carrying on there a semi-pastoral and semi-agricultural way of life; now however groups of them have become dispersed throughout northern and central Afg̲h̲ānistān. They number at most 10,000 souls. For other communities in Afg̲h̲ānistān of mixed Turkish-Mongol origin, see hazāras in Suppl. Unlike the S̲h̲īʿī Hazāras, the Mog̲h̲ols are Sunnī. The origins of these Mog̲h̲ols probably lie in the appearance in Afg̲h̲ānistān o…

, the spelling in the Indo-Muslim sources for the ancient Indian town of Somnāth , properly Somanātha “lord of soma” (the hallucinogenic drink of the early Indo-Iranians), referring to Siva (S̲h̲iva), and, by extension, “lord of the moon”. It is now an ancient ruined town on the southwestern coast of the Kāt́hīāwāŕ peninsula of western India, in what was the older Indo-Muslim sultanate of Gud̲j̲arāt [ q.v.]. Recent excavations have revealed settlement there dating back to 1500 B.C., and Somnāth plays a part ¶ in the story of the death of Kṛṣna (Kris̲h̲na) in the Mahābhārata …

, an Arab tribe which in Umayyad times claimed descent from Kahlān b. Sabaʾ of Yemen and relationship with Lak̲h̲m and ʿĀmila; this certainly corresponded with the prevailing political alliances. However, the North Arab tribes claimed that D̲j̲ud̲h̲ām, Ḳuḍāʿa and Lak̲h̲m were originally of Nizār but had later assumed Yemenī descent. D̲j̲ud̲h̲ām were among the nomads who had settled in pre-Islamic times on the borders of Byzantine Syria and Palestine; they held places like Madyan, ʿAmmān, Maʿān a…

, a river of Inner Asia, and like many rivers in that region, one without outlet to the sea or to any more extensive river system. It rises in the Kūh-i Ḥiṣār mountains in north-central Afg̲h̲ānistān, flows westwards and receives tributaries from the Band-i Turkistān and Paropamisus mountains in north-western Afg̲h̲ānistān. Some 250 miles from its source, it reaches the town of Bālā-Murg̲h̲āb in the modern Bādg̲h̲īs province of Afg̲h̲ānistan, and then enters the Turkmen SSR and flows for another 250 miles northwards towards the Ḳara Ḳum desert [ q.v.] to New Marw (Russ. Mary), and t…

, Muṭṭawwiʿa (a.), lit. “those who perform supererogatory deeds of piety, those over and above the duties laid upon them by the S̲h̲arīʿa ” echoing the use of the verb taṭawwaʿa in Ḳurʾān, II, 153/158, 180/184, IX, 80/79, the term used in military contexts for volunteer fighters. Al-Samʿānī defines them ( Ansāb , ed. Haydarābād, xii, 317) as “a group who devote themselves to g̲h̲azw and d̲j̲ihād , station themselves in ribāṭs along the frontiers ( t̲h̲ug̲h̲ūr) and who go beyond the call of duty ¶ ( taṭawwaʿū ) in g̲h̲azw and undertake this last in the lands of u…