Table of Contents

  • BAVĀNĀTĪ

    Ī. Afšār

    (d. 1892-93), MĪRZĀ MOḤAMMAD-BĀQER, Persian man of letters, poet, instructor of Persian in London, and self-styled prophet.

  • BĀVANDIDS

    Cross-Reference

    See ĀL-E BĀVAND.

  • BĀVĪ

    P. Oberling

    (or Bābūʾī), a Luri-speaking tribe of the Kohgīlūya, in Fārs.

  • BĀWĪYA

    J. Perry

    a Shiʿite tribe of Ḵūzestān. They range east and south of Ahvāz, between the Kārūn and Jarrāḥī rivers, to the south of Band-e Qīr and north of Māred.

  • BÄX FÄLDISỊN

    F. Thordarson

    “horse dedication,” a funeral rite practiced by the Ossetes until recent times.

  • BAY

    Cross-Reference

    See BARG-E BŪ.

  • BAYĀN (1)

    J. T. P. de Bruijn

    term (lit. “statement,” “exposition,” “explanation”) from an early date encompassing the various arts of expression in speech and writing. Often ʿelm-e bayān merely denotes rhetoric as a whole.

  • BAYĀN (2)

    D. M. MacEoin

    term applied to the writings of the Bāb in general and to two late works in particular, the Bayān-e fārsī and al-Bayān al-ʿarabī.

  • BAYĀNI, JĀR-ALLĀH-ZĀDA

    Tahsin Yazici

    (d. 1597), Shaikh Moṣtafā, a Turkish poet who composed on the ḡazals of Hāfeẓ.

  • BAYĀNĪ, MEHDĪ

    M. Dabīrsīāqī

    (1906-68), specialist in Persian manuscripts and calligraphy and pioneer in the field of Persian librarianship.

  • BAYĀT

    G. Doerfer

    an important Turkish tribe. A substantial proportion of the Bayāt people must have entered Iran in the train of the Saljuq invaders in the first half of the 11th century.

  • BAYĀT(Ī)

    J. During

    one of the old modes of the Irano-Arabic musical tradition, mentioned for the first time by Šayḵ Ṣafadī (15th century).

  • BAYĀT-E EṢFAHĀN

    M. Caton

    or ĀVĀZ-e EṢFAHĀN, a musical system based on a specific collection of modal pieces (gūšahā) which are performed in a particular order.

  • BAYĀT-E KORD

    M. Caton

    or KORD-e BAYĀT, a part of the modal system (dastgāh) of Šūr in Persian music.

  • BAYĀT-E TORK

    M. Caton

    a musical system (āvāz, naḡma) and one of the branches of the modal system (dastgāh) of Šūr in traditional classical music.

  • BAYATỊ, GAPPO

    F. Thordarson

    (Ger.: Georg-Gappo Baiew; 1869-1939), Ossetic man of letters.

  • BAYĀŻ

    M.-T. Dānešpažūh

    literally “white,” usually a small paper notepad that opens lengthwise and was carried around in an inside pocket. Several such MS are found in various libraries.

  • BAYAZIT

    R. W. Edwards

    (Bāyazīd; Osm. Bayezid), a stronghold located three kilometers southeast of the modern village of Doğubayazit, Turkey, and approximately twenty-five kilometers southwest of Mt. Ararat, important in the defense of Anatolia against invasion from Iran.

  • BĀYBŪRTLŪ

    P. Oberling

    (also Bāybūrdlū), a Turkic tribe of northwestern Iran whose only vestiges seem to be the names of a few historical personalities.

  • BĀYDŪ

    B. Spuler

    a son of Ṭaraḡāy and grandson of Hülegü (Hūlāgū), reigned as il-khan in Iran, 1295.

  • BAYHAQ

    C. E. Bosworth

    a rural area (rostāq) of medieval Khorasan, between the district of Nīšāpūr and the eastern borders of Qūmes, and its town, also known as Sabzavār.

  • BAYHAQĪ, ABU’L-FAŻL

    Ḡ.-Ḥ. Yūsofī

    MOḤAMMAD B. ḤOSAYN, secretary at the Ghaznavid court and renowned Persian historian (995-1077).

  • BAYHAQĪ, ABU’L-ḤASAN MOḤAMMAD

    H. Halm

    B. ŠOʿAYB ʿEJLĪ NAYSĀBŪRĪ (d. 936), a jurist who helped promote the spread of the Shafeʿite school of Islamic law in Khorasan.

  • BAYHAQĪ, EBRĀHĪM

    C. E. Bosworth

    B. MOḤAMMAD, 10th-century Arabic littérateur, author of a work of adab.

  • BAYHAQĪ, ẒAHĪR-AL-DĪN

    H. Halm

    ABU’L-ḤASAN ʿALĪ B. ZAYD (ca. 1097-1169), also known as Ebn Fondoq, an Iranian polymath of Arab descent, author of the Tārīḵ-e Bayhaq.

  • BĀYJŪ

    P. Jackson

    Mongol general and military governor in northwestern Iran (fl. 1228-1259). He belonged to the Besüt tribe and was a kinsman of Jengiz Khan’s general Jebe (Jaba).

  • BAYLAQĀN

    C. E. Bosworth

    a town of the medieval Islamic region of Arrān, the classical Caucasian Albania, lying in the triangle between the Kor and Aras (Araxes) rivers.

  • BĀYQARĀ B. ʿOMAR ŠAYḴ

    E. Glassen

    (b. 1392-93, d. 1422-23?), a Timurid prince and grandson of Tīmūr, active in Fārs.

  • BAYRAM KHAN

    N. H. Ansari

    (or BAYRĀM) KHAN, Moḥammad Ḵān(-e) Ḵānān (d. 1561), an illustrious and powerful Iranian noble at the court of the Mughal emperors Homāyūn and Akbar.

  • BAYRĀMŠĀH

    Ḡ.-Ḥ. Yūsofī

    (d. 1367-69), the beloved companion (nadīm) of Sultan Oways, second ruler (r. 1356 to 1374-75) of the Jalayerids.

  • BAYRĀNAVAND

    P. Oberling

    a Lor tribe of the Pīš(-e)Kūh region in Lorestān.

  • BĀYSONḠOR, ḠĪĀṮ-AL-DĪN

    H. R. Roemer

    B. ŠĀHROḴ B. TĪMŪR (1397-1433), Timurid prince who played an important role as a statesman and a patron of art and architecture and was himself a first-class calligrapher.

  • BĀYSONḠORĪ ŠĀH-NĀMA

    Dj. Khaleghi Motlagh, T. Lentz

    an illuminated and gilded manuscript of Ferdowsī’s Šāh-nāma measur­ing 26.5 × 38 cm, containing 346 pages and twenty-one paintings, written in nastaʿlīq, and kept in the former Royal Library (Golestan Palace Museum, no. 6) in Tehran. i. The manuscript.  ii. The paintings.

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  • BAYT

    A. Hassanpour

    a genre of Kurdish folk art, an orally transmitted story which is either entirely sung or is a combination of sung verse and spoken prose.

  • BAYT-AL-ʿADL

    M. Momen

    (House of Justice), a Bahai administrative institution.

  • BAYTUZ

    C. E. Bosworth

    a Turkish commander who controlled the town of Bost in southern Afghanistan during the middle years of the 10th century.

  • BAYŻĀ

    C. E. Bosworth

    a town of medieval Islamic Fārs (modern Tall-e Bayżā), 25 miles north of Shiraz, 8 farsaḵs according to the medieval geographers and one stage east of the Sasanian and early Islamic town of Eṣṭaḵr.

  • BAYŻĀWĪ, NĀṢER-AL-DĪN

    E. Kohlberg

    Shafeʿite jurist, Asḥʿarite theologian, and renowned Koran commentator (13th-14th centuries).

  • BĀZ

    H. Aʿlam

    general term formerly applied particularly to birds from the genera Falco (falcons) and Accipiter (hawks), which were traditionally prized and trained for hunting game birds.

  • BĀZ-NĀMA

    Moḥammad-Taqī Dānešpažūh

    books or treatises on the keeping and training of falcons.

  • BĀZA-ḴŪR

    D. Huff

    (Baz-e Hur), a village and site of some important Sasanian structures on the road from Mašhad to Torbat-e Ḥaydarīya.

  • BAZAG

    Cross-Reference

    “toilette.” See COSMETICS.

  • BĀZĀR

    Multiple Authors

    “market (place),” term which may refer to: a market day, usually once a week, when farmers bring their wares to the market to sell; a fair held at specific times; and the physical establishments, the shops, characterized by specific morphology and architectural design.

  • BAZAR i. General

    Michael E. Bonine

    Large interior courtyard caravanserais are an integral part of most bāzārs, particularly in the larger cities where international trade was once significant. Around the courtyard are single- or two-storied complexes of offices occupied by wholesalers, although the bottom level is more often for storage and even contains shopkeepers or craftsmen.

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  • BĀZĀR ii. Organization and Function

    Willem Floor

    Both weekly market days and regular fairs occurred in pre-Islamic times. Among the latter, for example, was the bāzār of Māḵ in Bukhara.

  • BAZAR iii. Socioeconomic and Political Role

    Ahmad Ashraf

    The bāzār in the Islamic city has been (1) a central marketplace and craft center located in the old quarters of the town; (2) a primary arena, along with the mosque, of extrafamilial sociability; and (3) a sociocultural milieu of a traditional urban life-style.

  • BAZAR iv. In Afghanistan

    E. F. Grötzbach

    In Afghanistan a bāzār is a collection of shops and workshops forming a topographic unit. As regards size and layout, however, there can be great differences.

  • BAZAR v. Temporary Bazars in Iran and Afghanistan

    M. Bazin

    The most firmly established form of periodic bāzār is certainly the one observed in the Caspian lowlands of Iran and especially in the central plain of Gīlān, where weekly bāzārs (bāzār-e haftagī) are part of a particularly long tradition.

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  • BĀZĀR-E WAKĪL

    Karāmat-Allāh Afsar

    an architectural monument of Shiraz from the reign of Karīm Khan Zand (Wakīl, r. 1750-79) and still an important center of business.

  • BĀZARGĀN

    Bernard Hourcade

    a village on the Turkish-Iranian frontier eighteen kilometers northwest of Mākū,  West Azerbaijan province. The development of this village is very recent and limited, linked with the nearby frontier crossing.

  • BĀZĀRGĀNĪ

    cross-reference

    See COMMERCE.

  • BĀZDĀRĪ

    Hūšang Aʿlam

    (or bāzyārī, lit. “bāz keeping,” obs.), falconry, as a practical art and as a sport.

  • BĀZGAŠT-E ADABĪ

    William L. Hanaway, Jr.

    “literary return,” a move­ment for a return to writing poetry in the Ḵorāsānī and ʿErāqī styles, which began in the mid-18th century and continued into the 20th century.

  • BĀZĪ

    Fereydūn Vahman

    (games). The growing interest in Iranian folklore in recent decades has resulted in the publication of descriptions of many games played in various parts of Iran, often to be found in dialect glossaries.

  • BĀZRANGĪ

    Richard N. Frye

    the family name of a dynasty of petty rulers in Fārs overthrown during the rise of the Sasanians.

  • BĀZYĀR

    cross-reference

    See BĀZ.

  • BĀZYĀRĪ

    Cross-Reference

    See BĀZDĀRĪ.

  • BDEAXŠ

    Cross-Reference

    See BIDAXŠ.

  • BE SŪ-YE ĀYANDA

    Nassereddin Parvin

    (Toward the future), Per­sian daily newspaper and unofficial organ of the Communist Ḥezb-e Tūda (Tudeh party, 1950-53.

  • BEADS

    cross-reference

    See JEWELRY.

  • BEANS

    Hūšang Aʿlam

    term applied to plants (and their seeds) of different genera of the vast family Leguminosae. In this article, discussion is confined to what is commonly called lūbīā in Persian.

  • BEAR

    Paul Joslin

    (Pers. ḵers, Av. arša-). Two varieties of bears are found on the Iranian plateau: the Eurasian brown bear and the Baluchistan black bear. The Eurasian brown bear is the most common of all bears. 

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  • BEAUSOBRE, ISAAC DE

    Werner Sundermann

    (1659-1738), Huguenot pastor, scholar and pioneer of modern studies of Manicheism.

  • BEAVER

    Hūšang Aʿlam

    Castor fiber L., semiaquatic mammalian rodent, in Persian commonly sag-e ābī (lit. “aquatic dog”), no longer extant in Iran. There appear to be references to beavers in Avestan and Pahlavi literatures.

  • Bečka, Jiři

    Manfred Lorenz

    (1915-2004), a noted Czech scholar of Iran, Afghanistan, and particularly, Tajikistan.

  • BĒDIL

    cross-reference

    See BĪDEL.

  • BEDIR KHAN

    Mehmed Uzun

    (Badr Khan; d. 1867), last ruler of the principality of Cizre-Botan, by extension, name of a Kurdish clan that has played important political, social, and cultural roles since the mid-19th century.

  • BEDLĪS

    Robert Dankoff

    (Turk. Bitlis, Arm. Bałēš, Ar. Badlīs), town and province of Turkey, of Kurdish population, situated twenty km southwest of Lake Van, commanding the passes between the Armenian highlands and the Mesopotamian lowlands.

  • BEDLĪSĪ, ḤAKĪM-AL-DĪN EDRĪS

    Cornell H. Fleischer

    B. ḤOSĀM-AL-DĪN ʿALĪ, MAWLĀNĀ (d. 1520), scholar, his­torian, poet, and statesman under the Ottoman Sultan Salīm I (r. 1512-20).

  • BEDLĪSĪ, ŠARAF-AL-DĪN KHAN

    Erika Glassen

    (b. 1543, d. 1603-04?), chief of the Rūzagī tribe of Kurds, whose traditional center was the town of Bedlīs; author of the Šaraf-nāma, a history of the Kurds in Persian.

  • BEDLĪSĪ, ŻĪĀʾ-AL-DĪN ʿAMMĀR

    Edward Badeen

    Sufi shaikh (d. between 1194 and 1207-08), teacher of Najm-al-Din Kobrā.

  • BEDŽỊZATỊ ČERMEN

    Fridrik Thordarson

    (Russ.: Chermen Begizov; DAUỊTỊ FỊRT;  1899-1941), Ossetic writer and editor.

  • BEECH

    Hūšang Aʿlam

    Fagus L. Modern Iranian botanists tend to refer to this tree as rāš. Its timber is used more than any other wood for making doors, windows, inexpensive furni­ture, and tools.

  • BEET

    Hūšang Aʿlam

    Beta vulgaris L., PERS. čoḡondar. The present distinction of beet varieties into vegetable (or red) beet, sugar beet, and fodder beet was unknown to the early Islamic botanists-pharmacologists.

  • BEG

    Peter Jackson

    (Pers. also beyg) a Turkish title meaning “lord” or “chief,” later “prince,” equivalent to the Arabic-Persian amīr, fem. BEGOM.

  • BEGGING

    C. Edmund Bosworth, Hamid Algar, ʿAlī-Akbar Saʿīdī Sīrjānī

    (Pers. gadāʾī, takaddī, soʾāl).  i. In the early centuries of the Islamic period. ii. In Sufi literature and practice. iii. In later Iran.

  • BEGLERBEGĪ

    Peter Jackson

    a Turkish title meaning “beg of begs,” “commander of commanders,” In the Il-khanid period sometimes employed to designate the leading amir in the state.

  • BEGRĀM

    Martha L. Carter

    the site of ancient Kāpiśa, located 80.5 km north of Kabul overlooking the Panjšīr valley at the confluence of the Panjšīr and Ḡorband rivers.

  • BEGTOḠDÏ

    C. Edmund Bosworth

    Turkish slave com­mander of the Ghaznavid sultans Maḥmūd and Masʿūd (d. 1040).

  • BEGTUZUN

    C. Edmund Bosworth

    (Pers. Baktūzūn), a Turkish slave general of the Samanids prominent in the confused struggles for power during the closing years of the Samanid amirate (end of the 10th century).

  • BEH

    Wilhelm Eilers, Hūšang Aʿlam, Nesta Ramazani

    “quince, Cydonia.”  i. The word.  ii. The tree.  iii. Culinary uses of the fruit. Wild quince trees are found in the Caucasus, and the cultivated variety may have originated there.

  • BEH-ARDAŠĪR

    Michael Morony

    (Mid. Pers. Vēh-Ardaxšēr, Ar. Bahorasīr), name of two cities founded by the first Sasanian king of kings, Ardašīr I (r. 226-41).

  • BEH-QOBĀD

    Michael Morony

    (Mid. Pers. Vēh-Kavāt), an administrative district created by the Sasanian king Qobād I in the early sixth century along the Babylon branch of the Euphrates.

  • BEHĀFARĪD

    Ḡolām-Ḥosayn Yūsofī

    Zoroastrian heresiarch and self-styled prophet, killed 748-49.

  • BEḤĀR AL-ANWĀR

    Etan Kohlberg

    (Oceans of light) by Mollā Moḥammad-Bāqer b. Moḥammad-Taqī Majlesī (d. 1699 or 1700), an encyclopedic compilation in Arabic of Imamite traditions.

  • BEHBAHĀN

    Aḥmad Eqtedārī

    Iranian city and county (šahrestān) in the province of Ḵūzestān.

  • BEHBAHAN

    Multiple Authors

    a city and sub-province in Khuzestan province.

  • BEHBAHAN ii. Population, 1956-2011

    Mohammad Hossein Nejatian

    This article deals with the following population characteristics of Behbahan: population growth from 1956 to 2011, age structure, average household size, literacy rate, and economic activity status.

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  • BEHBAHĀNĪ, ʿABD-ALLĀH

    cross-reference

    See ʿABD-ALLĀH BEHBAHĀNĪ.

  • BEHBAHĀNĪ, MOḤAMMAD

    Hamid Algar

    (1874-1963), AYATOLLAH, a leading mojtahed of Tehran who played a role of some importance in the events of the first two postwar decades.

  • BEHBAHĀNĪ, MOḤAMMAD-ʿALĪ

    Hamid Algar

    (1731-1801) B. MOḤAMMAD-BĀQER, ĀQĀ, Shiʿite mojtahed celebrated primarily for his ferocious hatred of Sufis.

  • BEHBAHĀNĪ, MOḤAMMAD-BĀQER

    Hamid Algar

    ĀQĀ SAYYED, Shiʿite mojtahed and champion of the Oṣūlī school in Shiʿite law (feqh).

  • BEHBAHANI, SIMIN

    Multiple Authors

    (1927-2014), eminent Iranian poet and human rights activist noted for her innovative treatment of the traditional genre of ghazal.

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  • BEHBAHANI, SIMIN i. Life

    Saeid Rezvani

    (1927-2014), was introduced to Persian poetry since early childhood; her poems were tinged with shades of social commitment and with the onset of the 1979 revolution took on unprecedented dimensions of social consciousness which won her numerous awards and prizes.

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  • BEHBAHANI, SIMIN ii. Poetry

    Saeid Rezvani

    Behbahani enjoyed a studied familiarity with Iran’s literary past. Over the course of several decades, she devoted her efforts toward the reinterpretation of the ghazal, and gave expression to new subject matters with new meanings not heretofore encountered in the classical tradition of the genre.

  • BEHBAHANI, SIMIN iii. Prose

    Houra Yavari

    Although more noted for her poems, Behbahani has also written extensively in prose, and her stories are characterized by experimentations with time and space, and reflect an imaginative approach to the remembrance of bygone days.

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  • BEHBAHANI, SIMIN iv. Selected Bibliography

    Saeid Rezvani and Houra Yavari

    This article contains a selected bibliography of the works of Simin Behbahani.

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  • BEHBŪDĪ

    Yuri Bregel

    (1875-1919), MOLLĀ MAḤMŪD ḴᵛĀJA, one of the leaders of the Jadīd movement in Central Asia in the 1900s-1910s, journalist and playwright.

  • BEHDĀRĪ

    Mohammad Ali Faghih

    (maintaining health), term applied to the entire organization and services provided either by government or by various other agencies to secure the health of the people, hospitals, clinics, centers and other supporting services.

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  • BEHDĀŠT BARĀ-YE HAMA

    Akbar Moarefi

    (“Health for All”), a magazine published by the Division of Public Health Education in Tehran, 1953-56.