Zabih Behrouz ( fa, ذبیح بهروز; 17 July 1890 – 12 December 1971) was an Iranian scholar, mathematician, etymologist, linguist, astronomer, and playwright. Son of the physician and calligrapher Abu’l-Fażl Sāvajī, he was born in

Tehran Tehran (; fa, تهران ) is the largest city in Tehran Province and the capital of Iran. With a population of around 9 million in the city and around 16 million in the larger metropolitan area of Greater Tehran, Tehran is the most popul ...

but studied in

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediter ...

and

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

. In

Cambridge University , mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts. Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge. , established = , other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...

he was the assistant of Edward Granville Browne, British orientalist and researcher. Behrouz returned to Iran in 1923, and a year later, he started to write some plays. Jijak Alishah was one of his first plays. It was about the tyrannical monarchy of

Naser al-Din Shah Qajar Naser al-Din Shah Qajar ( fa, ناصرالدین‌شاه قاجار; 16 July 1831 – 1 May 1896) was the fourth Shah of Qajar Iran from 5 September 1848 to 1 May 1896 when he was assassinated. He was the son of Mohammad Shah Qajar and Malek ...

. His plays were mostly critical and in his plays, he criticized tyranny and hypocrisy. Behrouz usually used historical characters from the past for talking about his time. He also wrote some books about Persian language and alphabet and Iranian history. The establishment of the Persian language academy called Farhangestan, in October 1936, occurred during Ali Asghar Hekmat’s tenure as minister of culture. The academy was initiated and later partially inspired by the work of Zabih Behrouz in developing a pure Persian lexicon for the military. To propagate his ideas, Behrouz founded, with the help of two of his disciples, Mohammad Moqaddam (later professor of

Old Persian Old Persian is one of the two directly attested Old Iranian languages (the other being Avestan language, Avestan) and is the ancestor of Middle Persian (the language of Sasanian Empire). Like other Old Iranian languages, it was known to its native ...

at the

University of Tehran The University of Tehran (Tehran University or UT, fa, دانشگاه تهران) is the most prominent university located in Tehran, Iran. Based on its historical, socio-cultural, and political pedigree, as well as its research and teaching pro ...

) and Sadeq Kia (later professor of

Middle Persian Middle Persian or Pahlavi, also known by its endonym Pārsīk or Pārsīg () in its later form, is a Western Middle Iranian language which became the literary language of the Sasanian Empire. For some time after the Sasanian collapse, Middle Per ...

and a deputy minister of culture and the arts), the «Iran-Vij Society», whose series of publications, ''Īrān-kūda'' ( fa, ایران کوده;), became the main vehicle for Behrūz’s thoughts.

Some of his plays

* Jijak Alishah * Iranian king and Armenian lady * In the way of Mehr (1933) * The night of Ferdosi * Medicine Man

Other works

* Persian and Arabic languages * Grandeur religion * Writing system and culture * Calendar and history in Iran * tall boy(ebne dilagh)

References

{{authority control 1890 births 1971 deaths Iranian dramatists and playwrights Linguists