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Iranology
Iranian studies ( fa, ايران‌شناسی '), also referred to as Iranology and Iranistics, is an interdisciplinary field dealing with the research and study of the civilization, history, literature, art and culture of Iranian peoples. It is a part of the wider field of Oriental studies. Iranian studies is broader than and distinct from Persian studies, which is the study of the modern Persian language and literature specifically. The discipline of Iranian Studies focuses on broad trends in culture, history, language and other aspects of not only Persians, but also a variety of other contemporary and historical Iranian peoples, such as Kurds, Lurs, Gilakis, Talysh, Tajiks, Pashtuns, Ossetians, Baluchis, Scythians, Sarmatians, Alans, Parthians, Sogdians, Bactrians, Khwarazmians, and Mazandaranis. In medieval Iran The medieval Persian poet Ferdowsi, author of the Iranian national epic the ', can be considered the founder of Iranian studies in the sense that in his wor ...
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Persian Language
Persian (), also known by its endonym Farsi (, ', ), is a Western Iranian language belonging to the Iranian branch of the Indo-Iranian subdivision of the Indo-European languages. Persian is a pluricentric language predominantly spoken and used officially within Iran, Afghanistan, and Tajikistan in three mutually intelligible standard varieties, namely Iranian Persian (officially known as ''Persian''), Dari Persian (officially known as ''Dari'' since 1964) and Tajiki Persian (officially known as ''Tajik'' since 1999).Siddikzoda, S. "Tajik Language: Farsi or not Farsi?" in ''Media Insight Central Asia #27'', August 2002. It is also spoken natively in the Tajik variety by a significant population within Uzbekistan, as well as within other regions with a Persianate history in the cultural sphere of Greater Iran. It is written officially within Iran and Afghanistan in the Persian alphabet, a derivation of the Arabic script, and within Tajikistan in the Tajik alphabet, a der ...
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Iranian Peoples
The Iranian peoples or Iranic peoples are a diverse grouping of Indo-European peoples who are identified by their usage of the Iranian languages and other cultural similarities. The Proto-Iranians are believed to have emerged as a separate branch of the Indo-Iranians in Central Asia around the mid-2nd millennium BC. At their peak of expansion in the mid-1st millennium BC, the territory of the Iranian peoples stretched across the entire Eurasian Steppe, from the Great Hungarian Plain in the west to the Ordos Plateau in the east and the Iranian Plateau in the south.: "From the first millennium b.c., we have abundant historical, archaeological and linguistic sources for the location of the territory inhabited by the Iranian peoples. In this period the territory of the northern Iranians, they being equestrian nomads, extended over the whole zone of the steppes and the wooded steppes and even the semi-deserts from the Great Hungarian Plain to the Ordos in northern China." The ...
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Parthian Empire
The Parthian Empire (), also known as the Arsacid Empire (), was a major Iranian political and cultural power in ancient Iran from 247 BC to 224 AD. Its latter name comes from its founder, Arsaces I, who led the Parni tribe in conquering the region of Parthia in Iran's northeast, then a satrapy (province) under Andragoras, who was rebelling against the Seleucid Empire. Mithridates I (r. c. 171–132 BC) greatly expanded the empire by seizing Media and Mesopotamia from the Seleucids. At its height, the Parthian Empire stretched from the northern reaches of the Euphrates, in what is now central-eastern Turkey, to present-day Afghanistan and western Pakistan. The empire, located on the Silk Road trade route between the Roman Empire in the Mediterranean Basin and the Han dynasty of China, became a center of trade and commerce. The Parthians largely adopted the art, architecture, religious beliefs, and royal insignia of their culturally heterogene ...
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Abulfazl Bayhaqi
Abūʾl-Faḍl Muḥammad ibn Ḥusayn Bayhaqī ( fa, ابوالفضل محمد بن حسین بیهقی; died September 21, 1077), better known as Abu'l-Faḍl Bayhaqi (; also spelled Beyhaqi), was a Persian secretary, historian and author. Educated in the major cultural center of Nishapur, and employed at the court of the famous Ghaznavid Sultan Mahmud, Bayhaqi was a highly cultured man, whose ''magnum opus''—the ''Tarikh-i Bayhaqi'', is seen as the most reliable source of valid information about the Ghaznavid era, which was written in an exquisite and vivid Persian prose that would become an ideal model for several eras. Bayhaqi is praised by modern scholars for his frankness, precision, and elegant style in his book, which he had spent 22 years to write, finishing it in thirty volumes, of which however only five volumes and half of the sixth exist today. Julie Scott Meisami places Bayhaqi among the historians of the Islamic Golden Age. Life Youth and early career Bayhaqi ...
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Tarikh-i Bayhaqi
''Tārīkh-i Bayhaqī'' ( fa, تاریخ بیهقی, italics=yes; ) is a history book written by Abul-Fazl Bayhaqi, in Persian language, Persian, in the 11th century CE. Much of this voluminous work is lost, but its remains is the most important source on the history of the Ghaznavid Empire. The work is more than a history book. Its detailed descriptions and unique style of narration of the historical events has made it similar to a "historical novel" and one of the masterpieces of the Persian literature. The work was written at the Ghaznavid chancellery in order to frame the Turkic peoples, Turkic-origin Ghaznavid rulers in line with Iranian peoples, Iranian kings. Names The work has been published under multiple names: *''Tārīkh-i Bayhaqī'' (, ''Bayhaqi's History'') *''Tārīkh-i Nāsirī'' (, ''Nasiri's History'') *''Tārīkh-i Masʿūdī'' (, ''Mas'udi's History'') *''Tārīkh-i Āl-i Nāsir'' (, ''History of the House of Nasir'') *''Tārīkh-i Āl-i Sabuktagīn'' (, ''Hist ...
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Khwaday-Namag
''Khwadāy-Nāmag'' ( pal, 𐭧𐭥𐭲𐭠𐭩 𐭭𐭠𐭬𐭪; New Persian: ; ) was a Middle Persian history from the Sasanian era. Now lost, it was imagined by Theodor Nöldeke to be the common ancestor of all later Persian-language histories of the Sasanian Empire, a view which has recently been disproven. It was supposed to have been first translated into Arabic by Ibn al-Muqaffa' (d. 757), who had access to Sasanian court documents. According to Nöldeke's theory, the book itself was composed first under the reign of Khosrow I Anushirvan (), and redacted in the reign of the last Sasanian monarch, Yazdegerd III (). ''Khwaday-Namag'' was the primary source of the 10th-century Persian epic ''Shahnameh'' ('Book of Kings') written by Ferdowsi. ''Khwaday-Namag'' was also translated to New Persian, and was expanded using other sources, by Samanid scholars under the supervision of Abu Mansur Mamari Abu Mansur Mamari ( fa, ابومنصور معمری) was an Iranian nobleman who serv ...
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History Of The Prophets And Kings
The ''History of the Prophets and Kings'' ( ar, تاريخ الرسل والملوك ''Tārīkh al-Rusul wa al-Mulūk''), more commonly known as ''Tarikh al-Tabari'' () or ''Tarikh-i Tabari'' or ''The History of al-Tabari '' ( fa, تاریخ طبری) is an Arabic-language historical chronicle completed by the Muslim historian Muhammad ibn Jarir al-Tabari (225–310 AH, 838–923 AD) in 915 AD. It begins with creation, and charts Muslim and Middle Eastern history from the myths and legends associated with the Old Testament through to the history of the Abbasid era, down to the year 915. An appendix or continuation, was written by Abu Abdullah b. Ahmad b. Ja'far al-Farghani, a student of al-Tabari. Editions Various editions of the Annals include: * An edition published under the editorship of M.J. de Goeje in three series comprising 13 volumes, with two extra volumes containing indices, introduction and glossary (Leiden, 1879–1901). * An edition published under the editorship o ...
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Muhammad Ibn Jarir Al-Tabari
( ar, أبو جعفر محمد بن جرير بن يزيد الطبري), more commonly known as al-Ṭabarī (), was a Muslim historian and scholar from Amol, Tabaristan. Among the most prominent figures of the Islamic Golden Age, al-Tabari is known for his historical works and his expertise in Qur'anic exegesis (), but he has also been described as "an impressively prolific polymath".Lindsay Jones (ed.), ''Encyclopedia of religion'', volume 13, Macmillan Reference USA, 2005, p. 8943 He wrote works on a diverse range of subjects, including world history, poetry, lexicography, grammar, ethics, mathematics, and medicine. His most influential and best known works are his Quranic commentary, known in Arabic as , and his historical chronicle called '' History of the Prophets and Kings'' (), often referred to as ("al-Tabari's History"). Al-Tabari followed the Shafi'i madhhab for nearly a decade before he developed his own interpretation of Islamic jurisprudence. His understanding ...
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Muslim Conquest Of Persia
The Muslim conquest of Persia, also known as the Arab conquest of Iran, was carried out by the Rashidun Caliphate from 633 to 654 AD and led to the fall of the Sasanian Empire as well as the eventual decline of the Zoroastrian religion. The rise of the Muslims in Arabia coincided with an unprecedented political, social, economic, and military weakness in Persia. Once a major world power, the Sasanian Empire had exhausted its human and material resources after decades of warfare against the Byzantine Empire. The Sasanian state's internal political situation quickly deteriorated after the execution of King Khosrow II in 628. Subsequently, ten new claimants were enthroned within the next four years.The Muslim Conquest of Persia By A.I. Akram. Ch: 1 Following the Sasanian civil war of 628–632, the empire was no longer centralized. Arab Muslims first attacked Sasanian territory in 633, when Khalid ibn al-Walid invaded Mesopotamia (then known as the Sasanian province of '' ...
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Persian Culture
The culture of Iran () or culture of PersiaYarshater, Ehsa, ''Iranian Studies'', vol. XXII no. 1 (1989) is among the most influential in the world. Iran, also known as Persia, is widely considered to be one of the cradles of civilization. Due to its dominant geopolitical position in the world, it has heavily influenced peoples and cultures situated as far away as Southern Europe and Eastern Europe to the west; Central Asia to the north; the Arabian Peninsula to the south; and South Asia, East Asia, and Southeast Asia to the east. Iranian history has had a significant impact on the world through art, architecture, poetry, science and technology, medicine, philosophy, and engineering. An eclectic cultural elasticity has been said to be one of the key defining characteristics of the Iranian identity and a clue to its historical longevity. Richard N. Frye, a prominent Iranologist, stresses the high-level historical impact of Iranian culture in his 2005 book ''Greater Iran: A 20th- ...
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Shahnameh
The ''Shahnameh'' or ''Shahnama'' ( fa, شاهنامه, Šāhnāme, lit=The Book of Kings, ) is a long epic poem written by the Persian poet Ferdowsi between c. 977 and 1010 CE and is the national epic of Greater Iran. Consisting of some 50,000 "distichs" or couplets (two-line verses), the ''Shahnameh'' is one of the world's longest epic poems. It tells mainly the mythical and to some extent the historical past of the Persian Empire from the creation of the world until the Muslim conquest in the seventh century. Iran, Azerbaijan, Afghanistan, Tajikistan and the greater region influenced by Persian culture such as Armenia, Dagestan, Georgia, Turkey, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan celebrate this national epic. The work is of central importance in Persian culture and Persian language, regarded as a literary masterpiece, and definitive of the ethno-national cultural identity of Iran. It is also important to the contemporary adherents of Zoroastrianism, in that it traces the historical ...
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Ferdowsi
Abul-Qâsem Ferdowsi Tusi ( fa, ; 940 – 1019/1025 CE), also Firdawsi or Ferdowsi (), was a Persians, Persian poet and the author of ''Shahnameh'' ("Book of Kings"), which is one of the world's longest epic poetry, epic poems created by a single poet, and the greatest epic of Persian-speaking people, Persian-speaking countries. Ferdowsi is celebrated as one of the most influential figures of Persian literature and one of the greatest in the history of literature. Name Except for his kunya (Arabic), kunya ( – ) and his laqab ( – ''Ferdowsī'', meaning 'Paradise, paradisic'), nothing is known with any certainty about his full name. From an early period on, he has been referred to by different additional names and titles, the most common one being / ("philosopher"). Based on this, his full name is given in Persian language, Persian sources as / . Due to the non-standardized transliteration from Persian alphabet, Persian into English language, English, different spellings ...
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