Iran in the Early Islamic Period Iran Studies Editorial Board Ali Gheissari (University of San Diego, CA) Yann Richard (Sorbonne Nouvelle) Christoph Werner (University of Marburg) VOLUME 12 The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/is Iran in the Early Islamic Period Politics, Culture, Administration and Public Life between the Arab and the Seljuk Conquests, 633–1055 By Bertold Spuler Edited by Robert G. Hoyland Translated by Gwendolin Goldbloom & Berenike Walburg LEIDEN | BOSTON Originally published as Iran in früh-islamischer Zeit: Politik, Kultur, Verwaltung und öffentliches Leben zwischen der arabischen und seldschukischen Eroberung 633 bis 1055 (Frank Steiner Verlag, Wiesbaden 1952). Cover illustration: Alexander the Great, who is accounted of Persian ancestry by many Muslim historians, visits the Kaʿba in Mecca. Ms 22-1948, fol. 18v / Firdawsi, Shahnama © The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Spuler, Bertold, 1911– [Iran in früh-islamischer Zeit. English] Iran in the early Islamic period : politics, culture, administration and public life between the Arab and the Seljuk conquests, 633–1055 / by Bertold Spuler ; edited by Robert G. Hoyland ; translated by Gwendolin Goldbloom & Berenike Walburg. pages cm. — (Iran studies ; v. 12) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-90-04-27751-9 (hardback : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-90-04-28209-4 (e-book) 1. Iran— History—640–1500. I. Hoyland, Robert G., 1966- II. Goldbloom, Gwendolin. III. Walburg, Berenike. IV. Title. DS288.S613 2015 955’.022—dc23 2014035103 This publication has been typeset in the multilingual “Brill” typeface. With over 5,100 characters covering Latin, ipa, Greek, and Cyrillic, this typeface is especially suitable for use in the humanities. For more information, please see www.brill.com/brill-typeface. issn 1569-7401 isbn 978-90-04-27751-9 (hardback) isbn 978-90-04-28209-4 (e-book) Copyright 2015 by Koninklijke Brill nv, Leiden, The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill nv incorporates the imprints Brill, Brill Nijhoff and Hotei Publishing. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use is granted by Koninklijke Brill nv provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers, ma 01923, usa. Fees are subject to change. This book is printed on acid-free paper. Contents Editor’s Preface and Acknowledgements vii Selective Post-1952 Bibliography xiv Author’s Preface and Acknowledgements xxiv General Maps xxix 1 Chronological Overview of Political History 1 2 The Religious Situation 125 3 The Ethnic Situation 213 4 Intellectual and Cultural Life 250 5 The Administration of Persia 282 6 The Legal Situation 361 7 The Social and Economic Situation 376 Specialised Maps 518 Abbreviations 525 Bibliography 526 Primary Sources 526 Secondary Sources 541 Indices 580 Index of Persons and Dynasties 580 Index of Places, Languages and Communities 594 Index of Subjects and Objects 610 Editor’s Preface and Acknowledgements Bertold Spuler was one of the leading German Orientalists of the middle decades of the twentieth century. He was a specialist of Iran and Central Asia and composed numerous books on this subject, attaining high international standing, as is indicated by the fact that many of his writings were translated into a variety of European languages.1 One that did not receive this treatment (though it was translated into Persian) was his monumental work on early Islamic Iran: Iran in früh-islamischer Zeit, which provides a fundamental basis for the study of Iran from the first Arab conquests in the 630s until the arrival of the Seljuk Turks in 1055. This is a very difficult period to write about, espe- cially the first half of it, which has been labelled ‘The Two Centuries of Silence’ by the prominent Iranian historian Abdulhossein Zarrinkub.2 Documentary evidence is very scarce and the Arabic and Persian literary accounts, though voluminous, are court-orientated, intended principally for edification and entertainment. It takes a lot of effort to use this material for historical ends and Spuler expended much labour sifting through it so that he could piece together a picture of numerous aspects of Iranian society. These included: 1 Die Chalifenzeit: Entstehung und Zerfall des Islamischen Weltreichs (Leiden, 1952); translated as The Age of the Caliphs by F.R.C. Bagley (Leiden, 1969); with a new introduction by Jane Hathaway (Princeton, 1995). Geschichte der Mongolen, nach östlichen und europäischen Zeugnissen des 13. und 14. Jahrhunderts (Zürich and Stuttgart, 1968); translated as History of the Mongols: based on Eastern and Western accounts of the thirteenth and fourteenth centu- ries by Helga and Stuart Drummond (London, 1972; repr. New York, 1988). Les Mongoles dans l’histoire (Paris, 1961); translated as The Mongols in History by Geoffrey Wheeler (New York, 1971). Die historische Literatur in persischer Sprache (HdO; Leiden, 1968); translated as Persian Historiography and Geography by M. Ismail Marcinkowski (Singapore, 2003). Geschichte der islamischen Länder: 1. ein Überblick (Berlin, 1948); translated as The Muslim World: a historical survey by F.R.C. Bagley (Leiden, 1960). Geschichte der islamischen Länder: 2. die Mongolenzeit (HdO; Leiden, 1953); translated as The Mongol Period: a History of the Muslim World by Arthur N. Waldron (Princeton, 1994). Regenten und Regierungen der Welt, vols. 3 and 4 (Bielefeld, 1953-); translated with revisions as vols. 2 and 3 of Martha Ross et al., Rulers and Governments of the World (London and New York, 1977–78). A bibliography of Bertold Spuler’s writings can be found in I. Türschmann and A. Hartmann, ‘Die wichtigsten Publikationen Bertold Spulers’ in Hans Roemer and Albrecht Noth, eds., Studien zur Geschichte und Kultur des Vorderen Orients: Festschrift fur Bertold Spuler zum 70. Geburtstag (Leiden, 1981), 458–77 (up to 1980), and in ‘Spuler, Bertold’, Encyclopaedia Iranica, online edition, New York, 1996–. 2 Do Qarn Sokut (Tehran, 1956), though his explanation for the silence – the destructiveness of the Arab conquests and the low cultural level of the conquerors – is not now generally accepted. viii Editor’s Preface and Acknowledgements religion (Zoroastrians, Muslims, Christians, Jews and Buddhists), ethnic groups (Arabs, Turks, Persians etc.), intellectual and cultural life, administration, law, economy (agriculture, manufacture, trade, etc.), social stratification, landown- ership, taxes, the military and daily life. The volume Spuler produced is doubly difficult to access. Possibly because of the situation in Europe after the Second World War, it did not enjoy a wide distribution and many university libraries – even some very good ones – do not possess a copy. Secondly, being in German, it has not reached the worldwide audience that it deserved. And yet, more than half a century on, no textbook for this period of Iranian history has been produced that might serve in its stead, which greatly impedes the teaching of this subject to new students. It seems worthwhile, then, to make Spuler’s work on this period accessible to a global audience. Now is a particularly opportune time, for Iranian history is enjoying something of a renaissance, in part because of current events, which see Iran featuring prominently in the world news and which have made schol- ars understand how important Iran is and was in geopolitical terms, as a cru- cial bridge between the Fertile Crescent and Central Asia, and in part because of the expanding horizons of late antique studies. Already in 1971, Peter Brown, in his by now cult book The World of Late Antiquity, argued that early Islamic Iran should be included within the purview of the scholar of late antiquity, for in the course of its encounters with the Late Roman Empire it had been exposed to some of the key phenomena of late antiquity, such as the tighten- ing bond between religion and politics, the emergence of self-governing reli- gious communities and the spread of Greek logic and science. The Sasanian period (224–652) has benefited from this attention, now well served by Touraj Daryaee’s Sasanian Persia: The Rise and Fall of an Empire (London, 2009), and the medieval period is also quite well catered for, notably by David Morgan’s Medieval Persia 1040–1797 (London, 1988). It is to be hoped that the transla- tion of Spuler’s Iran in früh-islamischer Zeit will stimulate interest in and aid research on the time between these two eras. Of course, the fact that no textbook for early Islamic Iran has been pro- duced since Spuler wrote does not mean that scholarship in this field has stood still – indeed, it has become an increasingly popular area of study of late. Since no recent advances in our knowledge will be represented in Spuler’s text, it would perhaps be helpful if I comment here on a few of the most important publications. As regards reference works the most significant development has been the launch of the Encyclopaedia Iranica, which made its début in 1982. Under the careful guidance of Ehsan Yarshater, it has become an essential tool for consultation and research on all aspects of Iranian history and culture, comprising high-quality entries on an enormous range of topics. Its usefulness Editor’s Preface and Acknowledgements ix has been greatly enhanced by the fact that it is available free online, which also means that it can be easily and swiftly updated. In addition, I should men- tion the voluminous output of C.E. Bosworth, who, over the last five decades, has produced foundational works on numerous aspects of Iranian history, including monographs (in particular the ones on the Ghaznavid dynasty and the province of Sistan), translations (especially of al-Ṭabarī), articles and ency- clopaedia entries (300 or so in the Encylopaedia of Islam and Encyclopaedia Iranica).