Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Achaemenids ăkˌəmĕnˈĭdz [key], dynasty of ancient Persia. They were descended presumably from one Achaemenes, a minor ruler in a mountainous district of SW Iran. His successors, when Elam declin...

(Encyclopedia) Commagene kŏməjēˈnē [key], ancient district of N Syria, on the Euphrates River and S of the Taurus range, now in SE Asian Turkey. Its metropolis, Samosata, was founded by Samos, the king of Comma...

(Encyclopedia) Buyid bo͞oˈyĭd [key], Shiite Islamic dynasty of N Persian descent that controlled Iraq and Persia from c.945 to 1060; founded by the sons of Buyeh. In the 930s, Buyeh's sons (Ali, Hasan, and Ahmad)...

(Encyclopedia) Caracalla kărəkălˈə [key], 188–217, Roman emperor (211–17); son of Septimius Severus. His real name was Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, and he received his nickname from the caracalla, a Gallic tu...

(Encyclopedia) Thousand and One Nights or Arabian Nights, series of anonymous stories in Arabic, considered as an entity to be among the classics of world literature. The cohesive plot device concerns the efforts of...

(Encyclopedia) Trabzon trĕbˈĭzŏndˌ [key], city (1990 pop. 144,805), capital of Trabzon prov., NE Turkey, a port on the Black Sea. A commercial and transportation center with renovated port facilities, it export...

(Encyclopedia) Belisarius bĕlĭsârˈēəs [key], c.505–565, Byzantine general under Justinian I. After helping to suppress (532) the dangerous Nika riot (see Blues and Greens), he defeated (533–34) the Vandals...

(Encyclopedia) velvet, fabric having a soft, thick, short pile, usually of silk, and a plain twill or satin weave ground. The pile surface is formed by weaving an extra set of warp threads that are looped over wires...

(Encyclopedia) Samanid sämäˈnĭd [key], Muslim Persian dynasty that ruled (819–1005) in Khorasan and Transoxiana as vassals of the Abbasids; founded by Saman-Khuda, of old Persian aristocracy. The Samanids were...

(Encyclopedia) Amu Darya or Amudarya both: ämo͞oˈ däryäˈ, äˈmo͞o därˈyə [key], river, c.1,600 mi (2,580 km) long, formed by the junction of the Vakhsh and Pandj rivers, which rise in the Pamir Mts. of ce...