Dabir is a title and surname of Persian origin used in Iran and the Indian subcontinent. It is derived from the Persian word Dibīr (Middle Persian for "secretary/scribe"). Dibīr was the title of one of the four classes in the society of Sasanian Iran, which played a major role in Sasanian politics. The term fell out of favour under the Umayyad Caliphate, when Persian was replaced with Arabic as the administrative language. The title again became an administrative title as New Persian form dabīr (دبیر) when Persian was revived as the language of administration under the Samanids and Ghaznavids. The title was thereafter used for decades till the Safavid period, when it was replaced by the title of monshi (منشی). However, dabīr was in use once again under the Qajar dynasty.
During the Mughal Empire in the Indian subcontinent, the Persian word Dabir was used as an honorific title for writers, government secretaries, and administrators. [1] The Indian poet Mirza Ghalib was given the honorific title Dabir-ul-Mulk. 16th century Indian teacher Rupa Goswami was among those who held the title Dabir Khas during his reign as the Sultan's chief secretary. In addition to its use as an honorific and surname, it is occasionally used as a given name. [2]
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, respectively Iranian Persian, Dari Persian, and Tajiki Persian. 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 derivative of the Arabic script, and within Tajikistan in the Tajik alphabet, a derivative of the Cyrillic script.
Shah is a royal title that was historically used by the leading figures of Iranian monarchies. It was also used by a variety of Persianate societies, such as the Ottoman Empire, the Khanate of Bukhara, the Emirate of Bukhara, the Mughal Empire, the Bengal Sultanate, historical Afghan dynasties, and among Gurkhas. Rather than regarding himself as simply a king of the concurrent dynasty, each Iranian ruler regarded himself as the Shahanshah or Padishah in the sense of a continuation of the original Persian Empire.
A satrap was a governor of the provinces of the ancient Median and Persian (Achaemenid) Empires and in several of their successors, such as in the Sasanian Empire and the Hellenistic empires. A satrapy is the territory governed by a satrap.
Bey, also spelled as Baig, Bayg, Beigh, Beig, Bek, Baeg, Begh, or Beg, is a Turkic title for a chieftain, and a royal aristocratic title traditionally applied to people with special lineages to the leaders or rulers of variously sized areas in the numerous Turkic kingdoms, emirates, sultanates and empires in Central Asia, South Asia, Southeast Europe, and the Middle East, such as the Ottomans, Timurids or the various khanates and emirates in Central Asia and the Eurasian Steppe. The feminine equivalent title was begum. The regions or provinces where "beys" ruled or which they administered were called beylik, roughly meaning "governorate" or "region". However the exact scope of power handed to the beks varied with each country, thus there was no clear-cut system, rigidly applied to all countries defining all the possible power and prestige that came along with the title.
Lal is an Indo-Iranian surname and given name, which means "darling", "precious", or "beloved", from the Sanskrit lala ("cajoling"). In addition, Lal means "garnet" or "ruby" in Persian, "ruby" in Pashto, and "red" in Hindustani and Bengali. The name Lal may refer to mainly Kayastha as well as used by other communities:
The surname Al-Zaidi (Az-Zaidi) can denote one or both of the following:
A jagir, also spelled as jageer, was a type of feudal land grant in the Indian subcontinent at the foundation of its Jagirdar (Zamindar) system. It developed during the Islamic era of the Indian subcontinent, starting in the early 13th century, wherein the powers to govern and collect tax from an estate was granted to an appointee of the state. The tenants were considered to be in the servitude of the jagirdar. There were two forms of jagir, one conditional, the other unconditional. The conditional jagir required the governing family to maintain troops and provide their service to the state when asked. The land grant, called iqta'a, was usually for a holder's lifetime; the land reverted to the state upon the death of the jagirdar.
Bhat is a Brahmin and Muslim surname in the Indian subcontinent. Bhat and Bhatt are shortened renditions of Brahmabhatta or Bhatta.
An honorific is a title that conveys esteem, courtesy, or respect for position or rank when used in addressing or referring to a person. Sometimes, the term "honorific" is used in a more specific sense to refer to an honorary academic title. It is also often conflated with systems of honorific speech in linguistics, which are grammatical or morphological ways of encoding the relative social status of speakers. Honorifics can be used as prefixes or suffixes depending on the appropriate occasion and presentation in accordance with style and customs.
The Persian language and Urdu have had an intricate relationship throughout the history of the latter. Persian historically played a significant role in the formation and development of the modern Urdu, and today acts as its prestige language.
Munshi is a Persian word, originally used for a contractor, writer, or secretary, and later used in Mughal India for native language teachers, teachers of various subjects, especially administrative principles, religious texts, science, and philosophy and were also secretaries and translators employed by Europeans.
Dhar is an Indian surname. It is commonly found among the Hindu Bengali Kayastha and Baniks including Subarnabanik community in Bengal region. Dhar or Dar is also used by some Kashmiri and Punjabi-Kashmiri clans and communities native to the Kashmir Valley and Punjab, and common today among Kashmiri Hindus and Kashmiri Muslims.
New Persian, also known as Modern Persian is the current stage of the Persian language spoken since the 8th to 9th centuries until now in Greater Iran and surroundings. It is conventionally divided into three stages: Early New Persian, Classical Persian, and Contemporary Persian.
The Sasanian Empire, officially Ērānšahr, was the last empire of ancient Iran. Named after the House of Sasan, it endured for over four centuries, from 224 to 651, making it the second longest-lived imperial Iranian dynasty after the directly preceding Arsacid dynasty of Parthia.
Persianization or Persification, is a sociological process of cultural change in which a non-Persian society becomes "Persianate", meaning it either directly adopts or becomes strongly influenced by the Persian language, culture, literature, art, music, and identity as well as other socio-cultural factors. It is a specific form of cultural assimilation that often includes a language shift. The term applies not only to cultures, but also to individuals, as they acclimate to Persian culture and become "Persianized" or "Persified".
Šahrestānīhā ī Ērānšahr is a surviving Middle Persian text on geography, which was completed in the late eighth or early ninth centuries AD. The text gives a numbered list of the cities of Eranshahr and their history and importance for Persian history. The text itself has indication that it was also redacted at the time of Khosrow II in 7th century as it mentions several places in Africa and Persian Gulf conquered by the Sasanians.
Ustad, ustadh or ustaz is an honorific title used in West Asia, North Africa, Central Asia, South Asia and Southeast Asia. It is used in various languages, including Persian, Arabic, Azerbaijani, Urdu, Hindi, Bengali, Marathi, Dhivehi, Punjabi, Pashto, Turkish, Kazakh, Uzbek, Indonesian, Malay and Kurdish.
Aryan, or Arya in Proto-Indo-Iranian, is a term originating from the ethno-cultural self-designation of the Indo-Iranians, and later Iranians and Indo-Aryans. It stood in contrast to nearby outsiders, whom they designated as non-Aryan. In ancient India, the term was used by the Indo-Aryan peoples of the Vedic period, both as an endonym and in reference to a region called Aryavarta, where their culture emerged. Similarly, according to the Avesta, the Iranian peoples used the term to designate themselves as an ethnic group and to refer to a region called Airyanem Vaejah, which was their mythical homeland. The word stem also forms the etymological source of place names like Alania and Iran.
Before British colonisation, the Persian language was the lingua franca of the Indian subcontinent and a widely used official language in North India. The language was brought into South Asia by various Turkics and Afghans and was preserved and patronized by Local Indian dynasties from the 11th century onwards, notable of which were the Ghaznavids, Sayyid Dynasty, Tughlaq dynasty, Khilji dynasty, Mughal Dynasty, Gujarat Sultanate, Bengal sultanate etc. Initially it was used by Muslim dynasties of India but later started being used by Non-Muslim empires too, For example the Sikh empire, Persian held official status in the court and the administration within these empires. It largely replaced Sanskrit as the language of politics, literature, education, and social status in the subcontinent.
Sarkar is a surname among the people of the Indian subcontinent. It was an honorific title given to landlords/zamindars of East India, irrespective of their religious affiliation, under the Mughal Empire and even in Sher Shah's reign, as part of the erstwhile Persian nobility. At present there are Sarkar families in different parts of West Bengal, India as well as in Bangladesh. The term is used in both Bengali Hindu and Muslim communities.