The Middle East is a geopolitical region encompassing the Arabian Peninsula, the Levant, Turkey, Egypt, Iran, and Iraq.
The history of Iran is intertwined with Greater Iran, a sociocultural region spanning from Anatolia to the Indus River and from the Caucasus to the Persian Gulf. Central to this area is modern-day Iran, which covers the bulk of the Iranian plateau.
Alexandria is a city in Egypt.
Turkmen, Türkmen, Turkoman, or Turkman may refer to:
The South Caucasus, also known as Transcaucasia or the Transcaucasus, is a geographical region on the border of Eastern Europe and West Asia, straddling the southern Caucasus Mountains. The South Caucasus roughly corresponds to modern Armenia, Georgia, and Azerbaijan, which are sometimes collectively known as the Caucasian States. The total area of these countries measures about 186,100 square kilometres. The South Caucasus and the North Caucasus together comprise the larger Caucasus geographical region that divides Eurasia.
Iskandar, Iskander, Skander, Askander, Eskinder, or Scandar, is a variant of the given name Alexander in cultures such as Iran (Persia), Arabia and others throughout the Middle East, North Africa, Southeast Asia, Caucasus and Central Asia. In Egypt, its bearers are mostly of Christian (Coptic) descent. Originally referring to Alexander the Great, it was transmitted through works such as the Iskandarnameh and the Sirr al-Asrar, and became a popular name for rulers in the medieval period.
The Qara Qoyunlu or Kara Koyunlu, also known as the Black Sheep Turkomans, were a culturally Persianate, Muslim Turkoman monarchy that ruled over the territory comprising present-day Azerbaijan, Armenia, northwestern Iran, eastern Turkey, and northeastern Iraq from about 1374 to 1468.
Khash is a dish of boiled cow or sheep parts, which might include the head, feet, and stomach (tripe). It is a dish of Armenian origin.
The Armenian highlands is the most central and the highest of the three plateaus that together form the northern sector of West Asia. Clockwise starting from the west, the Armenian highlands are bounded by the Anatolian plateau, the Caucasus, the Kura-Aras lowlands, the Iranian Plateau, and Mesopotamia. The highlands are divided into western and eastern regions, defined by the Ararat Valley where Mount Ararat is located. Western Armenia is nowadays referred to as eastern Anatolia, and Eastern Armenia as the Lesser Caucasus or Caucasus Minor, and historically as the Anti-Caucasus, meaning "opposite the Caucasus".
The Jalayirid Sultanate was a dynasty of Jalayir origin, which ruled over modern-day Iraq and western Iran after the breakup of the Ilkhanate in the 1330s. It lasted about fifty years, until disrupted by Timur's conquests and the revolts of the Qara Qoyunlu Turkoman. After Timur's death in 1405, there was a brief attempt to re-establish the sultanate in southern Iraq and Khuzistan. The Jalayirids were finally eliminated by the Qara Qoyunlu in 1432.
Greater Iran or Greater Persia, also called the Iranosphere or the Persosphere, is an expression that denotes a wide socio-cultural region comprising parts of West Asia, the Caucasus, Central Asia, South Asia, and East Asia —all of which have been affected, to some degree, by the Iranian peoples and the Iranian languages.
Khorshīd or Khorshēd, also spelled as Khurshed and Khurshid, is a Persian given name. In the modern day as well as historical Iran, Turkey, and Azerbaijan, but also in Iraqi Kurdistan, Egypt, Central Asia and South Asia, it is mostly a given name for boys. The origin of the word is related to the Avestan divinity Hvare-khshaeta. In Turkish, it is sometimes written as Hurşit.
The Aq Qoyunlu or the White Sheep Turkomans was a culturally Persianate, Sunni Turkoman tribal confederation. Founded in the Diyarbakir region by Qara Yuluk Uthman Beg, they ruled parts of present-day eastern Turkey from 1378 to 1503, and in their last decades also ruled Armenia, Azerbaijan, much of Iran, Iraq, and Oman where the ruler of Hormuz recognised Aq Qoyunlu suzerainty. The Aq Qoyunlu empire reached its zenith under Uzun Hasan.
Turkmeneli, also known as Turkmenland, and historically as Turcomania,, and East Turkmeneli is a political term used to define the vast swath of territory in which the Iraqi Turkmens historically have had a dominant population. The term incorporates the Iraqi Turkmen homelands running from Iraq's border with Turkey and Syria and diagonally down the country to the border with Iran. It is sometimes referred to as East Turkmeneli to distinguish from the Syrian Turkmen homeland, known as West Turkmeneli. Apart from the designation of the region as Turcomania in a 1785 map by William Guthrie, there's no certain mention of the region in published works until the establishment of the Iraqi Turkmen Front.
The ancient Near East was home to many cradles of civilization, spanning Mesopotamia, Egypt, Iran, Anatolia and the Armenian highlands, the Levant, and the Arabian Peninsula. As such, the fields of ancient Near East studies and Near Eastern archaeology are one of the most prominent with regard to research in the realm of ancient history. Historically, the Near East denoted an area roughly encompassing the centre of West Asia, having been focused on the lands between Greece and Egypt in the west and Iran in the east. It therefore largely corresponds with the modern-day geopolitical concept of the Middle East.
stan has the meaning of "a place abounding in" or "a place where anything abounds" as a suffix. It is widely used by Iranian languages as well as the common Turkish languages and other languages. The suffix appears in the names of many regions throughout West, Central and South Asia, and parts of the Caucasus and Russia.
Bayram Khwaja Yiwa was the founder of the Qara Qoyunlu, a Muslim Turkoman tribal confederation, that in a short space of time came to rule the territory comprising present-day Azerbaijan, Georgia, Armenia, northwestern Iran, eastern Turkey, and northeastern Iraq from about 1374 to 1468.
Turkoman, also known as Turcoman, was a term for the people of Oghuz Turkic origin, widely used during the Middle Ages. Oghuz Turks were a western Turkic people that, in the 8th century A.D, formed a tribal confederation in an area between the Aral and Caspian seas in Central Asia, and spoke the Oghuz branch of the Turkic language family.
