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Bazaar, which is rooted in Middle Persian wāzār and Armenian vačaṟ, has acquired three different meanings: the market as a whole, a market day, and the marketplace. The bazaar as a place is an assemblage of workshops and stores where various goods and services are offered.

Primitive forms of shops and trade centres existed in early civilizations in the Near East, such as Sialk, Tepe in Kashan, Çatal Hüyük, Jerico, and Susa. After the 4th millennium BC, the population grew and villages gradually joined together to shape new cities, resulting in trade even with the remote areas as well as the acceleration of the population in towns. The advancement of trade and accumulation of wealth necessitated the creation of trade centres. Trade, and consequently marketplaces, worked as the main driving force in connecting separate civilizations, while fostering a division of labour, the diffusion of technological innovations, methods of intercultural communication, political and economic management, and techniques of farming and industrial production....

Term for two distinct decorative motifs based on types of water-lily; one originated in Egypt, the other in India. Lotus motifs in Egypt occur from the beginning of the Dynastic period c. 3000 bc in two stylized forms. The curved outline of the flower-head distinguishes the motif based on the white-flowered Nymphaea lotus from the more triangular outline of the motif based on the blue-flowered Nymphaea caerulea (see fig. (a)). Representations on the walls of tombs and temples suggest that lotus flowers were much in evidence in daily life, and the motif decorates jewellery and many domestic objects. In the tomb of Tutankhamun (reg c. 1332–c. 1323 bc), for example, the bowl of an alabaster cup represents an open white lotus, while the handles have the form of the blue lotus flower and two buds; a necklace has lotus motifs on both pendant and lock; and the pointed lotus petals form decorative borders on many objects (all Cairo, Egyp. Mus.). Lotus flowers and buds are among other plantlike capitals on stone pillars in funerary monuments and temples (see Borchardt, figs 9–11). The lotus also had some ritual significance: the flowers of water-lilies close at night and open at sunrise, a feature that came to symbolize a resurgence of life and the sun itself and became associated with the sun god Horus. The morning sun was pictured as rising from the lotus flower and settling back into the flower at night. When associated with Isis, the lotus became a fertility symbol....

[Arab. muṣallā; Pers. ‛īdgāh]

Large open-air space where prayers are held on the occasion of the two major religious festivals in Islam, ‛Id al-Fitr and ‛Id al-Adha. In eastern Islamic lands, including Iran and the Indian subcontinent, the Arabic term muṣallā (‘place of prayer’) is often replaced by the Persian ‛īdgāh (‘place of the festival’). A muṣallā must be large enough to contain all the males of a city who are old enough to engage in prayer; it may be walled and equipped with a free-standing mihrab and minbar constructed of durable materials, but it need have no other significant architectural form. Not every Islamic city has an architecturally formalized muṣallā. Normally located outside a city or town, a muṣallā may occasionally be found within the walls of a city; in any event, the site of a city’s muṣallā generally reflected changes in urban development. Muṣallās are often placed next to cemeteries (which are usually outside the walls, too); for this reason, or because prayers for the dead were performed at the ...

Temple site in the Tiruchirapalli District, Tamil Nadu, India, situated on an artificial island on the Kaveri River. One of the greatest religious centres of the south, Srirangam attracts pilgrims annually for the Vaikuntha Ekadasi festival in honour of Vishnu. The site contains two large temple complexes, the Vaishnava Ranganatha and the Shaiva Jambukeshvara, as well as numerous shrines and bathing ghats. Tamil literature of c. 3rd–7th centuries attests its religious importance for devotees of both Shiva and Vishnu, but later it became a centre for the development of mainstream Vaishnavism, culminating with the philosopher–saint Ramanuja in the late 11th century and the early 12th.

The Ranganatha, with its unique seven enclosures, is the largest temple complex in south India (see fig.). It is dedicated to the reclining form of Vishnu, supported on the primal waters by the coils of the 1000-hooded snake of eternity, Ananta. Koil Olugu...

[Arab. bādahanj, malqaf; Pers. bādgīr]

Traditional form of natural ventilation and air-conditioning built on houses throughout the Middle East from North Africa to Pakistan. Constructed at least since the 2nd millennium bc in Egypt, wind catchers have also been used to cool caravanserais, water cisterns and mosques. Consisting of an open vent built on the roof facing into or away from the prevailing wind, wind catchers have shafts carrying the air down through the roof into the living area below, thereby ventilating and cooling the spaces. Wind catchers are generally placed above the summer rooms of courtyard houses. On the Iranian plateau, where the finest wind catchers are built, the vents are in the tops of brick towers which capture the faster airstreams above the general roof level. When there is little air movement, as on summer afternoons, the wind catcher acts as a chimney, drawing warm air up the shaft and through the living areas from the courtyard. In coastal settlements, towers generally face onshore winds. Most inland towers also face prevailing winds but in some desert settlements in the Yazd region of central Iran, where the prevailing wind is hot and dusty, vents similarly face away from the wind, and the preferred air from the courtyard is drawn through the summer rooms. In Iraq and central Iran, wind catchers are important in moderating the climate of the deep basements used as summer living rooms. In the Gulf and in Sind (the lower Indus region) wind catchers serve ground- and first-floor summer rooms....