Page:From Constantinople to the home of Omar Khayyam.djvu/421

 (224-241 A.D.), built another city, which he called Nih. This city his son, Shapur (I), then governor of Khurasan, asked as a present ; but his father refused, and Shapur, in pique, erected upon the ruins of the ancient site a new city which he called Nih-Shdpur^ out of which name the Arabs later made JVai-sdbur.^ Yakut (who lived at Nishapur for a time, in 1216 a.d.) gives another fanciful etymology, namely Nai-sdhur^ ' Reedy Shapur,' from the beds of reeds (nai) which once abounded in the vicin- ity ; 2 and he includes also a report of a still more fanciful ex- planation, based upon a legend current among the people, that once, when Shapur was missing, those who were sent in search of the fugitive prince came to where Nishapur now stands ; but, not finding him, said, 'Sabur is not here' (m[8^]-«aftwr)! '^ But enough of such guesses.

Such was the historic celebrity of Nishapur that other names are reported to have been applied to it. Thus a common desig- nation for the city in early Moslem days was Ahr-shahr, mean- ing in Persian 'Cloud-city,' a name found also in Armenian writers, and applied to the district as well as to the town.* Another term, probably honorific, was Irdn-shahr, 'the City of Iran,' which was employed by Mukaddasi and others as an alternate title in describing Nishapur ; ^ while wholly compli- mentary was the designation 'Vestibule of the East.'^

This variety in nomenclature tends to show the fame which

1 So Mustaufi, quoted by Barbier geog. pp. 7-8. For references to the de Meynard, Diet. geog. p. 678, n. 1. Armenian historians, Moses Khore-

2 Yakut, tr. Barbier de Meynard, nac'i (Geog. 29 — assigned to fifth Diet. geog. p. 578. This explanation century a.d., but later), Elishe Varta- was found also in a marginal note on pet (fifth century a.d.), and Lazar a manuscript of the earlier Idrisi Farpec'i (fifth-sixth century a.d,), (1154), tr. Jaubert, Geog. cf^drisi, 2. see Langlois, Histoire de VArmenie, 2. 182, n. 1, and is repeated by Abu-'l 186, n. 1, 229, 306, 308; and cf. Mar- Fida (1321), Geography, p. 451. quart, ErdnSahr, pp. 16, 74-75.

8 See Yakut, op. eit. pp. 578-579. ^ Thus Mukaddasi, 3. 299-300 (with


 * See, for example, the historian a discussion of the designation) and

Tabari (839-923 a.d.), tr. Noldeke, 314; see also Masudi, 8. 78; and cf.

Gesch. Pers. Sas. aus Tabari, p. 17 ; Le Strange, p. 283.

Yakut, tr. Barbier de Meynard, Diet. ^ Applied by Yakut, op. eit. p. 680.

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