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The geographical knowledge of the Iranians greatly increased during the Achaemenid period, when the empire was divided administratively into twenty taxation districts (satrapies) and ethnically into some thirty nations (OPers. kâras). Yet, the notion of the seven-fold divi-sion of the earth influenced Persian ideology (Shahbazi, 1983, pp. 242-46 with undue overestimation). Darius the Great (q.v.) was thought to have divided his empire into seven parts and given them to the loyal colleagues who helped him recover the Persian throne (Plato, Epistel III, tr. Bury, pp. 501, 503); and an Aramaic document from Egypt dated in the reign of Darius II designating a district governor as hpth.pt', from Iranian *haftax^v.apâta "protector of one-seventh," shows that the division of a region into seven districts was a normal practice patterned after the Iranian cosmology of dividing the earth into seven kešvars (Henning, 1968, pp. 138, 143-44 [repr. in idem, 1977, II, pp. 659, 664-65]; see also HAFTVÂD).

The Parthian and Sasanian empires were also divided into provinces and principalities with no evident regard to the "seven regions" system. The later Sasanians had adopted the (Greek) division of the world into four quarters (see Nâma-ye Tansar, p. 40, tr. p. 63; Ebn Faqih, p. 197) and administered Êrânšahr in four geographical sections (kôsts) of the north (abâxtar, identified as Âdur-bâdagân), east (xwarâsân), south (nêmrôz) and the west (xwarwarân). The application of the geographical directions likewise influenced the doctrine of the seven-fold division of the earth (for a detailed and well-documented discussion see Pur Dâwud, 1952). Thus the Bunda-hišn, while admitting that "there are 33 kinds of land" (8.1), coordinates the seven regions with the four cardinal points, placing one in the east, one in the west and a pair in both north and south (8.2-7). The same is done by Hamza Esfahâni (pp. 4-5) and Târikh-e Sistân (p. 23). Similarly, the prologue to the Š of Abu Mansur Mohammad b. 'Abd-al-Razzâq (q.v.) gives the following report (Qazvini, pp. 42-44), from a source datable to about 620, when Sasanian troops had conquered Egypt (Shahbazi, 1990, p. 214): "the earth is divided into four directions (Ch) from one end to the other, and (also) into seven parts (haft bahr), each part of which they called a kešvar. The first is Arzah, the second Ša-bah, the third Faradadafš, the fourth Vidadafš, the fifth Vurubarst, the sixth Vurujarst, (and) the seventh, which is the center of the world, Khoniras-e bâmi (splendid Khoniras), and it is the one wherein we are, and the kings called it Êrânšahr." The same text then enumerates the countries of the world, from China to the Byzantine Empire, in accordance with the four directions, and again comes to Êrânšahr, claiming that it "is from the river of Egypt [the Nile] to the Âmuya" and "surpasses in every art the other kešvars surrounding it" (Qazvini, pp. 44-49). Another elaborate "Iranian" scheme of the "seven kešvars, similarly arranging known nations into six connected circles surrounding the central Êrânšahr was given by Abu Rayhân Biruni, together with a sketch map, both reproduced by Yâqut (Boldân I, p. 27). The Ketâb al-tafhim, attributed to Biruni, and the anonymous Mojmal al-tawârikh (ed. Bahâr, pp. 478-81) give a simpler version of the scheme.

Plate II

Further developments came as the result of familiarity with the Greek tradition of dividing the terrestrial sphere into four quarters, two above and two below the Equator, and holding that only the one covering the continents of Asia, Africa and Europe, was habitable. This quarter contained various nations living in a number of klimas, "climes" or regions (24 according to Ptolemy but seven in Pliny, Natural History 6.34). Muslim scholars adopted this scheme, and recorded quite accurate geographical data and maps. Some (e.g., Ya'qûbi, the author of the H, Estakhri, Ebn Hawqal, and Moqaddasi) rejected the doctrine of the seven kešvars; others adapted the system of klimas (aqâlim, sg. eqlim) to their factual descriptive geography of administrative and political entities; and some (e.g., Tabari, I, p. 154; Mas'udi, Tanbih, pp. 31-32) could not escape the influence of the traditions of Iran and Mesopotamia (Miquel). Ebn Kordâdò-beh starts (p. 4) with a description of the spherical earth divided into four quarters and then explains (p. 5): "We live in the northern quarter, and the southern quarter is desolate because of heat; the other half, which is below (i.e., on the other side of) us, is uninhabited. Each quarter, whether in the north or south, is divided into seven eqlims. Ptolemy mentions in his book 4,200 towns which flourished at his time." Characteristically, Biruni remarked that restricting the inhabited lands to one quarter was unscientific and that one logically expected inhabited quarters on the other side of the globe as well (India, ed. E. Sachau, pp. 133, 135, cited by Homâ`i, intro. to al-Tafhim, p. 132).

Plate III

Plate IV

In due course and under the influence of astronomers, the seven eqlims came to be pictured as seven tracts of land above and parallel to the equator, each belonging to a planet and associated with one or two signs of the zodiac (Miquel). The specifically Iranian (as against the Roman) system is given by Yâqut (Boldân I, pp. 25-32), Mas'ûdî (Muruj I, pp. 181-82) and Ekhwân al-Safâ (Rasâ`el I, Beirut, 1376/1957, pp. 120-38) as follows: The first eqlim belonged to Kayvân (Saturn) and associated with Capricornius and Aquarius; the second eqlim belonged to Hormoz (Jupiter) and associated with Sagitarius and Pisces; the third one belonged to Bahrâm (Mars) and associated with Aries and Cancer; the fourth one belonged to Kharšâd (kh 'sun') and associated with Leo; the fifth one belonged to (A)Nâhid (Venus) and associated with Taurus and Libra; the sixth eqlim belonged to Tir (Mercury) and associated with Gemini and Virgo; and number seven belonged to Mâh (the moon) and associated with Cancer. It is this scheme that Nezâmi Ganjavi elaborated in his Haft-peykar (q.v.), describing how Bahrâm Gôr married seven princesses from seven lands and built for them seven palaces painted in the colors of the seven planets, who are also the lords of the seven days of the week.

Bibliography

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	Idem, "On the Xvadây-nâmag," in Iranica Varia: Papers in Honor of Professor Ehsan Yarshater, Acta Iranica 30, Leiden, 1990, pp. 208-29.

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