But Why Istanit?

VI. SHIRAZ [(Shir = milk, or Shir = lion) - H. C.] representing the province of Fars or Persia Proper, of which it has been for ages the chief city.

[It was founded after the Arab conquest in 694 A.D., by Mohammed, son of Yusuf Kekfi. (Curzon, Persia, II. pp. 93-110.) - H. C.] The last Dynasty that had reigned in Fars was that of the Salghur Atabegs, founded about the middle of the 12th century. Under Abubakr (1226-1260) this kingdom attained considerable power, embracing Fars, Kerman, the islands of the Gulf and its Arabian shores; and Shiraz then flourished in arts and literature; Abubakr was the patron of Saadi. From about 1262, though a Salghurian princess, married to a son of Hulaku, had the nominal title of Atabeg, the province of Fars was under Mongol administration. (Ilch. passim.)

VII. SHAWANKARA or Shabankara. The G. T. has Soucara, but the Crusca gives the true reading Soncara. It is the country of the Shawankars, a people coupled with the Shuls and Lurs in mediaeval Persian history, and like them of Kurd affinities. Their princes, of a family Fasluyah, are spoken of as influential before the Mahomedan conquest, but the name of the people comes prominently forward only during the Mongol era of Persian history. [Shabankara was taken in 1056 from the Buyid Dynasty, who ruled from the 10th century over a great part of Persia, by Fazl ibn Hassan (Fazluieh-Hasunieh). Under the last sovereign, Ardeshir, Shabankara was taken in 1355 by the Modhafferians, who reigned in Irak, Fars, and Kerman, one of the Dynasties established at the expense of the Mongol Ilkhans after the death of Abu Said (1335), and were themselves subjugated by Timur in 1392.

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