Rabaḍ () refers to the
suburb
A suburb (more broadly suburban area) is an area within a metropolitan area. They are oftentimes where most of a metropolitan areas jobs are located with some being predominantly residential. They can either be denser or less densely populated ...
s of seventh- to eighth-century cities in
Central Asia
Central Asia is a region of Asia consisting of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. The countries as a group are also colloquially referred to as the "-stans" as all have names ending with the Persian language, Pers ...
, including what is now the
Turkistan Region
Turkistan Region, formerly known as South Kazakhstan Region from 1992 to 2018 and Chimkent Region from 1963 to 1991, is the southernmost region of Kazakhstan, bordering Uzbekistan. It had a population of 2,088,510 as of the 2022 Kazakhstan cens ...
in southern Kazakhstan, Iran, and Afghanistan.
This term, in the
Andalusī Arabic form of ''ar-rabāḍ'', was borrowed into Spanish as ''
arrabal'' and into Portuguese as ''
arrabalde''.
[ (At Google Books]
2nd edition
(2001), .)
City layout
A typical
''qalʿat'' ("fortress") in Central Asia was based on a tripartite city model:
citadel
A citadel is the most fortified area of a town or city. It may be a castle, fortress, or fortified center. The term is a diminutive of ''city'', meaning "little city", because it is a smaller part of the city of which it is the defensive core.
...
,
''shahristan'' (residential area inside the walls), and ''rabaḍ'' (suburb). This city model is valid not only for Central Asian city typology, but is also used to describe similar city types elsewhere in the
Muslim world
The terms Islamic world and Muslim world commonly refer to the Islamic community, which is also known as the Ummah. This consists of all those who adhere to the religious beliefs, politics, and laws of Islam or to societies in which Islam is ...
.
See also
;Related
*
Rabat (disambiguation), Arabic word for 'fortified town' or 'suburb'
*
Rábade, town in Galicia, Spain
*
Ribat
A ribāṭ (; hospice, hostel, base or retreat) is an Arabic term, initially designating a small fortification built along a frontier during the first years of the Muslim conquest of the Maghreb to house military volunteers, called ''murabitun' ...
, Arabic word for Early Muslim frontier fort, later caravansary and Sufi retreat
*
Robat (disambiguation), Persian variant for 'ribat'
;Other
*
RABaD (disambiguation), Hebrew acronym for Rabbi Abraham Ben David. See page for the most famous 3 by this name.
References
{{reflist
Urban design
Central Asia