divan

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(dĭ-vän', -văn')

1. A long backless sofa, especially one set with pillows against a wall.
2. (also dī-văn')
   1. A counting room, tribunal, or public audience room in Muslim countries.
   2. The seat used by an administrator when holding audience.
   3. A government bureau or council chamber.
3. (also dī-văn') A coffeehouse or smoking room.
4. (also dī-văn') A book of poems, especially one written in Arabic or Persian by a single author.

[French, from Turkish, from Persian dīvān, place of assembly, roster, probably from Old Iranian *dipivahanam, document house : Old Persian dipī-, writing, document (from Akkadian ṭuppu, tablet, letter , from Sumerian dub) + Old Persian vahanam, house.]

Have a seat and make yourself comfortable. This explanation may take a while.

If the seat is a divan, you should be comfortable indeed. In fact, you might fall asleep, which would be easy enough to do on a divan; it's a name we use for a couch, usually without back or arms but furnished with pillows so that it can double as a bed. But a divan is no ordinary piece of furniture. It has connotations of romance, literature, and luxury, thanks to its Turkish and Persian heritage.

Divan can be traced back several thousand years to the Old Iranian language, where it probably began as a long word meaning "document house," a place to store written records. The Persians used a shorter version of the word to mean both a bundle of written material and a place where written documents were used, so it could mean a collection of poetry, a courtroom, or the activity that takes place in such a room. Speakers of Turkish got divan from the Persians and gave it the shape it now has in English. As early as 1586 a book in English describes a Turkish "council called divan."

But the Turks, and English travelers to Turkey, also used divan as the name of a cushioned bench, originally in a council room. A travel book published in 1702 explains: "Their greatest Magnificence consists in their Divans or Sofas." And a 1703 account of a journey to Jerusalem explains that divans "are a sort of low stages ... elevated about sixteen or eighteen inches or more above the floor, whereon the Turks eat, sleep, smoke, receive visits, say their prayers, etc."

That is the divan with which the English language has been furnished ever since. It has always been more than a mere couch, as William Makepeace Thackeray in the nineteenth century implied in a poem about his attic hideaway: "No better divan need the Sultan require / Than the creaking old sofa that basks by the fire." The welcoming divan is both subject and title of a recent song by Smudge (Tom Morgan) performed by Evan Dando of The Lemonheads with the refrain, "You can crash out on my divan."

The Internet is stuffed with virtual divans couched in poetic language. Consider Saundra Mitchell's Web page poem "Crimson Divan," which ends with

Or you can "Take a break from the fast-spinning light-flashing tyre-screaming chaos of the superhighway, and put your feet up with Divan, Australia's first national online poetry journal."

Divan is not the only Turkish delight in English. We have dozens of other delicious and exotic words imported from that language and culture, including coffee (1598), sherbet (1603), and yogurt (1625), tulip (1578) and turban (1588, related words), dervish (1585), kiosk (1625), and possibly even yarmulke (1903). Turkish is one of the world's major languages, spoken by about sixty-three million people in Turkey and another ten million or so in other countries. It belongs to the Altaic language family.

• Chairs and Sofas - divan: large couch or sofa, usu. without back or arms
• Governmental Bodies and Institutions - divan: council of state or council chamber in Middle East

For the piece of furniture also known as divan, see Divan (furniture).

For other uses, see Diwan (disambiguation).

Audience in the Diwan-i-Khas granted to the French ambassador, the vicomte d'Andrezel by Sultan Ahmed III, 10 October 1724, in a contemporary painting by Jean-Baptiste van Mour.

A divan (Persian: دیوان, dīwān) was a high governmental body in a number of Islamic states, or its chief official (see dewan).

Contents 1 Etymology 2 Council 3 Ministerial departments 4 Halls 4.1 Dīwān-e-Ām 4.2 Dīwān-e-Khās 5 Other Uses 5.1 West-Eastern Divan Orchestra 6 Sources and references

Etymology

The winter Diwan of a Mughal Nawab.

The word is recorded in English since 1586, meaning "Oriental council of state," from Turkish divan, from Arabic diwan, is a Middle-Persian loan-word in Arabic and was borrowed also at an earlier date into Armenian^[1] dīvān "bundle of written sheets, small book, collection of poems" (as in the Divan-i Hafiz), related to debir "writer." Sense evolved through "book of accounts," to "office of accounts," "custom house," "council chamber," then to "long, cushioned seat," such as are found along the walls in Middle Eastern council chambers - which is this sense entered European langugues as Divan (furniture). The modern French, Spanish, Italian words douane, aduana, dogana respectively (meaning "customs") also come from diwan.

Council

The word first appears in the ninth-century descriptions of the caliphate of Omar I (A.D. 634-644). Great wealth, gained from the Muslim conquests, was pouring into Medina, and a system of business management and administration became necessary. This was copied from the Persians (whose Sassanid empire was being conquered and islamised under Umar) and given the Persian name divan. Later, as the state became more complicated, the term was extended over all the government bureaus.

The divan of the Sublime Porte was for many years the council of the Ottoman Empire. It consisted of the Grand Vizier, who presided when the Sultan was absent, and other viziers, kazaskers, nisanci, defterdar, and occasionally the Janissary Ağa.

The Assemblies of the Danubian Principalities under Ottoman rule were also called "divan" (see Akkerman Convention, ad hoc Divan).

In Javanese and related languages, the cognate Dewan is the standard word for chamber, as in the Dewan Perwakilan Rakyat or Chamber of People's Representatives.

Ministerial departments

In the sultanate of Morocco, several portfolio Ministries had a title based on Diwan:

• Diwan al-Alaf: ministry of War.
• Diwan al-Bar: 'ministry of the Sea', i.e. (overseas=) Foreign ministry.
• Diwan al-Shikayat (or - Chikayat): ministry of Complaints.

Halls

Dīwān-e-Khās at Agra Fort

"Divan" refers to two types of palatial buildings in Indian courts. They tend to occur in pairs in the Mughal imperial capitals; the most famous ones are in Agra Fort, but there are others in Red Fort, Delhi and Fatehpur Sikri and certain other princely capitals such as Amber and also in Lahore Fort Pakistan.

Dīwān-e-Ām

(Persian ديوان عام), also Divan-i-Aam. The court's Hall of Public Audience, where the ruler held mass audience. He would sit on his throne facing petitioners. His minister would assemble the petitions and refer them to the Dīwān-e-Khās for private audience.

Dīwān-e-Khās

(Persian ديوان خاص). A court's Hall of Private Audience, smaller than the Dīwān-e-Ām. Here envoys and other honoured guests were granted a personal audience with the ruler. At Agra, the Dīwān-e-Khās is a small marble structure near the Dīwān-e-Ām.

Other Uses

West-Eastern Divan Orchestra

The West-Eastern Divan Orchestra is a youth orchestra consisting of musicians from countries in the Middle East, bringing together young musicians from Egypt, Iran, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, and Syria. It was founded in 1999 by the Argentine-Israeli conductor Daniel Barenboim and the late Palestinian-American academic and author Edward Said.

Sources and references

1. ^ François de Blois, "Divan", Encyclopaedia Iranica; accessed February 10, 2007

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. 
• EtymologyOnLine
• RoyalArk- here Morocco

This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)

Dansk (Danish)
n. - divan, lovgivende forsamling, tobaksbutik, rygeværelse i cigarbutik

Nederlands (Dutch)
divan, rookkamer, bundel gedichten van islamitisch dichter, oosterse rechtbank, Ottomaanse raadszaal

Français (French)
n. - divan

Deutsch (German)
n. - Diwan, Couch

Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - ανάκλιντρο, ντιβάνι

Italiano (Italian)
divano

Português (Portuguese)
n. - divã (m)

Русский (Russian)
тахта, софа

Español (Spanish)
n. - diván, otomana

Svenska (Swedish)
n. - divan

中文（简体）(Chinese (Simplified))
长沙发椅, 沙发床, 会议厅, 枢密院, 咖啡馆

中文（繁體）(Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 長沙發椅, 沙發床, 會議廳, 樞密院, 咖啡館

한국어 (Korean)
n. - 긴 의자, 흡연실, 회의실

日本語 (Japanese)
n. - 長いす

العربيه (Arabic)
‏(الاسم) أريكه من غير ظهر أو أيدي, الديوان, غرفه للتدخين‏

עברית (Hebrew)
n. - ‮ספה, דרגש, אולם המועצה, מועצת המדינה‬

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