(May 31)

Today is Monday; 10th of the Iranian month of Khordad 1400 solar hijri; corresponding to 19th of the Islamic month of Shawwal 1442 lunar hijri; and May 31, 2021, of the Christian Gregorian Calendar.
1177 lunar years ago, on this day in 265 AH, the Iranian adventurer, Yaqoub Ibn Layth Saffar, founder of the short-lived Saffarid Dynasty, died in Jondi Shapour in Khuzestan at the age of 39, due to severe stomachache, and was succeeded by his brother Amr.
1008 lunar years ago, on this day in 434 AH, the Arabic scholar of Iranian stock Abu Zakariya ibn Abdul-Wahhab Ibn Mandah, was born. As an expert on hadith he is held in high esteem by Sunni Muslims. He wrote several books including one on the biography of the famous Hadith scholar Tabarani, who among the merits of the Commander of the Faithful, Imam Ali ibn Abi Taleb (AS), has recorded the famous incident of “Radd ash-Shams” or the miraculous return of the sun, on the supplication of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA), after it had set. He passed away in Isfahan at the age of 78.
798 solar years ago, on this day in 1223 AD, during the Mongol invasion of the lands of the Cumans – a non-Muslim Turkic people whose expansive khanate stretched from the Black Sea to Lake Balkhash in what is now Kazakhstan, the Battle of the Kalka River in Ukraine, ended with a resounding victory for the armies of Genghis Khan led by Subutai, who defeated the joint forces of the Russians and Cumans.
444 solar years ago, on this day in 1577 AD, Empress Noor Jahan of the Moghal Empire of the subcontinent was born as a commoner in the border town of Qandahar to the Iranian refugee, Mirza Ghiyas Beg Tehrani, who was fleeing Safavid Persia to India following the fall from grace of his aristocratic family. Named Mehr an-Nisa at birth, she was the fourth child of her father, whose talents were appreciated in India by Emperor Jalal od-Din Akbar who appointed him minister and conferred the title E’temad od-Dowla upon him. Mehr an-Nisa was brought up at the Moghal court and was married to an Iranian émigré, Ali Quli, titled Shir-Afgan for his bravery in grappling with a tiger. Her husband died in a skirmish and the widow returned along with her orphaned daughter to the Moghal court where Emperor Noor od-Din Jahangir enamoured by her beauty proposed marriage to her. He subsequently made her the empress with the official title “Noor Jahan” (Light of the World). She was noted for her wisdom, administrative abilities, and scholarly pursuits. She was the power behind the throne. Although she didn’t bear the emperor any child, she remained loyal to him even after his death, and was later buried in the same mausoleum in Lahore in what is now Pakistan. Her brother Asef Khan rose to become minister, while she arranged for her daughter from her previous marriage, to marry Jahangir`s youngest son, Prince Shahryar, and her niece Arjmand Banu (later Mumtaz Mahal – buried in the famous Taj Mahal) to marry Prince Khurram, (the future Emperor Shah Jahan). A staunch follower of Prophet Mohammad’s (SAWA) Ahl al-Bayt, Noor Jahan, who punished the killers of the great Iranian scholar, Qazi Seyyed Noorollah Shushtari (Shaheed Sallis or the Third Martyr), died on 17 December 1645 at the age of 68.
212 solar years ago, on this day in 1809 AD, Austrian musician and composer, Joseph Haydn, died at the age of 77. In 1781, his acquaintance with the famous Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart led to improvement of his symphonies. His musical pieces include “The Creation”.
202 solar years ago, on this day in 1819 AD, US Poet Walt Whitman was born in West Hill, New York. He became America’s national poet with vibrant works such as “Leaves of Grass” (1855). His poems included: “When Lilacs Last in the Doorway Bloomed”. Some of his poems were inspired by his Civil War experience as a hospital volunteer in Washington. Although a staunch supporter of the Union cause, Whitman comforted dying soldiers of both sides. He died in 1892.
189 solar years ago, on this day in 1832 AD, French mathematician, Evariste Galois, died at the young age of 21 from wound suffered in duel. Born at Bourg-la-Reine, while still in his teens, he was able to determine a necessary and sufficient condition for a polynomial to be solvable by radicals, thereby solving a problem standing for 350 years. His work laid the foundations for Galois Theory and group theory, two major branches of abstract algebra, and the subfield of Galois Connections.
174 solar years ago, on this day in 1847 AD, following a series of border incidents in the 1830s by the Ottoman Empire against the Iranian port city of Khorramshahr in violation of the 1821 Treaty of Erzurum that pushed the two counties to the brink of war, Britain and Russia mediated the Second Treaty of Erzurum.
119 solar years ago, on this day in 1902 AD, the Boer War ended with the British victory over the Dutch of South Africa and signing of the Treaty of Vereeniging, ending the 3-year uprising by the Afrikaners, led by Louis Botha, the commandant general of the Transvaal forces. The combination of superior fire power and a brutal war of attrition launched by Lord Kitchener forced the Boers to give in. The British burned the farms of Africans and Boers alike and collected as many as a 100,000 women and children in carelessly run and unhygienic concentration camps on the open veldt. Britain annexed Transvaal.
111 solar years ago, on this day in 1910 AD, South Africa was formed with the merger of two British colonies.
86 solar years ago, on this day in 1935 AD, in Quetta in what is now capital of Pakistan’s Baluchistan State, a magnitude 7.7 degree earthquake killed some 50,000 people.
51 solar years ago, on this day in 1970 AD, the Ancash earthquake caused a landslide that buried the town of Yungay in Peru, resulting in the death of more than 47,000 people.
34 solar years ago, on this day in 1987 AD, the World Health Organisation (WHO) designated May 31 as World No Tobacco Day (WNTD) which is observed worldwide every year.
29 solar years ago, on this day in 1992 AD, the researcher and lecturer of Tehran’s Sharif University of Science and Technology, Dr. Jalal Samimi, following twenty years of study, discovered the five sources of Gama Rays at the centre of the Milky Way Galaxy. Born in the city of Zabul, southeastern Iran in 1940, he obtained PhD in Physics, and conducted several experiments in regard to nuclear emulsion.
26 solar years ago, on this day in 1995 AD, Ayatollah Sheikh Azizollah Khosrowi Zanjani passed away at the age of 87. A student of the Father of the Islamic Revolution, Imam Khomeini (RA), he followed the footsteps of his teacher in the struggles against the despotic Pahlavi regime. After establishment of the Islamic Republic, he strove to serve the goals of the system of government in Iran.
14 solar years ago, on this day in 2007 AD, in southern Thailand Buddhist terrorists sprayed gunfire into a mosque, killing 7 Muslim worshippers. Black-clad raiders roared into Kolomudo, a Muslim village, firing assault rifles and hurling grenades from a pickup truck at a group of teenagers relaxing near the mosque. When the attack was over, five of the youths lay martyred. A roadside bomb killed 11 paramilitary troops almost simultaneously, while a 12th soldier died the next day.
13 solar years ago, on this day in 2008 AD, Chinese authorities evacuated nearly 200,000 people and warned more than 1 million others to be ready to leave quickly as a lake formed by a devastating earthquake that occurred on May 12 threatened to breach its dam. The confirmed death toll from the earthquake, reached nearly 69,000, with another 18,000 still missing.
11 solar years ago, on this day in 2010 AD, the illegal Zionist entity indulged in a terrorist act of piracy in international waters by hijacking the Gaza-bound Freedom Flotilla carrying humanitarian relief for the Palestinian population of this impoverished enclave. The flotilla consisted of six ships with food and medicine, along with 663 activists from 37 countries. Zionist soldiers boarded it and brutally attacked the unarmed activists, martyring at least nine Turkish citizens and injuring over fifty others. This gruesome and barbaric raid drew worldwide condemnation and reinforced the resolve of activists and aid convoys to break the siege of Gaza Strip. Unfortunately, the US has continued to support the barbarism of Israel.