Note 558 — KING SHAH BAKHT AND HIS WAZIR AL-RAHWAN.[295] (continued 3)

Arab. “Burúj” pl. of Burj. lit. = towers, an astrological term equivalent to our “houses” or constellations which form the Zodiacal signs surrounding the heavens as towers gird a city; and applied also to the 28 lunar Mansions. So in Al-Hariri (Ass. of Damascus) “I swear by the sky with its towers,” the incept of Koran chapt. lxxxv.; see also chapts. xv. 26 and xxv. 62. “Burj” is a word with a long history: πύργος, burg, burgh, etc.