Notes on Transliteration, Spelling and Calendars
To ease reading, the use of diacritics in words transliterated from Arabic has generally been limited to the following Arabic letters: ʾ for hamzā, ʿ for ʿayn, ḍ for ḍāḍ. The macron has been used to signify the long vowel (ā, ī and ū). No distinction is made for the tāʾ marbūta. All Arabic words, apart from proper nouns, are italicized unless incorporated into the English language as listed in the Oxford Dictionary of English (i.e. Kaaba, salat). In order to ease comprehension, some plural forms of Arabic words recurring in the text have been Anglicized (i.e. mishkāts). Select words and terms, especially names of Imams and Duʿāt as well as honorific titles are spelt as commonly used in the Dawoodi Bohra community. Wherever two years or centuries are written together, the Hijra year precedes the Gregorian.