|
|
| History of Greater Iran |
| until the rise of modern nation-states |
| Pre-modern |
|
|
|
|
Greater Iran (in Persian: ایرانِ بُزُرگ Irān-e Bozorg, or ایران زَمین Irānzamīn "Iranian soil" or ایران شهر Irānshahr "The Land of Iran") refers to the regions of South, West, and Central Asia that have significant Iranian cultural influence and have historically been ruled by Iranian peoples.[2][3][4] It roughly corresponds to the territory on the Iranian plateau and its bordering plains,[1] stretching from Iraq, the Caucasus, and Turkey in the west, to the Indus River of Pakistan in the east. It is also referred to as Greater Persia,[5][6][7] while the Encyclopædia Iranica uses the term Iranian Cultural Continent.[8]
The term 'Iran' is not limited to the modern state, more or less equivalent to western Iran. Iran includes all the political boundaries ruled by the Iranian including Mesopotamia and usually Armenia and Transcaucasia.[9][10] In a sense the concept of Greater Iran, starts from the history that originated with the first Persian Empire or the Achaemenid Empire in Persis (Fars), and in fact is synonymous with history of Iran in many aspects. Persia lost many of its territories gained under the Safavid dynasty, including Iraq to the Ottomans (via Treaty of Amasya in 1555 and Treaty of Zuhab in 1639), Afghanistan to the British (via Treaty of Paris in 1857[11] and MacMahon Arbitration in 1905[12]), and its Caucasus territories to Russia in the 18th and 19th centuries.[13] The Treaty of Gulistan in 1813 resulted in Persia ceding Armenia, Azerbaijan, and eastern Georgia to Russia.[14] The Turkmanchey Treaty of 1828, after the Russo-Persian wars permanently severed the Caucasian provinces from Iran and settled the modern boundary along the Aras River.[15]
Due to this geographic diversity, newly independent nations under Russian or British involvement, while maintaining a cultural or language connection with Persia, developed their own unique socio-political and cultural paths. Some of these nations included Afghanistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Georgia, Iraq, and Pakistan. In 1935 under the rule of Reza Shah, the endonym Iran was made the official international name.[16] From a native Persian perspective, both Iran and Persia are interchangeable but until then the official name of Iran was Persia, but now both terms are interchangeably used even though Iran is the official political title.
The name “Irān“, meaning “land of the Aryans”,, is a new Persian of the old genitive plural aryānām (proto-Iranian, meaning "of the Aryans"), first attested in the Avesta as airyānąm (the text of which is composed in Avestan, an old Iranian language spoken in northeastern Greater Iran, or in what are now Turkmenistan and Tajikistan).[17][18][19][20] The proto-Iranian term aryānām is present in the term Airyana Vaēǰah, the homeland of Zoroaster and Zoroastrianism, near the provinces of Sogdiana, Margiana, Bactria, etc., listed in the first chapter of the Vidēvdād, immediately after it.[21][22] The Avestan evidence is confirmed by the Greek sources: Eratosthenes apud Strabo speaks of Arianē as being between Persia and the Indian subcontinent.[18]
Although, up until the end of the Parthian period in the 3rd century C.E, idea of “Irān“ had an ethnic, linguistic, and religious value, it did not yet have a political import. The idea of an “Iranian“ empire or kingdom in a political sense is a purely Sasanian one. It was the result of a convergence of interests between the new dynasty and the Zoroastrian clergy, as we can deduce from the available evidence. This convergence gave rise to the idea of an Ērān-šahr “Kingdom of the Iranians,” which was “ēr“ (Middle Persian equivalent of Old Persian “ariya“ and Avestan “airya“).[18]
Richard Foltz notes that while "A general assumption is often made that the various Iranian peoples of 'greater Iran'—a cultural area that streched from Mesopotamia and the Caucasus into Khwarizm, Transoxiana, Bactria, and the Pamirs and included Persians, Medes, Parthians and Sogdians among others—were all 'Zoroastrians' in pre-Islamic times... This view, even though common among serious scholars, is almost certainly overstated." Foltz argues that "While the various Iranian peoples did indeed share a common pantheon and pool of religious myths and symbols, in actuality a variety of deities were worshipped—particularly Mitra, the god of covenants, and Anahita, the goddess of the waters, but also many others—depending on the time, place, and particular group concerned.".[23] To the Ancient Greeks, Greater Iran ended at the Indus.[24]
Richard Nelson Frye defines Greater Iran as including "much of the Caucasus, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Central Asia, with cultural influences extending to China and western India." According to Frye, "Iran means all lands and peoples where Iranian languages were and are spoken, and where in the past, multi-faceted Iranian cultures existed."[25]
According to J. P. Mallory and Douglas Q. Adams most of Western greater Iran spoke SW Iranian languages in the Achaemenid era while the Eastern territory spoke Eastern Iranian languages related to Avesta.[26]
George Lane also states that after the dissolution of the Mongol empire, the Ilkhanids became rulers of greater Iran[27] and Uljaytu, according to Judith G. Kolbas, was the ruler of this expanse between 1304-1317 A.D.[28]
Primary sources, including Timurid historian Mir Khwand, define Iranshahr (Greater Iran) as extending from the Euphrates to the Oxus[29]
Traditionally, and until recent times, ethnicity has never been a defining separating criterion in these regions. In the words of Richard Nelson Frye:
| “ |
Many times I have emphasized that the present peoples of Central Asia, whether Iranian or Turkic speaking, have one culture, one religion, one set of social values and traditions with only language separating them. |
” |
Only in modern times did western colonial intervention and ethnicity tend to become a dividing force between the provinces of Greater Iran. As Patrick Clawson states, "ethnic nationalism is largely a nineteenth century phenomenon, even if it is fashionable to retroactively extend it."[30] "Greater Iran" however has been more of a cultural super-state, rather than a political one to begin with.
In the work Nuzhat al-Qolub (نزهه القلوب), the medieval geographer Hamdollah Mostowfi wrote:
چند شهر است اندر ایران مرتفع تر از همه
Some cities of Iran are better than the rest,
بهتر و سازنده تر از خوشی آب و هوا
these have pleasant and compromising weather,
گنجه پر گنج در اران صفاهان در عراق
The wealthy Ganjeh of Arran, and Esfahān in Iraq,
در خراسان مرو و طوس در روم باشد اقسرا
Merv and Tus in Khorasan, and Konya (Aqsara) too.
The Cambridge History of Iran takes a geographical approach in referring to the "historical and cultural" entity of "Greater Iran" as "areas of Iran, parts of Afghanistan, and Chinese and Soviet Central Asia".[31] A detailed list of these territories follows in this article.
Greater Iran is called Iranzamin (ایرانزمین) which means "The Land of Iran". Iranzamin was in the mythical times opposed to the Turanzamin the Land of Turan, which was located in the upper part of Central Asia.[32]
In the pre-Islamic period, Iranians distinguished two main regions in the territory they ruled, one Iran and the other Aniran. By Iran they meant all the regions inhabited by ancient Iranian peoples. That region was much vaster than it is today. This notion of Iran as a territory (opposed to Aniran) can be seen as the core of early Greater Iran. Later many changes occurred in the boundaries and areas where Iranians lived but the languages and culture remained the dominant medium in many parts of the Greater Iran.
As an example, the Persian language (referred to, in Persian, as Farsi) was the main literary language and the language of correspondence in Central Asia and Caucasus prior to the Russian occupation, Central Asia being the birthplace of modern Persian language. Furthermore, according to the British government, Persian language was also used in Iraqi Kurdistan, prior to the British Occupation and Mandate in 1918-1932 [3].
With Imperial Russia continuously advancing south in the course of two wars against Persia, and the treaties of Turkmenchay and Gulistan in the western frontiers, plus the unexpected death of Abbas Mirza in 1823, and the murdering of Persia's Grand Vizier (Mirza AbolQasem Qa'im Maqām), many Central Asian khanates began losing hope for any support from Persia against the Tsarist armies.[33] The Russian armies occupied the Aral coast in 1849, Tashkent in 1864, Bukhara in 1867, Samarkand in 1868, and Khiva and Amudarya in 1873.
- "Many Iranians consider their natural sphere of influence to extend beyond Iran's present borders. After all, Iran was once much larger. Portuguese forces seized islands and ports in the 16th and 17th centuries. In the 19th century, the Russian Empire wrested from Tehran's control what is today Armenia, Republic of Azerbaijan, and part of Georgia. Iranian elementary school texts teach about the Iranian roots not only of cities like Baku, but also cities further north like Derbent in southern Russia. The Shah lost much of his claim to western Afghanistan following the Anglo-Iranian war of 1856-1857. Only in 1970 did a UN sponsored consultation end Iranian claims to suzerainty over the Persian Gulf island nation of Bahrain. In centuries past, Iranian rule once stretched westward into modern Iraq and beyond. When the western world complains of Iranian interference beyond its borders, the Iranian government often convinced itself that it is merely exerting its influence in lands that were once its own. Simultaneously, Iran's losses at the hands of outside powers have contributed to a sense of grievance that continues to the present day." -Patrick Clawson of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy[34]
- "Iran today is just a rump of what it once was. At its height, Iranian rulers controlled Iraq, Afghanistan, Western Pakistan, much of Central Asia, and the Caucasus. Many Iranians today consider these areas part of a greater Iranian sphere of influence." -Patrick Clawson[35]
- "Since the days of the Achaemenids, the Iranians had the protection of geography. But high mountains and vast emptiness of the Iranian plateau were no longer enough to shield Iran from the Russian army or British navy. Both literally, and figuratively, Iran shrank. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Afghanistan were Iranian, but by the end of the century, all this territory had been lost as a result of European military action."[36]
In the Middle Ages, the territory of Greater Iran was known to be composed of two portions: Persian Iraq (western portion) and Khorasan (eastern portion). The dividing region was mostly along with Gurgan and Damaghan cities. Especially the Ghaznavids, Seljuqs and Timurids divided their Empire to Iraqi and Khorasani regions. This point can be observed in many books such as "Tārīkhi Baïhaqī" of Abul Fazl Bayhqi, Faza'ilul al-anam min rasa'ili hujjat al-Islam (a collection of letters of Al-Ghazali) and other books. Transoxiana and Chorasmia were mostly included in the Khorasanian region.
Iraq has formed an intrinsic part of the Iranian world for most of the last three millennia. It is where the Achaemenid capital Babylon, and the Parthian and Sassanian capital Ctesiphon were located.
| “ |
According to Sassanian documents, Persians distinguished two kinds of land within their empire: [the heartlands] "Īrān", and [the colonies] "Anīrān" ("non-Īrān"). Iraq was considered to be part of Īrān [the heartlands].[39]
As Wilhelm Eilers observes: "For the Sassanians, too [as it was for the Parthians], the lowlands of Iraq constituted the heart of their dominions". This shows that Iraq was not simply part of the Persian Empire—it was the heart of Persia.[39]
|
” |
During the time of the Sassanid Empire, from the 3rd century to the 7th century, the major part of Iraq was called in Persian Del-e Īrānshahr (lit. "the heart of Iran"), and its metropolis Ctesiphon (not far from present-day Baghdad) functioned for more than 800 years as the capital city of Iran.[40][41]
| “ |
Of the four residences of the Achaemenids named by Herodotus — Ecbatana, Pasargadae or Persepolis, Susa and Babylon — the last [situated in Iraq] was maintained as their most important capital, the fixed winter quarters, the central office of bureaucracy, exchanged only in the heat of summer for some cool spot in the highlands.[42]
Under the Seleucids and the Parthians the site of the Mesopotamian capital moved a little to the north on the Tigris — to Seleucia and Ctesiphon. It is indeed symbolic that these new foundations were built from the bricks of ancient Babylon, just as later Baghdad, a little further upstream, was built out of the ruins of the Sassanian double city of Seleucia-Ctesiphon.[42]
|
” |
|
—Iranologist Ehsan Yarshater, The Cambridge History of Iran,[42]
|
Because the Achaemenid Empire or "First Persian Empire" was the successor state to the empires of Assyria and Babylonia based in Iraq, and because Elam is part of Iran, the Iranians also share in the heritage of ancient Mesopotamia together with the Iraqis. The ancient Persians adopted Babylonian cuneiform script and modified it to write their language, along with adopting many other facets of ancient Iraqi culture, including the Aramaic language which became the official language of the Persian Empire.
| “ |
In 539 BC, the new Persian emperor, Cyrus, defeated the Babylonian army and entered Babylon. So attractive did Cyrus and his successors find Babylon that they made it the administrative capital of the empire. More important, Cyrus attempted to bring about a synthesis of Persian and Iraqi culture. The quest for this synthesis laid the foundation for the great dilemma [of identity] Iraqis face today.[43]
One result of this quest was the Persian recasting of the ancient Iraqi tradition of gathering to recite or listen to tellers. Precursors of these men had earlier narrated what we know as the Babylonian Epic of Creation (Enûma Eliš). In later but still ancient Iran, reciters repeated the national epic, the Shahnameh, and sang "The Weeping of the Magi" (Geristan-e-Moghan).[43]
|
” |
The Cyrus Cylinder, written in Babylonian cuneiform in the name of the Achaemenid king Cyrus, describes the Persian takeover of Babylon (the ancient name of Iraq). An excerpt reads:
| “ |
When I entered Babylon in a peaceful manner, I took up my lordly abode in the royal palace amidst rejoicing and happiness. Marduk, the great lord, established as his fate for me a magnanimous heart of one who loves Babylon, and I daily attended to his worship. My vast army marched into Babylon in peace; I did not permit anyone to frighten the people of Sumer and Akkad. I sought the welfare of the city of Babylon and all its sacred centers. As for the citizens of Babylon,[...] upon whom Nabonidus imposed a corvée which was not the gods' wish and not befitting them, I relieved their wariness and freed them from their service. Marduk, the great lord, rejoiced over my good deeds. He sent gracious blessing upon me, Cyrus, the king who worships him, and upon Cambyses, the son who is my offspring, and upon all my army, and in peace, before him, we moved around in friendship [with the people of Babylon]. |
” |
According to Iranologist Richard N. Frye:
| “ |
Throughout Iran’s history the western part of the land has been frequently more closely connected with the lowlands of Mesopotamia [Iraq] than with the rest of the plateau to the east of the central deserts [the Dasht-e Kavir and Dasht-e Lut].[44][45] |
” |
The Timurid historian Ḥāfeẓ-e Abru (d. 1430) wrote of Iraq:
Iraqis share significant religious, cultural and ethnic ties with Iranians. Close to two-thirds of Iraqis adhere to Twelver Shīa Islam – the same religion, sect, and school adhered to by most Iranians – and around one-fifth of Iraqis speak Iranian languages. Many Iraqis who speak Arabic are of Iranian origin, and Iranian surnames are common in Iraq. Many Iraqis hold elements of Persian identity, while still loving Iraq — a legacy of several millennia of cultural synergy and migration between the Iraqi lowland and the Iranian highland.
Iraqi culture has much in common with the culture of Iran. The spring festival of Nowruz is celebrated in Iraq by Kurdish and Shī'i Iraqis. Indeed, a spring festival has been practised in Iraq since Sumerian times. The Mesopotamian cuisine is very similar to the Persian cuisine and features many Persian dishes and cooking techniques. The Iraqi dialect has absorbed many words from the Persian language.[47]
There are still cities and provinces in Iraq where the Persian names of the city are still retained. e.g. ’Anbār and Baghdād. Other cities of Iraq with originally Persian names include Nokard (نوكرد) --> Haditha, Suristan (سورستان) --> Kufa, Shahrban (شهربان) --> Muqdadiyah, Arvandrud (اروندرود) --> Shatt al-Arab, and Asheb (آشب) --> Amadiya.[48]
In the modern era, the Safavid dynasty of Iran briefly asserted their hegemony over Iraq in the periods of 1501–1533 and 1622–1638, losing Iraq to the Ottoman Empire on both occasions (via the Treaty of Amasya in 1555 and the Treaty of Zuhab in 1639). Ottoman hegemony over Iraq was reconfirmed in the Treaty of Kerden in 1746.
When the Kingdom of Iraq was formed in 1921 by the British, the Persian government refused to recognize the state, claiming Najaf and Karbala as "holy places of Persia".[49] During the four-decade-long British occupation of Iraq, the British sought to reduce Persian influence in the country[50] – a policy continued under the later Ba'athist dictatorship which came to power through a US-sponsored coup in 1963. Following the fall of the Ba'athist regime in 2003 and the empowerment of Iraq's majority Shī'i community, relations with Iran have flourished in all fields. Iraq is today one of Iran's largest trading partners.
Many Iranians were born in Iraq or have ancestors from Iraq, such as the Chairman of Iran's Parliament Ali Larijani, the former Chief Justice of Iran Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi, and the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Iran Ali Akbar Salehi, who were born in Najaf and Karbala respectively. In the same way, many Iraqis were born in Iran or have ancestors from Iran, such as Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, who was born in Mashhad.
Culturally and historically Kurdistan has been part of what is known as Greater Iran. Kurds who speak a Northwestern Iranian language known as Kurdish comprise the majority of the population of the region there are also communities of Arab, Armenian, Assyrian, Azeri, Jewish, Persian, and Turkic people traditionally scattered throughout the region. Most of its inhabitants are Muslim, but there are also significant numbers of other religious sects such as Yazidi, Yarsan, Alevi, Christian, Kurdish Jews, and a modern revival of interest in Zoroastrianism, though the last of these is largely, if not entirely, nominal.
Armenia was a province of various Persian Empires since the Achaemenid period and was heavily influenced by Persian culture. Armenia however, has historically been largely populated by a distinct Indo-European-speaking people who merged with local Caucasian peoples, rather than being directly associated with the Iranian peoples. Ancient Armenian society was a combination of local cultures, Iranian social and political structures, and Hellenic/Christian traditions.[52] Due to centuries of independent indigenous development, conquests by western powers including the Romans and Russians, and its diverse diasporic population that has absorbed many cultural traits, especially those of Europe and Lebanon.
Iran continues to have a sizeable Armenian minority that links Armenians to Iranian culture. Many Armenians such as Yeprem Khan were directly involved and remembered in the History of Iran.
With the Treaty of Gulistan, Iran had to cede all the Khanates of the South Caucasus, which included Baku Khanate, Shirvan Khanate, Karabakh Khanate, Ganja Khanate, Shaki Khanate, Quba Khanate, and parts of the Talysh Khanate. Derbent (Darband) was also lost to Russia. These Khanates comprise what is today the Republic of Azerbaijan. By the Treaty of Turkmenchay, Iran was forced to cede Nakhichevan Khanate and the Mughan regions to Russia, as well as Erivan Khanate. These territories roughly constitute the modern-day Republic of Azerbaijan and Republic of Armenia. Most localities in this region bear Persian names or names derived from Iranian languages.
Prince Muhammad-Beik, 1620. Artist is
Reza Abbasi. Painting is located at Berlin's Museum Für Islamische Kunst.
The eastern Georgian regions of Kartli and Kakheti were Persian Provinces during Sassanid times (particularly starting with Hormozd IV). Some members of the Georgian elite were involved in the Safavid government and Amin al-Sultan, Prime Minister of Iran, was the son of a Georgian father.[53]
Eastern Georgia was under the influence of Persia until 1783 when Erekle II of Kartli and Kakheti signed the Treaty of Georgievsk with the Russian Empire. Persia officially gave up claim to parts of Georgia according to the terms of the Gulistan and Turkmenchay Treaties.
Early in antiquity, Narseh of Persia is known to have had fortifications built here. In later times, some of Persia's literary and intellectual figures from the Qajar period have hailed from this region. Also separated from Greater-Iran/Persia in the mid-19th century, by virtue of the Gulistan Treaty and Turkmenchay Treaty.
که تا جایگه یافتی نخچوان
Oh Nakhchivan, respect you've attained,
بدین شاه شد بخت پیرت جوان
With this King in luck you'll remain.
---Nizami
North Caucasus region in today's southern Russia including the republics of Dagestan, Chechnya, North Ossetia, Kabardino-Balkariya and other republics and oblasts of the region long formed part of Persia and the Iranian cultural sphere until they were annexed by Imperial Russia over the course of the 18th and 19th centuries. Strong Persian cultural influence can be traced up as far as Tatarstan in central Russia. Fine examples of Iranian architecture in many Caucasus cities like the Sassanid citadel in Derbent bear witness to the importance of these territories before the arrival of Russians to the region, when it was under Persian influence, rule and suzerainty. (Even today, after decades of partition, some of these regions retain a sort of Iranian identity, as seen in their old beliefs, traditions and customs (e.g. Norouz)).[54]
Khwarazm is one of the regions of Iran-zameen, and is the home of the ancient Iranians, Airyanem Vaejah, according to the ancient book of the Avesta. Modern scholars believe Khwarazm to be what ancient Avestic texts refer to as "Ariyaneh Waeje" or Iran vij. Iranovich These sources claim that Urgandj, which was the capital of ancient Khwarazm for many years, was actually "Ourva": the eighth land of Ahura Mazda mentioned in the Pahlavi text of Vendidad. Others such as University of Hawaii historian Elton L. Daniel believe Khwarazm to be the "most likely locale" corresponding to the original home of the Avestan people,[55] while Dehkhoda calls Khwarazm "the cradle of the Aryan tribe" (مهد قوم آریا). Today Khwarazm is split between several central Asian republics.
Superimposed on and overlapping with Chorasmia was Khorasan which roughly covered nearly the same geographical areas in Central Asia (starting from Semnan eastward through northern Afghanistan roughly until the foothills of Pamir, ancient Mount Imeon). Current day provinces such as Sanjan in Turkmenia, Razavi Khorasan Province, North Khorasan Province, and Southern Khorasan Province in Iran are all remnants of the old Khorasan. Until the 13th century and the devastating Mongol invasion of the region, Khorasan was considered the cultural capital of Greater Iran.[56]
Afghanistan was part of Greater Khorasan, and hence was recognized with the name Khorasan (along with regions centered around Merv and Nishapur), which in Pahlavi means "The Eastern Land" (خاور زمین in Persian).[57]
Afghanistan is where Balkh is located, home of Rumi, Rabi'a Balkhi, Sanāī Ghaznawi, Jami, Khwaja Abdullah Ansari and where many other notables in Persian literature came from.
ز زابل به کابل رسید آن زمان
From Zabul he arrived to Kabul
گرازان و خندان و دل شادمان
Strutting, happy, and mirthful
---Ferdowsi in Shahnama
The national anthem in Tajikistan, "Surudi Milli", attests to the Perso-Tajik identity, which has seen a large revival, after the breakup of the USSR. Their language is almost identical to that spoken in Afghanistan and Iran, and their cities have Persian names, e.g. Dushanbe, Isfara, Rasht Valley, Garm, Murghab, Vahdat, Zar-afshan river, Shurab, and Kulob ([4]). Its also important to note that Rudaki, considered by many as the father of modern Persian Language, was from Tajikistan.
Home of the Parthian Empire (Nysa). Merv is also where the half-Persian caliph al-Mamun moved his capital to. The city of Eshgh Abad (some claim that the word is actually the transformed form of "Ashk Abad" literally meaning "built by Ashk", the head of Arsaced dynasty) is yet another Persian word meaning "city of love", and like Iran, Afghanistan, and Uzbekistan, it was once part of Airyanem Vaejah.
Uzbekistan has a local Tajik population. The famous cities of Afrasiab, Bukhara, Samarkand, Shahrisabz, Andijan, Khiveh, Navā'i, Shirin, Termez, and Zar-afshan are located here. These cities are the birthplace of the Islamic era Persian literature. The Samanids, who claimed inheritance to the Sassanids, had their capital built here.
ای بخارا شاد باش و دیر زی
Oh Bukhara! Joy to you and live long!
شاه زی تو میهمان آید همی
Your King comes to you in ceremony.
---Rudaki
The Tashkurgan Tajik Autonomous County regions of China harbored a Persian population and culture.[58] Chinese Tashkurgan Tajik Autonomous County was always counted as a part of the Iranian cultural & linguistic continent with Kashgar, Yarkand, Hotan, and Turpan bound to the Iranian history.[59]
The western provinces and territories of Pakistan, which comprise Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, FATA and Baluchistan, are Iranian-speaking regions where Pashtuns and Baluchis comprise the majority of the local populations. The Baluch and Pashtun tribes are the easternmost of the Iranic peoples and the Baluchistan region, which covers southwestern Pakistan, is the easternmost region of the Iranian plateau.
-
Map depicting the Achaemenid Empire.
-
1598 German map of the region.
-
1610 map by Dutch map maker Jodocus Hondius showing Bactria and Georgia among the territories.
-
1719 map depiction of Asia.
-
-
1753 map by Robert de Vaugondy titled Estats du Grand-Seigneur en Asie where the color yellow marks the territories of Persia.
-
1808 British map of Persia.
-
-
19th century British map depicting Persia
- ^ a b "IRAN i. LANDS OF IRAN". Encyclopædia Iranica. http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/iran-i-lands-of-iran.
- ^ Marcinkowski, Christoph (2010). Shi'ite Identities: Community and Culture in Changing Social Contexts. LIT Verlag Münster. p. 83. ISBN 978-3-643-80049-7. "The 'historical lands of Iran' – 'Greater Iran' – were always known in the Persian language as Irānshahr or Irānzamīn. Both terms refer to the Iranian plateau in addition to the Persianate world at large, those regions that had been historically under significant Persian cultural influence, roughly corresponding to the territories ruled over by the ancient Parthians and Sasanids – i.e., in addition to 'Iran proper', also the Caucasus, Mesopotamia (Iraq), Central Asia, and large parts of what is now Pakistan and Afghanistan and conforming to the Persian 'historical understanding' of the 'full territorial extent' of Iran. The capital of this entity was, at times, situated in what is now Iraq."
- ^ Richard Frye http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8599016121144917550 "I spent all my life working in Iran. and as you know I don't mean Iran of today, I mean Greater Iran, the Iran which in the past, extended all the way from China to borders of Hungary and from other Mongolia to Mesopotamia"
- ^ Richard Nelson Frye, The Harvard Theological Review, Vol. 55, No. 4 (Oct., 1962), pp. 261-268 http://www.jstor.org/pss/1508723 I use the term Iran in an historical context[...]Persia would be used for the modern state, more or less equivalent to "western Iran". I use the term "Greater Iran" to mean what I suspect most Classicists and ancient historians really mean by their use of Persia - that which was within the political boundaries of States ruled by Iranians.
- ^ Lange, Christian. Justice, Punishment and the Medieval Muslim Imagination. Cambridge Studies in Islamic Civilization. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-88782-3. http://www.cambridge.org/uk/catalogue/catalogue.asp?isbn=978-0-521-88782-3&ss=exc. Lange: "I further restrict the scope of this study by focusing on the lands of Iraq and greater Persia (including Khwārazm, Transoxania, and Afghanistan)."
- ^ Gobineau, Joseph Arthur; O'Donoghue, Daniel. Gobineau and Persia: A Love Story. ISBN 1-56859-262-0. http://www.mazdapublisher.com/BookDetails.aspx?BookID=285. O'Donoghue: "...all set in the greater Persia/Iran which includes Afghanistan".
- ^ Shiels, Stan (2004). Stan Shiels on centrifugal pumps: collected articles from "World Pumps" magazine. Elsevier. pp. 11–12, 18. ISBN 1-85617-445-X. http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=SOTRAMbmb2kC. Shiels: "During the Sassanid period the term Eranshahr was employed to denote the region also known as Greater Iran..." Also: "...the Abbasids, who with Persian assistance assumed the Prophet's mantle and transferred their capital to Baghdad three years later; thus, on a site close to historic Ctesiphon and even older Babylon, the caliphate was established within the bounds of Greater Persia."
- ^ www.college.columbia.edu/cct/nov03/features5.php
- ^ Reitzenstein and Qumrân Revisited by an Iranian, Richard Nelson Frye, The Harvard Theological Review, Vol. 55, No. 4 (Oct. , 1962), pp. 261-268 http://www.jstor.org/pss/1508723
- ^ International Journal of Middle East Studies (2007), 39: pp 307-309 Copyright © 2007 Cambridge University Press http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=1009412
- ^ Erik Goldstein (1992). Wars and peace treaties, 1816-1991. Psychology Press. pp. 72–73. http://books.google.com/books?id=_sZpuJhvK_4C&pg=PA72&dq=treaty+of+paris+Afghanistan&hl=en&ei=HeQyTZj1OYKclgew2pnHCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=7&ved=0CEEQ6AEwBg#v=onepage&q=treaty%20of%20paris%20Afghanistan&f=false.
- ^ Sir Percy Molesworth Sykes (Macmillan and co.). A history of Persia, Volume 2. pp. 469. http://books.google.com/books?id=lm_UAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA469&dq=Macmahon+arbitration+persia&hl=en&ei=EeUyTdySEcH_lgeDkcGXCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCkQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false.
- ^ Roxane Farmanfarmaian (2008). War and peace in Qajar Persia: implications past and present. Psychology Press. pp. 4. http://books.google.com/books?id=Q_CPdClFR2cC&pg=PA4&dq=Qajar+loss+of+Afghanistan&hl=en&ei=1NYyTeqmNYOclge2g9TdCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCMQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=Qajar%20loss%20of%20Afghanistan&f=false.
- ^ India. Foreign and Political Dept. (1892). A Collection of Treaties, Engagements, and Sunnuds, Relating to India and Neighbouring Countries: Persia and the Persian Gulf. G. A. Savielle and P. M. Cranenburgh, Bengal Print. Co. pp. x (10). http://books.google.com/books?id=C7L7CSjut9wC&pg=PR10&dq=treaty+of+gulistan&hl=en&ei=mucyTavNDsSqlAeN-ZTWDA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CDkQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=treaty%20of%20gulistan&f=false.
- ^ Abbas Amanat (1997). Pivot of the universe: Nasir al-Din Shah Qajar and the Iranian Monarchy, 1831-1896. I.B.Tauris. pp. 16. http://books.google.com/books?id=L3qqb8hQWFYC&pg=PA16&dq=Qajar+loss+of+territory+to+Russia&hl=en&ei=ldgyTdv9G8X_lgeP6oiQCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=4&ved=0CDIQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=Qajar%20loss%20of%20territory%20to%20Russia&f=false.
- ^ Kenneth M. Pollack (2005). The Persian puzzle: the conflict between Iran and America. Random House, Inc.. pp. 38. http://books.google.com/books?id=ZmAW881sDEgC&pg=PA38&dq=Persia+changed+name+to+Iran&hl=en&ei=o-oyTcmdDYLGlQfErKWYCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CDUQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q&f=false.
- ^ William W. Malandra (2005-07-20). "ZOROASTRIANISM i. HISTORICAL REVIEW". http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/zoroastrianism-i-historical-review. Retrieved 2011-01-14.
- ^ a b c Nicholas Sims-Williams. "EASTERN IRANIAN LANGUAGES". http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/eastern-iranian-languages. Retrieved 2011-01-14.
- ^ "IRAN". http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/iran. Retrieved 2011-01-14.
- ^ K. Hoffmann. "AVESTAN LANGUAGE I-III". http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/avestan-language. Retrieved 2011-01-14.
- ^ Encyclopaedia Iranica: ĒRĀN-WĒZ. By D. N. MacKenzie: By late Sasanian times Ērān-wēz was taken to be in Western Iran: according to Great Bundahišn (29.12) it was “in the district (kustag) of Ādarbāygān.” But from Vendidad 1 it is clear that it has to be sought originally in eastern Iran, near the provinces of Sogdiana, Margiana, Bactria, etc., listed immediately after it.
- ^ Encyclopaedia Iranica: ZOROASTER ii. GENERAL SURVEY. By W. W. Malandra: In the Avesta, the geography of the Vendīdād and of the Yashts make it clear that these texts locate themselves in eastern [ancient] Iran [today's Afghanistan]. Even though there are later traditions which place him in Azerbaijan and Media, it is more reasonable to locate Zoroaster somewhere in eastern [ancient] Iran [today's Afghanistan] along with the rest of the Avesta. Further, the two Avestan dialects belong linguistically to eastern [ancient] Iran [today's Afghanistan]
- ^ Richard Foltz, "Religions of the Silk Road: Premodern Patterns of globalization", Palgrave Macmillan, rev. 2nd edition, 2010. pg 27
- ^ J.M. Cook, "The Rise of the Achaemenids and Establishment of Their Empire" in Ilya Gershevitch, William Bayne Fisher, J. A. Boyle "Cambridge History of Iran", Vol 2. pg 250. Excerpt: "To the Greeks, Greater Iran ended at the Indus".
- ^ Frye, Richard Nelson, Greater Iran, ISBN 1-56859-177-2 p.xi
- ^ Mallory, J. P.; Adams, D. Q. (1997), Encyclopedia of Indo-European culture, London and Chicago: Fitzroy-Dearborn, ISBN 1-884964-98-2. pg 307: "Dialetically, Old Persian is regarded as a southwestern Iranian language in contrast to the east Iranian Avestan which covered most of the rest of Greater Iran
- ^ George Lane, "Daily life in the Mongol empire", Greenwood Publishing Group, 2006. pg 10" The year following 1260 saw the empire irrevocably split but also signaled the emergence of the two greatest achievements of the house of Chinggis, namely the Yuan dynasty of greater China and the Il-Khanid dynasty of greater Iran.
- ^ Judith G. Kolbas, "The Mongols in Iran", Excerpt from 399: "Uljaytu, Ruler of Greater Iran from 1304-1317 A.D."
- ^ Mīr Khvānd, Muḥammad ibn Khāvandshāh, Tārīkh-i rawz̤at al-ṣafā. Taṣnīf Mīr Muḥammad ibn Sayyid Burhān al-Dīn Khāvand Shāh al-shahīr bi-Mīr Khvānd. Az rū-yi nusakh-i mutaʻaddadah-i muqābilah gardīdah va fihrist-i asāmī va aʻlām va qabāyil va kutub bā chāphā-yi digar mutamāyiz mībāshad.[Tehrān] Markazī-i Khayyām Pīrūz [1959-60]. ایرانشهر از کنار فرات تا جیهون است و وسط آبادانی عالم است. Iranshahr streches from the Euphrates to the Oxus, and it is the center of the prosperity of the World.
- ^ Patrick Clawson. Eternal Iran. Palgrave Macmillan. 2005 ISBN 1-4039-6276-6 p.23
- ^ The Cambridge History of Iran, Vol. III: The Seleucid, Parthian and Sasanian Periods, Ehsan Yarshater, Review author[s]: Richard N. Frye, International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 21, No. 3. (Aug., 1989), pp.415. Link: [1]
- ^ Dehkhoda Dictionary, Dehkhoda, see under entry "Turan"
- ^ Homayoun, N. T., Kharazm: What do I know about Iran?. 2004. ISBN 964-379-023-1, p.78
- ^ Patrick Clawson. Eternal Iran. Palgrave. 2005. Coauthored with Michael Rubin. ISBN 1-4039-6276-6 p.9,10
- ^ Patrick Clawson. Eternal Iran. Palgrave. 2005. Coauthored with Michael Rubin. ISBN 1-4039-6276-6 p.30
- ^ Patrick Clawson. Eternal Iran. Palgrave. 2005. Coauthored with Michael Rubin. ISBN 1-4039-6276-6 p.31-32
- ^ Scarre, Christopher (1999). The Seventy Wonders of the Ancient World: The Great Monuments and How They Were Built. Thames & Hudson. pp. 185–186. ISBN 978-0-500-05096-5.
- ^ Andrade, Dale (2010). Surging South of Baghdad: The 3rd Infantry Division. Diane Publishing. p. 39. ISBN 978-1-4379-8119-3.
- ^ a b Buck, Christopher (1999). Paradise And Paradigm: Key Symbols In Persian Christianity And The Baháí̕ Faith. SUNY Press. p. 64. ISBN 978-0-7914-4061-2.
- ^ Marcinkowski, Christoph (2010). Shi'ite Identities: Community and Culture in Changing Social Contexts. LIT Verlag Münster. p. 83. ISBN 978-3-643-80049-7. "During the time of the Sasanids, Iran's last dynasty before the arrival of Islam in the 7th century, the major part of Iraq was called in Persian Del-i Īrānshahr (lit. 'heart of Iran'), and its metropolis Ctesiphon (not far from present-day Baghdad) functioned for more than 800 years as the capital city of Iran."
- ^ Yavari, Neguin (1997). Iranian Perspectives on the Iran-Iraq War; Part II. Conceptual Dimensions; 7. National, Ethnic, and Sectarian Issues in the Iran-Iraq War. University Press of Florida. p. 78. ISBN 978-0-8130-1476-0. "Iraq with its capital of Ctesiphon was called by the Sasanian kings the 'heart of Iranshahr,' the land of Iran... The ruler spent most of the year in this capital, only moving to the cities of the highlands of Iran for the Summer."
- ^ a b c Yarshater, Ehsan (1993). The Cambridge History of Iran, Volume 3. Cambridge University Press. p. 482. ISBN 978-0-521-20092-9. "Of the four residences of the Achaemenids named by Herodotus — Ecbatana, Pasargadae or Persepolis, Susa and Babylon — the last [situated in Iraq] was maintained as their most important capital, the fixed winter quarters, the central office of bureaucracy, exchanged only in the heat of summer for some cool spot in the highlands. Under the Seleucids and the Parthians the site of the Mesopotamian capital moved a little to the north on the Tigris — to Seleucia and Ctesiphon. It is indeed symbolic that these new foundations were built from the bricks of ancient Babylon, just as later Baghdad, a little further upstream, was built out of the ruins of the Sassanian double city of Seleucia-Ctesiphon."
- ^ a b Polk, William Roe (2006). Understanding Iraq: A Whistlestop Tour from Ancient Babylon to Occupied Baghdad. I.B. Tauris. pp. 31–32. ISBN 978-1-84511-123-6. "In 539 BC, the new Persian emperor, Cyrus, defeated the Babylonian army and entered Babylon. So attractive did Cyrus and his successors find Babylon that they made it the administrative capital of the empire. More important, Cyrus attempted to bring about a synthesis of Persian and Iraqi culture. The quest for this synthesis laid the foundation for the great dilemma Iraqis face today. One result of this quest was the Persian recasting of the ancient Iraqi tradition of gathering to recite or listen to tellers. Precursors of these men had earlier narrated what we know as the Babylonian Epic of Creation. In later but still ancient Iran, reciters repeated the national epic, the Shahnameh, and sang "The Weeping of the Magi"."
- ^ Frye, Richard N. (1975). The Golden Age of Persia: The Arabs in the East. Weidenfeld and Nicolson. p. 184. ISBN 978-0-7538-0944-0. "[..] throughout Iran’s history the western part of the land has been frequently more closely connected with the lowlands of Mesopotamia than with the rest of the plateau to the east of the central deserts."
- ^ Yavari, Neguin (1997). Iranian Perspectives on the Iran-Iraq War; Part II. Conceptual Dimensions; 7. National, Ethnic, and Sectarian Issues in the Iran-Iraq War. University Press of Florida. p. 80. ISBN 978-0-8130-1476-0. "Between the coming of the 'Abbasids and the Mongol onslaught, Iraq and western Iran shared a closer history than did eastern Iran and its western counterpart."
- ^ Morony, Michael G. "IRAQ AND ITS RELATIONS WITH IRAN". IRAQ i. IN THE LATE SASANID AND EARLY ISLAMIC ERAS. Encyclopædia Iranica. http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/iraq-i-late-sasanid-early-islamic. Retrieved 11 February 2012. "Persian remained the language of most of the sedentary people as well as that of the chancery until the 15th century and thereafter, as attested by Ḥāfeẓ-e Abru (d. 1430) who said, “The majority of inhabitants of Iraq know Persian and Arabic, and from the time of domination of Turkic people the Turkish language has also found currency: as the city people and those engaged in trade and crafts are Persophone, the Bedouins are Arabophone, and the governing classes are Turkophone. But, all three peoples (qawms) know each other’s languages due to the mixture and amalgamation.”"
- ^ Csató, Éva Ágnes; Isaksson, Bo; Jahani, Carina (2005). Linguistic Convergence and Areal Diffusion: Case Studies from Iranian, Semitic and Turkic. Routledge. p. 177. ISBN 978-0-415-30804-5.
- ^ See: محمدی ملایری، محمد: فرهنگ ایران در دوران انتقال از عصر ساسانی به عصر اسلامی، جلد دوم: دل ایرانشهر، تهران، انتشارات توس 1375.: Mohammadi Malayeri, M.: Del-e Iranshahr, vol. II, Tehran 1375 Hs.
- ^ Anderson, Terry H. (2011). Bush's Wars. Oxford University Press. p. 12. ISBN 978-0-19-974752-8.
- ^ Nakash, Yitzhak (2003). The Shi'is of Iraq. Princeton University Press. pp. 100–102. ISBN 978-0-691-11575-7.
- ^ "A conversation with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, President of the Islamic Republic of Iran". charlierose.com. http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/10611. Retrieved 11 February 2012.
- ^ See:
- ^ Patrick Clawson. Eternal Iran. Palgrave. 2005. Coauthored with Michael Rubin. ISBN 1-4039-6276-6 p.168
- ^ Encyclopædia Iranica: "Caucasus Iran" article, p.84-96.
- ^ Daniel, E., The History of Iran. 2001. ISBN 0-313-30731-8, p.28
- ^ Lorentz, J. Historical Dictionary of Iran. 1995. ISBN 0-8108-2994-0
- ^ Dehkhoda, Dehkhoda dictionary, Tehran University Press, p.8457
- ^ See:
- ^ "Persian language in Xinjiang" (زبان فارسی در سین کیانگ). Zamir Sa'dollah Zadeh (دکتر ضمیر سعدالله زاده). Nameh-i Iran (نامه ایران) V.1. Editor: Hamid Yazdan Parast (حمید یزدان پرست). ISBN 964-423-572-X Perry-Castañeda Library collection under DS 266 N336 2005.
.jpg)
