Sohail Forouzan-sepehr's Website: Glory of Ancient Persia from My POV (Page 5)

Glory of Ancient Persia from My Point of View (Page 5)

All photographs of this album by Sohail Forouzan-sepehr is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License. Using any photograph is only permitted by referring full-name of the photographer & the website as: "Photograph taken by Sohail Forouzan-sepehr"

4-8 June 2007, Homa Hotel (5*), Shiraz, Iran

(Also Persepolis, Pasargadae, Firuzabad, Kazerun)

Shiraz

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Shiraz Local Time

Shiraz, an ancient city in south-western Iran and capital of Fars Province, located in the Zagros Mountains, is a commercial centre of the surrounding region, which produces grapes, citrus fruit, cotton, and rice. It is known as the city of poetry, wine, roses, and also considered by many Iranians to be the City of Love due to the many gardens and fruit-trees that can be seen in the city. Shiraz is most likely more than 4000 years old. The earliest reference to the city is on Elamite clay tablets dated to 2000 BC, found in June of 1970, while digging to make a kiln for a brick making factory in SW corner of the city. The tablets written in ancient Elamite, name a city called "Tiraziš" [Ref: George G Cameron (1948); "Persepolis Treasury Tablets", University of Chicago Press, pp 115]. The name Shiraz also appears on clay sealings found at Qasr e Abu-Nasr, a Sassanid ruin, east of the city (2nd century AD). As early as the 11th century several hundred thousand people inhabited Shiraz. It had an estimated population of 1,255,955 in 2005. Incidentally the oldest sample of wine in the world dating to approximately 7000 years ago was also discovered on clay jars recovered outside of Shiraz. The city is also famous for its people hospitality.

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320. Karim Khan's Citadel was built in 1766-7 AD by the order of Karim Khan Zand, ruler and de facto Shah of Iran (1760-1779 AD) in the middle of the city of Shiraz. To know more about Karim Khan, please refer to the caption of fig 228 in the Album 4. The citadel consists of four high walls connected by four round towers on the corners. The walls are 3 metres thick at the base and 2.8 metres at the top. The four towers are 15 metres high and made of bricks. The design of the citadel combines military and residential architecture as it was the residence of Karim Khan and the military centre of the dynasty. At the moment, Karim Khan's Citadel is supervised as a museum by Iran's Cultural Heritage Organization.

321. Entrance of Karim Khan's Citadel with a facade representing an ancient Iranian epic tale about the battle between Rostam, the greatest Persian mythical hero, and Div e Sepid (White Demon), the chieftain of all demons and evil spirits.