Greater Iran

Greater Iran (in Template:Lang-fa Irān-e Bozorg, or ایران‌زمین Irānzamīn "Iranian soil") refers to the regions that have significant Iranian cultural influence. It roughly corresponds to the territory on the Iranian plateau, stretching from the Caucasus in the west to the Indus River in the east and conforms to the historical understanding of the full territory of "Iran." It is also widely referred to as Greater Persia in European languages, while the Encyclopædia Iranica uses the term Iranian Cultural Continent.

In a sense the concept of Greater Iran, starts from the history that originated with the first Persian Empire in Persis, and in fact is synonymous with history of Iran in many aspects. Persia (now called Iran) was the nucleus of the Persian activity, until the Qajar dynasty lost Persia many of its territories, including Afghanistan to the British (via Treaty of Paris, 1857 and MacMahon Arbitration, 1905), and its northern territories to Russia. 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. Treaty of Gulistan, in 1813, effectively resulted in Persia (Iran) losing, Azerbaijan, Armenia, and southeastern Georgia. 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. In 1935, under the influence of the Persian monarch Reza Shah, Persia changed its name officially and internationally to "Iran" (meaning land of Aryan).

Because the concept is a cultural one, representing regions settled by Iranian people, it does not correspond to any particular political entity, and—because it represents a late Bronze Age dispersion—predates such political entities by many centuries. For the Sassanids, in whose 3rd century inscriptions the term 'Iran' first appears as a political concept, the multinational Iranian state included Asia Minor but excluded territories east of the two Iranian salt desert basins (the Dasht-e Kavir and the Dasht-e Lut). This situation is however reversed in the cultural context, i.e. that of the Iranian nation.

Etymology

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 Avestan as airyānąm (Avestan is an old Iranian language spoken in northeastern Greater Iran, or in what are now Afghanistan and Tajikistan). 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. The Avestan evidence is confirmed by the Greek sources: Eratosthenes apud Strabo speaks of Arianē as being between Persia and India.

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“).

Definition

Richard Nelson Frye defines Greater Iran as including "much of the Caucasus, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Central Asia, with cultural influences extending to China, western India, and the Semitic speaking world." 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."

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.". To the Greeks, Greater Iran ended at the Indus

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.

George Lane also states that after the dissolution of the Mongol empire, the Ilkhanids became rulers of greater Iran and Uljaytu, according to Judith G. Kolbas, was the ruler of this expanse between 1304-1317 A.D.

Primary sources including Timurid historian Mir Khwand define Iranshahr (Greater Iran) as from the Euphrates to the Oxus

File:Greater Iran.gif

Geographically and culturally, Greater Iran includes all of the Iranian plateau, stretching to Central Asia (Bactria) and the Hindukush to the northeast and Afghanistan and Western Pakistan in the southeast and into eastern Syria and the Caucasus to the northwest.

Traditionally, and until recent times, ethnicity has never been a defining separating criteria 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." "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 writes:

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 as well,
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". A detailed list of these territories follows in this article.

Background

In Persian, 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.

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. 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

"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

"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."

Provinces

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.

Pakistan

The western provinces of Pakistan, which comprise the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, FATA and Baluchistan are Iranian-speaking regions where Pashtuns, Baluchis comprise the majority of the local populations. The Baluch and Pashtun tribes are the easternmost of the Iranic peoples and Baluchistan is the easternmost region of the Iranian plateau.

Western China

See also: Iran-China relations and Tajiks in China

The Tashkurgan Tajik Autonomous County regions of China harbored a Persian population and culture. 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.

Central Asia

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, 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.

Afghanistan

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).

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

Tajikistan

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.

Uzbekistan

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

Turkmenistan

Home of the Parthian Empire (Nysa). Merv is also where the half-Persian caliph al-Mamun moved his capital to, in order to move the center of the caliphate away from Arab speaking lands. 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.

Caucasus

Azerbaijan

Also by 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.

Northern Caucasus (Southern Russia)

See also: Russo-Persian Wars, Treaty of Gulistan, and Treaty of Turkmenchay

Northern Caucasus region in today's Southern Russia including the republics of Dagestan, Chechnya, North Ossetia, Kabardino-Balkariya & other republics & oblasts of the region long formed part of Persia & 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 & suzerainty. (Even today, after decades of partition, some of these regions retain a sort of Iranian identity, as seen in their old believes, traditions and customs (e.g. Norouz)). For a discussion see.

Eastern Georgia

Prince Muhammad-Beik, 1620. Artist is Reza Abbasi. Painting is located at Berlin's Museum Für Islamische Kunst.

Eastern Georgian regions of Kartli and Katheti 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.

Eastern Georgian regions were under the influence of Persia until 1783 when, exhausted by constant Persian invasions and Islamization,Erekle II of Eastern Georgia 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.

Armenia

See also: Persian Armenia and Iranian Armenians

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. 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. [5]

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.

Nakhichevan

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

Middle East

Kurdistan

A very early record of confrontation between the Kurds and the Sassanid Empire appears in a historical text called the Book of the Deeds of Ardashir son of Babak. The book explains the life of "Ardashir Papagan" or Ardashir I of Persia, the founder of the Sassanid Dynasty, and is written in the Pahlavi language. In this book, the author explains the battle between Kurdish King Madig and Ardashir.

Culturally and historically Kordestan 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, Ossetian, 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, Mandean and a modern revival of interest in Zoroastrianism, though the last of these is largely, if not entirely, nominal.

Iraq

Iraq was a province of various Persian Empires since the Achaemenid period and was heavily influenced by Persian culture. It is where one of the Sassanid capitals was located (Ctesiphon). There are still cities and provinces in contemporary Iraq where the Persian names of the city are still retained. e.g. al-Anbar or Baghdad. Other cities of Iraq with originally Persian names include Nokard (نوكرد) --> al-Haditha, Suristan (سورستان) --> Kufa, Shahrban (شهربان) --> Miqdadiya, Arvandrud (اروندرود)--> Shatt al-Arab, and Asheb (آشب) --> Imadiyya.

Patrick Clawson verifies this:

"Arab nationalists may seek retroactively to extend the present into the past, but this skews reality. Iranian domains once extended well into what is now Iraq. The first Sassanian capital was at Ctesiphon, 21 miles southeast of Baghdad." said Patrick Clawson.

Even after Iraq was Arabized during the Islamic conquests of the 7th century, the Persian presence was still quite recognizable and dominant at times, as many famous Persian Shia clerics are buried in Najaf and Karbala. At the latest, the Safavids lost control of these areas to the Ottoman Empire.

Map gallery

• 
  A 1753 map by Robert de Vaugondy titled ESTATS DU GRAND-SEIGNEUR EN ASIE where the color yellow marks the Greater Persian territories.
• 
  Map depiction circa 500 BC
• 
  19th century British map depicting Persia
• 
  Map depiction of 1719 of Asia
• 
  1598 German map of the region
• 
  Herman Moll's map of 1720. Note the provincial markings.
• 
  1610 Map by Dutch map maker Jodocus Hondius showing Bactria and Georgia among the territories.
• 
  1808 British map of Persia.

Treaties

• 1639 Treaty of Zuhab: Iran formally transfers Baghdad and modern Iraq to the Ottoman Empire.
• 1813 Gulestan Treaty: Iran loses a large amount of its land in the Caucasus.
• 1828 Turkmenchay Treaty: Signed by Fath Ali Shah. Russia gains sovereignty over the Caucasus.
• 1857 Paris Treaty: Signed by Nasereddin Shah. Iran loses Herat and parts of Afghanistan in exchange for the evacuation of Iran's southern ports by Great Britain.
• 1881 Akhal Treaty: Signed by Nasereddin Shah. Iran loses Merv and parts of Khwarazmia in exchange for security guarantees from Russia.
• 1893: Iran transfers to Russia additional regions near the Atrek River that were Iranian under the Akhal Treaty. This treaty was signed by General Boutsoff and Mirza Ali Asghar Amin al-Sultan on May 27, 1893.
• 1907: Persia was to be carved up into three regions, according to the Anglo-Russian Convention of 1907.
• 1970: Iran abandons sovereignty rights over Bahrain to Great Britain in exchange for Greater and Lesser Tunbs and Abu Musa islands in the Persian Gulf.

See also

Median Empire Persian Empire Persianization Persian language List of Persian Kings Iran History of Iran Iranian Plateau Culture of Iran Iranian peoples Iranian Studies Iranian languages Pan-Iranism Afghanistan History of Afghanistan Azerbaijan

Armenia Kurdistan History of the Kurdish people Kurdish culture Kurdish language Turkey History of Turkey Pakistan Georgia Greater Khorasan Persianate cultures Turko-Persian tradition List of Persia-related topics Yaz culture Greater Russia Greater Syria

Further reading

• "Ethnic Identity in Iran" by Richard Nelson Frye, JSAI 26, 2002, see p. 82 [6]
• Columbia College Today on "Iranian Cultural Continent"

External links

In English

• A map of the treaties affecting Greater Iran
• Article on Iranian.com
• Persians in China
• Pirooz in China

In Persian

• Interview: where "Iran e Bozrorg" is discussed (2) (3)