Shushtar Persian:شوشتر | |
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City | |
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  Shushtar | |
| Coordinates:32°02′42″N48°51′34″E / 32.04500°N 48.85944°E /32.04500; 48.85944[1] | |
| Country | Iran |
| Province | Khuzestan |
| County | Shushtar |
| District | Central |
| Population (2016)[2] | |
• Total | 101,878 |
| Time zone | UTC+3:30 (IRST) |
Shushtar (Persian:شوشتر)[a] is a city in theCentral District ofShushtar County,Khuzestan province,Iran, serving as capital of both the county and the district.[4]
Shushtar is an ancientfortresscity, approximately 92 kilometres (57 mi) fromAhvaz, the centre of the province. Much of its past agricultural productivity derives from theirrigation system which centered on theBand-e Kaisar, the first dam bridge in Iran.[5] The whole water system in Shushtar consists of 13 sites calledShushtar Historical Hydraulic System which is registered as aUnesco World Heritage Site.
In theElamite times Shushtar was known asAdamdun.[citation needed] In theAchaemenian times its name wasŠurkutir.[citation needed] According to tradition, Shushtar was founded by the legendary kingHushang after he builtSusa (aka Shush), and the name "Shushtar" was a comparative form meaning "more beautiful than Shush".[6]Josef Marquart also interpreted the name Shushtar as being derived from Shush, but with a slightly different meaning, with the suffix "-tar" indicating a direction.[6] The Arabic name of the city,Tustar, is an adaptation of the Persian form Shushtar.[6]
Shushtar may be the "Sostra" mentioned byPliny the Elder.[6] It is also known in Syriac literature as aNestorian bishopric.[6]
During theSassanian era, it was an island city on theKarun river and selected to become thesummer capital. The river was channeled to form a moat around the city, while bridges and main gates into Shushtar were built to the east, west, and south. Several rivers nearby are conducive to the extension of agriculture; the cultivation of sugar cane, the main crop, dates back to 226. A system of subterranean channels calledGhanats, which connected the river to the private reservoirs of houses and buildings, supplied water for domestic use and irrigation, as well as to store and supply water during times of war when the main gates were closed. Traces of theseghanats can still be found in the crypts of some houses.
Under the caliphate, Shushtar was the capital of one of the sevenkuwar (sub-provinces) that made up Khuzestan.[6] Itskurah likely encompassed the eastern edge of the northern Khuzestan plain.[7]: 178 Today, this area is inhabited by semi-nomadic people, and only lightly - which possibly explains whyal-Maqdisi wrote that he "[knew] no towns" that were dependencies of Shushtar.[7]: 178
Historically, Shushtar was always one of the most important textile-producing cities in Khuzestan.[7]: 185 Authors throughout the Middle Ages consistently listed a diverse array of textile products manufactured at Shushtar.[7]: 185 For example,al-Istakhri (writingc. 933) listeddibaj (brocade) andtiraz; al-Maqdisi (writingc. 1000) listeddibaj,anmat (carpets), cotton, andMerv-style clothes; andHafiz-i Abru (writingc. 1430) recordeddibaj,tiraz, andharir (silk).[7]: 183 Shushtar's commercial importance was recognized by its being chosen to produce theKiswah (the embroidered covering for theKaaba) in 933 — a major honor with political importance.[7]: 185–6
According to al-Maqdisi's account, there was a cemetery right in the middle of Shushtar.[7]: 338–9 Nanette Marie Pyne says that this is "not as unusual a phenomenon as it sounds: cemeteries in this part of Iran are often placed on the highest ground, in some places to avoid the raisedwater table, in others to avoid taking cultivable land out of production."[7]: 339 In the case of Shushtar, the highest ground would have been in the middle of the city, on top of the settlement mound formed by Parthian and Sasanian occupation.[7]: 339 Al-Maqdisi also describes that Shushtar's mosque was located "in the middle of the markets in the cloth merchants' area."[7]: 339 A second cloth market was located by the city gate.[7]: 339 The clothfullers' area was located by the bridge, which was nearby.[7]: 339
Al-Maqdisi described Shushtar as being surrounded by orchards includingdate palms, grapes, andcitrons.[7]: 337–8 An alternate manuscript also lists "fine pomegranates" and "superior pears".[7]: 339
Ibn Battuta visited, noting "On both banks of the river, there are orchards and water-wheels, the river itself is deep and over it, leading to the travelers' gate, there is a bridge upon boats."[8]
The ancient fortress walls were destroyed at the end of theSafavid era.
In 1831, acholera epidemic ravaged Shushtar, killing about half of the city's inhabitants. TheMandaean community was hit particularly hard during the Plague of Shushtar, as all of their priests had died in the plague.Yahya Bihram, the surviving son of a deceased priest, went on to revive the Mandaean priesthood in Shushtar.[9]
Shushtar benefited from the Karun steamship service established in 1887.[6] It was the farthest point upstream that the boats went, and goods had to be unloaded here and sent overland by caravan.[6] It developed into the main commercial center in southwestern Iran, and by 1938 it had 28,000 residents.[6] During the early 20th century, the city suffered from unrest between itsHaydari and Ne'mati factions.[6] The typical Haydari-Ne'mati rivalry also took on a political dimension in Shushtar, since the Haydaris were pro-Arab and pro-monarchy while the Ne'matis were pro-Bakhtiyari and pro-constitutionalist.[6]
With the completion of theTrans-Persian Railway, Shushtar began to decline.[6] The railway bypassed Shushtar in favor of Ahvaz, which took over Shushtar's commercial importance, and Shushtar's population decreased.[6]
TheBand-e Kaisar ("Caesar's dam") is believed by some to be aRoman built arch bridge [since Roman captured soldiers were used in its construction], and the first in the country to combine it with adam.[5] When the Sassanian ShahShapur I defeated theRoman emperorValerian, he is said to have ordered the captive Roman soldiers to build a large bridge and dam stretching over 500 metres.[10] Lying deep inPersian territory, the structure which exhibits typical Roman building techniques became the most easternRoman bridge andRoman dam.[11] Its dual-purpose design exerted a profound influence on Iranian civil engineering and was instrumental in developing Sassanid water management techniques.[12] While the traditional account is disputable, it's not implausible that Roman prisoners of war were involved in its construction.[6]
The approximately 500 m longoverflow dam over the Karun, Iran's most effluent river, was the core structure of theShushtar Historical Hydraulic System, a large irrigation complex from which Shushtar derived its agricultural productivity,[13] and which has been designatedWorld Heritage Site by theUNESCO in 2009.[14] The arched superstructure carried across the important road betweenPasargadae and the Sassanid capitalCtesiphon.[15] Many times repaired in theIslamic period,[16] the dam bridge fell out of use in the late 19th century, leading to the degeneration of the complex system of irrigation.[17]
Ancient works of Shushtar, which were registered at the annual meeting of theUNESCO World Heritage Committee on 26 June 2009, under the title of Shushtar Historical Water System, as the tenth work of Iran in the UNESCO World Heritage List with number 1315.[18]
Historically, the Subbi Kush neighborhood of Shushtar was home to aMandaean community for centuries, although Mandaeans no longer lived there by the 21st century due to emigration.[9] One of Shushtar's best-knownMandaean priests wasRam Zihrun.[19]: 140
At the time of the 2006 National Census, the city's population was 94,124 in 21,511 households.[20] The following census in 2011 counted 106,815 people in 26,639 households.[21] The 2016 census measured the population of the city as 101,878 people in 28,373 households.[2]
The devoutness of Shushtar's people has led to it being nicknamed "Dar al-Mu'minin".[6]
Local tradition attributes certain customs to ancient Roman colonists, as well as the construction of the Band-e Kaisar and the introduction of brocade manufacturing technique.[6]
Shushtar has ahot semi-arid climate (Köppen climate classificationBSh) with extremely hot summers and mild winters. Frost does occasionally occur at night during winter, but winters in Shushtar have no snow. Rainfall is higher than most of southern Iran, but is almost exclusively confined to the period from November to April.
| Climate data for Shushtar (1994-2005 normals and records) | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Month | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | Year |
| Record high °C (°F) | 24.8 (76.6) | 30.8 (87.4) | 35.0 (95.0) | 41.6 (106.9) | 48.0 (118.4) | 51.6 (124.9) | 51.8 (125.2) | 51.6 (124.9) | 48.8 (119.8) | 42.8 (109.0) | 34.8 (94.6) | 29.6 (85.3) | 51.8 (125.2) |
| Mean daily maximum °C (°F) | 17.7 (63.9) | 20.4 (68.7) | 25.0 (77.0) | 32.2 (90.0) | 39.7 (103.5) | 44.6 (112.3) | 46.3 (115.3) | 46.0 (114.8) | 41.8 (107.2) | 35.6 (96.1) | 26.2 (79.2) | 19.8 (67.6) | 32.9 (91.3) |
| Daily mean °C (°F) | 13.6 (56.5) | 15.4 (59.7) | 19.4 (66.9) | 25.9 (78.6) | 32.4 (90.3) | 36.5 (97.7) | 38.6 (101.5) | 38.2 (100.8) | 34.1 (93.4) | 29.0 (84.2) | 20.7 (69.3) | 15.5 (59.9) | 26.6 (79.9) |
| Record low °C (°F) | 1.2 (34.2) | −0.2 (31.6) | 3.6 (38.5) | 7.8 (46.0) | 17.2 (63.0) | 21.4 (70.5) | 20.2 (68.4) | 24.0 (75.2) | 19.8 (67.6) | 11.8 (53.2) | 3.4 (38.1) | 1.8 (35.2) | −0.2 (31.6) |
| Averageprecipitation mm (inches) | 92.5 (3.64) | 32.3 (1.27) | 58.6 (2.31) | 16.6 (0.65) | 2.5 (0.10) | 0.1 (0.00) | 0.0 (0.0) | 0.0 (0.0) | 0.0 (0.0) | 2.0 (0.08) | 46.3 (1.82) | 70.5 (2.78) | 321.4 (12.65) |
| Averagerelative humidity (%) | 71 | 58 | 48 | 35 | 22 | 17 | 19 | 21 | 21 | 27 | 45 | 67 | 38 |
| Mean monthlysunshine hours | 175.5 | 203.8 | 225.0 | 240.8 | 308.5 | 348.0 | 339.5 | 341.5 | 312.1 | 269.8 | 206.2 | 169.0 | 3,139.7 |
| Source: IRIMO,[22][23] (records[24]), (humidity[25]), (precipitation[26]), (sun[27]) | |||||||||||||
Media related toShushtar at Wikimedia Commons
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