 Flag of the Mazanderani people | |
 Mazandarani man and woman with Mazani clothing inNowruz | |
| Total population | |
|---|---|
| 4.8 million[1] (2023) | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
| Province ofMazandaran and parts of the provinces ofAlborz,Golestan,Tehran andSemnan inIran | |
| Languages | |
| Mazandarani | |
| Religion | |
| Majority: Shia Islam Minority: Sunni Islam,Baháʼí Faith | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
| Gilaks, otherIranian peoples |
Mazanderanis (Mazanderani:مازرونی مردمون), also known as theTabari people orTabarestani people (Mazanderani:توری مردمون orتبری مردمون), are anIranian people[2][3] who are indigenous to the Caspian Sea region ofIran. They are also referred to asMazanis for short. They inhabit the southern coast of theCaspian Sea and are part of the historical region known asTabaristan. TheAlborz Mountains mark the southern boundary of the area settled by the Mazanderani people.[4][5]
The population of Mazanderanis was 4,480,000 in 2019.[6] As per a 2006 estimate, Mazandaranis numbered between 3[7] and 4 million.[8]
Mazanderani people are also known as the Tabari people, and traditionally call the Mazanderani language as Tabari. Their region was called Tapuria or Tapurestan, Land of Tapuris.[9]
Most Mazanderanis live on the southeastern coast ofCaspian Sea. Their traditional professions are farming and fishing.[7] Mazandaranis are closely related to the neighboringGilaki people as well asSouth Caucasian peoples (e.g.Georgians,Armenians).[10][11]
The origin of the Mazanderanis goes back toTapuri people andAmardi people. TheMazandaran region has experienced a long reign of independent and semi-independent rulers in the centuries after the Arab invasion[12] lasting until 1596, whenShah Abbas I incorporated Mazandaran into theSafavid Empire.
TheMazanderani language is a Northwestern Iranian language spoken by the Mazanderani people; however, most Mazandaranis are also fluent inPersian.[4][13] TheGilaki and Mazanderani languages (but not other Iranian languages)[10] share certain typological features withCaucasian languages.[10]
[13] Mazanderani is closely related to Gilaki and the two languages have similar vocabularies.[4] They preserve more of the noun declension system characteristic of older Iranian languages than Persian does.[4] With the growth of education and the media, the distinction between Mazanderani and other Iranian languages is likely to disappear.[4]
Assistant professor Maryam Borjian ofRutgers University states that Mazanderani has different sub-dialects and there is high mutual intelligibility among Mazanderani sub-dialects.[13]
The dialects of Mazanderani are Saravi, Amoli, Baboli, Ghaemshahri, Chalusi, Nuri, Shahsavari, Ghasrani, Shahmirzadi, Damavandi, Firoozkoohi, Astarabadi, and Katouli. The native people ofSari,Qaem Shahr,Babol,Amol,Nowshahr,Chalus, andTonekabon are Mazanderani people and speak the Mazanderani language.[14][15]
The Mazanderanis and the closely related Gilaks occupy the southCaspian region of Iran and speak languages belonging to the North-Western branch ofIranian languages. It has been suggested that their ancestors came from theCaucasus region, perhaps displacing an earlier group in the South Caspian.[10] Linguistic evidence supports this scenario, in that the Gilaki and Mazanderani languages (but not other Iranian languages)[10] share certain typological features with Caucasian languages.[10]
Based on mtDNA HV1 sequences, the Gilaki and Mazanderani most closely resemble their geographic and linguistic neighbors, namely other Iranian groups. However, their Y chromosome types most closely resemble those found in groups from theSouth Caucasus.[10] Researchers have interpreted these differences as demonstrating that peoples from the Caucasus settled in the south Caspian area and mated with peoples from local Iranian groups, possibly because ofpatrilocality.[10] The Mazanderani and Gilaki groups are closely related on the male side with populations from the SouthCaucasus such asGeorgians,Armenians, andAzerbaijanis.[10]
Analysis of theirNRY patrilines has revealedhaplogroup J2, associated with theNeolithic diffusion of agriculturalists from theNear East, to be the predominantY-DNA lineage among the Mazanderani (subclades J2a3h-M530, J2a3b-M67 and J2a-M410, more specifically.).[16] The next most frequently occurring lineage,R1a1a, believed to have been associated with earlyIranian expansion intoCentral/SouthernEurasia and currently ubiquitous in that area, is found in almost 25%,. This haplogroup, with the aforementioned J2, accounts for over 50% of the entire sample.[16][17]Haplogroup G2a3b, attaining significant frequency together withG2a andG1, is the most commonly carried marker in the G group among Mazanderani men. The lineagesE1b1b1a1a-M34 andC5-M356 comprise the remainder, of less than 10% sampled.[16]
In theSafavid,Afsharid, andQajar eras Mazandaran was settled by large numbers ofGeorgians,Armenians, and otherpeoples of the Caucasus, whose descendants still live across Mazandaran.[18][19][20] The names of many towns, villages and neighbourhoods in Mazandaran reflect this legacy by bearing variations of the name "Gorji" (i.e., Georgian), although most of the Georgians are assimilated into the mainstream Mazanderanis. The history of Georgian settlement is described byIskandar Beg Munshi, the author of the 17th centuryHistory of Alam Aray Abbasi. In addition, European travelers such asChardin andDella Valle have written about their encounters with the Georgian, Circassian and Armenian Mazanderanis.[20]
