Shushtar

SHUSHTAR, a town in the province of Khuzistan, Persia, about 32° N. and 49° E., in the angle formed by the bifurcation of the Karun River into the Ab i Gargar and Ab i Shatait, some 40 m. below the point where the Karun debouches into the plains from the Bakhtiari mountains. The town covers a larger area than its estimated population of 20,000 warrants, being in large part in a ruinous and deserted condition; it has indeed been described as one of the most tumble-down places in all Persia. Many of the houses, of stone and brick, have cellars, called shewadan, in which the inhabitants shelter in the excessive heat of summer, which on occasion reaches 128° F. The sanitary conditions are very bad. The bazaar is a poor one and the few permanent shops are to be found in the street leading through the centre of the town to the Pul i Bulaiti (bridge). Even the mosques are devoid of special architectural features except perhaps the oldest one built under the Abbasids. On the other hand, the citadel, or Qal'ah Salasib, is a most imposing though ruinous mass, crowning the cliff, covering an area 35o by iso yd., and described by Sykes as "the finest fort he had ever seen in Persia." The town has three exits : (a) west ward over the bridge to Dizful, now interrupted owing to the bridge being broken down in the middle, its place being taken by a ferry; (b) southward by the Pul i Lashkar road to the Miy anab (the name of the fertile tract between the Gargar and Shatait branches) ; and (c) over the great dam to the suburb of Bulaiti. Water Works.—Shushtar is most famed for the great works constructed in ancient times for the disposal of the voluminous water of the Karun river. These comprise (a) the Ab i Gargar Canal (the Masruqan of the middle ages). (b) The great barrage called the Band i Qaisar which is thrown across the Ab i Shatait (the principal arm of the river) west of the town. It is about yd. long and supports a bridge, the Pul i Dizful (previously re ferred to). (c) The canal called Minau, which takes off above the barrage by a tunnel cut out of the rock on the western side of the town below the citadel, the purpose of which was to irrigate the Miyanab. Tradition says that the Minau Canal was built by Dara the Great and that it was Ardashir I. (the Sasanid) who began to construct the barrage after the canal mouth had dried up. The barrage was only completed under Shapur II. by the Roman prisoners with Valerian II. The Ab i Gargar was first dug simply to divert the volume of the water of the main river; the Band i Qaisar was then constructed, the bed of the river above the barrage was paved with huge stone slabs bound with iron, to pre vent further erosion. This paving was called Sliadurwan, a term

also applied to the barrage itself. Ultimately, a new barrage is said to have been built across the Gargar.

Population and Industries.

The population is a mixture of Arab and Iranian or proto-Iranian elements, known locally as Shushtaris, speaking a patois of their own and all Shia Moham medans. A few Bakhtiaris are the only other element. Travellers speak of the disagreeable and fanatical character of the inhabi tants; but among the Persians their devoutness has earned for the town the honorific title of Dar al Muminin. Its position gives the town a considerable commercial as well as strategic impor tance. It stands on a trunk road from Mohammerah via Ahwaz, Dizful, Khurramabad and Qum to Tehran, in large part fit for motor traffic. The industries are carpet weaving called gilim, the making of woollen cloths for abas, coarse cotton canvas and tur bans, glazed earthenware, pack and riding saddles ; copper, brass and silver-work ; tanning and dyeing. A project was under con sideration in 1928 for hydro-electric development by utilizing the water of the Karun near Shushtar.

History.

In the Umayyad period Shushtar became a strong hold of the Kharijites, one of the earliest religious sects of Islam. Under the Caliphs it was the capital of one of the seven provinces into which Khuzistan was then divided. When Baghdad became the centre of the empire, Shushtar, by its proximity was advan tageously affected. The town was conquered by Timur and re mained in the hands of the Timurids until 1514, when it fell to a Shia dynasty of Sayyids under the suzerainty of the Safavids and became a centre of Shia propaganda. In the beginning of the 19th century it was governed by a son of Fath Ali Shah who restored the barrage and the bridge; and at this time it was said to have a population of 45,000.

Ritter, Erdkunde (1840) , IX. ; J. DieulaloY, La Perse, la Chaldee, et la Susiane (1887) ; G. N. Curzon, Persia and the Persian Question (1892) ; P. M. Sykes, Ten thousand miles in Persia (1902) ; G. Le Strange, The lands of the Eastern Caliphate (1905) ; E. Herzfeld, Eine reise durch Luristan, Arabistan, etc., Pet. Mitt. (1907), LIII.; P. Schwarz, Iran im Mittelalter, Quellen and Forschungen zur Erd- and Kulturkunde (1924) , Band IX.