Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran since 1980, is a
country in
Western Asia. Comprising
a land area of 1,648,195 km2 (636,372 sq mi), it is the second-largest
nation in the
Middle East
and the 18th-largest in the world; with over 75 million inhabitants, Iran is the
world's 17th-most-populous nation. Its neighbors are Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan
and Armenia on the north, with Kazakhstan and
Russia
across the
Caspian Sea,
Afghanistan and Pakistan on the east, Turkey and Iraq on the west, and on the south
it is bordered by the Persian Gulf and the
Gulf of Oman.
Tehran is the capital, the country's largest city and the political, cultural, commercial
and industrial center of the nation. Iran holds an important position in international
energy security and world economy as a result of its large reserves of petroleum
and natural gas.
History
Recent archaeological
studies indicate that as early as 10,000 BC, people lived on the southern shores
of the Caspian, one of the few regions of the world which according to scientists
escaped the Ice Age. They were probably the first men in the history of mankind
to engage in agriculture and animal husbandry.
Iran is home to one of the world's oldest
civilizations
beginning with the formation of the Elamite kingdom in 2800 BCE. The Iranian
Medes
unified the country into the first of many empires in 625 BCE, after which
it became the dominant cultural and political power in the region. Iran reached
the pinnacle of its power during the Achaemenid
Empire founded by
Cyrus the Great in 550 BCE which was the
largest empire the world had yet seen.
Language and
literature
Official language (of Iran) is Persian. Persian serves as a lingua franca in Iran
and most publications and broadcastings are in this language.
Next to Persian, there are many publications and broadcastings in other relatively
popular languages of Iran such as Azeri, Kurdish and even in less popular ones such
as Arabic and Armenian. Many languages originated in Iran, but Persian is the most
used language. Persian belongs to Iranian branch of the Indo-European family of
languages. The oldest records in Old Persian date to the Achaemenid Empire, and
examples of Old Persian has been found in present-day Iran, Iraq, Turkey and Egypt.
Persian is spoken today primarily in Iran, Afghanistan and Tajikistan, but was historically
a more widely understood language in an area ranging from the Middle East to India,
significant populations of speakers in other Persian Gulf countries, as well as
large communities around the World.
Persian,
until recent centuries, was culturally and historically one of the most prominent
languages of the Middle East and regions beyond. Persian scholars were prominent
in both Turkish and Indian courts during the fifteenth to eighteenth centuries in
composing dictionaries and grammatical works. The name of the modern Persian language
is sometimes mentioned as Farsi in English texts.
Persian literature
Human beings are members of a whole,
In creation of one essence and
soul.
If one member is afflicted with
pain,
Other members uneasy will remain.
If you have no sympathy for human
pain,
The name of human you cannot retain.
–
A poem by the Persian poet Sa’adi (1210 – 1290)
gracing the entrance of the Hall of Nations of the
United Nations building in New York City
Persian literature is one of the world's oldest literatures. It spans two-and-a-half
millennia, though much of the pre-Islamic material has been lost. While
initially
overshadowed by Arabic during the
Umayyad and
early Abbasid caliphates, New Persian soon became a literary language
again of the
Central Asian lands. The rebirth of the language in its new form is often accredited
to Ferdowsi, and their generation, as they used pre-Islamic nationalism as a
conduit to revive the language and customs of ancient Persia. With Ferdowsi's immortal
poem, the Shahnameh epic poetry rose to the height of its achievement almost at
its beginning. Hailed as the greatest monument of Persian language and one of the
major world epics, it consists of some fifty thousand couplets relating the history
of the Iranian nation.
Religion
The
official
state religion is Islam.
Constitution
The Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran advances the cultural, social,
political, and economic institutions of Iranian society based on Islamic principles
and norms.
The supreme leader great Ayatollah sayyid Ali Khamenei is the highest official State
authority.
Next to the Leader, the President shall be the highest official State authority
who is responsible for the implementation of the Constitution and, as the Chief
Executive, for the exercise of the executive powers, with the exception of those
matters that directly relate to the Leader. The President shall be elected by the
direct vote of the people for a four-year term of office. His consecutive re-election
shall be allowed only for one term.
Iranian Calendar
Iranian official calendar, regulate according to Solar
year & Iranian months.21 March, equal 1th Farvardin, is beginning of Iranian
New Year (NOWRUZ)
Culture
Iranian culture has long been a predominant culture of the Middle East and Central
Asia, with Persian considered the language of intellectuals during much of the 2nd
millennium, and the language of religion and the populace before that. The Sassanid
influence carried forward to the Islamic world. Much of what later became known
as Islamic learning, such as philology, literature, jurisprudence, philosophy, medicine,
architecture and the sciences were based on some of the practices taken from the
Sassanid Persians to the broader Muslim world.
International Registered
Monuments
Persepolis, Founded by Darius I in 518
B.C., Persepolis was the capital of the Achaemenid Empire.
Tchogha Zanbil,
Takht-e Soleyman,
Bam and its Cultural Landscape, Pasargadae,
Soltaniyeh, Bisotun,
Meidan Emam, Armenian Monastic Ensembles of Iran.
