Mazandaran province

Mazandaran province is one of the 31 provinces of Iran. Its capital is the city of Sari. Located along the southern coast of the Caspian Sea and in the adjacent Central Alborz mountain range and Hyrcanian forests, it is bordered clockwise by Russia, Golestan, Semnan, Tehran, Alborz, Qazvin, and Gilan Provinces. Mazandaran covers an area of 24842 km².
The province has diverse natural resources, notably large offshore reservoirs of oil and natural gas. The diverse natural habitats of the province include plains, prairies, forests and rainforest stretching from the sandy beaches of the Caspian Sea to the rugged and snowcapped Alborz sierra, including Mount Damavand, one of the highest peaks and volcanoes in Asia.
Mazandaran is a major producer of farmed fish, and aquaculture provides an important economic addition to traditional dominance of agriculture. Another important contributor to the economy is the tourism industry, as people from all of Iran enjoy visiting the area. Mazandaran is also a fast-growing centre for biotechnology.

Etymology

The name "Mazandaran" is Avestan for "the gate of the giants" or "the valley of the giants," from ماز + ‎اندر + ـان‎,. The name appears in the 10th-century CE Persian epic the Shahnameh to refer to a land inhabited by daevas —supernatural beings in Zoroastrian belief—and sorcerers, and that this land is difficult to conquer.
Toponyms in Mazandaran include several names with the word div, such as Div Asiyab, Div Cheshmeh, Div Kela, and Div Hamam.

History

Human habitation in the area dates back at least 75,000 years. Recent excavations in Gohar Tape in Rostamkola provide proof that the area has been urbanized for more than 5,000 years, and the area is considered one of the most important historical sites of Iran. It has played an important role in cultural and urban development of the region.
Indigenous peoples of the region include the ethnic Mazanderanis, who speak an Iranian language which most closely resembles Gilaki and Sangiseri language, but also has phono-typical similarities to several Caucasian languages, reflecting the history of the region and its peoples.
In the early 20th century, Reza Shah connected northern Elbourz to the southern slopes by constructing seven new roads and railways, the provinces of Mazandaran and Gilan became known as Shomal by all Iranians.
Mazandaran province was made part of the Region 1 upon the division of the provinces into five regions solely for coordination and development purposes on June 22, 2014.
File:Vase with grape harvesting scenes BM 1 897.12-31.189.jpg|thumb|upright=0.8|left|Vase with grape harvesting scenes, British Library, Sasanid Empire, for Ardashir I,

Pre-Islamic history

Before the arrival of the Iranian-speakers to Iran, the native people of this area were subsistence hunters and cattle herders. Archaeological studies in caves belt and Hotu man in Behshahr in the Mazandaran date to ca. 9500 BCE. The Amard were a tribe living along the mountainous region bordering the Caspian Sea, including current day Amol. Tapuri were a tribe in the Medes south of the Caspian Sea mentioned by Ptolemy and Arrian. Ctesias refers to the land of Tapuri between the two lands of Cadusii and Hyrcania.
The territory known as Mazandaran has changed hands among various dynasties from early in its history. There are several fortresses remaining from the Parthian Empire and Sasanian Empire, and many older cemeteries scattered throughout the province. During this era, Mazandaran was part of Hyrcania, which was one of the important provinces.
In 662 CE, ten years after the death of Yazdegerd III, the last Sasanian emperor, a large Muslim army under the command of Hassan ibn Ali invaded Tabarestan.
With the advent of the Sasanian Empire, the King of Mazandaran was Gushnasp, whose ancestors had reigned in the area since the time of Alexander the Great. In 529–536, Mazandaran was ruled by the Sasanian prince Kawus, son of Kawadh. Anushirawan, the Sasanian king, defeated Zarmihr, who claimed his ancestry from the legendary blacksmith Kaveh. This dynasty ruled the area till 645 AD, when Gil Gilanshah joined Mazandaran to Gilan.
In 651 the Sasanid Empire fell, and all of the Sasanid domains gradually came under Arab control, except for the Caspian region of Iran.

Islamic history

maintained an existence independent of the Umayyad Caliphate which supplanted the Sasanian Empire in the early seventh century, with independent Zoroastrian houses like the Bavand and Karen fighting an effective guerilla warfare against the Ummayads. A short-lived Alid Shiite state collapsed before the subsequent take-over by the Ziyarid princes. During the post-Islamic period the local dynasties fell into three classes: local families of pre-Islamic origin; the ʿAlid sayyid; and local families of secondary importance.
The Karinids claimed descent from Karin, brother of Zarmihr who was the pre-Islamic ruler under the Sasanians. Their last representative Mazyar was put to death in 839.
In the 9th-11th century AD, there were repetitively military raids undertaken by the Rus' between 864 and 1041 on the Caspian Sea shores of Iran, Azerbaijan, and Dagestan as part of the Caspian expeditions of the Rus'. Initially, the Rus' appeared in Serkland in the 9th century traveling as merchants along the Volga trade route, selling furs, honey, and slaves. The first small-scale raids took place in the late 9th and early 10th century. The Rus' undertook the first large-scale expedition in 913; having arrived on 500 ships, they pillaged the westernmost parts of Gorgan as well as Mazandaran and Gilan, taking slaves and goods.
The Bavandids, who claimed descent from Kawus, provided three dynasties. The first dynasty was overthrown on the conquest of Tabaristan by the Ziyarid Kabus b. Wushmgir. The second dynasty reigned from 1073 to 1210, when Mazandaran was conquered by 'Ala al-Din Muhammad Khwarzamshah. The third ruled from 1237 to 1349 as vassals of the Mongols. The last representative of the Bavandids was killed by Afrasiyab Chulawi.
The Paduspanids claimed descent from the Dabuyids of the north. They came to prominence around 660 and during the rule of the ʿAlids were their vassals. Later, they were vassals of the Buyids and Bavandids, who deposed them in 1190. The dynasty, restored in 1209–10, survived until the time of Timur; the branch, claiming descent from Kawus the son of Kayumarth reigned until 1567 and the other, that of Iskandar the son of Kayumarth, until 1574.
In the Safavid era Mazandaran was settled by very large numbers of Georgians, Circassians, Armenians, and other Peoples of the Caucasus, whose descendants still live or linger across Mazandaran. Towns, villages and neighbourhoods in Mazandaran still bear the name "Gorji" in them, although most of the large amounts of Georgians, Armenians, and Circassians are already assimilated into the mainstream Mazandaranis. The history of Georgian settlement is described by Iskandar Beg Munshi, the author of the 17th century Tarikh-e Alam-Ara-ye Abbasi, and both the Circassian and Georgian settlements by Pietro Della Valle, among other authors.
Tabaristan remained independent until 1596, when Shah Abbas I, Mazandarani on his mother's side, incorporated Mazandaran into his Safavid empire, forcing many Armenians Circassians, Georgians, to settle in Mazandaran. Pietro della Valle, who visited a town near Firuzkuh in Mazandaran, noted that Mazandarani women never wore the veil and didn't hesitate to talk to foreigners. He also noted the extremely large amount of Circassians and Georgians in the region, and that he had never encountered people with as much civility as the Mazandaranis.

Post-Safavid period

After the Safavid period, the Qajars began to campaign south from Mazandaran with Agha Mohammad Khan who already incorporated Mazandaran into his empire in 1782. On 21 March 1782, Agha Mohammad Shah proclaimed Sari as his imperial capital. Mazandaran was the site of local wars in those years, which led to the transfer of the capital from Sari to Tehran by Fath Ali Shah. In Modern era at Mazandaran make new house and bridge in Amol and Sari. In along the beach and in the forest built Villa and modern settlements.
Before the reign of Nader Shah, the province was briefly occupied by the Russian army in the aftermath of the Russo-Persian War and returned to Persia in 1735. Following the outcomes of the Russo-Persian War and the Russo-Persian War northern Iran, especially Mazandaran and Gilan, as well as, to a certain extent, Tehran, fell under a growing Russian sphere of influence.
In the 19th century, during the reign of Fath-Ali Shah Qajar, the verdant region of Mazandaran was paid due attention as a recreational area.
The top provincial official referred to the existence of three international airports and three major sea ports in the province and the visit of millions of Iranian and foreign tourists to Mazandaran, including health tourists.

Demographics

Language and ethnicity

The population of the province has been steadily growing during the last 50 years. The following table shows the approximate province population, excluding the Golestan province, which has separated as an independent province in 1998.
The population is overwhelmingly Mazandarani, with a minority of Gilaks, Azerbaijanis, Kurds, Georgians, Armenians, Circassians, Turkmen and others.
Mazandarani people have a background in Tabari ethnicity and speak Mazandarani. Their origin goes back to the Tapuri people, from which their land was called Tapuria, the land of Tapuris. The Tapuris were made to migrate to the south coast of the Caspian Sea during the Achaemenid dynasty.
The native people of Sari, Amol, Qaem Shahr, Babol, Nowshahr, Chalus, and Tonekabon are Mazandarani people and speak the Mazandarani language.
The eastern Gīlakī dialect is spoken in the entire valley of the Čālūs river, though Kurdish tribes were established in the yeylāq of Kojūr and Kalārdašt in the Qajar period. Today Kurds in Mazandaran are mostly known as Khajevand Kurds and form majority of the cities of Kelardasht, Abbasabad, Nowshahr, Chalus and Kajur. Other Kurdish tribes in Mazandaran Province are Modanlu, Jahanbeiglou, Abdolmaleki, Jalalvand and Amarlu.
The Mazandarani inhabit the majority of the province. The closely related Gilak form the largest minority and are concentrated in Ramsar, Tonekabon.
In recent years the region has seen an influx of Iranians from other regions of Iran, many of them attracted by its nature and seaside.
Mazanderani or Tabari is a Northwestern Iranian language. Various Mazandarani dialects exist which are spoken in Mazandaran province and the neighboring Golestan province such as Mazanderani, and Gorgani and possibly Qadikolahi and Palani. Today, Mazandaranis also use Persian. The educated can communicate and read Persian well.
The people residing in Chalus speak Mazanderani language. The dialect of Kalarestaqi is spoken in the west of Chalus and the dialect of Kojuri in the east.
The people residing in Nowshahr speak the Kojuri-dialect of Mazanderani language.
The closely related Gilaks form the largest minority in Mazandaran. They speak the Gilaki language and are concentrated in Ramsar, and Tonekabon. The native people in Ramsar are Gilaks although there are also Mazandarani people living there. They speak the Gilaki language although the style they speak has been influenced by the Mazandarani language, making it slightly different from the Gilaki spoken in Gilan..
A dialect of Azeri is spoken in the town of Galoogah.