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CAIS ARCHAEOLOGICAL & CULTURAL NEWS^©

05 September 2005

A collection of historical maps of the Persian Gulf has been published in a book by Sahab Geographic Institute in Tehran.

The book, which is named after the Persian Gulf, contains 123 historical maps of the region, as reported by Pejman Akbarzadeh, a member of “artists without border” and an activist with the movement to preserve the identity of “the Persian Gulf”. These maps have been selected from the archive of the institute which contains over 2300 maps, gathered from renowned topographic institutes and universities worldwide.

An interesting bilingual preface written by Mohammad Reza Sahab which gives a brief account on the history of the Persian Gulf and Iranian struggles to protect it against malicious plots to alter its name with forged ones, as well as the captions of the maps which are printed both in English and Persian, will help foreign readers to enjoy the book.

Dating back to 2000 to 3000 BC and now being kept in the British museum, the piece of pottery, the picture of which has appeared on the first page of the book is the first map of the Persian Gulf region and is believed to be sketched by Babylonians. The rest of the maps in the book which are arranged by chronological order cover a span of time between 1500 BC and 1795 AD.

In his preface to the book, Mohammad Reza Sahab, head of Sahab Geographic Institute, writes that despite all the struggles by Iranians and Iranian government in the past 47 years, Arab states persistently try to alter the name of the Persian Gulf by using their money and their political ties. He also commiserates that Iranians’ struggles are usually temporal and of internal impact rather than being globally influential.

“The Persian Gulf in Ancient Maps” which is the complete name of the book, is printed in 5000 copies.

"History is the Light on the Path to Future"

Encyclopaedia Iranica

The British Institute of Persian Studies

"Persepolis Reconstructed"

Persepolis3D

The British Museum

The Royal

Asiatic Society