CAIS
The Circle of Ancient Iranian Studies
[ Home ]
[ About CAIS ]
[ Articles ]
[ Daily News ]
[ News Archive ]
[ Announcements ]
[ CAIS Seminars ]
[ Image Library ]
[ Copyright ]
[ Disclaimer ]
[ Submission ]
[ Search ]
[ Contact Us ]
[ Links ]
|
CAIS ARCHAEOLOGICAL & CULTURAL NEWS OF IRANIAN WORLD© |
|
Psychotic Claims About Origins of Persepolis Rejected
|
|
11 July 2006 |
LONDON,
(CAIS - Shapour Suren-Pahlav) -- In recent insulting claims by an Islamic
fundamentalist about Persepolis and ancient Iranians, have raised voices of
concern and anger both inside and outside Iran.
Abbas Salimi Namin,
the head of Tehran based Office for Research Studies for
Compiling Contemporary Iranian History, and a close ally of Ayatollah Ali
Khamenei, the leader of Islamic republic claimed that the ceremonial capital of
the Achaemenid Empire, Persepolis, was
built by non-Iranian peoples, and bizarrely call the monument as the Elamite and Russian
heritage remains.
An expert, Abdol-Majid Arfei said that based on the inscriptions attributed to the Achaemenid king of kings, Darius the Great, Iranian artisans and craftsmen from all the satrapies (provinces) of the Empire were engaged in the construction of the historical monuments in Persepolis.
“The discovered accounts and insriptions such as
transportation rates, financial accounts, paid expenses, workers’ wages, name
of the employees in the Persepolis complex, transfer expenses, child allowance
paid to mothers who gave birth, and many other similar cases, most of which
related to the territory of the Achaemenid Empire, point out to the
construction of the monument by the Achaemenid emperors” added Arfaei.
Meanwhile, an expert on history, Dr. Parviz Rajabi rejected another Salimi
Namin’s pathetic assertion attributing Persepolis to Russian civilization,
despite the fact that there was no Russian culture in existence when the second Iranian
dynasty, the Achaemenids founded by Cyrus the Great in 6th c. BCE.
“Not only has Darius the Great left behind his inscriptions, but, also other Achaemenid Emperors who were involved in the construction of Persepolis have bequeathed their inscriptions separately.
“The inscriptions are written in three languages: Aryan, also known as
Old-Persian, Elamite and Babylonian. On the other hand, Persepolis was not left
incomplete. Instead, there was a magnificent palace there during the Achaemenid
dynastic rule and this structure has undergone repairs several times,“ Rajabi
said.
An archeologist in the Fars province, Alireza Asgari said that Apadana is one of the first palaces in which Norouz (Iranian new year) festivities were held at the beginning of each spring. The magnificent palace was built on the order of Darius the Great. The Emperors of the Achaemenid dynasty used to observe justice in running state affairs, Asgari said.
Regarding Namin’s baseless claim on the subject that Jews attacked Persia during the
reign of Xerxes, Achaemenid Emperor who reigned between 485 and 465 BCE,
massacred 77,000 people, Asghari believes that this claim has no ground.
The archeologist said that Cyrus the Great, was the savior of Jews and they were not massacred during Achaemenid dynastic era. “During the reign of Xerxes, no war occurred between the Iranians and their Jewish subjects. On the other hand, Queen Esther, the wife of Xerxes, was herself Jewish,“ he concluded.
Referring
to another claim by Namin defending Arab invaders of Iran in 7th century,
claiming that it was Non-Muslim Arabs who attacked Iran and not Arabs.
Asgari responded to his claim, saying that there is enough evidence
about the Arab attack, and protested by saying, “we
do not have the right to distort history and deny some facts due to
religious prejudices”.
Abbas Salimi Namin, has a BS in computer science from Britain and was the former editor of the hard line "Keyhan Hawa’i" (or Keyhan by Air, a weekly review of the daily Keyhan in English), a close ally of Ayatollah Ali Khameneh'i, the leader of the Islamic Republic, which his five years research as he claims himself, does not make him an authority in the field of history. He has not only offended the feelings of the Iranian nation, but has also has created a disturbance in the public opinion by trying to distort thousands of years of history and civilization, which is the foundation of identity and the source of pride of 70 million Iranians.
He also recently in a barefaced letter to the secretary general of UNESCO, foolishly claimed that the Achaemenid clay tablets in Chicago University were belonging to the "late Elamite period [1]".
According to Dr. Mir Abedin Kaboli, archeologist of the Cultural Heritage and Tourism Organization of Iran, the existing reasons that Persepolis was constructed by Iranians during the Achaemenid dynasty are strong enough to reject all such baseless claims; yet “the people who claim something else must present their evidence.” It is undoubtedly correct to argue that expressing such groundless claims is contrary to a person’s duty to protect his or her ancient history which must be safely transferred to future generations.
Abbas Salimi Namin, is one of the many examples of unlearned people currently in charge of the country, which not only they put Iran's national interests at risk, but also they are the biggest threat to Iranian national heritage and cultural identity. These kind of thoughtless comments or perhaps well-planned and organized hatful remarks, assist enemies of Iran to falsify Iranian history, such the recent feeble-claims as the father of the Iranian nation, Cyrus the Great was an Elamite, the Kurds were one the lost tribes of Israel, Parthians and Scythians were Turkish tribes, and Prophet Zoroaster was an Uzbek.
|
|
|
"History is the Light on the Path to Future" |
|
Encyclopaedia Iranica
The British Institute of Persian Studies "Persepolis Reconstructed"
The British Museum
The Royal Asiatic Society
|
